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vipa

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Posts posted by vipa

  1. Your comment is well taken and based on his wide experience of and here is the word VIEWING!!!!! NOT EVER DANCING A SINGLE STEP I WOULD SAY HE IS OBTUSE AND MEAN!!!!!!!!

    I agree with a lot that has been said. He can be obtuse (what was he talking about with Janie Taylor?) and at the very least dismissive. I also agree that he gushes over certain dancers. David Hallberg is an example. We all admire Hallberg but he is not perfect in every role. I'm sure you will never read a word of criticism from Macaulay about Hallberg ever. Also, Morgan (a talented dancer) why waste precious space on a dancer who was injured and therefore not seen?

    On the other hand there are times when his writing is insightful and even poetic. He is one of the few "serious" dance critics we have now (I wish Acocella wrote more on dance in New Yorker). I, personally, never doubt his love of dance. I'll take the good with the bad, but I do see the good. Also, I know for a fact if you email him respectfully (disagree or not) he will respond in a thoughtful way.

  2. I took class from him when I first came to NYC, back in Richard Thomas's school on Broadway. Sometimes I would get free tickets to ABT from a friend and we would go together. He was a wonderful man.

    Dick Andros was indeed a wonderful man. He really loved ballet and worked to share his love and knowledge right until the end. And boy, he could make a person laugh. He will be missed by many.

    There is a memorial page on Facebook if anyone is interested. You can search Facebook for Dick Andros memorial page or use this link.

    http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2241...2642&ref=ts

  3. My suggestion is Balanchine's Midsummer Night's Dream. I took my kids when they were 5 and 8 and they loved it. I told them the outline of the story before we went. The choreography is not only beautiful, but it offers a clear and fast moving plot. The music is beautiful and accessible. My children enjoyed this ballet a lot more than they enjoyed Nutcracker. As the years went on we moved on to other ballets, but this was a good start. Interestingly I found that my kids were often bored by muti- act story ballets but if I found the right rep performance they were captivated. Any program with Symphony in 3 Movements & Tchaikovsky pas de deux was a sure hit. Fancy Free was also a good bet.

  4. -- Natalia Osipova: "the exceptional thrill came from the liftoff provided by her feet; in more than 30 years of watching ballet I've never seen that degree of spring." "Ms. Osipova is remarkable to watch just standing on point."

    I would really quibble with the implication that her liftoff is provided by her feet. Many things contribute to a big jump, such as the shape of the legs and the timing of the movement. She may use her feet well as part of the mechanics of jumping, but her feet do not provide "that degree of spring."

  5. I wish they would put up all the casting for Birthday Offering.

    It would be very interesting to know the other ballerinas. When it was first staged for ABT, the cast was mostly principals and soloists,if i remember correctly.

    Yes the ABT cast of Birthday Offering was all soloists in principals - 7 couple if I remember correctly, and I think Julie Kent was one of the ladies.

    I don't see the newest soloist S.Messmer yet. Also Copeland, who seemed to be cast in so many things for the last 2 years isn't listed - not yet anyway.

  6. I, too, didn't really care for Daneman's article, a little hagiographic/gushy to begin (both about Margot and actor's abilities) and then not near the end. I'm also having a very hard time viewing the clips and stills from this new film. Maybe it's because I'm so aware of how they can cut to hide things, but no matter how tight the angle on the actors, their upper bodies simply do not ever move like a dancer's. People worry about whether an actor can dance on pointe?! I wonder whether their upper body's plastique, line, etc.etc. match the real dancers. And, that rarely, if ever, happens. But then again, it's only MHO, and I'm probably more critical than the general audience viewing this.

    Thank you for stating that so well. I so agree. At the same time I think that the audience for the film might be ballet goers. Even casual ballet goers would see that something is amiss even if they couldn't verbalize it.

  7. San Francisco Ballet is getting on the 'new media' bandwagon; recently their website was upgraded to include some nice, 60-90 second videos on each of the principal dancers. Watch them here.

    Good for them. I wish ABT would go more into the video thing. I have to say, I enjoyed the SFB videos, but because of the format of quickly cutting from one ballet to the next, it was hard for me to distinguish the qualities of one dancer from the next.

  8. Madame Swoboda always taught following the same sequence at the "barre". Les pliés, battements tendus, ronds des jambes à terre, etc. The sequence was easy to remember, even for new students. The person who led the class was always placed in the front of the row and we could concentrate on our work without having to worry about complicated choreography. (Not always the case with other teachers). No visitors were allowed, no one could watch her class without her permission. Anyone approaching the doorway was quickly evicted with a " who you are?"

    If anyone is still interested, then I will continue.

    Her favorite color was blue !

    I took her classes as a kid. A big difference between her classes and other classes was that all of her combinations moved from the one end of the room to the other, even the adagio.

  9. I don't know how to post a link, but there is a short youtube video of Karz talking about her life and book. Also some footage of her dancing. You can go to youtube and search for Zappora Zarz or Sugarless Plum or copy and paste the web address found below. I can't wait to read the book.

    Reply to myself - I guess I did know how to post a link! That easy huh!

  10. I take your point but nevertheless qualifiers do exist. If an opera singer is suffering from a cold or other minor ailment, often an announcement is made before the show, and everyone takes the singer's indisposition into consideration when evaluating the performance (or ought to, in any case). If a top tennis player is injured and has a temporary run of disappointing results, that too is considered when evaluating his performance. If a dancer is suffering from injury or illness, surely the same applies. Special pleading happens too, but there's a difference between that and acknowledging that a performer through no fault of his own wasn't functioning at peak level.

    I respectfully disagree. I really do not want to hear about a singer's cold, I wish those announcements would be banned. If not banned I wish that when the announcement was made, an offer of a refund or ticket exchange would also be made. As an audience member, I do not want to take anyone's indisposition into consideration. How can I lose myself in a performance if in the back of my mind is the idea that the performance that I'm seeing is not the best it could be.

    Imagine if we heard about every performer's problems: back's a little sore, going through a divorce, upset stomach etc.

    I could go on and on, but I feel like I am going really off of the Natalia Osipove@ABT topic. Sorry! But we on BT have been critical of many performers. If we knew the "inside scoop" of how they were feeling should we have been less critical?

  11. or (as Vipa writes) that "in the ABT world a lot of ticket buyers will always go for the Russian import!"--(neither of which phrases suggests all that much respect by the by).

    It is so me to put my foot in my mouth. Again, I meant no disrespect to fans of Osipova. I only meant that there are ticket buyers, who are not regular ballet goers, who assume that the Russian import is superior.

    To those who point to exhaustion, fevers etc. I just have to say that for me the performance I see, is the performance I see. In opera I don't want to hear that so-in-so is not in good voice that day.

    I just think that if you go out there and do it there are no qualifiers, whether you are a tennis player or a ballet dancer.

  12. I missed her Giselle, which friends of mine loved, and saw her Sylph. I am in the minority, but I find her sort of amusical. Even in the Youtube videos I've seen she seems to disregard the music and do her thing.

    In my original post quoted above, I meant no disrespect to her fans. However, my reservations stand. I just re-watched youtube videos and really find her unmusical. For me personally that is a deal killer. Great jump, uneven technique in the way I think of technique (a go for it attitude but lots of stumbles) but she is young, with a lot of expectations placed on her.

    I won't buy a ticket to see her, but I guess in the ABT world a lot of ticket buyers will always go for the Russian import!

    For those of you who love her, enjoy.

  13. I missed her Giselle, which friends of mine loved, and saw her Sylph. I am in the minority, but I find her sort of amusical. Even in the Youtube videos I've seen she seems to disregard the music and do her thing. For this reason I am avoiding her Sleeping Beauty (I never go to see R&J - not my thing). Does anyone else see this or am I crazy? As I said, I have friends who loved her Giselle.

  14. ABT's pattern has been to promote (and announce) over the course of the year, one at a time. I don't think there's any fixed date.

    Cabro, I think that is true in general, but if I remember correctly, a group of corps people became soloists in Aug. 2007 - Boone, Lane, Copeland, Kajiya and maybe some others.

    My feeling is that NYCB can carry a principal heavy company more easily than ABT because of their respective reps. NYCB can have a number of principal roles every evening. ABT because of the number of full length ballets, has fewer principal roles in general. Even now they end up with principals getting 1 or 2 shots at say Swan Lake or Sleeping Beauty in NY.

  15. Allegra Kent! I wish that more of you could have had the chance to experience just how alluring and riveting she was on stage -- how very, very beautiful. Congratulations to her on this award.

    Agreed. I only saw her a couple of times at the end of her career when she was not performing much but WOW. It was a great thing, in my opinion, that Balanchine kept her on salary even though she performed so infrequently. I also saw her taking class, even that was special.

    BTW I see her often at ballet performance, most recently at Avery for ABT. She is always warm, pleasant and so unconventional!

  16. Has anyone else read The Time Traveler's Wife, BTW?

    I read it about a year ago and loved it. I've resisted seeing the movie.

    I'm waiting for the 3rd book of the trilogy that began with "The Girl With the Dragon Tatoo." Not as deeply human as "Time Traveler's Wife" but really fun read.

  17. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/25/arts/dan...=1&ref=arts

    Putting aside the financial issues confronting Morphoses (although there are a lot of companies that would kill for a $1.3 million budget), here is what puzzles me: What is the audience for this company? Or, to put it another way, what need wasn't being met by its absence??

    It seems to me that the people who love the "grand personalities" and general gaudiness at ABT and the Royal Ballet wouldn't be interested in the comparatively "plain Jane" nature of Morphoses. And the ultra-hipsters who like Cedar Lake wouldn't find Morphoses hip enough. As a result, Morphoses occupies a kind of uncertain middle ground -- neither grand in the old manner or hip in the 21st century way.

    Please -- tell me what I'm missing!?!

    Interesting question. If they had a company of dancers, perhaps they could be the "Joffrey" of today. Back in the day, the Joffrey Ballet offered a group of dancers that were diverse, in many cases not ABT or NYCB material, but great and beloved by many (Crist, DeAngelo, Singleton to name a few). The company had a new age sensibiliy, along with revivals, and cheap tickets. I'm not saying that Morphoses should copy Joffrey exactly (which ultimately had to leave NY), but that there is a way to find an audience occupying a middle ground. To my way of thinking a company of interesting dancers is the key.

  18. I'm disappointed to see so little here for my favorite up and coming corps members: I don't see anything new here for Eric Tamm, and where is Isabella Boylston? ... but perhaps I'm expecting too much. But I'm totally dismayed at the absence (are they in there *anywhere*?) of Misty Copeland, Kristi Boone and Yuriko Kajiya.

    Do not despair. First of all ABT is very bad about listing complete castings, for example Blue Bird pas does not appear in SB. That is just one example. (A pet peeve of mine, NYCB does much better in this respect).

    Second you never know what "company" might mean. In the Avery season the Barton piece was cast as "company" but there were clearly principal roles. In the Millepied piece, only the pas couple was listed, but clearly Simkin (I don't remember who else did the role) was featured.

    Third there are many months between now and the Met. Interestingly many of the same ballets that are cast for the spring are still TBA for DC in January.

    Just keep following casting as the months go by!! It ain't over til it's over, or til the fat lady sings or something like that.

  19. I'm hoping Simkin/Lane get the SB tba. Lane has had success in SB and as Gamzetti (last spring) interesting that she hasn't been cast. Also interesting that Part has Aurora again. Many months for cast changes, it will be fun to keep an eye on things. This is why I no longer buy subscriptions. I wait for casting and buy individual tickets.

  20. Lots of empty seats at today's matinee. House went wild -- standing ovation --for Benjamin Millepied's ballet, and especially for Daniil Simkin. I thought Marcelo Gomes and Isabella Boylston

    I was also there, and sadly there were many empty seats. I enjoyed the Ratmansky piece, and think it might be a keeper. The cast danced well. I must say my eye always goes to Sarah Lane because of her beautiful port de bras and the wonderful openness of her upper body. Her partner Joseph Phillips won't be in the corps for long. I wish, however, that Ratmansky did not go with the cliche of the cutesy short person's pas de deux. Yes, play to their strengths of moving quickly (and these 2 did so without ever seeming rushed) but all that looking under the arm cute stuff is - well as I said - a cliche.

    One of Three - I can't comment upon it too much because my mind sort of wandered. It didn't seem to have much to do with the music.

    Other Dances - the opening duet - matching lines and musicality were glorious. The rest I felt lacking. These are world class dancers who are great, but I was disappointed in some ways. I felt that in Hallberg the "Russianisms" such as the head shaking and folk dance movements seemed plastered on. There was nothing organic or, to my way of thinking, fun about them. Murphy of course showed me steps that I didn't know were in the thing (I've seen it a few times before, including Makarova/Baryshnikov), but she too seemed to be missing a sense of fun. The lifts seemed lacking in the sense of abandon that the music asks for. There is a lift in which she is held sideways, and then drops to his arms and is turned around (a bad description, I hope you know what I mean). It was done well at every stage, but you saw every stage (lift, drop, turn) and so there was no sweep or sense of abandon, it looked cautious to me.

    Millepied - I don't think it's a keeper, but I think it shows he could make a keeper. Oddly, for me the pas was the weakest part (I say this because of the discussion of the Boylston/Millepied relationship). My husband told me that this was the section during which he watched the musicians. In the opening movement I liked the way Millepied explored and developed the theme of the angles he had the dancers make. He did this in movements and patterns. Of course the Simkin moments were very, very entertaining. Will this be a problem in casting? Can anyone else do it? Does his understudy have a slightly different version?

    I too enjoyed watching the dancers warm up, mark, practice between ballets. I wonder how the dancers felt.

    As a comment to my last question. My husband, who was with Dennis Wayne Dancers, said he loved the opportunity to be onstage before an audience before the actual performance (this was part of the D. Wayne thing)

  21. ...and why is that Part still doesn't get a Giselle...?

    I can't imagine Part as Giselle because she is too tall.

    I can't see Part as Giselle either. It's not a height thing. For me it's a rightness for a role. Part did not prove to be as a good Aurora as she was a Lilac Fairy.

    I'm still hoping for Lane/Simkin in some major partnership. Maybe Giselle is too much to hope for.

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