annamicro

clip after clip, we will have soon the whole ballet here another official one from hamburg Ballet, with new dancing moment (and finally a short moment of leslie Heylmann and Konstantin Tselikov, not present in the other videos ...sorry, they are also in the first longer one: still mixing live memories and videos!)

edited with updated link

I'm in awe of Anna Polikarpova -- still going strong after all of these years!

She a wonderful dancer and a great artist. When you are an artist, passing years don't make you less interesting or weaker, they just change you in a different and new yourself.

Ivan Urban, her husband, will be Liliom in the second cast: moustache and beard for the occasion (at least he was wearing them at the premiere).

A wonderful new ballet, with a fantastic score: I loved it! A rich and complex work that offers a full range of emotions and moments of sublime poetry

With two orchestras playing together it doens't seem easy to bring on tour, so I hope a DVD will come out sooner or later, hopefully with the extraordinary Hamburg Ballet: it's a pity that for economical reasons Neumeier's works are often out as DVDs danced by other companies (Die Kameliendame is a completely different thing danced by Paris Opera or ABT and not in good way: they seem light years away from the real work that can be seen in Hamburg).

A cast of great artists, they deserve to be named:

Julie: Alina Cojocaru (as guest from London Royal Ballet)

Liliom: Carsten Jung

Louis, thier son: Aleix Martìnez

The man with Balloons: Sasha Riva

Frau Muskat: Anna Polikarpova

Marie: Leslie Heylmann

Wolf Beifeld: Konstantin Tselikov

Ficsur: Lloyd Riggins

A sailor: Kiran West

Gate Keeper: Edvin Revazov

A Shy Young man: Alexandr Trusch

A sad Clown: Zachary Clark

Elmer, son of Marie and Wolf: Emanuel Amuchàstegui

Here are some other moments of the ballet

http://www.ndr.de/fernsehen/sendungen/hamburg_journal/media/hamj15185.html

In the current season, Vasiliev is still expected to debut 'L'Arlesienne' for the upcoming Roland Petit tribute gala on Dec 28,

A Russian debut: he has already danced l'Arlesienne in Rome, in 2010. He also won an Italian ballet prize for that performance

http://www.danzaedanzaweb.com/premio.html

It seems that their repertoire is already huge, clearly they want more. I hope not too much.

now waiting for the Little Mermaid from SF Ballet!!!

If you enjoyed Alice, be aware that Neumeier's Littele Mermaid is very different and inspired to the "real "story: very tragical, not funny at all. And not for childrens :-)

I am so sorry to have wasted money on this.

Many people say that it's better as DVD than live. Lucky you to have only bought the DVD. I wasted days off to travel to London.

Most Importantly for me: Whoever cast the matronly Lauren Cuthbertson as a young teen should be shot; TOTALLY wrong for the character. This sort of role calls for a gorgeous smallish soubrette with a doll-like face, a-la Elena Obraztsova or (in the RB) Sarah Lamb or even Alina Cojocaru who, although older, is very doll-like and fresh-faced.

None of the dancers you are proposing is British : the press coverage pushing in this direction was huge. Lamb was dancing in the second cast, though.

A thing that I didn't understand is why Alice in this "show" is supposed to be 15-16 but Cuthberson is acting as a 8 years old.

Both Yanowsky and Rojo were great in the Rose Adagio... by far the best thing of the work, IMO.

the only McGregor I had seen before was at a Linbury studio performance and the dancers were Cojocaru and (I think) Kobborg. Let's just say with Cojocaru it looked very, very, very good and nothing if not precise.

maybe Engram with Federico Bonelli?

Still no flowers offered during curtain calls. Am i missing a tradition?

Flowers are never offered on stage. You can send flowers to dancers but they will be delivered in the dressing rooms.

Does no one want to see Wheeldon's Alice or are we just hoping Royal Ballet or Canada tours it?

I've seen it in London twice and I'm not willing to see it again. It was badly recieved by British critics and by large part of the audience, and with plenty of reasons in my opinion.

An incredibly expensive show with a poor choreography: I hope ABT is looking for something better if they want to add something to its repertoire.

It could be good for Broadway though.

annamicro - Did Italian tv or theater recently have a version of R&J with dialogue?

Do you mean Amedeo Amodio's Romeo e Giulietta with Berlioz music? The most recent performances were at end of March in San Carlo Theatre in Naples. Lacarra was guesting...I'm sorry I missed the opportunity to see her: I was there for business in those days, but couldn't arrange it!

I don't think it has ever been televised.

if any of them will be back. If youtube clips are to be believed, Cojocaru/Kobborg are superb.

I don't know if anybody can "be back for Onegin": it seems that Reid Anderson politic is to have only Stuttgart dancers as guests in Onegin (in La Scala we had Eichwald dancing with Bolle... not shows worth to remember, IMO).

Cojocaru/Kobborg clips on youtube were filmed in June 2004, seven years and 6 shows ago so you cannot really believe to them: Cojocaru and Kobborg were great, but they are even better now! They were fantastic in October in London and also in June in Antwerp. Their guesting with Royal Ballet of Flanders seems to be against "Onegin guesting rules": I don't know if it was because it was a benefit show for RBF (they danced for free) or just a kind concession for really deserved "artistic merits"....anyway a fantastic night for Antwerp ballet audience (and additional people coming from abroad )!

Cojocaru/Kobborg and Gomes as Onegin would be good reason to travel to NYC from Europe! (I should start saving money from now )

Caroline Duprot and Gemma Bond both danced Olga with the Royal.

I really loved Duprot Olga, probably she is still my favorite

Thanks for posting. I wasn't going to see SB this season (having exhausted my ballet budget), but I just bought tickets for Cojocaru/Kobborg! He is close to 40 if not 40 already - It's not likely that I'll have another chance to see them together.

I think Kobborg is 39.

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"....to show the music to me" - I so agree. She shapes the music so that it becomes a true partner in the dance. I mean this almost literally - as in a vibrant, physical presence that embraces Cojocaru.

I've always thought that Cojocaru has a unique way to paint the music and to give it different colours, making often clearer meanings hidden inside it: she is not dancing on it but using it to make her dancing a complete art form.

Yesterday evening Alina danced a sublime Manon in London (her first show with Johan Kobborg after the engagement and maybe it added something...NYC missed an opportunity, we gained it! ), and in her review of that formidable show Judith Flanders writes

"a musicality so intense that it just flows through her that raises her above everyone else. ... Sometimes she allows her steps to drift behind the music, and appears to be driven by it; sometimes she is slightly in advance, and appears to be driving it. But it is never anything but the core of her dancing."

http://www.theartsdesk.com/index.php?option=com_k2&view=item&id=3815:manon-royal-ballet&Itemid=27

After having been envious for a couple of weeks, I'm now looking forward the second Manon on Saturday

The gala review I read seemed to suggest that Cojocaru had been using more normal-looking shoes for awhile, but had switched back to the 'soup-can' shoes, so maybe you were lucky enough to see her without them. Or as you suggest, perhaps it's different strokes for different folks.

I will add that I was using binoculars, so it was extremely obvious to me that the fabric had been removed from the top of Alina's shoes, leaving a rough edge, which you can see here:

http://thefastertimes.com/dance/2011/05/24/photos-of-alina-cojocaru-and-polina-semionova-in-a-b-t-s-don-quixote/

It may have been less of an issue for other viewers though.

I'm normally using binoculars too, unfortunately...Those are the usual Cojocaru shoes. If you look very close at it, you will notice that fabric is not removed nor a cotton ring is sewed around the top, as many dancers do, but the top is covered by something like deerskin, the thickness of the material and the sewing make the top even larger. I can agree that sometimes it can look weird and that maybe 6th position is the less brilliant ballet trick in her repertoire , but usually I really focus to other aspect of Alina dancing: there is so much to watch when a dancer is dancing with the entire body, heart and brain included, and adds so many details both to movements and acting.

Macauley (like you) seems to have been more touched/moved by Cojocaru's performance, but I found that very sweetness in her portrayal to be somewhat out of character for Kitri.

I've not been touched by Cojocaru performance at all: I've not seen it. I just know her dancing quite well and I've seen also Semionova a few times, so I was just having in my mind an idea of their possible Kitris, that happened to correspond to Macauly review.

BTW, I've never seen Semionova in DQ and I've seen only some excerpts of Cojocaru (I've seen live only the pdd). I agree that Cojocaru's Kitri is an unusual character and for some aspects needs to be well supported by a great acting interaction, as with her usual partner Johan Kobborg, so I was happy to know that she was dancing with Carreno, that in my opinion could have done it excellently as he seems to have done.

I just suspect that Cojocaru portrayal of Kitri is more her own idea of the character than an acting limit. The last ballet I saw her in was Neumeier's A Midsummer Night's Dream and she was a quite energetic and physically aggressive Titania. After the show I told her I love her energy and physical power in that role and recalled a thread of this forum, talking of miscast, where Canbelto was making her name as a possible miscast as Myrtha "who would she scare? No one". After more than two weeks I'm still laughing at her reaction and her face when claiming "I can do it". (being Canbelto I would avoid to face her about that after her next Giselle ) And I'm now looking forward it: the problem is to find a (possibly tiny) Giselle that is well worth such a Myrtha!

For the moment enjoy her Giselle. The new partnership with Hallberg is intriguing, but it's a pity that NY cannot see the "whole stuff", with Johan Kobborg: their Giselle is better show after show (and they are many) and the first act is now something of unbelievable also having seen many of their performances (forget of the DVD, I saw that show also live and, comparing Alina to Alina, it's one of the less excellent performance I've seen from her in the role). You cannot see the two together, but the last news is that Kobborg is Dvorovenko Albrecht in Saturday matinee...

Hehe, yes, the Manon last pdd is exactly what came to mind when I was thinking of how to describe the trick before the fish dive (supported double tour en l'air?)! But it's good that you mentioned ice skating, because it reminded me that they also did a little flourish before some lift (or was it another fish dive?), which involved Alina first opening her legs in a split (legs parallel to the floor), which reminded me a lot of the preparation for a split twist lift in pairs skating.

Thanks for the clarification and addition!!!

As for Cojocaru…prior to the performance, I happened to read a particularly acerbic review of the ABT opening night gala, in which the reviewer praised Cojocaru's performance but bemoaned her 'soup-can' pointe shoes. And while I was watching last night, I could not get this unfortunately-apt image out of my head. I know that she uses the large boxes because of her foot problems (and I'm sorry to hear about them), but it was certainly a jarring contrast to Semionova's picture-perfect feet. Cojocaru also made some notable changes to the choreography, and I wondered if they were done to conserve her feet. For example, in Act I, in the variation where Kitri beats her fan on the ground in between the turns where she kicks her leg up and around--those were changed to something else. She also did the hops on pointe in place instead of traveling diagonally downstage.

It's strange how many people are pointing out Cojocaru feet (a friend was even thinking that her turned up foot in arabesque was the result of an injury, when it's a Russian virtuosity to make the line more appealing ), when she danced in Milan, or recently in Hamburg, they were never (or very rarely, I cannot remember a comment, but who knows) mentioned. Probably having seen her dancing many times I don't care about that or maybe I'm just looking at other things.

Also Alastair Macauley is talking of them, but they seem not have affected is opinion that much...

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/25/arts/dance/american-ballet-theater-hosts-alina-cojocaru-review.html?_r=1

An interesting article for me, because it put in great English the reasons why I love one of the two (with all her possible imperfections) and I've never been touched by the dancing of the other (with all her indubitable qualities). Probably is for the fact that her dancing and acting is not capturing me that I cannot avoiding being distracted by Semionova's very muscular and oddly shaped legs with big calves, the big shoulder and the long torso that makes her long legs look shortish (these aspects were commented many times here in Italy: probably we are focusing on different aesthetic points).

Funny, I've not seen these shows and he draws quite exactly the picture I had in my mind.

The only thing I don't agree with is that Osipova is the definitive Kitri of today. I still prefer Alexandrova, but she is a very close second...and her match with Ivan Vasiliev can add extra value to Natasha's one: lucky you to have him in NY.

Thank you for all your reviews: I'm really looking forward the next ones!

Once again, Carreno and Cojocaru pulled off some impressive lifts, with him twirling her in the air before lowering her into the fish dive.

This sounds quite interesting , maybe more an extra virtuosity (thanks to the small size of the Ballerina) than a semplification: can you or anybody else describe it more in details? ... Sorry, I realized that this morning, writing the previous sentences I mixed up two technical considerations about the show (the changes in solos and in the lifts) ...anyway I'd love to have more details about the lift: is anything similar to twist lift in ice skating, or Manon last pdd?

(When did the company start performing Nureyev's version?)

On the 7th of July 1990, quite a long time.

Yes that's it. My oh my, not something I ever expected Lopatkina to dance.

Well, Petit's Saturday Night Fever could be even more shocking: the piece is exactly what you would expect from the title. She danced it at Petit 85th Birthday Gala (broadcasted by Russian TV Kultura).

It's not likely to find it on youtube because Petit is very strict and stingy with his copyright.

There was a Lopatkina gala televised on Russian tv and the usual warhorses are there but there's one number that I found baffling. A person comes out in a black tuxedo and hat. Very androgynous. A closeup reveals it's actually Lopatkina. Her hair is her offstage short red crop, and she does this weird little jazzy dance with ballroom dancing shoes. It's more Dancing With the Stars than ballet.

Does anyone know what this piece was, who choreographed it, and whether Lopatkina still dances it? It really seems a strange piece for her.

Could it be Tango, by Androsov? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8_uAMQNpIhk

Are all this network of people of hers so strong to the point of extending its power overseas to such places as La Scala...?

Does her case has any precedent in the history of ballet-(or opera)- at all...?

Bolle. Just think at the press coverage (in Italy, of course, but also in the US) for his debut with ABT.

It was inevitable that Vaziev would summon her to Milan; I wonder what took him so long.

It was Mariinsky fault: she was invited as a substitute of Zakharova in Ballet Imperial in May-June this year, but the Mariinsky didn't give the permission, so we had Alina... Cojocaru (maybe not the best ballet for a guesting, but her second adagio with Murru was one of the best thing I've seen in La Scala).

I note that Alina Somova is to appear as a guest artist at La Scala, Milan.

http://www.teatroallascala.org/en/stagioni/2010_2011/opera-e-balletto/jewels.html

On the face of it this isn't so surprising as I believe her former champion at the Kirov, Makhar Vaziev, is now in charge of the ballet there and presumably seeks to boost his former protégée’s career.

La Scala is perhaps the most famous house for opera in the world and I can't help wondering what her reception would be were she a singer. Now I really can't imagine that house inviting an operatic equivalent of Somova to La Scala to start with, but if by some fluke she were to appear and if we could imagine her dancing skills transformed into musical ability, I imagine the hyper-critical Milanese would boo her off the stage.

I would like to ask the question, are ballet fans politer and or they less technically aware then the opera buffs?

Your comment and your question make me think that you have not seen La Scala Ballet Sleeping Beauty in London. It was named among the disasters of the year on Dance Europe, even if according to Milan regional news it was a huge success.

The theatre is sold out only if Big Bolle dances and part of the audience thinks that when they see Zakharova and Bolle together they have the best in the world. I think that Somova is perfect with the other two: the same deep and subtle artistry.

When I went back to La Scala for the Béjart night in January I realized to have not been there for 14 months in a row: it's just 30 min walking, but in those months I preferred to watch more than 50 shows in London, Paris, Hamburg, Zurich, Barcelona, Madrid, Ravenna...

Some (very few) dancers are interesting, but the company is definitely not as relevant as the name of the theatre where they usually dance (a beautiful theatre, but absolutely inadequate for ballet show: the seats with a clear view are a small minority)

Zakharova sustained two hip injuries in the course of 6 months this year. ... and the second was the recent Covent Garden tour.

As expected, La Scala announced that Zakharova is not dancing in Forsythe Night in September, for "personal reasons".

I am considering purchasing this DVD but would like more information on Neumeir's concept...I don't want to run into a 'Matthew Bourne' re-creation.

Here you can find the synopsis and some photos.

http://www.hamburgballett.de/e/rep/schwanensee.htm

It's a re-creation, but also the classical part is there. I think it's an interesting work, well worth to be seen. The cast of the DVD is great.

Greyhounds in Giselle (Rome and San Francisco).

I've seen la Fille mal gardee pony causing the most common problem you can think to have with a horse on stage...

And Boslhoi goat sometimes is a little bit reluctant entering on stage: Maria Alexandrova entered with a big smile ...but also trying desperately to drag the "dead stone" attached to the leash. In another entrance Esmeralda has the white goat in her arms: that is much easier...

I was, though, deeply disappointed that Kobborg did nothing but support the ladies the whole evening! All the solo variations were cut out, probably because the stage was to small for that. He is a brilliant partner and I find much pleasure in watching good partnering, but I would have loved to see him DANCE too, as he is one of my absolute favourites among dancers.

Well, to sum up, I will have to go to London more often in the future to see more of all these wonderful dancers! (Though the ticket prizes of Covent Garden are sheer horror )

Thanks a lot for your comments!

Maybe this was Johan original program, maybe not.

At the end of June, Kobborg had to flight back from Japan to Denmark for serious family reasons. Life and work have to go on, but not always it's an easy thing. I think you can be grateful for the show and the great cast : Cojocaru and Benjamin are fantastic and two of my three top favorite ballerinas in the Royal Ballet, McRea and Polunin are among the most interesting young dancers all around the world and I really like Whitehead, he has a very strong stage presence and good acting skill, he is maybe not that strong as a pure classical dancers, but he is definitely one of my favorite ballet-dance artists.

I don't think that Royal Opera House tickets are really expensive. Some of them yes, ok, but it's one of the most "democratic" theatre I've ever been: you can have fantastic seats, maybe not that close to the stage, but with an excellent and completely free view for quite cheap prices: there are good places for every budget and everybody can attend to a show and SEE it. In Milan La Scala, for example, there are very few seats with a clear view and they are expensive, and you can even spend 70-138 euros to see almost nothing (to not talk of the much lower quality of the performances). I spent much more when coming to Copenhagen than for a show at Covent Garden...