Tuesday, June 14

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Kyiv City Ballet will tour the U.S. for the first time this fall.

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The company’s star ballerinas, Krystina Kadashevych and Oksana Bondarenko, will be featured on the tour, as will Vsevolod Maevskiy, a former soloist at the Mariinsky Ballet in St. Petersburg, now a principal with the troupe.

 

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A piece on American Ballet Theatre's gala in Vogue, with red carpet pix.

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....At last night’s ABT June Gala, he bid farewell to the company and its members with swift graciousness. “Nobody really wants to sit here and listen to us speak all night,” he said to his ABT audience, back in Lincoln Center’s Metropolitan Opera House for the first time since the pandemic began. “What we want to do is to see these fabulous dancers dance…So let me just simply say that ABT has been the focus and inspiration for my entire professional life. And I have been nurtured by these dancers and dancers past with the gift of trying to explain, not just what beauty looks like, but what feels like. And tonight, it feels pretty damn good.”

 

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A preview of American Ballet Theatre's "Of Love and Rage" by Marina Harss in The New York Times.

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In this sense, “Of Love and Rage” is like a time capsule from a more carefree period, in the world, and in his life. But one thing hasn’t changed. Work keeps him occupied. In rehearsal, he seemed as concentrated as ever. Every few minutes, he got up to demonstrate something, and his suggestions to the dancers came out in a polite but near-constant stream.

“When I am in the studio,” he said, “I am fully focused on the dancers and the ballet. I can still do that. But I have not choreographed since the war started.”

 

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The family of Ballet Arizona dancer Colleen Hoopes celebrate her life.

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But amid their pain, her family is honoring her legacy. They have established the Colleen Buckley Scholarship at the Draper Center for Dance Education. The scholarship will support young dancers who, like Colleen, dream of being professional ballet dancers, her parents said. 

 

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An interview with Houston Ballet's Harper Watters.

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"I consciously continued to create content that was authentic to me and would reach other people," he said. "I would use these heeled videos to bring people into my world and then I would share my world as a black, queer dancer."

He began sharing his life as a dancer on his YouTube Series, The Pre-Show, which takes viewers backstage and gives them a glimpse inside the world of professional ballet.

 

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A review of the National Ballet of Canada by Isabella Perrone for Broadway World.

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What's especially refreshing in this staging is how modern it feels for something clearly set in a fairytale-esque setting full of royalty, magic, and darkness. Odette was captured, but consistently fights against Rothbart's hold on her and stands defensive over the other women. Siegfried's mother and sisters seem to have a great amount of agency, possibly due to their royal status, and at the masked ball where Siegfried is to choose a bride each candidate introduces herself and vies for his hand independently (give or take a few supporting dancers).

 

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Jovani Furlan launches a line of dancewear for men only.

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One could say that Furlan, who has been dancing professionally for 12 years, previously for the Miami City Ballet before joining NYCB in 2019, has enough experience to know what is missing from the male dancewear market. And so mid-pandemic, while still living with family in Brazil and looking to utilize the time offstage, that’s exactly what he set out to do.

 

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A review of Queensland Ballet by Denise Richardson for dance Australia.

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It has been a decade since Li Cunxin took over the reins as Artistic Director of Queensland Ballet, and this specially curated program of works, “Li’s Choice”, celebrates the milestone. It also celebrates the company – its breadth, depth and diversity.

 

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The National Ballet of Canada will visit New York next year.

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Toronto audiences will have a chance to catch Anima Animus for its Canadian premiere just before the company hits the road for the Big Apple. The last time the National toured to NYC was back in 2008, performing Jiří Kylián’s Soldiers’ Mass. A decade earlier in 1998, the company performed the work of Canadian choreographers James Kudelka, Dominique Dumais and John Alleyne.

 

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A review of the National Ballet of Canada in "Swan Lake" by Gary Smith in The Hamilton Spectator.

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Choosing to stamp a more human face on this elegant old warhorse, Kain has retained such moments of magic from Bruhn’s dramatic vision. In a program note she says she wants us, “to leave the theatre moved by the romantic nature of the piece.” In this, she has succeeded brilliantly.