abatt

I think you may be right, mussel. Recall that the Mik cancelled a prior tour to New York when McKenzie would not allow Osipova (who was a full time ABT principal at the time) to appear with the Mik at the Koch due to a non compete clause. If Osipova cannot participate in the upcoming tour, the Mik may scrap the NY leg. Hard to believe that the entire enterprise would be contingent on the availabilityi of a single dancer. I would go see the company regardless of whether Osipova was appearing. added: But why would they go to the expense of appearing in CA for 3 days if they were not planning on also making at least one additional tour stop in the US? If they were going to cancel the NYC leg, why not also cancel the CA leg too and be done with it.

Yes, Vishneva is a great artist. However, she has chosen, increasingly, to focus on non-classical work. For me, her modern non-ballet works don't work on video or in person anymore. I thought she might do something remotely classical at the gala, since this was a tribute to the teacher that helped her reach her full potential as a classical ballerina. But no, that did not happen.

I wonder if Osipova and Polounin will be part of the NY leg of the tour.

I've always thought of Cojocaru and Kobborg as a package deal as far as the Romainian Ballet was concerned. If he's no longer affiliated, I wonder what her future plans will be.

ABT did Anastasia a number of years ago. It was one of the worst ballets I had ever seen.

Casting is up for week 1 of the Spring Season. http://www.nycballet.com/NYCB/media/NYCBMediaLibrary/PDFs/Press/Casting/NYCB_Casting_April-19-24,-2016_lobby.pdf Isaacs is debuting in Tschai pdd, and Gordon is debuting in Symphony in 3 Movements.

I'm willing to bet money that during the next revival of Giselle, Copeland will be cast as Giselle. She has mentioned that this a role she has always wanted to do. McKenzie will not deny her Giselle.

Since she has never been cast as Aurora, and is not scheduled to be cast as Aurora in any future performances, an educated guess would be that Copeland presently does not know the role. Practically speaking, if McKenzie can fill up an opera house by listing Copeland in an 8 minute role, there is no need to cast her in the lead instead of the the 8 minute Florine role In fact, the smarter money is on leaving her in the 8 minute role, which she can perform multiple times in a single week, or even twice in a day. Nobody does Aurora twice in a week except in a dire emergency due to illness or injury. More performances as Florine in a week = increased ticket sales for every one of those performances. In this regard, I'm a little bit surprised that ABT has not yet posted the secondary casting for the Met ABT SB shows.

There may be hope for a future run in New York City of this musical. The creative team have made various changes, and an invitation only workshop took place on March 28. Tiler Peck and many of the original cast members participated in the reading. http://www.playbill.com/article/ahrens-and-flahertys-little-dancer-tests-legs-in-nyc-workshop

I've gone to a few PT shows this season, and it seems like Trusnovec is cutting back on his performance schedule. A lot of roles that used to be his sole domain are now shared with other men in the company. Not sure what his age is, but it appears that time may be catching up to him. I wonder how many more years he plans to dance.

In response to a question about the 16/17 performance schedules, NYCB has indicated on its twitter page that the schedules will not be available until late April or early May, when subscriptions go on sale.

http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2016/03/24/city-ballet-season-to-feature-two-premieres-by-women/?ref=dance&_r=0 Return of Sleeping Beauty. Yeah http://www.nycballet.com/NYCB/media/NYCBMediaLibrary/PDFs/Press/2016-03-24_NYCB-2016-17-Season-Announcement.pdf Here is the full press release

I don't agree with the decision to put this ballet in a new setting. I'm just pointing out what I think Lopez's motivation was to change the setting. It's all about the buzz for some company artistic directors.

People always feel the need to revise and tinker with the classics. It results in additional publicity and a curiosity factor. I'm not sure the NY Times would have sent its lead critic to Florida to review this production if it was merely the same exact production that's performed at NYCB and elsewhere.

I was happy that Simone Messmer got such a positive review. I'm glad she is thriving there. Another instance of ABT ignoring the talent within its own ranks.

I also got my singles this evening. Box office rep said it was ABT's directive to not sell singles to subscribers, but the backlash from subscribers calling and emailing with complaints caused ABT to change course. Time for whoever cooked up this scheme (and then tried to blame it on the Met) to lose his or her job.

I'm not sure there is friction with the Met box office. Someone noted above that one of the box office employees was critical of the fact that ABT was not allowing single ticket sales, because the result would be even longer lines and more work for them during the week of March 20th. I think this came directly from ABT as a scheme to ultimately make more money once dynamic pricing starts, and it backfired. If there wasn't friction before, I guess there will be now, since ABT is trying to distance itself from this mess by taking the coward's way out and pretending that there must have been a miscommunication in the instructions received by the Met employees.

I think Mr. Timm reported to his superiors at ABT the number of complaints he received, and they now are doing a 180 degree shift from the rules that were in effect earlier in the week. What I find troubling, among other things, is that there is a pretense that they never instructed the Met not to sell singles to subscribers during priority week. Give me a break. Hopefully the Met employeees at the box office window are now fully aware that they are allowed to sell singles. So much wasted time and energy, and for what?!.

LOL. Mr. Timm is having a busy week. I emailed him yesterday too. He replied promptly and was trying to be helpful. He claims that ABT subscribers are allowed to buy single tixs at the box office window during priority week, and that this has always been the case. He did not offer any explanation as to why every box office employee previously refused to sell the tickets on ABT's instructions. Armed with my email from Mr. Timm, I intend to revisit (for the third time this week!!!) the box office tonight or tomorrow to see what the latest and greatest policy is on this topic. Best of luck to anyone intending to wait on line Sunday. The weather is going to be ugly.

Something very bizarre is going on. Every subscriber I've spoken with was denied the chance to buy any additional single tickets at the box office window until the public on sale date. It's not just one Met box office emplouyee who is doing this. It's all of them, and they state that they are acting on direct orders from ABT. Is ABT now trying to pretend that all of these Met employees have gone "rogue" and are not acting based on instructions from ABT? It appears that the marketing department has no clue that another department within ABT provided these instructions to the Met.

Hee Seo is the exchange artist. As noted somewhere in this thread, Hee Seo will perform Aurora next month at the Mariinsky, with Shkylarov as Prince Desire and Kondaurova as Lilac.

Does anyone think this new policy relates to scalping issues? I have no doubt that certain shows will end up on Stub Hub for 4 or 5 times the actual ticket price. But if they are trying to prevent scalping, isn't thare a better way than treating your subscribers poorly?

For me, sitting through the Ratmansky Firebird is a painful experience no matter who is performing. I did not like that ballet at all. I'm buying one ticket to that program so I can see the new Ratmansky ballet and Seven Sonatas. I considered buying an additional performance of that program, with an alternate cast, but now that is off the table. Not happening under any circumstance.

I think that ABT was, indeed, trying to minimize and depress single ticket purchases before March 27, when dynamic pricing goes into effect so that they could make more money per ticket once they jack up the prices. I bet a large segment of the ticket buyimg public has no clue that prices will increase on March 27. Since subscribers tend to be more in tune to the rules and regs of ABT pricing and policies than the casual ticket buyer, it is surprising that ABT would play this game with its most loyal customers. ABT's motives are, in my opinion, pretty transparent. The funny thing is that none of the dates I was interested in adding are "hot" tickets. I think that the only things that will actually increase on Mar 27 are the Ferri R&J and any performance involving Misty Copeland. Perhaps the Vishneva R&J, but I'm not even sure about that.

I resent the idea that ABT places so little value on the time of its subscribers. This means that as a subscriber, you need to wait once on the subscriber exchange line during priority week, and a second time on the line for single ticket purchases once the public on sale date occurs if you wish to add additional dates. You need to accomplish all this on or before March 26, because they raise the prices on March 27. (*By the way, it is my understanding that you cannot exchange subscriber tickets during the first week of public single ticket sales, so that if you're a subscriber, you have no choice but to wait in line twice if you want all of your exchanges and single ticket purchases to be completed by the magical price increase date of March 27.) In addition to the reasons articulated above about banking money as soon as possible, the new policy makes no sense for other reasons. When they take your money as a donation because you've exchanged into a cheaper section, ABT does NOT get that donation money. (See NY Susan's entry, above, where they would not let her use the price difference for an additional ticket, but instead suggested that she give the money to the Met as a donation.) That donation is a donation to the Met Opera. Is ABT looking to increase the donations to the Met Opera instead of allowing people to buy additional ABT tickets with the monetary difference? Additionally, when you pay internet ticketing fees those fees again do not go to ABT. They go to the Met Opera. So to the extent that subscribers take to the internet or phone to buy their additional tickets next week, none of those handling fees are going to ABT. ABT should be careful what it wishes for. If they want subcribers to stay within the same number of tickets that they originally purchased on subscription, their wish will be granted. There are certain dates that I would have bought singles for but I'm now so pissed off they will be permanently deleted from the list of dates I intend to buy. Considering that there is no discount whatsoever when you buy a subscription, plus you have to pay a subscription handling fee, I'm wondering whether going forward it makes sense to only buy single tickets, and not bother with the subscriptions. At least you only have to wait in line once. The folks within the ABT administration did not think this one through, and this is going ot backfire.