volcanohunter

I've certainly walked out of ballets I thought were terrible, though never demonstratively; I wait for a pause or intermission to make my escape. And if I watch a ballet and find it to be a waste of time, I don't go back for seconds. Where I live now, I have relatively few opportunities to see live ballet, so I hate to do it, but there's only so much frustration I can stand. I suppose I am intending to boycott a work my local company is planning for next season because I think the music and subject matter are unworthy, and because I disliked a similar project undertaken by the same choreographer a few years ago. As Jack Reed put it, it's a matter of protecting myself. As for the Romeo + Juliet broadcast, I did watch it, but took the unusual step, for me, of not recording it. As it turns out, I was correct in predicting that I wouldn't have the slightest desire to watch it again.

The DVD and Blu-Ray can now be pre-ordered at Amazon. The American release date is June 30.

If you haven't seen it yet and are dying to see it on the big screen, Spartacus will be screened at five UltraStar locations in California and Arizona on May 27 and 28. Wednesday, May 27 at 11:00 a.m. Thursday, May 28 at 7:00 p.m. The participating cinemas are located in San Diego, CA; Carlsbad, CA; Apple Valley, CA; Surprise, AZ; and Lake Havasu City, AZ. http://centralsystem.digiscreen.ca/ShowPag...p;date=05272009

A brilliantly succinct review.

There's no reason not to continue the thread. I'm sure everyone who read it the first time around would be very interested in learning about filming subsidies, DVD sales and the like.

Thanks to the back cover of the DVD version I finally know that they were Emmanuel Strosser and Frédéric Vaysse-Knitter. At the screening their names had flitted past too quickly.

The American release date is June 30, and the ballet can now be pre-ordered at Amazon in both DVD and Blu-Ray formats. Search for 'La Dame aux camelias'.

BTers have ripped their hair out over this issue, for example, on this thread, which would certainly benefit from your input as a producer. Most of us can only speculate about how ballet comes to be filmed. http://ballettalk.invisionzone.com/index.php?showtopic=28457 For example, I'd be interested to know whether Dutch television has any sort of quota for ballet programming. DVDs of the Netherlands Opera seem to turn up fairly regularly, but there aren't nearly enough videos of the Dutch National Ballet for my taste.

I'm glad to hear about this. I had begun to despair of seeing any new ballet releases from Kultur, so this is welcome news.

You may also want to add Agnès Letestu dancing "La Cigarette" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ko2MEjQzVTs

No, I didn't travel to Berlin for it. All I saw was a brief report on DW-TV around the time of its premiere. But I am impressed with how quickly it's been made into a DVD. Six months from premiere to video release is pretty speedy turnover. Right now Patrice Bart is choreographing a ballet about Percy Bysshe Shelley for the company. I wonder whether we'll get a DVD of that one, too. http://www.staatsballett-berlin.de/spielpl...p;id_language=2

As sandik mentioned, it's very rare to find a modern dancer who hasn't been cross-trained. I'd taken years of ballet, character and jazz dance classes before I ever stepped into a modern class. When I was working as a modern dancer, I continued to take ballet class four times a week and supplemented my classes with Pilates. I don't think this is atypical. I only encountered a preoccupation with purity from one ballet teacher who objected to non-dance training as unnecessary.

The details are still sketchy on this one, so bear with me if I have to add more details later. Arthaus Musik will release a DVD and Blu-Ray of Mauro Bigonzetti's Caravaggio in the UK on June 1 and in the US on June 30 (possibly). The Staatsballett Berlin production stars Vladimir Malakhov, Polina Semionova, Beatrice Knop, Mikhail Kaniskin, Dmitry Semionov, Elisa Carrillo Cabrera, Shoko Nakamura, Michael Banzhaf and Leonard Jakovina. The ballet is set to a score by Bruno Moretti, based on the works of Monteverdi. The performance is 93 minutes long, with an additional 29 minutes of bonus footage on the disc. There's no entry on the Arthaus Musik site yet, but on another site I found that the UPC for the DVD is 807280146394, and for the Blu-Ray it's 807280146493. http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/images/...83926&s=dvd http://www.staatsballett-berlin.de/spielpl...p;id_language=2 trailer: http://cb-player.de/en_EN/29368

Here is a link to a French television report about an exhibit on Nureyev through the prism of his costumes currently taking place in Moulins. It includes brief comments from Christian Lacroix and Ezio Frigerio. http://tf1.lci.fr/infos/culture/0,,4407006...-costumes-.html

Exactly. As though the reason for the absence of great composers today is orchestras playing too much Beethoven. If only they played more contemporary program music (is there such a thing?), the talented would-be composers out there would feel less inhibited and start composing great music. Somehow I don't think that Beethoven needed to be shielded from Palestrina, Monteverdi, Bach and Mozart in order to thrust his artistic revolution on the world. I'm sure that the young composer of today loses nothing by immersing him- or herself in Beethoven, just as the young choreographer can only gain from prolonged exposure to Balanchine.

There must be some reason why so much of Balanchine is actively performed while most of Massine, sad to say, has disappeared. For the record, I have absolutely nothing against narrative ballets. I also believe that the narrative vs. non-narrative dichotomy is a false one. The problem isn't that today's choreographers favour abstract ballet. The problem is that there are no choreographers with the genius of a Balanchine or an Ashton or a Tudor out there. Why would shifting emphasis to short narrative ballets succeed in manufacturing that genius?

Isn't this the strongest argument against ballets that "reflect the realities of contemporary American culture"? Wouldn't Office Space: The Ballet seem equally alien to audiences 25 years from now? Haven't Balanchine's ballets "aged better" precisely because they're abstracted and more archetypal as a result?

Possibly, but I suspect you'll end up with pallid Ashton and Tudor imitations.

If ballet is stagnant because there aren't any geniuses among Balanchine's choreographic disciples, what leads her to believe that imitating Ashton or Tudor is going to produce that genius?

I have to admit it seriously dampened my enthusiasm for the DVD.

A trailer for the program has been posted. http://www.emergingpictures.com/stravinsky_trailer.htm

Here are a few additional screening dates. May 23 in Hunter, NY June 6 in Coral Gables, FL June 7 & 8 in Albany, NY A detailed cast list is now posted. Don Quixote - Vladimir Ponomarev Sancho Panza - Anton Lukovkin Lorenzo - Igor Petrov Kitri - Olesia Novikova Basil - Leonid Sarafanov Gamache - Vladimir Lepeev Espada - Andrei Merkuriev Street Dancer - Yekaterina Kondaurova Flower Sellers - Yana Selina, Yana Serebriakova Queen of the Dryads - Alina Somova Cupid - Yevgenia Obraztsova Mercedes - Galina Rakhmanova Tavern Owner - Alexander Efremov Gypsy dance - Polina Rassadina, Nikolai Zubkovsky Oriental dance - Ti Yon Riu Fandango - Elena Bazhenova, Karen Ioannisyan Variation - Olga Esina The trailer that mariinskyfan mentioned is also linked. http://www.emergingpictures.com/don_quixote_trailer.htm

I've attended a number of HD ballet screenings at the cinema, albeit most of them weren't live. I recommend it. Seeing dancers magnified and seemingly eating up vast quantities of space as they move goes a long way to restoring the energy of dance lost in translation to film. But again, you may end up seeing things you'd rather not see. In the vision scene adagio from Sleeping Beauty, Alina Cojocaru went from a very high à la seconde directly into a very deep penché, and seeing what happened to her magnified hip socket in the process bordered on freaky. It didn't have the same unsettling effect when I watched it later on my TV set.

The DVD is scheduled for release on July 14. Amazon isn't taking orders yet, but the ASIN is B00274SIA6 for future reference.

A French television report on the POB's new production of Cranko's Onegin follows Clairemarie Osta and Manuel Legris from early rehearsals to dress rehearsal. http://tf1.lci.fr/infos/culture/0,,4401423...a-garnier-.html