amiaow

Thanks sz, didn't realise it was already released!

Does anyone know if there is likely to be a DVD release?

Loved it too, what a fun way to end the evening!

Luminous is wonderful- and heavy! Great idea on that extra suitcase.

I look forward to hearing about which bookstores to shop at via your friend- I'm spending a weekend in Sydney with my sister in a couple of months and have a day free for shopping while she's at work. This could get dangerous! ;)

I rarely get to see the Australian Ballet these days (moved to Brisbane and they rarely tour here and I haven't spent much time in Syd/Melb in recent years) but the tiny Amber Scott is really lovely, you should see her if you can. However, Aus ballet website says casting is only available one hour before show, so chance of getting a good ticket is unfortunately greatly diminished if you have to wait until then!

Unfortunately I have no idea on the bookstores- I've bought nearly all of my ballet books overseas. Hope you find something, and have a wonderful time in Sydney

I saw on the Mariinsky Ballet Facebook page that Kondaurova was on holidays for the rest of the season.

Thank you! Watched the Mariinsky live for my evening entertainment last night. It was wonderful!

The woman is Natalia Zozulina.

I was particularly sorry to hear of Vasnetsova leaving. Did she join another company?

I'm in Brisbane, Australia which is a large city with good internet. I'm about to attempt Episode 6 so keep your fingers crossed

I'm using Chrome. It does pre-load, but it still plays as terribly as it does when not pre-loaded. Strange! I will attempt another browser for next week's episode and hopefully that will help. Thank you for your assistance!

I tried, it won't pre-load. Might sneak in an after-work session to see if it's my home connection or just the country I live in!

Is anyone else having trouble streaming this series? Mine stops every few seconds and it's driving me crazy... don't have this problem with anything else!

I'm really enjoying this series. It's such a nice change from the drama of Breaking Pointe and even the show about the Royal NZ Ballet. Looking forward to the next episode!

There is plenty of video evidence of Skorik doing plenty of successful fouettes.

Also Gamzatti on Feb 19th- is this also a debut?

AFAIK Somova has been her natural brunette for many years.

I was a bit surprised that the lone American on the company's roster, Keenan Kampa, is not on this tour. Also, no Xander Parish, the British member of the troupe, who often dances the Swan lake pas de trois. Very odd. On the other hand, the playbill lists newcomer Alexandra Somova ("lil' sister") as a member of the corps.

I'm guessing that those-not-here went to Copenhagen earlier this month. Fateev is 'spreading the wealth' for touring opportunities, it seems.

Kampa just had hip surgery- don't know how long she'll be out for but expect it might be a while.

The Raymonda variations- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8fBXIKaAFbw

Adagio- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Lbhyh1A74o

The issue of Harper's Bazaar is actually the current one- November 2013. Not sure why they date magazines that way!

I think compared to the competition they were deserving of their places. It's not as though they were awarded the Grand Prix! Bondareva put in a couple of lovely performances in Round 1 + 2 but her Round 3 was really quite athletic and lacked artistry. Skorik put in good but not great performances in Round 1 + 2 and her Round 3 was much improved. I enjoy watching Skorik- I can't take my eyes off of her and think she is absolutely beautiful, but she's inherently unstable due to her hyper-flexible structure. She's obviously worked hard on this in recent years but it still troubles her. It would probably improve with the addition of some muscle mass but what dancer carries more than the absolute minimum muscle mass? She does have something special- the video is now gone from Youtube, but in her 2 swans variation in the rehearsal for the 3D telecast she looked much better than Odette- she just needs to come out of her shell on stage. When she's on, she's just gorgeous.

I have a newfound appreciation of Timur following this competition. People will whinge that he won gold because he's from a wealthy family and can benefit the Mariinsky, blah blah blah whinge whinge whinge, and so on. But, he was lovely- he looks so happy to be out there- he's super consistent, he puts in clean, precise, solid performances every time and I just love to watch him jump. He covers so much stage. He's a tall guy too, look at the length of those legs in grand jete! He doesn't look as good in partnering as he does in his solos- just lacks a little something that makes you want to watch him, but he was deserving of his place compared to the other males.

I can understand die-hard Mariinsky fans having a whinge about this pair. You can clearly see the artistic and stylistic difference between dancers who trained at VBA vs. those who didn't. But this wasn't a Mariinsky competition, and they performed well in each round and obviously performed very well compared to the other couples. Congratulations to them!

They are through to the second round, which I think begins tomorrow. They danced together so I assume they are competing as a duo?

Speaking of Obraztsova, there is a little section on her trip to Moscow competition with some footage and her reflections on her recent monologue about herself on Youtube. It now has English subtitles for those of us who have very poor Russian!

Edit: Definitely competing as duo- http://moscowballetcompetition.com/en/node/28 has updated standings and categories.

Performance from Moscow Ballet competition- great to see this variation, it seems to be omitted from most of the Youtube videos that appear of SL. IMO they did really well. I know people whinge about Timur but I love to watch him- he's always so precise, even if his partnering is sometimes a little wobbly.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L3wI44DVOU8

I went to last night's performance of Corsaire. Ekaterina Shipulina played Medora, Lobukhin played Conrad, Kristina Kretova played Gulnare and Denis Savin played Birbante. I must admit that I spend most of my time following the Mariinsky but after this performance I have a newfound appreciation of the strong Bolshoi style.

Shipulina took some time to settle into the role and had a few timing issues with the orchestra during the Act 1 PDD & variations, but once she got going she was strong. She portrayed a sweet, radiant Medora. Lobukhin as Conrad was fine- his standout moment was his variation during Act 1 which drew gasps from the crowd with his magnificent leaps. I personally felt that the relationship between Medora and Conrad seemed a little contrived, but maybe that's just Corsaire. Kretova as Gulnare was lovely, perfectly in character with a great sense of humour in Act 3 and technically she was excellent. Savin could have received a few boos from the audience for his role as Birbante, in the best possible way of course!

The standouts for the evening were the three odalisques, played by Maria Vinogradova, Anne Okuneva and Chinara Alizade- what wonderful precision. The ladies of the corps de ballet were also really wonderful. It was remarkable how little variation there was in height/size between them- I am so used to seeing significant differences and they were so uniform!

The sets were divine, but the sound coming from the orchestra was not the warm, beautiful upwelling I'd expect when listening to this score- it might have been the accoustics or where I was sitting on the first balcony, but it definitely took the orchestra at least the first act to meld. The costumes during Act 2 and 3 were lovely but I felt that the white/maroon/turquoise of Act 1 was actually a little hard to look at and certainly difficult to determine the difference between some of the main characters (especially the men) based on costuming.

This performance was good, but it didn't capture my spirit in the way I expected a Russian company would. I'm off to the Bolshoi again next Friday evening for The Bright Stream which I am really looking forward to!

And Somova? She certainly attracted her share of controversy!