ksk04

Just to update, here are the announced casts on the website:

Feb.24 - Zakharova, Volchkov

Feb.25, 27 (mat), 28 - Osipova, Vasiliev

Feb.26, 27 (eve) - Aleksandrova, Lobukhin

I am confused though...is that Mikhail Lobukhin from the Mariinsky dancing with Maria Alexsandrova?? There is no Lobukhin on the Bolshoi website that I can see or have really heard of before (that I can remember). What is going on here?!

I hope this isn't inappropriate but I wonder if this comes with a huge pay cut for Martins...the speculated reasons in the past for him making so much more than Kevin McKenzie have been that McKenzie has Rachel Moore as his Executive Director, the implication being Martins has more responsibilities since he was on his own and therefore is doing enough to cover the additional salary.

An inquiry to the box office confirms the change to Don Q. The woman I spoke to said the change came from the Bolshoi not the center, they didn't give a particular reason when they decided to change it, it happened very recently, and that she too was looking forward to a showing of La Bayadere.

I doubt we would get Spartacus even if they changed the program again...I don't think they could strike the sets from the Kennedy Center and get them across the country in the time frame they have between the two dates.

Irina Dvorovenko and Max Beloserkovsky will be at Festival Ballet Theatre (Orange County, CA) 12/11, 12/12 (mat and eve) and 12/13. Paloma Herrera and Gennadi Saveliev will be there 12/19 (mat and eve) and 12/20 (mat and eve).

I got an email today from OCPAC showing the Bolshoi as bringing Don Quixote to the center, instead of the previously announced La Bayadere (though the website still says La Bayadere but now has a Don Q picture next to it). All the leaflets I have seen at the center have shown pics from the Shades of La Bayadere so I guess this is a recent development.

Wonder why the change? We had the Mariinsky here last season with both Don Q and Giselle...and now this year the only classical companies are bringing the same stuff: ABT with Giselle and the Bolshoi with Don Q. A touch overkill methinks...especially because I can't even remember the last time La Bayadere toured here.

Sunday matinee…Dvorovenko/Beloserkovsky/Part/Matthews

Act one at this outing was pretty boring…none of the supporting characters livened the stage with the exception of the peasant pas danced by Isabella Boylston and Mikhail Ilyin. I think they were my favorite of the three pairs I saw, mostly because they looked like they actually enjoyed dancing together. Melissa Thomas as Bathilde added nothing to the story, and Karin Ellis-Wentz as Giselle’s mother didn’t quite live up to the presence of Susan Jones or Nancy Raffa. As mostly expected Beloserkovsky was pretty bland throughout, though nothing he did was bad…just nothing particularly interesting. On a random note, I would like to point out Roman Zhurbin (I think?) who on the opening night and during this performance looked like he would rather do nothing else than cart the respective Giselles around on his shoulder for the rest of the show with the biggest smile on his face. It’s a small but appreciated touch.

The first act was only enlivened because of Irina’s Giselle…thankfully she has enough personality for her husband and the whole village, really. Her dancing was beautiful throughout the show; she kept giving these lingering balances and wonderfully secure turns at every chance, though it was never overdone or tasteless. Her second act was very nice; she was just like a wisp floating around the stage, thanks, of course, to Beloserkovsky, whose partnering was great throughout. For me, she gave a great and thoughtful performance--she is capable of delivering drama coupled with an easy, expressive technique that never makes you worry about her getting through the choreography.

Veronika Part looked more secure in this show than the opening night. Her leaps seemed to have an extra punch in them to make them hang in the air for a second longer. Her Myrtha is a very tragic figure (not as frigid as Gillian Murphy), and though she is quite tall and womanly I would love to see her Giselle (if Lopatkina can do it at her height, I don’t see why it would be so verboten for Veronika to get a go at it, considering the lack of truly great Giselles in ABT’s permanent ranks). Kristi Boone and Simone Messmer were Moyna and Zulme.

On the box office, I noted the number of rushers and how easy it was to obtain really good seats; the back few rows of the orchestra were clearly empty; there looked to be empty seats in all levels.

Indeed, the rush is a great OCPAC tradition, even when tickets are selling better than this week...I did rush today and got 6th row orchestra dead center seats. With the row in front of me empty in my little sightline. What luck!

I have to say when I saw the Kent/Carreno cast I thought I would prefer to see her with Gomes (since it has been said he brings the best out of her) and Carreno with Reyes (they usually seem paired for Giselle). Too bad I didn't know about the cast change, as I wanted to see Marcelo this time around but try to actively avoid Paloma Herrera in classical roles.

Got back from today's matinee...Ricetto/Hallberg/Murphy/Saveliev cast. Still pretty undersold, imo, but a bit better than opening night.

Maria Riccetto and David Hallberg got off to a good start...their acting meshed together very well, but in their opening scene, unlike others I've seen, this wasn't the first meeting between them, or so it came off. Maria was more teasing than shy, and they were very easy with other where other couples drag out the uncertainty a little more. Also, again I don't know if this was intentional, but Maria's Giselle clearly saw when Albrecht reaches for his sword in his first altercation with Hilarion. Does she know? Does she not know? This wasn't really answered, though in her mad scene she definitely brushed off Hilarion's big sword reveal much quicker than other Giselles. Gennadi's Hilarion was different here than on opening night...he was much more aggressive with David's Albrecht and at the end of the mad scene, I felt for him more than any other characters as he threw back his head and arms for Albrecht to kill him, and when Albrecht did not he fell to the floor sobbing for everything that went wrong (I don't think he did any of those things before).

I have to say the peasant pas was just okay. Hee Seo was beautiful on her own (seemed a bit gunshy though during her turns) but Blaine Hoven did her absolutely no favors with his partnering. Every time they did a supported pirouette or a lift she tensed and grimaced the entire way through (with reason too, she almost slipped off his shoulder and he knocked her leg way off balance in her pirouettes). I don't know what was going on, and I don't know if they dance together that much but it did not come off well.

Riccetto had a few stumbles, literally, however it is to her credit that neither broke her confidence or character. In her act one solo she slipped in the diagonal toe hops but recovered very quickly (probably imperceptibly if you didn't know what was supposed to be there) by finishing them out with fondu releves moving on the diagonal. Then in act two during the big overhead lifts where Giselle first appears to Albrecht...it looked like she caught her foot and slipped on her tutu and fell in a big heap on the floor. Again she recovered quickly and luckily got to immediately make her exit.

I will admit I am not a big Murphy fan, but she really owns the role of Myrtha, and won me over with this one. Every expression and every move is so totally thought out...I could list the little things that knocked me over but that will be boring and long. However I will give her amazing props for timing one of her runs across the front of the stage with a glare and flick of her finger at the audience (completely in character) when a baby started wailing his head off in one of the tiers to silence the dissension in her forest. It was great.

Maria and David were fantastic in the second act. David was amazing to watch...his entrechat sixs were so that you could count each individual beat. Maria was light and she and David really moved as one during the grand pas. She kept her poses and extensions very traditional (which is much appreciated) and the simplicity of it all created a great mood.

Overall, a much more engaging and emotionally stirring outing all around for me.

I hope someone else (anyone?!?!) will add their thoughts about the shows this week. I'm still down for one more tomorrow, and am hoping to see a different Moyna/Zulme set.

Edited to ask: Are the seats selling better?

ksk04 wrote:

Went to opening night last night...have to report it was very sadly under attended. Swaths of rows in the orchestra and tier 1 (those were the sections I could see from my seat) were completely empty.

Just going from the online ticketing (where you can see which seats remain unsold)...no. There are four seating sections and all of them show 100+ tickets available in EACH section, for the rest of the week. OCPAC does tend to do a big rush business though, but I don't know if it's that big. I'm sure the matinees this wknd will be the most full.

Went to opening night last night...have to report it was very sadly under attended. Swaths of rows in the orchestra and tier 1 (those were the sections I could see from my seat) were completely empty. Quite unusual for an ABT showing here, and it appears that it will be that way for the rest of the week if the seat selection box office on their website is to be believed.

I went to this cast mostly for Carreno and Part. I usually don't go to see Julie Kent as she's not a particular favorite, but people on here often write she seems better suited to Romantic roles. She seemed very hesitant out of the gate (understandable as this is her first full length ballet back from having a baby) and it seemed her jump really lagged through most of the first act, however she was creating beautiful and beautifully held arabesques and balances throughout. Jose for his part also was quite reserved, though seemingly ardent in his affections for Giselle.

Maria Riccetto and Jared Matthews did the peasant pas, and, for me, she lit up the stage and he seemed much more in control than I have seen him in the past. The divine Maria Bystrova was Bathilde and when she arrived onstage, it was hard to take your eyes off of her. In the second act, Gennadi Saveliev really burst out as Hilarion...I rarely get to see him truly dance - he is usually limited to strutting about onstage as the bad guy, and he was quite lovely (got a big holler at the bows).

Veronika Part was spectacular as Myrtha, icy and strong. The highlight of the entire night, truly. It has been...a very long time since I have seen her ontage and she was fantastic. The entire corps of Willis actually looked very nice together and very well rehearsed. Boylston and Kajiya were Moyna and Zulme.

For me...the second act really didn't take off between Kent and Carreno. Julie struggled heavily with the developpe and penche opening of the pas de deux (she actually didn't penche at all and kinda just stood there). During the variation section immediately after the grand pas, they sparked and both of them seemed to get a big burst of energy, but it didn't last long.

All in all a decent night. I know I will be back on Sunday for the Dvorovenko/Belotserkovsky/Part cast, and I am going to try to squeeze in the Sat mat with Riccetto/Hallberg as well, but we will see.

Osipova has said in interviews that she's done Kitri so much that she could do it if they woke her up at 3 am in her sleep. I don't blame her if she wants to expand her horizons.

From an interview with ballet.co.uk:

"I dream about serious, major work – about Juliet. I would really like to dance it now, at my age, not when I am thirty. I don’t even care which version I dance...It would be interesting to dance “Sleeping Beauty”, but it’s performed so rarely that I am unlikely to get it. In that ballet I would have liked to dance the happiness of youth. After all,I am still so young. "

Interview, 2008

So I am not surprised she wound up dancing these roles.

The lack of Radetsky in anything besides the Tharp and Fancy Free is quite disappointing. I guess he will go back to doing von Rothbarts and Espadas to infinity. It's too bad-I don't begrudge Cory Stearns anything because I have seen him and I quite like what he could turn out to be, but he has a ton of very coveted role debuts this season (Armand and Oberon certainly)...one wonders if the bounty couldn't have been spread more evenly among the soloist men with Steifel and Corella further reducing their time with ABT.

I think that has to be a mistake, no? Maria Riccetto is scheduled to dance Myrtha at that performance and she just started doing Giselle. It looks like someone swapped their roles...I hope anyway.

Since there was a week long engagement I was hoping for Stella Abrera to finally debut in Giselle...there are certainly enough shows. It's too bad.

Well it looks like I'll be at opening night for sure for JM Carreno and V.Part. Possibly the Reyes/Cornejo/Abrera show, and if the roles get worked out I'd like to see Riccetto as Giselle with David Hallberg, since I always end up missing him when they are in town.

I've sat everywhere at OCPAC and almost every place has decent sightlines, save anywhere behind the first few rows of tier 3. I like midway back orchestra for ballet, personally (though I have sat as close as orchestra C and not killed my neck) as I do like to be close, but will do front of Tier 1 or Tier 2 also. The Tiers all slope down very far in the front so they aren't as high up as other venue's upper levels. I agree that it's a very interestingly designed space, well-thought out for seating.

Note: if you're in town for the weekend and want to catch several shows, almost all performances get a large amount of tix for student/senior rush avail. 1 hour before showtime. $20 for orch seats, and $10 for the tiers. This is of course dependent on availability (but for ballet...read: almost always avail), but that's usually how I play it and I have rarely been disappointed!