I was browsing around in the bookstore yesterday and spotted this. Apparently in the summer of 1518, in Strasbourg, one woman began dancing and couldn’t stop. This “hysteria” spread until a great number of people had literally danced themselves to death. It’s referred to as the dancing plague, which I’d never heard of before. The book is written by medical historian John Waller, and has received pretty good reviews. I’m definitely going to read it.

Of course it reminded me of the wilis of Giselle and made me think, though we moderns love to roll our eyes at some of these “silly” ballet characters — girls being turned into swans, maiden ghosts forcing the men who snubbed them in life to dance to their deaths — it’s interesting to explore their bases in history, myth and literature. The ideas usually came from somewhere.

My recent rant about opera crowds being more respectful of a performance than dance-goers is featured in the Westside Independent, an online magazine about all things Upper West Side.

Here’s an interesting article on the BBC’s website about audience applause during classical music performances that I found to be at least somewhat apropos of our earlier discussion about applause during ballet. They’re a bit different since applause at the wrong time interferes more directly with music than with dance-watching, but, still, many of the same issues came up. Apparently, the BBC Proms festival of classical music is currently underway, which draws many newcomers.

I have to say, I greatly appreciate the word “numpties” used by one commenter

Thanks to a comment from the executive producer on my prior post, I remembered to watch the series premiere last night of the newest TV dance show (Oxygen network).

It was sweet. All of the contestants are “real people,” some with dance background, most with none, and all of whom are overweight, some severely and life-threateningly so. They each work with a professional dance partner, a nutritionist, a doctor, and a fitness coach to learn to eat right, maintain physical fitness, and of course dance. For many of these contestants, success on the show is a matter of life and death — no exaggeration. That’s what morbidly obese means — it’s not just a loose term that means “gross” or something; it means the obesity could have morbid results. The doctor was very interesting. He talked about how for many of the contestants, fat had leaked into their liver, their pancreas, and their diaphragm, making it harder for those organs to function, harder for the contestants to breathe. I knew it could cause diabetes but I didn’t know fat could do that – could spread to other organs, like cancer, and overtake them.

Anyway, it’s a competition of course, like almost all reality TV these days, so a person is eliminated each week. The dancing is all fast-paced and aerobic, which makes sense. The dances last night were chosen by the contestant — hip hop, disco, swing or jive. Next week everyone is supposed to compete in disco.

There are three judges and each contestant receives a score, based on the quality of their dancing. They then weigh themselves, and the percentage of their total body weight that they lost that week is added onto their dance score for a total score. The person with the lowest score leaves. There seems to be no audience vote.

Which is fine, because it’s completely impossible to root for one person at the expense of the rest. Of course you want them all to do well. And it’s kind of sad that it has to be a competition anyway, given the goal of the show (which is of course to lose weight but there’s also an incentive in the form of a $100,000 prize). But competitions are what audiences seem to want these days. As it was, the first person to leave last night was the person who probably had the least to lose: she’s an attractive young woman, a former model, and had only recently begun to put on the pounds. But she wasn’t anywhere near as heavy as the rest. Hopefully, she had enough time on the show (meaning, the weeks — I assume it was weeks — spent preparing), to change her lifestyle.

I think the show is a very good idea, but I do hope its important message is able to rub off on the general public and it doesn’t just become a spectacle like so much reality TV. The reason many thin people are thin is that they have happy, fulfilling, active lifestyles. They appreciate the taste of food and so seek well-made, quality food (ie: eat canned asparagus with dinner and you’re probably going to have to get rid of the horrendous aftertaste with a monster bag of Oreos or whatnot; eat asparagus vinegarette with a nice glass of wine and no need for dessert), in moderation and without gorging (you can’t appreciate the taste if you’re only going to gobble it right down) and without ever depriving themselves of their favorites. (ie: eat chocolate and be happy, but buy a quality bar and you’ll be much more fulfilled than if you eat crap from a vending machine, in which case you’re probably going to have to eat a few bars to be likewise sated).

I know it sounds funny for a blogger with the words “skinny white girl” in her tag line to be lecturing on weight loss, but honestly my mother is the same size as many of the contestants on the show — actually bigger; she’s really too big to dance — and she has a whole host of health problems and I worry about her daily. The only difference between us is lifestyle (city versus small town) and our approach to food.

Of course another reason thin people are thin is that they don’t have time to eat so much because they’re out being active, and being active is fun, not a chore. You don’t have to go to the gym, you don’t have to run laps. You can lose weight and become fit by learning to dance, so long as you’re learning proper technique and learning to use proper muscle groups. And then you’re not just losing weight but getting sculpted as well

I think this show is a great idea. It’s on every Monday night from 10-11:30 EST, 9 pm Central. Visit their website to learn some of the dance moves on the show, watch episodes, and submit your own videos. You can also join their Facebook page to discuss. For weight loss, I recommend your local dance studio — preferably ballet (I’m not kidding; just because barre work is slow doesn’t mean you’re not getting an intense workout, avec the body sculpting I was talking about!) If you’re in NY, the Harkness Center at the 92 Street Y is a very good dance studio with a very non-intimidating atmosphere. If you’re braver, try Steps on the west side (be warned, famous dancers take class there). If you want to work at home, I highly highly HIGHLY recommend this.

Woo hoo — Gary Vaynerchuk just gave the big thumbs up to my friend’s wine. (That’s the Esporao one; the middle “pansies on the nose” one he tastes).

Can you imagine someone setting up a table in front of the Met and podcasting about ballet with the (slightly crazed) enthusiasm of this guy? Do you think people would go for it?

On bringing home that big ole disco ball See, I was right in calling this the Mark Ballas Show! I really thought it was going to be Gilles. I guess since they said there was less than a one percent difference in votes between the two, they both kind of won.

I always feel anticlimactic at this point. I’m sad.

And the next season isn’t starting until September?… It seems like light-years, but I guess it’s only after the summer during which, for me at least, there will be beaucoup de ballet and ballroom competitions. I’m still a little depressed though…

(above image taken from AccessHollywood)

Well, I was on a train late last night and missed watching the Dancing With the Stars semis on TV. Now I realize how hard the show makes it for you to catch re-runs. Geesh. Rickey doesn’t have everything posted, so I went to YouTube, and they have most of the competition routines, but the sound quality is crap and subtitles (in, for example, Gilles’s visit to his hometown, Cannes, with the French interviews with his mother and friends) are cut off. And they didn’t have the full episode. The YouTube clips re-direct you to this website, but once there, they just keep making you take these ridiculous quizzes, telling you, eventually the site will be unlocked. Well, it never unlocked for me — instead they redirected me to more and more quiz websites. I hope that site’s not a scam that unleashes some kind of virus or something. Anyway, people beware: don’t try to watch re-runs on watchdancingwithstars.com.

Anyway, I at least saw the routines. I only saw the bio on Gilles. Were there bios on the rest of the competitors? If not, that’s kind of silly, interesting as his little trip to Cannes was.

So, semis consisted of: Mark and Shawn dancing Jive and Argentine Tango; Melissa and Tony Quickstep and Cha Cha; Ty and Chelsie Samba and Viennese Waltz; and Gilles and Cheryl Salsa and Waltz (although one YouTube clip called it a Quickstep).

My favorites were Mark and Shawn’s Argentine Tango and both dances by Melissa and Tony.

Continue reading ‘THE GIRL NEXT DOOR? NO, MELISSA RYCROFT IS MORE LIKE A GLAMOROUS OLD-TIME HOLLYWOOD STARLET!’

Sorry, am compelled to call DWTS the Mark Ballas show now, because whenever he dances, it is so all about him. Mark! Can the man ever learn to be the frame? “Oh baby, what’s wrong?” he says to Shawn in practice, before hugging her. Oh Mark — just melt me. But it’s nice to see a pro not beating up on his amateur, unlike Cheryl, who gave Gilles more hard times this week… Anyway, I thought Mark and Shawn’s Quickstep was great fun, but again, was only watching him. The quintessential ham. Seriously, though, he’s an excellent performer, and an excellent dancer… which is rare I think. And I love that half-Texan half-British accent. Shawn seemed to do very well.

Chelsie’s taking over and making it all about her with Ty isn’t as bothersome, I guess, since the woman is supposed to be the picture.

Continue reading ‘THE MARK BALLAS SHOW: SEMI-SEMI-FINALS’

(photo of Wendy Whelan and Craig Hall in Christopher Wheeldon’s After the Rain by John Ross, taken from Ballet Co)

NYCB’s Spring season began on Tuesday and I spent much of the weekend at the Koch theater. Friday night was my first time seeing Balanchine’s Divertimento No. 15, (set to Mozart), which Arlene Croce called one of his greatest ballets, and I can see why, particularly with all the complex, richly detailed variations. The ballet begins with an Allegro section danced by the whole ensemble, the women entering the stage first. But I have to say I felt like the dance properly began when the three male leads — Tyler Angle, Amar Ramasar, and Andrew Veyette– came onstage, particularly Angle and Veyette (I prefer Ramasar in the more dramatic roles but he always has a charisma that draws your eye). With the exception of Sterling Hyltin, who is becoming one of my favorite ballerinas, the men just stood out more. At one point, after executing a step perfectly on beat, Andrew looked out at the audience and flashed a knowing, mischievous grin that made me and my friend (and those around us) giggle, and that set the tone of the whole night for me.

Though all of the women seemed to keep time with the fast-tempo and execute all the intricacies of that insanely quick-footed choreography, Sterling’s dancing had the most dash and flair.

Continue reading ‘NEW YORK CITY BALLET SPRING SEASON BEGINS! (PROGRAMS 1 AND 2)’

BalletMet Columbus, based in Columbus Ohio, is currently putting on a ballet version of the F. Scott Fitzgerald classic.

Says 35-year-old choreographer Jimmy Orrante: ” The story has parallels with today, with the cycle repeating of people going to parties, being careless with overspending and going into debt. The parties were big and the spending was big — without any question of how much things cost.”

Says artistic director Gerard Charles: “The era is a good one to portray in dance but there are certainly challenges to it because of the literary style of the writing.”

I’ll say! I love modern story ballets; should be interesting. It appears it’s showing this weekend and next. Anyone in Ohio?

(photo by Courtney Hergesheimer)

Via Mr. Elegant.

This Brazilian documentary about two young, black, underprivileged aspiring pro ballet dancers that will premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival later this month looks good.

I finally got around to seeing Billy Elliot on Broadway. I’d resisted for a while since I’m not a fan of musical theater — at all — but my friend Mika had an extra ticket and talked me into going with her (by telling me there was a lot of dancing) And she was right — there was. Unbelievably, I actually liked it!

It follows the movie pretty closely, is the story of a boy from a working-class town in Northeast England who, amidst a miners strike his father and older brother are involved in, falls in love with ballet after mistakenly happening in on a dance class — he’s only supposed to be returning some boxing mitts to their proper place but the teacher sees him and asks him to join class, which he does begrudgingly. Once he realizes he’s pretty good at the turns, etc., he’s a goner. Of course his father believes that ballet is for pansies and, besides, the family doesn’t have the money for expensive lessons and admission to the Royal Ballet Academy and all that, but of course it all works itself out throughout the course of the play.

There was a lot of dancing — not only in obvious places like the dance classes and audition, but in the scenes between the striking miners and their clashes with police — in full riot gear, present to protect Scabs — and the ballet students, and Billy. It was really well orchestrated. Go here to see some great performance photos.

I also loved the actor who played Billy’s father, Gregory Jbara. He’s of course the most dynamic character in the whole thing since he’s got a lot of gender prejudices and class issues to overcome, and when he does finally begin to change, to support his son, he really makes you want to cry.

There are three Billy’s — the one on my night was Trent Kowalik, who was pretty good as well. As a dancer he excels at turns. But of course what I was waiting for the whole time was Stephen Hanna, (former) New York City Ballet principal dancer, who plays the older Billy. I was a bit disappointed in the way they used him though. The film ends with the grown-up Billy doing a portion of Matthew Bourne’s Swan Lake, so I was expecting that. But they completely cut it! And I was so upset! I waited all night to see Stephen Hanna do that! Instead they had this rather corny scene in the middle (pictured above) where the little Billy is having a dream and he dances with the image of who he will become — Stephen Hanna. At first it’s nice — they both do some turns and jumps in tandem, and eventually some partnering with Stephen lifting Kowalik into some lovely little fish dives. But then Hanna straps Kowalik into a harness and for about the final third of the piece, the damn harness carries Kowalik all around stage — it’s like circus tricks, not dance!

After that I kept waiting and waiting for more Stephen, but the only other time we see him is in a non-dance scene with the father. It’s actually a pretty funny scene and Hanna’s able to utilize his acting skills — and he’s pretty good, except that he falls back into an American accent at the end of his last line . It’s at the Royal Ballet Academy where Billy is about to try out. Billy’s gone back to change and the father’s left in the hallway alone — still trying to get over his homophobia / fear of male ballet dancers, when along comes Hanna (and then you knew why they needed such a big, muscly dancer), for a smoke. Hanna’s dressed in a blousy 18th Century-style top and tights, so when he takes out a smoke and strikes a nonchalant pose it’s rather funny. Then he starts doing some developpes (slow lift of one leg, with bent knee, into full extension of that leg), lifting his leg right in Jbara’s direction, exposing his crotch. Jbara looks like he’s going to have a heart attack and the audience is cracking up. It ends with Hanna warning Jbara to support his son lest he may lose him to his dream, and the father listens.

(Hanna with Darci Kistler in Peter Martins’ Octet, photo by Paul Kolnik, taken from here)

But no dancing in that scene. So, I was waiting and waiting until the end, and then, curtain call after curtain call, and dance-within-curtain-call after dance-within-curtain-call and it just never happened. Hanna also plays one of the regular strikers and so is dressed for the final dance scene in his construction boots and all, so I’m thinking maybe he just didn’t have time to do a costume change. But then just have another actor / dancer do those scenes — you certainly don’t need a NYCB principal-caliber dancer for that! — and leave Hanna to the ballet! Argh! I realize Hanna took the role knowing what it would entail, but they really could have used him to much better effect, showing audiences what male ballet dancers are really capable of, and what the future Billy will be like.

Anyway, overall I did enjoy it — for those very well choreographed dance scenes I mentioned above and for the actors, particularly Jbara. It’s worth seeing if you get the chance.

Katrina alerted me to this. Apparently, two Dancing With the Stars celebrity contestants have had to pull out of the show due to injury, and just the weekend before season eight is to premiere. It was first rumored that singer Jewel had to pull out due to tendinitis, but now, according to ABC’s press release, her injuries are much worse: fractured tibia in both legs. I know from covering the Sean Bell trial that fractured tibia are extremely serious. Two men who were in Sean Bell’s car during the shooting sustained fractured tibia from bullets and a doctor testified it would have been impossible for the one to walk or run on the injured leg and that he would be (and he most definitely was, judging by video footage) in howling pain. Both underwent surgery to have permanent metal rods implanted to hold the bones together. I guess the seriousness of a fractured tibia can vary — I mean obviously, but good lord, you’d think to sustain a fracture in each leg, she would have had to have fallen from an overhead lift or something. Anyway, no wonder she’s pulling out.

Continue reading ‘TWO DANCING WITH STARS CELEBS PULL OUT WEEKEND BEFORE SHOW’

Apparently the artistic director of the Houston Ballet, Stanton Welch, whose work — that I’ve seen anyway– I’ve really liked, has made a new ballet based on the life of Marie Antoinette, which is just about to premiere. See a video of the company’s rehearsal footage here, and some photos of the making of face casts to be used during the execution scene here. And follow progress on the ballet on the company’s blog.

I’d so love to see this, though I can’t really go to Houston right now. I hope they take it on tour. If anyone is local (DA perhaps?), please do report!

(above image borrowed from Houston Ballet website)

Say that five times in a row (Above photo of Sara Mearns in Davidsbundlertanze by Paul Kolnik, courtesy of New York City Ballet)

Last Wednesday, my friend Judy and I went to NYCB for their Founding Choreographers II program, which included two by Balanchine — Ballo della Regina, and Robert Schumann’s Davidsbundlertanze (it’ll be a miracle if I don’t misspell it at some point), and Jerome Robbins’s Glass Pieces.

My favorite was the middle one (whose name translates to “Dances of the League of David” — Schumann’s imaginary society of artists organized to combat Philistinism), and it’s becoming one of my favorites of Balanchine’s in general, though many people can’t stand it and think it moves way too slowly. Made in 1980 and one of Balanchine’s last works, it’s meant to depict the mid-19th Century composer Schumann’s relationship with his wife, a pianist named Clara Wieck, and his ensuing mental breakdown, which led to a suicide attempt, followed by institutionalization.

There are four couples who seem to me to depict various stages of the same relationship — one is older and more mature, another is young, hot-headed and full of passion, another frolicking and playful, and the last and most pathos-ridden somewhere in between, full of loving and longing but pockmarked with fateful misunderstandings and missed connections, generally standing I think for the tragic impossibility of true human connection.

Continue reading ‘DAVIDSBUNDLERTANZE!’

(photo of Xiomara Reyes, taken from ABT website).

Sunday evening I attended another Works & Process event at the Guggenheim. These programs are so fantastic — they’re designed to kind of make the average person an insider, to give you a behind-the-scenes view of how art or cultural programming is created. Anyway, this one was on female choreographers and American Ballet Theater. Unbenownst to me (and most I think), ABT in conjunction with Altria has set up the Women’s Choreography Project, whose mission is to encourage more young women to venture into choreography — an excellent aim given that there are so startlingly and inscrutably few female choreographers, at least in ballet.

The women participants whose work we saw were: Gemma Bond, Misty Copeland, Nicole Graniero, Elizabeth Mertz, and Xiomara Reyes — all ABT ballerinas, and all, except Xiomara and Misty, members of the corps de ballet. (Xiomara is a principal and Misty a soloist.) It’s not a given or a demand of course that these ballerinas will necessarily become choreographers, but the program, led by Stephen Pier, exists for them to explore their talents, ultimately decide whether choreography is for them. It will be interesting to see, if programs like these proliferate, if it leads to more women dancemakers.

Anyway, it was really interesting watching Pier work with the women, but, to be honest, a bit confusing. At the beginning, Pier defined choreography for the audience as the movement of bodies through time and space. “That’s all,” he said. Then, he had Gemma Bond demonstrate a phrase she’d been working on.  She walked to the middle of the stage, smiling bashfully, and did a short, abstract lyrical segment. Then, Pier told her to focus on the back wall, to look at the shape of three windows, the lights coming through them, their geometry, and some writing on the wall underneath them (which I think was something like a dedication to whoever funded the auditorium, in small letters).

Bond used her hand to shield her eyes from the stage lights, and squinted up toward the windows. We all turned around, followed her gaze to the back of the room. She then laughed, shrugged her shoulders, and gamely re-performed the phrase. “It’s the same thing,” said the woman next to me. But I didn’t think it was. I thought she used the stage a little more; the pattern was now more horizontal than vertical, which went along with the three, horizontally aligned windows. She did exactly what was asked of her, I thought. Then Pier asked her, “well, what are you going to do with that red light coming out from the middle window?” She looked back at the windows, focused for a moment on the middle one, then, seemingly concentrating hard, repeated the phrase again. This time it was the same horizontal pattern as before, but now she stepped forward in the middle, kind of punctuating the movement with a little dot, making both vertical and horizontal use of the stage. “Now, that’s different,” said the lady next to me.  I agreed, but thought this difference was far more subtle than the last.

It was really interesting, but I think we were all intrigued because we knew exactly what was going on, what the choreographer was using to guide her. If we didn’t, I think it would just have been three slightly different patterns with no real meaning.

Pier then gave the women a pair of opposites to work with: fast and slow, light and dark, sharp and soft. All chose sharp and soft, except for renegade Misty, who chose freedom and constraint — which wasn’t one of Pier’s categories! (At one point, he asked each what they found hardest about the project and Misty said it was keeping within the rules. I love her!) Anyway, I looked deeply at the dances, trying hard to concentrate, to see the contrasts, but couldn’t always find them.

But as I was watching this, I was thinking of what I’d seen earlier in the day — the rehearsal footage of Alvin Ailey choreographing on his dancer Donna Wood Sanders, which I wrote about here. How he told her, you’re a prisoner, you can’t escape, you’re struggling, trying, let me see that. And this dance, Masekela Langage, about a group of people living under systematized racial oppression, was obviously very close to his heart.

I realize Pier was only giving these women exercises, that he wasn’t saying this was all there was to choreography. At least I hope that’s what he meant. He had said choreography was only about the movement of bodies through time and space. Is that all? I couldn’t help but get the feeling that Ailey’s world was so different from that of a lot of contemporary ballet, where it’s all about geometric patterns, interesting shapes, use of space, use of different rhythms, and not so much about creating something from the heart. I mean, literary writers and artists have to create because they have something to tell the world, something they find deeply meaningful. Although this was obviously only a glimpse into their process, I didn’t get the sense that these women were being encouraged to explore their visions of the world and learn to make movement that emanates from that place. It makes me wonder how most contemporary choreographers work — if they’re just thinking of light and shadow and abstract oppositions and geometry; if they’re not concerned with trying to tell us something.

Anyway, I have to say Xiomara (photo up top) completely blew me away with her work. She danced a lyrical balletic piece, but it had a kind of hippy-ness to it, a kind of swaying Gyspy-like, Latin feel. She danced with so much emotion. Her facial expressions almost reminded me of a flamenco dancer’s. I’ve never seen her dance like that before. I feel like perhaps she’s someone who’s better at dancing her own work than classical ballet. And perhaps she’d be good at creating work for other contemporary ballet dancers like her. Maybe she’ll be our next female ballet choreographer?

They also showed pieces by women who’ve choreographed for ABT: Lauri Stallings (whose Citizen I wrote about here) and Aszure Barton, whose work I’d never seen before and really loved. ABT II (the studio company, comprised of teenaged dancers) performed her Barbara, a sweet ballet that didn’t really have one single linear narrative, but had a lot of little subplots involving cutely intriguing characters.

On an endnote, Irlan Silva (above, from the studio company) — whoa! Methinks he is going to be in the main company soon…

(photos by Paul Kolnik, taken from NYTimes)

Tuesday night I went to see New York City Ballet’s Founding Choreographers I program (I know, I’m very late; it’s been a nasty week of migraines and sanity-destroying upstairs neighbors — more on the latter later).

It was a good, varied program. First on were two short abstract but very musical “leotard ballets” by Balanchine, both set to Stravinsky, that went together nicely (though they were choreographed years apart), Monumentum Pro Gesualdo and Movements for Piano and Orchestra. The pieces are mainly abstract and play with geometrical shapes and configurations, and there’s a bit of cute “Egyptian” styling in the flexed hand and feet gestures, and the ballets really give the dancers the chance to show off their musicality, especially the second, fast-paced one. I’m liking Maria Kowroski (in the top picture with Charles Askegard) better and better. She was very charismatic. Even though the ballets were story-less, she was kind of playing a part, and it really drew your attention to her. Askegard was really on too.

Maria Kowroski, by Paul Kolnik

The second piece, Robbins’ Dances at a Gathering (pictured second, up top) was what I really went for. It was Kathryn Morgan’s debut in the ballet. She was very good, but who really ended up standing out to me was Sara Mearns. She danced her part in a way that really reminded me of ABT’s artiste supreme Julie Kent in Robbins’ similar but shorter, more virtuosic version, Other Dances. Mearns, like Kent, really connected with the music — not just like she was dancing to the music but with it; it, rather than the male dancer, became her partner. I remember in Other Dances when Kent girlishly lifted her shoulders and a big, joyful grin sweetly overcame her face when the onstage pianist first put his fingers to the keys. Sure Angel was there too, but the music is what made her dance, he was secondary. Robbins has I think three (that I know of) of these dancers-interacting-with-musicians dances: this one, Other Dances, and Suite of Dances, danced by a solitary man to/with an onstage cellist.

Sara Means, by Paul Kolnik

The problem to me with Dances at a Gathering is that there’s so much, it’s just too long, and you lose the quality and the mood that are so prevalent in the other two. Instead of one dancer connecting with a musician, or a duo with each partner connecting in his and her own particular way, here there’s a multitude of dancers, each trying to do that throughout the l-o-n-g dance. Every time I see it, I’m in love with it until about half-way through when it starts to drag. Then there’ll be another section that draws me in, and then another section that drags, then another section that drags, then another that begins to draw me in again where I begin to think, gee if there weren’t all those sections earlier that dragged, this one would be quite engaging, but by this point, I just want the damn thing to end already. And I know I’m not the only one who felt that way. You can feel the whole audience shifting in their seats. You can hear the heavy breathing. Someone needs to seriously edit that ballet!

Anyway, that said, I also really liked Benjamin Millepied. He dashed around the stage as if he were desperately searching for someone or something he’d lost. There was a longing and a quiet urgency to his performance that was really quite poignant.

Benjamin Millepied, by Paul Kolnik

(all headshots taken from NYCB site)

See principal Megan Fairchild talk about that ballet (and see excerpts) here.

Last on was Balanchine’s Stars and Stripes, the high-speed, super-energetic ballet danced to John Philip Sousa’s marching band music that today looks kind of goofy in its hyper-patriotism. At first you want to roll your eyes at what seem to be a cheesy series of Rockette-like high kicks and formation changes and almost circus-like high jumps and stage-traversing turning jetes in the soldier section, but then you realize that in 1958, when it premiered, it was still kind of a point at which America was becoming acquainted with ballet, with the movements and with the Petipa structure — the wondrous in sync ensemble work, the pas de deux with the breathtaking lifts, the solos with their athletic jumps for the man, fouettes and fast chaine turns for the woman. As eye-rolling as this ballet may now be, if you look at it with a historical eye it was very original in its celebratory Americanization of the classical.

Well, I was going to say it didn’t bother me this week as much as last, but then I watched the first 15 minutes (I had a legal seminar tonight and didn’t get home until after the show had already begun, so had to watch the first 15 after the rest). The Flatley number was horrendous. What was up with that girl in the bikini walking around playing Yankee Doodle Dandee with a flute at the beginning? What is this, a boxing match? Soft-core porn? I actually thought this whole show was kind of porn-ish — generally more about flaunting bodies than artistry.

Except for Maria Kochetkova — the Russian ballerina who competed — and WON thankfully! — in the solo category. I think that’s probably why I liked tonight better than last week — she was on, just about the show’s only saving grace. And I’m not just saying that because I’m a ballet fan. I would really have loved to have seen some wonderful ballroom, but, I’m sorry, I’m just not into that Australian couple. I thought the same of their Jive tonight as I did their Samba last week — fast footwork but just lacking in precision and clarity with an overall sloppy look. At least compared to the Latin I’ve seen at the big competitions.

I liked Victor DaSilva and Claudia Sawides  — the South African duo — tonight better than the last time we saw them. The routine was still about the lifts — those exhibitions always are — but this one had a bit more narrative and emotion, passion to it. I felt like they connected better this time than last. I also liked the Argentine couple. Their Tango was very polished with sharp footwork. Lovely! I pretty much agreed with the couples results.

And I agreed with the solo results too, but only because I liked ballet. I’m sure Robert the popper is excellent at that kind of dance style, as was the Indian dancer at classical Indian dance. As I and others have said repeatedly, you just can’t judge these wholly different styles of dance next to each other.

I’m again annoyed at camera guy though. Camera person, I should say — don’t know why I think it’s a guy. S/he kept homing in on the Indian woman’s face and we couldn’t see some of her beautiful hand and foot gestures. You don’t dance with your face! I felt like she must have been going very fast with her feet at one point because of all the applause, and I think I heard the sound of the bells she wore around her ankles, but I’m not sure because the show’s acoustics weren’t so great. I also think I saw Maria Kochetkova do continuous fouettes with some double pirouettes thrown in, and at one point changing feet right in the middle — which is marvelous! But because of the camera panning in and out, then down to her feet, then a faraway shot, etc., I’m not exactly sure if that happened.

Sorry, by the way, to keep calling most of these dancers by their nationalities and dance styles. The show’s website doesn’t seem to have their names, only those of the judges and team leaders.

I didn’t think any of the group routines were anything to write home about, and both the intro to the American team and that silly Yankee Doodle Dandy number by Flatley and crew up front were ridiculously chauvinistic (I mean in a nationalist way). Why the need to celebrate America and proclaim it the nation with no boundaries, encompassing all the world, etc. on a supposedly international show like this? And is anyone surprised that our team, and our country, won the gold? The whole thing was just so corny. When Flately said at the end to his co-host, “I know, I’ve never seen anything like this on television!”, it looked like he was trying hard not to burst out laughing. At least he should have been.

And what happened to Pasha and Anya? Who knows. According to the website, team Russia was supposed to have two soloists from the Bolshoi, one pair of ballroom dancers, and a Cossack team. I saw two pairs of ballroom dancers and one soloist from San Francisco Ballet. But I missed the first night, so I might have missed the “other” Bolshoi soloist? I don’t know; I’m not a huge fan of the show’s website.

I think the idea behind this show is a good one. I like having dancers from a variety of countries dance different styles — some native to their country, some not, giving audiences wide exposure to the art. But there were just so many cheesy, corny, porn-esque moments, the camera work seriously frustrated my ability even to see what I was supposed to be seeing, and the judging was downright ludicrous.

And you know I haven’t said that about any of the other dance shows. I’ve been very open-minded so far. But the judges tonight seem pretty open about rewarding ass-shaking over artistry, subtlety, dance skill, interpretive skill, ingeniousness of choreography, you name it. What is dance if it is not those things?

That Australian couple performed one of the worst Sambas I think I’ve ever seen. Maybe I’m still coming off of my Alvin Ailey high, or maybe it’s just this show and the horrifying camera work that is completely destroying practically everyone’s dancing, but what I saw from that Australian couple was all flash, no substance.

Continue reading ‘Superstars of Dance is Completely Degrading to the Art Form’

I’m loving Maria Kochetkova! (She’s the ballerina dancing for Russia). I love how polished and perfect she was — all those turns! And her technique and precision were incredible. But I also love her personality — that she said she wanted to be on the program to show people who may not have seen ballet before what it’s like. I love how fascinated she is with everyone else’s dancing — like how she remarked that it was so wonderful to see so many forms of dance from around the world. Honestly, a lot of ballet dancers turn their noses up at other forms of dance, mainly because, having spent so much time in ballet school, they lack exposure to much else. So, it’s so reassuring to see a young ballerina who is not like that at all. And who’s a brilliant dancer!

Continue reading ‘Superstars of Dance, Semis Part I’

Image taken from Explore Dance, photo by Paul Kolnick; dancers: Yvonne Borree and Robert La Fosse.

New York City Ballet doesn’t often put on full-length story ballets, but when they do, they do very well with them. Coppelia was very entertaining. The leads were danced charmingly by Joaquin De Luz, probably the most actorly of the male dancers, and the doll-faced Megan Fairchild.

(photos of De Luz and Fairchild by Paul Kolnick, from NYCBallet website)

This is kind of a sad comedy that takes place in 19th Century Galicia. It’s the story of toymaker Dr. Coppelius (played by La Fosse, also in top pic) who creates a life-sized doll whom he rather sadly comes to love as his own daughter. Frantz (De Luz) is a country bumpkin in love with Swanilda (Fairchild) but also can’t help flirting madly with the doll (yeah, he is not too bright).

Continue reading ‘Sweet Coppelia at New York City Ballet’

Okay, here’s my (late) list of favorites from 2008: (click on highlights to read what I wrote about each dance)

Favorite overall dance of the year:

Revelations by Alvin Ailey. Because the movement language — a unique blend of American Modern with African — is highly evocative, richly varied, and, because it’s set in a specific time and place recognizable to most if not all of us, it’s imbued with meaning and feeling accessible to everyone. And because it speaks to the human condition like no other dance I’ve ever seen. I’m still looking for something to top this and don’t know if I’ll ever find it.

(photo by Paul Kolnick)

Favorite new dances:

1) Nimrod Freed’s PeepDance in Central Park;

Continue reading ‘Favorites of 2008′

If you don’t want to miss a Christmas classic, but don’t want to shell out the money in this crap economy, no worries. San Francisco Ballet’s Nutcracker is going to be on PBS this Wednesday.

I viewed an advance copy and it’s really one of the better Nutz I’ve seen. San Francisco Ballet is one of the best ballet companies in the country, in the world really, and they’ve done a lovely production. Kristi Yamaguchi, Olympic gold medalist in figure skating and Dancing With the Stars champion last season, introduces. She’s from the Bay area and talks about how this company, which her mother would take her to see as a child, really made her fall in love with the beauty of movement and the thrill of performing. This production is set in San Fran, during the 1915 World’s Fair, so it’s a bit updated in terms of the costuming and sets (both of which are gorgeous), and Yamaguchi gives a nice little half-time historical talk.

(photos of Karapetyan and Kochetkova by David Allen, from SFB website)

And the dancers are spectacular. Davit Karapetyan is probably the hunkiest Nutcracker / Cavalier I think I’ve ever seen (remember how I was going on about him when I saw the company here in September!), and Maria Kochetkova is radiant as the grown-up Clara. Yuan Yuan Tan is a lovely Snow Queen. And of course the music — Tchaikovsky is the greatest composer ever. Okay arguably…

So, PBS Wednesday, the 17th at 8pm in NY. Go here for local listings.

(photo by Katsuyoshi Tanaka, of Marcelo Gomes with Lua)

Last night I went to my lawyer friend’s holiday party and met one of her co-workers, a Brazilian lawyer named Beatrice. Our conversation naturally led to a discussion of dance, which of course led to a discussion of Samba, and eventually even ballet. She revealed that as a child and teen, she danced with Laura Alonzo’s student company of Ballet Nacional de Cuba!

She remembered Marcelo! Said she never danced with him because he was so “little”; much smaller than she. I was like, “Little?! No, he’s huge, much larger than life!” She said, not then! What’s he like, what’s he like, I asked?! She said, well, when he was 10 he was really sweet! Said his parents always went to the studio with him and seemed so supportive, which was so cute, and so unusual for the parents of a boy dancer in Brazil back then. She said he used to always get partnered with this really bitchy girl who thought she was god’s gift and she was such a prima, always demanding and blaming him for anything that went wrong. But he was so nice, he was always a sport about it.

So, not much has changed for poor Marcelo then?

Beatrice also got to dance once with the great Jose. Said he was huge back then. She never talked to him, only danced one brief duet once. She still has the picture of him lifting her little body far above his head. How very lucky to have grown up in Latin America…

(photo of Twyla Tharp’s Brief Fling by Lois Greenfield, from American Ballet Theater)

There’s a good article by Joan Acocella in this week’s New Yorker reviewing a couple of recent dances at Brooklyn Academy of Music. In it, she talks about American choreographers and their uneasiness with ballet, their distrust of the dance form as inherently European (and snobbish). Hence, their need constantly to compare and contrast it with other forms of dance, even to deconstruct it.

Funny, but when I saw Tharp’s Brief Fling recently during American Ballet’s Theater’s City Center season, as much as I liked the fun of it (especially since my favorites Marcelo Gomes and Craig Salstein danced in my program — both of whom really up the drama and humor as far as they can possibly go), I couldn’t help but get annoyed thinking, why do so many choreographers either contrast ballet with other dance forms (with modern, with American social, with aerobics, with tango — in Brief Fling, it was with traditional Celtic or Scottish dance) or try to take it apart and show its underpinnings, to critique it — like early William Forsythe, like Jorma Elo, like even the new piece ABT commissioned by Lauri Stallings? So, I was thankful for Acocella’s little historical discussion of American choreography and ballet. Go here for the article.

She also reviews, Urban Bush Women and Compagnie Jant-Bi and falls for African dance! Yes, Joan

is now on Sling.

Wentworth & leggett rare bookshop

Originally uploaded by swan lake samba girl via mobile.

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Favorite bookstore in Durham. They have the best collection of dance books I’ve seen anywhere. Three shelves.

Travel music ii

Originally uploaded by swan lake samba girl via mobile.

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Now listening to (and learning about) Tchaikovsky.

(photo of “A Fool For You” by Jack Vartoogian, from NYTimes)

Eee, I’m totally not packed and have very little time to write!

Last night was opening night of NYCB. They had a pretty extensive program — nine dances altogether; a couple by Balanchine, one by Jerome Robbins, one by Susan Stroman (who choreographs a lot of Broadway shows), and the rest by NYCB artistic director Peter Martins.

My favorite overall was “The Unanswered Question” by Balanchine, danced by the bewitching Janie Taylor (pretty much my favorite female dancer in the company, with Kathryn Morgan running an extremely close second) and Daniel Ulbricht, who I liked better than I’ve ever liked before last night. In kind of typical Balanchinian lady-worship fashion, Janie was carried around by a group of men, hoisting her high above their collective heads, and far over Daniel’s. She was this ghostlike, very ethereal creature, representing his dream, his ideal, that toward which he strove and all that. The men dipped and dove and manipulated her body into different shapes, all the while Daniel reaching, reaching upward toward her, never able to make real contact. His internal struggle was apparent in every movement, and the strain on his face was heartbreaking. It was beautifully done.

(photo of Janie Taylor by Paul Kolnick, from Explore Dance)
My other favorites were Martins’ “A Fool For You” danced to a jazzy Ray Charles score performed by the Juilliard Jazz Orchestra. As ALWAYS Amar Ramasar stole the show for me (probably my favorite male dancer in the company) with his dramatics, his acting, his sweeping, hip swaying, jazzy moves. He has a very broad range of movement and can combine dance forms probably better than anyone in the company — at least anyone I’ve seen. And Andrew Veyette had a thrilling solo full of bravura ballet theatrics (around the stage barrel turns, grand leaps, multiple turns) and tumbling gymnastics. When I first saw him dance a couple of years ago, I didn’t think of him really as a virtuosic dancer, but he’s turning out to share that role well with Ulbricht and Joaquin de Luz.

(photo of Ramasar by Paul Kolnick)
And then Stroman’s “Blossom Got Kissed” was sweet, Charleston-y, adorable fun. Set to Duke Ellington and Billy Strayhorn and also performed by the Juilliard Jazz Orchestra, it’s a bit Tharpian in its contrast of ballet with American social / jazz era dance. Story is: quiet ballet girl tries to fit in with glitzy club girls dressed in sassy red minis but can’t dance her way out of a paper bag — not in their style anyway. Eventually, a cute but nerdy boy (dance-acted perfectly by Robert Fairchild) recognizes her potential, and sweeps her off into a lovely classical ballet pas de deux. Savannah Lowery was the ballet girl but stealing the piece to me was Kathryn Morgan. She had only a corps part but I don’t care, whatever she does, whenever she’s onstage I just can’t move my eyes from her. I don’t even know what it is about her. She dances perfectly, but so do many. There’s just something a bit more compelling with her that I can’t think of how to describe right now because I’m too tired…

(photo of K. Morgan by Paul Kolnick, from Ballet.co)
Anyway, sorry for this very general, hastily-written review. If I have time I’ll probably write something more for Explore Dance. But in the meantime, I must pack!

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Oh one other highlight: Sen. Chuck Schumer (he’s a great speaker, but I guess, duh…) was there introducing the State Theater’s new name: the David Koch Theater (named after the man who’s funding all the renovations).

One other thing: I tweeted a little about this too. I tweet more frequently than I blog these days. So feel free to follow me there. (I recently started and don’t have a lot of followers, or followees — but there aren’t many dance people using Twitter either…)

I love it! And just in time for Christmas. (Via Luxlotus)

For dance fans, I recommend Carlos Acosta. It’s actually more about Cuba, his family back home, some of the racial politics there and how they affected his parents, and what it’s like for someone who’s grown up in such poverty to encounter wealthy western societies than it is about ballet gossip or specifics about the dance world. Which is why I loved it.