cubanmiamiboy

...but neither a single Petipa , Jack...!

...OR perhaps in the intended one for some...? "To be, or not to be: that is the question: Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, Or to take arms against a sea of troubles, And by opposing end them? " Willy.

I found the trailer # 2 of the documentary. Enjoy!...(and watch it if you can catch it...)

Frederick Franklin has referred to this particular too...(didn't also Zoritch in the Ballet Russes documentary..?)

dirac, but there is also something about the accent. I wish I could describe it better, but I guess my ear is by now more adapted to the current English inflexions, vs. those from the past...

Oh, I remember Miss Bravo...definitely. And the documentary too... http://archive.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2005/4/27/132530.shtml

Mme. Alonso about "Theme and Variations-(Grand Finale) "I didn't have the opportunity to see Mr. Balanchine toward the end of his life, but I did get some messages from him. I remember-for example- one anecdote from 1976, when I was dancing Carmen at the MET as a guest artist of American Ballet Theatre .Back then I was getting some physical therapy by an ex-dancer friend of mine, Bill Weslow. Balanchine was also having treatments with Billy, so he sent me a lovely message with him : GB-'Please Billy, tell Alicia that after all this years no one has ever danced "Theme and Variations" as good as she danced it'. I was thrilled...and so I truly cherish this judgment coming from the master himself, plus the very fact that he still remembered me... " Lovely. So if you're dancing the ballerina role in T&V, you better practice those entrechat-sixes really well...!

The article is by Gia Kourlas: http://www.nytimes.c....html?ref=dance Thanks for that article, bart....how clever! ..."she does not allow cheating..." That's EXACTLY the PERFECT way to describe a travesty's rendition of T&V..."cheating".

I saw a GREAT documentary tonight at the Colony Theater...!! , Carlos Montaner's "The Grandchildren of the Cuban Revolution" "The Grandchildren of the Cuban Revolution is an uncompromisingly frank, fresh account of Cubas youth after more than 50 years of that islands life under one single government. After five decades of official ideology and a formidably regimented campaign to create El Hombre Nuevo, this 60-minute documentary allows us to discover the many hidden textures of Cubans under 35, the majority of the films participants born after the revolutionary victory of 1959. Candid, fast-paced and irreverent, The Grandchildren of the Cuban Revolution lets its own interviewees open up to describe the hardships and misfortunes of being subjected to a totalitarian design since the day they were born." http://grandchildrenofthecubanrevolution.com/

"BIG ephiphany..."

I find very interesting that even though Balanchine's admitted that A&Y's interpretation wouldn't follow 100% his own idea of how the ballet should had been danced, he wasn't shy to admit to liking it...I guess that if the technical part and speed requirements were fulfilled, the rest wouldn't bother him that much...

Re: Youskevitch quote... ...here is what Mme. Alonso has to say... Alicia Alonso on "Theme and Variations" (III) "In 'Theme and Variations' Igor and I developed a hard and passionate work, achieving our own particular concept of the PDD, essentially with a distinctive expressive feeling. We wanted to be like a dialogue, very warm and personal and way far away from the form being established by Balanchine. That's why we couldn't avoid , on the execution of the new choreography, interpreting it in our own personal way, as much as what the enormous technical demand would allow to. We decided that we were to give a sense of dancing to the melody, to express a sensibility, to follow a theme, to achieve a humanization, or in other words, to make a duo between a man and a woman. As it was expected, Balanchine noticed the shift right away, but for some reason, he didn't criticized us; he kept staring at what we did in silence...and he respected it. At the end of the first rehearsal he just told us: G.B-'It is not exactly what I'm asking for...but I like it..."

Patrick...in the opening scene there are two killers coming to a diner where The Swede-(Lancaster)-is supposed to come to eat, which he never does, so they end up chasing him in his hotel room and killing him right there. I know! Isn't it great...?

bart...here is what Alonso has to say about it... Alicia Alonso about "Theme and Variations".(II) Youskevitch's variation: "The variation that Balanchine made for Youskevitch, so celebrated by the critics, had its evolution during the early staging phase of the work. Initially, I remember that Balanchine created a variation very par terre and technically simple, based on positions and designs on different angles of Youskevitch body line. Then he overheard that Youskevitch wasn't particularly pleased with it, because he considered that it had few technical complexities. Balanchine accepted the challenge and said: G.B: 'All right, we will do a variation based on three different choreographic themes', and it resulted in what probably is the variation with the highest technical virtuosity among all those that he created for his men" atm711...you don't cease to amaze me!. Just when I think I've heard the ultimate thing on what you were able to see-(the last one being Toumanova as your first Giselle), then you have to come with... I mean... Well, you see...You saw her dancing in '47, and I did so in '97...and believe me...she still had it. Always a pleasure.

My second pick for our movie night was Robert Siodmak's 1946 "The Killers", which was made on Hemingway's short story of the same title. Interesting enough, I just read that this was the acting debut of Burt Lancaster, who plays 'The Swede', a boxer who becomes infatuated with a gangster's moll during a complex scheme. The femme fatale here is stunningly beautiful Ava Gardner, who goes by the name of "Kittie Collins"-( ). Both Lancaster and Gardner are definitely as attractive as they can be. As for the plot I most confess I found it sort of dense at some point, and even more during the final sequences where the scheme is being explained by the insurance investigator-(Edmond O'Brien). What happens is that sometimes I find this 40's films actors to speak really fast-(oh, deja vu with the other thread on speedy dancers of the past! )-and at first I couldn't figure out how the caption worked. Very beautiful also how Siodmak's artsy direction emphasizes shadows, dark rooms and the ever present cigarette smoke, making Gardner and Lancaster's faces even more alluring at times. Something I want to underline is Mikos Rozsa's Oscar nominated score, which really drives the story and heightens the flash points, using a combination of orchestral and minimalist musical motifs to good effect. While trying to figure out the damned caption button, I accidentally hit something and a very interesting thing happened. The film muted the voices and other sounds and isolated just the music. What a great discovering! I kept listening to it until I realized that I wasn't understanding a thing of was happening so I went back and fixed it. Aside from some confusing points I loved the film...and so Gardner's final words when she makes a desperate plea to her dying man..."Tell him that Kittie is innocent...tell him, tell him that Kittie is innocent!!" (Oh...how dramatic... ) "Raw, rugged, ruthless drama of a man who gambled his luck, his love, his life for the treachery of a girl's lips!!"

I'm glad you liked it Jack...there's more to come!

When I get home i will try and generate something about Fanfare...(haven't forgotten your request, cahill! )...and also on Bugaku. Robbins piece will present a challenge for me to write about though...

One time I posted some transcriptions I made from a ballet program of Mme. Alonso's reflections on Balanchine's first staging of "Theme and Variations". I couldn't find them here, but I think it would be a good idea to make a separate thread on them now that we're discussing the ballet at length in the MCB Forum. So here they are. Mme.Alonso about "Theme and Variations": "In 'Theme and Variations" Balanchine kept testing me all the time, establishing a kind of fight in between my technical strength and his choreography. So he would ask me, for instance: G.B-'Miss Alonso...do you think you could do entrechat-sixes here...?' A.A-'I'll do them..' ...and then he would say... G.B-'So, could you now do pas de chat en tournant..?' A.A-'If you want me to, of course I'll do them..' ...and like that, on and on he would keep torturing me , adding new steps, new difficulties, just to see if I would say 'No, I can't ' at one point, but... I never gave up! That's why the version of 'Theme and Variations' that was presented in the premiere was technically and musically very, very complicated. When other ballerinas danced the role later on-(some of them friends of mine like Maria Tallchief, who was Balanchine's wife)-they would tell me 'But Alicia, how did you let him put this or that in the choreography...?!; Now we are all in trouble!', I would just answer: 'Well, what could I do...?; It was your husband who put it there, Maria!... Another thing that I can't forget is that with 'Theme and Variations' Balanchine made his debut as a conductor, and besides the historical importance of it I will always remember it because the tempo he chose was MADLY FAST. We all ended up breathless!"

bart...but I wish I could describe Kronemberg's approach just as "large-scale" or "grand-imperial", but that was sadly not the case. I like her too, don't get me wrong, but her rendition of T&V was just...bland. There were segments in which she was just relying too much in the posing fact, minimizing speed, attack and sharpness, which at the end are the very basis of T&V's female variations. I notice that this is a phenomenon that's getting more and more extended within the ballet world, in which the dancers- (females AND males)-are dancing variations and pieces in a much more slower tempo than their predecessors. This could be a good thing, let's say, in the White Swan PDD or all the warhorses PDD adagios- (Nut, Black Swan, Bayadere, etc...)-but please, don't bring T&V into it...that's a crime. As I said, one just have to look at those clips from the past, where dancers like Dudinskaya- (Black Swan/Bayadere), Fonteyn- (Corsaire), Alonso- (Coppelia), Markova- (Giselle), Baronova- (Le Cock d'Or) or Chabukiani- (Flames...)-leave you jaw dropping, even at some point wondering..."is that video being sped up...?"-(like some thread I read a while ago about it)-with their magnificent offerings of devilish chainee turns, pique turns, pirouettes, fouettes and everything in between. Well...the result of this obsession to achieve the famous Russian/Soviet Kirov ballerinas perfect épaulement or "royal carriage"-(or as many refer to, the "perfect line" or to execute the step to a 150 % of perfection)-is a sad travesty, and many times a boring execution, to which the dancer becomes just another faceless one. Sometimes while looking at certain ballets and dancers I really believe that the ultimate goal of bailarines and bailarinas nowadays has changed, and giving an exciting performance has given way to given a perfect- (and many times ultra generic)- execution. I see T&V as probably the ultimate example of an EXCITING ballet...more than beautiful, grand or any other adjectives we could fairly add. Yes...he wasn't really up to the role, IMO. Probably the slow one. I noticed some of them struggling with the super fast final tableaux Definitely, bart, and would I had been the stager, I would had sped the tempo even more...! (Believe me...she can take it) Because she-(just as Kirkland, I assume by her brief clips)-had the formula to combine the two. Something that we're certainly loosing...sadly. Oh, DEFINITELY. She has it...which is why I would LOVE to see her developing the other side of the ballet repertoire. At this point of her career it would be great if she could start working on her Giselles, Sylphs, Filles and the like, with their ample range of accents and characterization details. I think they will repeat the same cast as here bart. Delgado/Panteado and Kronemberg/Guerra Oh yes...I want it!

I like my Lucias macabres and crazy looking and in the appropriate XVII Century Scottish setting. Last season we had one Lucia here and the production went under that unnerving trend of changing its historical/psychological context and even the story itself changed a little bit. Only Elizabeth Caballero was able to save the day, but otherwise...a complete failure.

Since we're discarding everything that's being "touched" or "re-touched"..then what's left...?

cahill, Patricia danced the lead of Bugaku on Saturday night with Reyneris Reyes. Today the cast was the same as Friday night, T&V with Jeanette/Panteado and Bugaku with Wu/Isanusi Will do...!

Last night's offering was a little disappointing. I'll skip for now Bugaku and Fanfare, to concentrate on T&V-(will expand my views on those two later on). I don't know what could be the reason behind Jenniffer Kronemberg's bland rendition of Baurora-(Balanchine's Aurora )-but I was two rows away from her, and she looked pretty tired. She lacked the intense attack to which that first series of pirouettes need to be treated, and ditto with the sequence of the three mini-diagonals of chainee turns in opposite directions. Her petite allegro, SOOO VITAL in this role, wasn't crispy, and so the magic of those sequences of entrechat/battu was totally lost. I kept thinking on how Balanchine obviously kept filling the the female variations with all this beautiful footwork, given that Alonso was famous for it-(right until the end of her career, and one can see it on those Grand Pas de Quatre or Giselle clips of the series of traveling entrechats for the second act, or at the end of the White Swan or Sugar Plum Adagios. Ditto with Carlos Guerra's Besiree-( ). He tried his best, but he couldn't make it all nice and clean for that famous sequence of 7 double tours en l'air. Generally speaking, I saw a slowing down of the ballet, and this is a NO-NO for T&V. I kept thinking..."stop paying so much attention at lines, and port de bras and the perfect placement and ATTACK,ATTACK, ATTACK the music...this is not Giselle!!!" Will continue. Edited to add: Did I just say "Don't think and just dance..."?!

Tricky question! At first I thought "What about Alonso-after-Nijinska-after-Gorsky's "Fille..."?, but then, what about the warhorses...? The Kingdom of the Shades seems pretty untouched since Petipa's times, I would guess....