Monday, October 16

[dirac]

A review of Marina Harss' "The Boy From Kyiv" by Alice Robb in The New Republic.

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Harss tries to present instead a more immediately accessible version of Ratmansky, tracing what she sees as his political awakening. The title, “the boy from Kyiv,” refers to a nickname he was given at the Bolshoi Ballet School as well as his commitment to his home country in the wake of Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. Harss attempts to cast her subject, who has spent his life ensconced in the insular world of ballet, as a newly political artist. But she also manages to highlight, paradoxically, how detached Ratmansky has often been, placid toward those around him and largely oblivious to sociopolitical turmoil—a man more concerned with ballet itself than with the world at large.

 

[dirac]

State Street Ballet presents "Giselle" with live accompaniment from the Santa Barbara Symphony.

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The performance features staging by State Street Ballet’s new Artistic Director Megan Philipp, who recently took over that role from founding director Rodney Gustafson (Cecily MacDougall will take the reins from Gustafson as executive director in January 2024); direction from Marina Fliagina and Chauncey Parsons; choreography by Jean Coralli, Jules Perrot, and Marius Petipa; and music written by Adolphe Adam.