Haglund's Heel

If you missed Carousel last night

... it looks like it will replay on Channel 13 in NYC on Sunday at 12:30 pm, and it appears that PBS plans to eventually upload the whole stunning Live From Lincoln Center presentation at this link.  It's not up yet, but the icon is there.

Program ReminderLive From Lincoln Center: Carousel

This Friday, April 26, at 9:00pm (Eastern) PBS's Live From Lincoln Center will broadcast the New York Philharmonic's production of Rodgers and Hammerstein's Carousel in which NYCB's Tiler Peck and Robert Fairchild dance.  It also stars Kelli O'Hara, Nathan Gunn, and Stephanie Blythe.

Check local PBS listings to confirm time in your area.

 

Update Apr 26

Wow, Live from Lincoln Center, what a fabulous presentation. Wow. Thank you.

 

Lincoln Center Festival 2013 = Disaster

What a letdown, LCF.  Seriously?  No ballet, but a bunch of Monkeys?

Not a thin dime this year, not one thin dime.

 

Lincoln Center Theater presentsNikolai and the Others – a play about Balanchine, Stravinsky, Nabokov

from LCT website

Richard Nelson has written a play about the time surrounding Balanchine's creation of Orpheus in 1948.  Previews begin on April 4 at Lincoln Center's Newhouse Theater.  Opening night is May 6th, and it appears that the play will run through mid-June.

From the Lincoln Center Theater website:

It's 1948 and during a spring weekend in Westport, Connecticut a close-knit group of Russian emigres, including choreographer George Balanchine, composer Igor Stravinsky, conductor Serge Koussevitsky, painter/set designer Sergey Sudeikin and composer Nikolai Nabokov, gather to eat, drink and talk.

In Nikolai and the Others playwright Richard Nelson (Some Americans Abroad, Two Shakespearean Actors) imagines the relationships between Balanchine and Stravinsky, their friends, lovers, wives and ex-wives, partners, supporters and dancers (including Maria Tallchief and Nicholas Magallanes), at the time of their historic collaboration on the ballet Orpheus.

Later that year, Orpheus would be the spectacular inaugural production of the newly formed New York City Ballet. With this in mind, the play also explores the controversial ways American art and artistic institutions were funded at the outset of the Cold War -- including the subtle hand of the State Department in the post-war cultural scene.

Natalia Alonso (Ballet Hispanico, Complexions) will portray Maria Tallchief, and there will be some Orpheus choreography on display as staged by Rosemary Dunleavy. Blair Brown as Vera Stravinsky, John Glover as Igor Stravinsky, Stephen Kunken as Nikolai Nabokov, Michael Rosen as Nicholas Magallanes, and Michael Cerveris as George Balanchine are among the cast of 18 players.

Spring is getting busy.  Purchase tickets here.

Jared & Yuriko in Swan Lake Act III – not here

On March 23rd, Jared Matthews and Yuriko Kajiya will perform Act III of Swan Lake with the Mississippi Metropolitan Ballet at the Jackson Academy Performing Arts Center, an 800 seat, $8,000,000 state of the art venue in Jackson.  Haglund wishes he could go, but flights are too expensive.  Once again this year, it is a crime that ABT is not allowing these two glorious dancers (and Stella Abrera) more meaningful opportunities to dance during the Met Season, especially when they are far more suited to the great Petipa roles, so many of which have been sorely miscast. This year ABT will continue with its effort to sell short, thick arms as the latest, greatest thing to come to its Swan Lake's Odette.

In other news, it appears that Boston Ballet will have an engagement at the Koch Theater during the 2013-2014 season.  Frankly, the asinine and juvenile behavior of the company's "star" who jumped to ABT last year is enough to completely turn off any interest in the company except for the chance to perhaps see Erica Cornejo dance again – in something not in the vein of Jorma Elo.

Reminder:  Lincoln Center Festival will announce its 2013 season around March 27th.

 

Lincoln Center Festival 2013

Lincoln Center Festival will announce its 2013 line-up within the next couple of weeks.  LCF members will be able to purchase tickets beginning March 27th; non-members will have to wait until early April.  Haglund has no idea what LCF's ballet offering will be this summer, but he's squirreling away nuts in the event that LCF schedules another stunner of a season like it did last year with the Paris Opera Ballet.  That week of Giselles last summer was one of the best ballet weeks in old Hag's long, hard life. 

You want to relive those moments, too, don't you – yes, you do.

From the LCF website:

Also on the LCF website is a short video clip.  LCF will probably move all this 2012 stuff into its wonderful Archives section of the website when the 2013 schedule is uploaded - so we can watch it forever.

 

Martha Swope: In Rehearsal photography exhibit @ NYPL Lincoln Center

The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts at Lincoln Center acquired revered dance photographer Martha Swope's archives in 2010.  Beginning on Thursday, September 27, an exhibit comprised exclusively of her dance and theater rehearsal photos will be on display in the Vincent Astor Gallery for the public to enjoy free of charge through Saturday, January 13, 2013.

The exhibit will feature more than 100 images including those from rehearsals of the original productions of West Side Story and A Chorus Line and from George Balanchine's and Igor Stravinsky's creation of Agon.  Rehearsal photos of Martha Graham, Mikhail Baryshnikov, Jerome Robbins, Stephen Sondheim, Jack Lemmon, Liza Minnelli, Gregory Hines, Chita Rivera and many other greats will also be on display. 

For those of us who grew up in remote parts of the country during the middle of the last century, Martha Swope's photography was our introduction to the New York City Ballet and the Martha Graham Company –– both for which she served as official photographer during her illustrious 40 year career.  Her images in Dance Magazine, Saturday Review, and the library edition of The New York Times were our connections to the greatness that we dreamed of seeing on stage one day.

For more information on this not-to-be-missed exhibit, click here and here.

 

Lincoln Center Festival – In Paris

There are a limited number of tickets remaining for the final five performances of In Paris which opened tonight at the Gerald W. Lynch Theater at John Jay College, and Haglund recommends you try to snatch up one of those tickets to see this highly creative theatrical production starring Mikhail Baryshnikov and a team of actors/singers/musicians who are outstanding in every way. 

Based on a short story by the Russian writer Ivan Bunin (1870-1953), the play is performed in Russian and French with English subtitles. The Playbill includes an insert that is an English translation which can be read in five minutes - a good reason to get to your seat early.  Oddly, the weakest parts of the production were an instance or two of over-reaching for humor and the more formal aspects of the choreography - the latter attributed to Alexei Ratmansky. 

Baryshnikov is pretty darned captivating as a socially awkward retired Russian general who falls for a younger waitress in a restaurant.  Very, very creative work by this team. Bottle instruments, huge postcards that evolve into other things, a revolving stage, beautiful voices, subtitles that no one can complain about, mice, a dog, a little aerial work, and a well-told story all made this a very enjoyable evening of theater.

Boy, the Lincoln Center Festival folks are doing a bang-up job this summer! 

 

 

POB Update

The Paris Opera Ballet will present its programs at the Koch Theater instead of the Met Opera House!  After that scandalous pricing of the Mariinsky Ballet last summer and the Met's faceoff with the Lincoln Center Festival folks when LCF wanted to sell discounted day-of tickets at the Rubinstein Atrium, who is surprised that the LCF yanked their business from the Met?

Tickets are on presale for LCF members as of today with general sales starting on April 2.  But all seats have not been released for sale yet.  So, if you're looking for a particular viewpoint at a particular pricepoint, you may have to be patient and diligently check seating availability on a regular basis.

Prices are wide ranging with some reasonable points: $25, $65, $95, $125, $150.  When they finally open the 4th Ring to sales, those prices will be $25 and $65.  As we all know, the views from the 4th Ring are very good.  There are $25 seats in the 2nd and 3rd Rings right now.

Haglund is so excited about seeing the Paris Opera Ballet's homegrown artists that he's going to all six of the Giselles and both of the other programs. 

 

Giselle all over the place

The official Lincoln Center Festival dates for the magnificent Paris Opera Ballet's Giselle performances are Friday, July 13, Saturday July 14 (Mat & Eve), and Tuesday, July 17 through Thursday, July 19 - a total of six performances.  Don't miss this presentation by a glorious company that is truly a company in style, essence, and purpose – not a mumbo-jumbo pick-up company of itinerant guest dancers like ABT has become.

POB will present a program entitled French Masters of the 20th Century on Wednesday, July 11, Thursday, July 12 and Sunday July 15.  Pina Bausch's Orpheus and Eurydice with the Balthasar-Naumann Ensemble and Chorus will be presented on Friday, July 20, Saturday July 21, and the company's final performance on Sunday July 22.

If you're a Member of Friends of Lincoln Center, you already know that you can purchase tickets beginning tomorrow.  Everybody else will have to wait until general ticket sales begin.

Meanwhile, ABT's performance of Giselle next Sunday in Chicago is shaping up to be quite the event which Haglund plans to attend.  Yuriko Kajiya will debut as Giselle.  Jared Matthews will dance the role of Count Albrecht for the first time with ABT having just debuted with the Royal Winnipeg Ballet a couple of weeks earlier.  Devon Teuscher will debut as Myrtha.  Who's going to keep all of these excited dancers calm?  That task could fall to the steady Blaine Hoven who will be performing the Peasant PdD with Isabella Boylston.  Not sure who is slotted for Hilarion, but hope it's a veteran.

Can't wait to see Jared press a horizontal Yuriko into the air in Act II.  He will be phenomenal!  Anyone who chooses to see the Saturday performances probably won't see those two iconic lifts - but please report back here if you do.  It's just a rumor at this point in time, but the word out on Division Street is if the Counts on Saturday miss those lifts, the spectacular Myrthas are going to swoop in from the wings and lift the Giselles for them.  There will probably be a lot of trash-talking to go with it.  "Get the f__ out of my way, skinny boy."  Listen, those Myrthas can trash-talk like Larry Bird blowing his bad breath all over Scottie Pippen, and they're just as strong and fierce. They're not going to put up with Albrecht popping Giselle six inches off the ground and then letting her slide down his front while he twirls around.  No sir-ee, Bob.  And just imagine - imagine - what Mayor Rahm Emanuel will say if the Counts wimp out on those lifts.  Just imagine.

 

Lincoln Center Festival 2012

The Lincoln Center Festival released a few specifics about its 2012 summer season.  The production of In Paris starring Mikhail Baryshnikov looks like a good ticket choice for the month of August.  The remaining Festival details – including that other hotly anticipated act that relates to Paris – will be released on March 22.  However, as of today LCF members can buy three-performance theater packages online.

Program reminders

PBS presents Miami City Ballet tonight at 9:00 p.m.

Tickets for the YAGP documentary "First Position" at the NYU Kimmel Center on November 5 are available at this link.

PBS presents NYCB Nutcracker on Live from Lincoln Center on Wednesday December 14th.

 

 

Ballets Russes Exhibit @ Lincoln Center

Haglund sat in front of six video monitors and simultaneously watched Olga Spessivtseva whirl through Giselle, Gary Chryst whip up a spirited Chinese Conjurer in Parade, Baryshnikov’s Prodigal Son prowl around Von Aroldingen’s Siren, Alicia Markova float through Les Sylphides, Nadia Nerina burn through allegro as the Firebird, and Alexander Grant‘s suffering Petrouchka.

The Ballets Russes exhibit at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts will close after Septermber 13th; so, there's still time to rout your way through Manhattan's newest office park, the renovation-in-process at Lincoln Center, to see this wonderful exhibit:  Diaghilev's Theater of Marvels: The Ballets Russes And Its Aftermath.

Curated by Lynn Garafola, the exhibit came about through the generous gifts and loans by many, but the Joffrey Ballet of Chicago contributed a major part of this collection including videos of Petrouchka, Parade with Leonid Massine and Robert Joffrey rehearsing the dancers, and the spectacular Gary Chryst dancing as the Chinese Conjurer. The Joffrey also contributed many of the reconstructed costumes from Petrouchka, Le Spectre de la Rose, and Parade as well as those huge Picasso puppets from Massine’s production.

There is a pair of Pavlova’s shoes – very tapered, very small Nicolinis – on display and a number of programs, letters, menus, and diary entries as well. The original painting of an eye done by Nijinsky during his mental decline stands out along a wall of traditional costume designs and portraits.

Well worth a visit.

Lincoln Center's Fountain - A Smoking Ashtray

The Lincoln Center fountain is finished and open for sitting.  Doesn't it look like a smoking ashtray?  Supposedly its design is similar to the roof on the new restaurant that is in the area where the old reflecting pool was.  Yawn.

Anonymous sources connected with the L.C. security detail said that they are not happy with the new fountain design.  Whereas before when the beautiful stone fountain was in place, they had considerable difficulty keeping people out of the water.  Not only does the new fountain have lower seating, but there is more than ample room under the seating for little children to climb into the water.  Basically, it's now ugly and an attractive nuisance. 

 

The little curvy things underneath?  They're water hoses.  Nice!

Copyright © 2009

The Ashtray - Lincoln Center's New Fountain

What a disappointment some of these renovations at Lincoln Center are turning out to be.  Today the engineers were testing the fountain waters in an effort to get them working for First Lady Obama's visit to Lincoln Center on May 18th for the ABT Gala.  In fact, there was a full crew at the site working for Saturday wages.

Being as tactful as possible — Haglund thinks that the new fountain looks like an ashtray from the lobby of some cheap hotel that went out of business long ago.  It connects not.  Not to anything else at Lincoln Center.  Not to any sense of music or art.  Not to any sense of beauty.  What a mistake and waste of money.

 

To add insult to injury, the new tiles that have been installed at the front steps and elsewhere are a yellow-tinged litterbox sand color that clashes with the beautiful original stone that remains — worse than the new blue Le Corsaire tutu clashes with Ali's pants.  What were they thinking?!  Either of them.

In sum, what a freakin' mess they are making out of what was a uniquely beautiful and spiritual setting.

 

Copyright © 2009