observations 11-29

Bows - Abrera, Seo, Teuscher, Bolle in Apollo with the LA Phil and Dudamel last night.

We need to see this in New York.

This spring.

At least once.

Period.

Grazie al I Bollerini Fan Club per questo video. Dobbiamo vedere questo spettacolo a New York questa primavera. Aiutaci per favore.

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The Royal Winnipeg Ballet will tour its acclaimed production of Going Home Star – Truth and Reconciliation throughout Canada this winter including a stop in Toronto on February 5th and 6th. Choreographer Mark Godden's inspiration for the ballet came from Canada's infamous Residential Schools for its First Nations people in which the children were forcibly assimilated into the mainstream and suffered horrific treatment. See our previous coverage here and here.

Last week the Royal Winnipeg Ballet and the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra released a CD of the music from the ballet which features Christos Hatzis' stirring composition. Hatzis used classical, jazz, aboriginal, DJ scratch, throat singing by Tanya Tagaq, and contributions from The Northern Cree Singers. It's available on iTunes. It is a fantastic collaboration of forms.

–– Hello, Lincoln Center Festival?

–– We need to see this, too.

 

Comments

[Angelica]

Thanks for this, Haglund. Our Stella raises the bar.

[Haglund]

Hi, Angelica.

The Orange County Register's classical music critic really liked the program: http://www.ocregister.com/articles/apollo-694169-dudamel-stravinsky.html

We'll have to wait and see if anyone weighs in on the dancing.

[Haglund]

The Los Angeles Times liked the music but whined about Balanchine's choreography, Bolle's muscles, and noisy pointe shoes.

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/arts/classical/la-et-cm-la-phil-dudamel-review-20151130-column.html

And while this picture of the sunburst was taken at an angle too far to the right resulting in the faces of Calliope and Polyhymnia showing, I don't know that I have ever seen a more perfect picture of three hemlines creating a single arc:

http://www.trbimg.com/img-565c07db/turbine/la-phil-dustavio-dudamel-review-112712015-photo2/1100/1100x619

[melponeme_k]

I wish I could have seen it. I also want to know how the Lane/Cornejo performance of Spartacus turned out.

As far as the noisy pointe shoes, the problem is common with ABT. The only other company that had the problem was Royal Ballet during The Dream last summer. But I've read they fixed the noise after their first night. I don't know why ABT does nothing about it.

[Haglund]

Melponeme_k, the Spartacus was cancelled by the folks in Argentina.

[melponeme_k]

Thank you for the update. I've been doing searches for it and the local newspaper had it in their weekend to do section. But I missed the cancellation notice.

[Lisa Copeland]

I find it interesting that here in NYC Balanchine is a god while in other places (London for example) his choreography is disliked. In fact, when the Mariinsky did Apollo (and I have never seen a better one, with Sergeyev as Apollo and Shapran as Terpsichore) I never heard such moaning and complaining. "Balanchine is boring" was the most frequent complaint I heard. I guess one person's gold is another's dross.

[Haglund]

Hi, Lisa.

I think that ballet is probably a tough sell in L.A. unless it has ample scenery/costumes and action hero antics. Like I said before, Orange County was brought up on Disney. New York was brought up on Balanchine who held substance over style. That's why there are 2,500 good miles between us.

I have no doubt that the shoe noise was annoying to more than just the critic which it would not have been if NYCB had been performing. ABT needs to get control of that problem which does not occur in a "Freed" house.