volcanohunter

The rights belong to his second wife and widow, Lise Lander, who assists Johnny Eliasen in staging the ballet.

https://www.opera.hu/en/company/szemely/lise-lander/458/

https://www.sfballet.org/johnny-eliasen-repetiteur-and-lise-lander-artistic-advisor-on-etudes/ 

The Bolshoi's Etudes were notoriously broadcast to the world in woefully underprepared condition. I saw some live performances in later years. Eventually, the corps began to dance in synchonization, but joylessly and mechanically. That is, until the grand allegro, when it was every man for himself. Generally, though, the tempos were slow, the batterie was fuzzy and the pirouettes could be wobbly. Every female lead was vexed by the solo variation, falling off pointe during the hops was the norm. The solo men's attempts to up the difficulty level ended with muffed finishes. In one case I left the hall the moment the curtain went down, saw Makhar Vaziev ahead of me in the corridor, and it was all I could do not to run after him, kick him in the shins and demand to know how he could permit such a shambolic display on the Bolshoi stage.

The rights to Etudes have already expired, and Class Concert isn't performed now, but it had been revived under Ratmansky in 2007 (and got only 13 performances).

Frankly, they should have stuck to Messerer. The Bolshoi's Etudes were mostly dreadful, even after about 50 attempts, whereas even now they could do Class Concert in a way that Danish or French dancers could not. It's just not Vaziev's preferred aesthetic.

Looking at the history of Romeo and Juliet at the Bolshoi, there is a sense over the past 40 years that the company wanted its own version of the ballet, distinct from the Mariinsky's, just as every other major production in its repertoire--save Legend of Love and Carmen Suite--differs from the one at the Mariinsky. Russian companies don't regard the choreography of Swan Lake as sacrosanct, much less the choreography for Romeo and Juliet. So for the Bolshoi the Lavrovsky may look like a fallback position rather than a revered classic.

1946-1980 Lavrovsky
1979-1995 Grigorovich
1995-2000 Lavrovsky (i.e., immediately after Grigorovich's ouster)
2003-2005 Poklitaru
2010-2018 Grigorovich
2017-2022 Ratmansky

P.S. Naturally I'm aware that you're aware. 

I can't say because the link is broken.

I suppose from the writer's point of view, a revival of the Lavrovsky production looks like a retreat. The ballet is in no danger of being lost because it has a home at the Mariinsky. (Personally, I find it very static and dislike the re-arrangement of the score, though Grigorovich did more violence to it in his version.) The Bolshoi could also perform The Sleeping Beauty more often than it does. But there will be less variety going forward.

The difference between the Bolshoi now and when Grigorovich was director is that it has a second stage to fill, although if repertoire is lacking, the company may simply cut back on the number of performances it gives. And if previously the Bolshoi needed a constant influx of new repertoire to beam into cinemas, that's a moot point for now.

The oboe variation for Odile was used by Burmeister in 1953, Nureyev in 1964, Bruhn in 1967 and Grigorovich in 1969. Perhaps other choreographers have used it as well.

Ashton used it for the second female variation in the pas de quatre he inserted into the ballroom scene, where it had no sinister implications, though it involved more hip-wiggling than is typical from a dancer wearing a classical tutu. 

Burmeister re-choreographed the pas de deux entirely. Nureyev kept the familiar Siegfried variation. Bruhn initially re-choreographed the entire pas de deux, but later restored the traditional variation for Siegfried and the coda. Grigorovich kept the familiar adage and coda.

In Paris Nureyev staged the traditional "Black Swan" pas de deux, although he inserted a brief variation for Rothbart to the waltz that Tchaikovsky composed to proceed the "coda" music (when the music was still in Act 1). I don't know whether anyone has considered using that music for Odile. We know that Petipa didn't. It is on the short side, but at least then the musical integrity of the piece would be maintained.

The Berlin Philharmonic wasn't banned permanently, but Valery Gergiev probably shouldn't count on any invitations. I wouldn't rule out the return of the Bolshoi and Mariinsky in the future, after a respectable interval and certainly under new management, not sullied by the disgraceful erasure of creators' names. I think this would be a greater obstacle for the Mariinsky, because Gergiev is not going to relinquish his musical and theatrical empire readily (six [or 12] venues and counting).

This piece about the repertoire crunch faced by Russian ballet companies appeared last week. I am not certain about the accuracy of the report; I spotted two factual errors, and there may be more.

First, the author states that "no foreign rights holders" revoked the rights to their ballets following 24 February 2022. This is not true. Jean-Christoph Maillot publicly asked the Bolshoi to stop performing The Taming of the Shrew, and Vladimir Urin publicly refused him, fearing that others would follow Maillot's example, and the Bolshoi would be left with very little to perform. As the article points out, it is running out of ballets to perform nevertheless, only at a marginally slower pace. Also, Ratmansky asked the same, was ignored and had his name erased from his ballets instead. Russians may not regard him as "foreign," but he is an American citizen and lives in the United States.

Secondly, as an example of continuing Bolshoi premieres, the author cites Yuri Possokhov's Queen of Spades, scheduled for the end of the season. Possokhov's ballet has not been canceled, but its premiere is no longer scheduled for this season. Presumably the Bolshoi would like to avoid a last-minute cancellation along the lines of Possokhov's Nureyev. That generated a lot of negative publicity about perceived incompetence within the Bolshoi.

As for expiring repertoire, the article states that in March the Bolshoi gave its final performance of Christopher Wheeldon's The Winter's Tale, and that the Stanislavsky gave its last performance of Akram Khan's Kaash. Further it lists the Bolshoi's expiring licenses, including Ratmansky's Flames of Paris (July 2023), the mixed bill Four Characters in Search of a Plot (September 2023), Possokhov's A Hero of Our Time (December 2023, but not performed since December 2020 and the most recent attempt to revive it scuttled), Christian Spuck's Orlando (March 2024), Balanchine's Jewels (May 2024), Ratmansky's production of Giselle (November 2024, but not performed since February 2021). It states that the license for the last remaining Balanchine ballet at the Mariinsky, Jewels, will expire in 2025.

The article also mentions The Pharaoh's Daughter. 

"Choreographer Alexei Ratmansky began the ambitious reconstruction, but did not carry it through to its premiere. As a result, the Mariinsky enticed Toni Candeloro, a Italian specialist in ancient ballets, to come to the rescue; for the first time he was given a chance to work with a large professional company. The premiere took place. The Mariinsky's yearning for a big premiere was so great that no debutant could spoil its will to succeed."

Quote

According to sources close to theaters, today they are forced to extend verbal agreements with foreign creators through personal contacts, remove names from posters, try to avoid sharp corners and fight their own fear of attracting the radicals of contemporary choreography. These may not fit into academic rules. They are more quickly affected by context: for several years now, Russian contemporary dance has been literally demonstrating from the stage how difficult it is to breathe.

The course toward "import substitution" already looks like a difficult path. The Bolshoi Theater, instead of the refined production of Alexei Ratmansky (his Romeo and Juliet was performed from 2017 to 2022), will restore another, very serious Romeo and Juliet by choreographer Leonid Lavrovsky, which impressed Europe in the middle of the last century.

The Mariinsky, which succeeded with The Pharaoh's Daughter, should probably prepare for questions from Alexei Ratmansky, who started the project. Of course, Ratmansky remains a world-renowned choreographer. But if the campaign to hush up authorship continues, one days posters for Swan Lake may read: "Folk libretto and music."

(Presumably a reference to Tchaikovsky's homosexuality.)

https://www.forbes.ru/forbeslife/486752-krizis-zanra-kak-rossijskij-balet-boretsa-s-nehvatkoj-repertuara

7 hours ago, Fosca said:

Both productions, Bolshoi and Munich, cared very much for the music and wanted to reconstruct the original partitura by Adam with the additions by Pugni, Drigo et al.

For me it's a maddening feature of ballet in general that music can be considered more sacrosanct than choreography. (Easier to preserve, yes, but what good does it do ballet when an old score is discovered in a library but the steps are lost?)

7 hours ago, Fosca said:

...of course he was convinced that he as a Russian had the ultimate understanding for the execution of the notated steps.

Ironic, then, that he seems to have no successor in Russia, which hired a scab from the opposite side of the continent. 

My understanding was that the Bolshoi production relied on notations to a limited degree. At the time Ratmansky was not yet using them, and in retrospect he said he would have approached the production differently. The Bolshoi's Le Corsaire premiered in 2007. It's my understanding that Ratmansky's first reconstructions came several years later.

Specialists tell us that the notations can be incomplete: part of a variation may not be notated, perhaps legs are notated but not arms, there may be a floor plan but no specific choreography. I would submit that if the Mariinsky production fills in those blanks the same way that Ratmansky did, that material is stolen.

I have no idea how much of Petipa's Pharaoh’s Daughter was notated and described by eyewitnesses. Ratmansky wrote about staging "close to two hours of reconstructed choreography and mise en scene." If the production still claims to a reconstruction of Petipa's original, to which end Bockamp was hired as a notation reader, the ballet could not possibly have been completely re-choreographed as the Mariinsky claims. Unless Candeloro just made up entirely new choreography, which is unlikely since he has never staged anything remotely on this scale, and in which case it wouldn't be a reconstruction as advertised. 

2 hours ago, Xiaoyi said:

Alexander Sergeev has been first soloist for around 10 years and NOT promoted this time.

I was going to write the same thing. Sergeev has been a first soloist for a looong time. For example, this interview, posted in 2017, describes him as a first soloist of the Mariinsky Theater.

1 hour ago, AB'sMom said:

Odette doesn’t die in this production, but Siegfried drowns at the end.

This became a kind of trend in the 1960s, possibly beginning with Cranko, who said something along the lines of Siegfried is a tragic hero and must be vanquished. Nureyev and Bruhn followed suit.

The Dutch National Ballet performs Rudi van Dantzig's production of Swan Lake.

Just about any production is preferable to Grigorovich’s monstrosity. Except for Kudelka's, which was actually more loathsome. 

6 hours ago, Fernie M said:

I think Sara Mearns plans to come back soon. Her IG story this morning commented on seeing National Ballet of Canada, their amazing performance invigorated her to return to stage as soon as possible. I’m not sure if story still up at this point.

Yes, Mearns posted a photo of the company bows with the caption: "Came back to see this. Had to. After being away from performing since October...this piece [Crystal Pite's Angels' Atlas], these dancers have brought me back. they've given me that deep visceral human experience that is unmatched. Thankyou for inspiring me to get back to stage, no matter what it takes."

Her next story from Sunday morning describes "doing 1.5 hours of plies and tendus bootcamp" via video link with Denmark. "Getting back into shape, at the phase in my career w the body I have now, is maybe the most intense ever."

1 hour ago, glassyeyed said:

I LOVED Crystal Pite's piece, Angels' Atlas.  I found the choreography incredible and emotional with the body of dancers appearing to become a living, breathing organism.  In an odd way, this choreography reminded me a bit of Balanchine's Serenade

As it happens, when the National Ballet of Canada returned to the stage post-Covid lockdowns in November 2021, The program included Serenade and Angels' Atlas.

4 hours ago, abatt said:

I'm a little surprised that Wendy Whelan has not yet engaged Pite for a NYCB commission.  

Pite is very, very busy. Angels' Atlas took years to arrange. 

On 3/21/2023 at 11:54 AM, Mashinka said:

Just tours to China then.

Yup.

On 3/17/2023 at 11:28 AM, California said:

Many companies do Petite Mort (including Colorado Ballet) but this is the only company that does both of the Mozart ballets that I have noticed. I saw PNB do this in the theater about a decade ago and plan to watch it again on their digital streaming. They really work well together and it's a puzzle why more companies don't do both paired. (Cost, perhaps?)

Probably not what you what you had in mind, but I once saw the State Ballet of Georgia perform a Kylián program including Petite Mort and Sechs Tänze (with Falling Angels sandwiched in between).

15 minutes ago, sandik said:

Seth Orza has been working diligently on developing a new soft ballet shoe with internal support (especially in the sole) -- it looks like he's ready for business!

Very cool!

Olga Smirnova will be interviewed via Zoom for the London Ballet Circle on May 4th at 7:00 pm BST. The cost is £5 for non-members.

9 hours ago, California said:

Ugh. Ratmansky is on record (in 2019) that it's time to drop blackface. I have to think he's spent enough time in the US to understand why it's such a problem for us.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/23/arts/dance/blackface-ballet-bolshoi-misty-copeland.html

And not all Russians have taken the Bolshoi’s side. Alexei Ratmansky, a former director of the company, now an artist in residence at American Ballet Theater, wrote on Facebook that it was time to drop blackface.

“What is the artistic value in black makeup, under which you can’t even recognize an artist?” he wrote. “Why provoke?”

This production is irredeemably tainted. No impressario or distributor will touch it, and the Mariinsky isn't helping itself by continuing to perform bona fide Ratmansky ballets without his name on them. So if it's going to be for domestic consumption, and if the company is a pariah anyway, why avoid the blackface and Asian stereotypes foreigners find offensive? If anything, they may double down in the name of "tradition."

I guess this is Spuck's stamp. There are Giselle and Sleeping Beauty and a Forsythe program. But I think two works by Sharon Eyal are too many for a ballet company. Her pieces are mesmerizing, and they go over really well with audiences, but you don't need ballet dancers to perform them. 

Sorry, folks, there is blackface, not for Ramzé, but for some of the male characters.