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My Favorite Dance-Based Workouts
I’m just not a gym-goer. I never have been. Even when I lived in an apartment complex with a small free gym for its tenants, I just didn’t go. Working out needs to be fun, and for that, I need to be in a class with other people and an entertaining teacher. And I love…
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Former NYCB Dancer Sophie Flack Signs Her Debut Novel, BUNHEADS, at BEA
My apologies for my lack of blog posts this week. I spent Monday through Thursday at Book Expo America, the largest book industry trade fair in North America, held every year in NY at the Javits Center. (Nevertheless, I did manage to go to ABT’s night of premieres on Tuesday, which I’ll blog about soon.)…
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Misty Copeland on Tavis Smiley
Apropos of our recent discussion on race and ballet, ABT’s Misty Copeland was recently on the Tavis Smiley show. She talks about race, ballet, elitism, her training, her recent appearance onstage with Prince, the immense difficulty of ballet, and of course, Black Swan. She’s very well spoken. Go Misty! Also, speaking of Black Swan,…
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Ballroom Kids Win “Live to Dance”
Apparently the young ballroom dance duo, D’Angelo and Amanda, won the first Live to Dance championship last night. Coming in second place was the 11-year-old contemporary / jazz dancer, Kendall Glover, and placing third were the ballet pair, White Tree Fine Art. Thank you to reader Irina for emailing me about the show’s results!…
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Roberto Bolle on the Intersection of Fashion and Ballet
Here’s an interview with Roberto Bolle backstage at Dolce & Gabbana’s 20th anniversary show in June. He talks about ballet and fashion, saying both have to do with the aesthetics of the body and movement, and that fashion is very important to Italy. I’ve never heard his voice before so this is fun! He struggles…
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THE INFLUENCE OF SO YOU THINK YOU CAN DANCE ON DANCE STUDIOS
Interesting article by Claudia La Rocco in the NY Times about the influence of SYTYCD on studios. (I missed SYTYCD this week; had really wanted to watch Thursday night but was at New York City Ballet all settled in my seat excitedly waiting for the premiere of Mauro Bigonzetti’s Luce Nascosta when I realized…
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THE WILIS ARE REAL: THE DANCING PLAGUE OF 1518
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…
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SLSG IN THE WESTSIDE INDEPENDENT
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.
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TO APPLAUD OR NOT TO APPLAUD
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…
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DANCE YOUR ASS OFF SERIES PREMIERE
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…