volcanohunter

...for some people it takes time to grasp that personality and talent does transcend limitations of choreography and stage.

In this particular case I don't think it ever will happen. On the occasions I've lasted to the end of Spartacus, which I haven't always, I've found the experience nauseating. I've acknowledged on this board before that Grigorovich live (or, I suppose, magnified on a movie screen) looks less silly than Grigorovich on the tube, but piercingly loud music can only go so far in distracting me from the crudeness of it all. And if the dancers have personality and talent, I only find myself wishing that they were dancing something else.

Are my Anglo-American ballet roots showing?

At the risk of directing more ire in my direction, there's the matter of Acosta. I've seen him live, I've seen him on film, and he doesn't excite me nearly as much as his reputation suggests he should. Perhaps I've gone in expecting too much. I don't find him objectionable (illustrious dancers who rub me the wrong way is a different category altogether), but he belongs to the category of illustrious dancers who don't do much for me.

I'm curious, did anyone go to the screening? I didn't mean to scare off posters with my intense dislike of this particular ballet.

Before Spartacus I'd made a point of going to all but one of the Opus Arte ballets at my local multiplex. The best attended by far was the Royal Ballet's Sleeping Beauty. Spartacus didn't strike me as well advertised. There had been no trailer at the showing of the ROH's Nozze two weeks earlier, and there was no Opus Arte season poster up in the lobby at the time. There was one there last night, which bodes better for POB's Cinderella, Cuba's Don Q, RB's Giselle and SFB's Nutcracker.

And now that Svetlana Zakharova dances the courtesan, you may really forget that Aegina is ugly .

Oh, I agree. In Aegina I'm guessing that Zakharova has finally a role vulgar enough to suit her.

As for the screening itself, I'll admit that despite all the raves addressed to Acosta, I just couldn't bring myself to cough up $20 for Khachaturian's music, Virsaladze's designs, Grigorovich's thumpingly macho histrionics, the excess of unison dancing and all that running at each other with outstretched arms. As for Aegina and that staff, I've always done my best to blot it out of my memory. Thanks, but I'll watch him in other roles.

Incidentally, is there a Grigorovich variation or pas de deux in which the heroine doesn't wrap her forearm around her head?

Also, I believe (though may be wrong) that Blu Ray is 'all region', and so the future is Blue. They are also 'backward compatible' with DVD, so it might be worth investigating how that works!

Yesterday I attempted to play an all-region PAL DVD in a region A Blu-Ray player and I couldn't do it, so I fear that Blu-Ray players aren't a fix-all.

Apparently it is possible to buy a Blu-Ray player that will play both region A & B and region 1 & 2 discs, but it won't play region 3-6 discs, despite the fact South America (region 4) is now in region A, and Belarus, Ukraine and most of Africa (region 5) are in region B. However, I understand that DVDs produced in South America use both region 1 & 4 coding, so this is less of a hurdle.

Honestly, isn't it time to be rid of these draconian restrictions?

Wright's production for the Birmingham Royal Ballet can be pre-ordered at Amazon. Enter product code B001E181WS in the Amazon search box at the top of the page.

The Story of Clara can now be pre-ordered at Amazon. The product code to be entered in the Amazon search box is B001E181X2.

Ignore that last post. Here's a bigger and better trailer:

http://centralsystem.digiscreen.ca/ShowPag...resentation=223

(Gosh, watching that reminds me just how much I hate everything about this ballet. )

The picture is tiny, but here's a link to a trailer for the ballet:

http://www.ex-centris.com/clip.php?i=5279&t=Ex-Centris

If he had better posture, James Franco could pass for Federico Bonelli's less handsome brother: toothy mouth, deep-set eyes. Mind you, Bonelli has broader shoulders and more refined features, so I'm not sure he'd take the comparison as a compliment.

My sister sees a strong resemblance between Carsten Jung and Matt Damon, but again, I think the dancer wins that contest.

I just did some diggings on the BRB production... In case there are other nutcracker fans like me, the BRB production mentioned by JMcN is not currently available outside of Europe. This BRB production was filmed in 1994. I contacted BRB shop and they said the DVD was designed for Region Code 2 (PAL) and therefore not multi-region friendly. As well, they told me that since the license had already expired, they now only have limited copies available for this 1994 production.

Kultur will release the Yoshida/Mukhamedov performance for the North American market on October 28.

http://estore.websitepros.com/1652646/Detail.bok?no=1340

I've watched the ballet again recently. I've gotten over my shock at the re-ordering of the music, so I can honestly say that I enjoyed it this time around. And I see that Kultur will issue it on DVD on October 28.

http://estore.websitepros.com/1652646/Detail.bok?no=1341

The Bolshoi's Spartacus, filmed in Paris in January, will be screened at Canadian cinemas on Saturday, August 9, at 1:00 p.m. local time.

Spartacus: Carlos Acosta

Phrygia: Nina Kaptsova

Crassus: Alexander Volchkov

Aegina: Maria Allash

Most screenings will take place at Empire Theatres.

www.empiretheatres.com/opusArte

Participating cities: St. John's, Halifax, Sydney, Fredericton, Saint John, Moncton, Charlottetown, St. Catharines, North York, Mississauga, Ottawa, London, Kitchener, Kingston, Richmond Hill, Burlington, Bolton, Winnipeg, Edmonton, Calgary, Vancouver, North Vancouver and Victoria.

The ballet will also be screened at the Ex-Centris Theatre in Montreal: www.ex-centris.com (August 9 & 10)

Princess Twin in Waterloo: www.princesscinemas.com

and Ridge Theatre in Vancouver: www.festivalcinemas.ca (10:00 a.m. PT)

IIRC, in the Makarova Ballerina series, Elisabeth Platel does the varitaion with single, double, triple, quadruple. Correct me if i'm wrong.

When i saw Royal ballet in San Antonio last year, i'm pretty sure Tamara Rojo did at least 1--and perhaps 2--quadruples. I seem to remember double, triple, quad, quad. I believe all the others did doubles.

I just looked over my old videotape, and Platel does three doubles and a quadruple, just like Aurélie Dupont. I have to add that Platel's performance is ravishing: pure perfection. Personally, I don't see what adding multiple triples and quadruples could add to the variation musically. If anything I suspect it would disrupt its atmosphere. Unless they can come up with a perfectly controlled and timed quadruple, like Platel did, I think most Auroras would be better off sticking to doubles and making their big splash in the manège, where the music is less restrained.

I'd reserved judgment until I'd seen the Paris Opera Ballet's new DVD, and its corps is characteristically amazing. So even though my assessment of the forthcoming Royal Ballet Giselle is based only on YouTube clips, I'm casting my vote for the Parisians.

Since I've never had the opportunity to see Dolin's Variations, would someone mind describing them, so I could get a better idea about what sort of dancer would be suitable for each?

The DVD will reach American shores on August 26. Pre-order while the price is low! Just enter product number B001B223UG into the Amazon search window at the top of the page.

The wonderful news is that the performance is excellent. It's a lovely, solid production with excellent leads, and every ballet fan should have this disc.

The bad news is that Wheeldon's garland dance is pretty awful: he spends so much time posing the dancers that they never really get around to dancing. It's a terrible waste of beautiful music and should be chucked. And as with POB's Swan Lake, Opus Arte can't get the credits in the booklet right. It lists Jose Martin as the Bluebird when it's actually Yohei Sasaki.

The performance is not quite perfect. The BBC recorded only one performance, so there was no way of editing out small stumbles. They may be part of the reality of live performance, but I'd rather not have them in a record for posterity. For example, Cojocaru does not nail the pirouettes in her Act 1 solo, though it does nothing to detract from her performance, and she finishes off with a terrific manege. As an aside, I've seen several ballerinas lately having trouble with the pirouettes, and I wonder about the wisdom of going for triples right off the bat. Cojocaru manages two excellent triples, her third triple is less secure, and she falls out of the fourth. I would think it would be better to adopt the POB practice of three doubles and a quadruple.

Nonetheless, she is pure magic, the overriding reason to get this disc. Her Rose Adagio is particularly magnificent. I prefer her radiant restraint to the giddiness I've seen from some ballerinas recently. Elisabeth Platel has pointed out that the balances of the Rose Adagio are essentially a demonstration of Aurora's self-possession, which is what Cojocaru conveys perfectly.

I also like Bonelli very much. It's an awful thing to say, but I'm actually glad it was him and not Kobborg that was taped. Bonelli is more princely in style and proportions. He doesn't quite nail Ashton's Act 2 solo, but then I've seen only Anthony Dowell do that, and in any case he fares better in it than Zoltan Solymosi. (In terms of purely musical response, I like David Ashmole in the Australian Ballet production best in Act 2.)

The prologue fairies are excellent, so it's a pity that there were so many waist-up shots during their variations, and Genesia Rosato's mime is admirably lucid.

The POB production, for all of Nureyev's eccentricities, is preferable in some respects. I have never liked turning the Lilac Fairy into a dancing role. The way I see it, once she's danced her variation and bestowed her gift on baby Aurora, she's used up her fairy dust and wouldn't have any left to counter Carabosse. Blessings, once bestowed, can't be changed: think Isaac and Esau. From what I remember of reading the story in childhood, Aurora was rescued by a fairy that had not yet made her gift, and Nureyev follows Petipa in this, at least. She's a beautiful dancer, but I wish that Marianela Nuñez were a bit taller. She gets a bit lost among the corps in the vision scene. I know that it makes her a sensational turner, but I also wish that she weren't quite so upright and that her torso moved a bit more. Of course she has a smile that can win over even curmudgeons like me.

Sarah Lamb is a radiant Florine, but Sasaki is unexciting; Benjamin Pech soars high above him. Valeri Hristov also can't quite compete with Jean-Guillaume Bart, and as good as the RB's corps is, the POB's is better.

I first saw this performance on a large film screen, and watching dancers magnified in glorious Technicolor, breathtaking Cinemascope and Stereophonic sound went a long way to conveying the kinetic energy of live performance that's lost when ballet is reduced to two dimensions on a TV screen. I took my mum to see it. She normally finds Sleeping Beauty a little boring, but this time she actually got a bit weepy when “Vive Henri IV” began to play. The experience had been that transfixing. Watching the DVD wasn't quite as captivating, but I had been pretty thoroughly enthralled in that movie theatre, and maybe I just need a larger TV.

I agree with canbelto about Cojocaru. She’s an Aurora for the ages. She’s thoroughly wonderful, the crown jewel in what is an excellent performance all around. Get it for her. I can almost guarantee you’ll love it.

Oh, why can't producers leave well enough alone? I realize that the Burgmuller pas de deux was a last-minute addition, but as it happens I think its performers make a very effective foil to Giselle and Albrecht and their doomed romance. Add two, four or eight more dancers to the mix, and this contrast is lost; it becomes just another divertissement.

[edited to add:] Though I should clarify that as long as there's a lead couple, I'm okay with other dancers acting as a mini corps. My objection to Wright's pas de quatre is that he takes choreography intended for two dancers and redistributes it among four. The original may be a double-decker pas de deux, but surely a fit male soloist can handle two variations if there's a variation for his partner in between.

Splendid news indeed. If it's going to hit the shops in the UK on September 1, it should certainly be in North America by Christmas. The ballet will be screened at Canadian movie theatres on November 1, and I'm very much looking forward to it. If Opus Arte intends to release new ballet DVDs every month or two, it's very good news for us all. Romeo and Juliet should be next.

A question to those familiar with the production: Does this version replace the peasant pas de deux with a pas de quatre? Peter Wright's production for the National Ballet of Canada does and I can't stand it.

Volcano...are you familiar with the past encarnations of the ballet...? LIke from the 70's?

Ooh, I can't claim to have seen that many Giselles in the '70s because I was quite small at the time, but I will fess up to being a Giselle junkie with most available recordings in my library.

According to Amazon.com, the DVD is finally in stock on this side of the Atlantic.

And still, with the current conversion, the cheapest deal would be no less than $55 US dollars, (including S/H)...Damm,is ballet expensive..! :foot:

At least VAT is deducted from non-EU orders. I've found that if several items are ordered at once, the deducted VAT will usually "cover" shipping costs. On my last order from the UK the shipping costs came to £7.04, but after VAT was deducted, the order came to £10.19 less than the total list price. It's a very faint silver lining, I know, but I'll take it.

Here's the pre-order information from Amazon:

http://www.amazon.com/Dancing-Mr-B-Six-Bal...s/dp/B001CK7OMO

Before I get too excited, are we likely to see new material on this video? Will we see the same performances by Ashley in "Ballo" and Farrell in "Diamonds," etc., that are already available? I can't stand the thought of waiting months for this release, only to find that it's mostly stuff I already have.

Does anybody know?

This program originally aired on PBS. Most of the performance footage is archival, as you say. The video's main attraction is the interviews. I remember there being some behind-the-scenes footage that was new: Tallchief rehearsing students in The Four Temperaments, Hayden rehearsing students in Serenade, Ashley giving class at SAB, and Kent rehearsing Kistler in La Sonnambula, as well as Kistler in class.

I also remember how fabulous the music from Sonnambula sounded in piano reduction: really spooky. The music in its original operatic setting never had that effect on me.

A trailer, probably the program's original intro, has been posted on You Tube by Digital Classics, the DVD's European distributor.

I'm curious about this release. The Bel Air Classiques DVD doesn't seem to be on sale outside France. At least it isn't available on British or German Amazon. This performance is included in the forthcoming Opus Arte season to be screened at movie theatres in Canada and the UK, so does this mean that Opus Arte holds the rights to the performance in the English-speaking world? If Opus Arte intends to release it on DVD, does this mean that it won't be releasing the Royal Ballet's telecast of Don Quixote from 2001? Admittedly, the RB wouldn't be my first choice for a Don Quixote, but the ROH did buy Opus Arte in order to promote its own productions (except, perhaps, this one).