Casting change for next week's Whipped Cream has been posted. Due to Herman Cornejo's injury, Jeffrey Cirio will substitute on Tuesday night. Let's hope that McKenzie doesn't drop to that very low default position and bring in guest artists for ANY of Herman's other performances. He should remove the struggling ballerinas whose performances were being carried by Herman in the first place and put in a crew who are actual ABT dancers and who can do the steps.
Whipped Cream is a delightful ballet well worth forking over the bucks to take all the kids you know to it. Haglund missed the Whipped Cream float that was driving around Manhattan yesterday, but the video of it looked pretty cute. Some of us are old enough to remember how the circus used to parade the elephants and clowns through the streets to drum up excitement for its big top circus show. What a thrill that was as a kid to see. The irony of yesterday's parade of ABT's characters was that it occurred on the weekend during which the Ringling Bros. circus comes to its fateful end. Its very last performance will be tonight at the Nassau Coliseum on Long Island.
From the video on ABT's social media page, it appeared that the Whipped Cream float might have been headed toward 9th Avenue yesterday where the 9th Avenue International Food Festival was in full swing with all its sugary funnel cakes, fried ice cream, chocolate covered crepes with powdered sugar and some of the world's best freakin' chicken empanadas from the famous Freakin' Puerto Rican Catering Company. All goodies will be available again today. Come on down to 9th Avenue!!!
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Casting for the tri-company performances of Jewels at the Lincoln Center Festival has been officially announced. The Paris Opera Ballet and the Bolshoi Ballet are treating us to more variety in the performances than New York City Ballet. What a shame that we will not see Maria Kowroski in one of the Diamonds performances. It's a real lesson to those of us who snapped up tickets to all five performances while anticipating variety.
While the casting doesn't mention the corps dancers for Emeralds, we hope to see some more of the beautiful Paris Opera Ballet dancers on stage. Welcome back, Paris Opera Ballet!
Thursday, July 20 at 7:30pm
Emeralds, Paris Opera Ballet
First Pas de Deux: Laëtitia Pujol, Mathieu Ganio
Second Pas de Deux: Myriam Ould-Braham, Mathias Heymann
Pas de Trois: Hannah O'Neill, Sae Eun Park, François Alu
Rubies, New York City Ballet
Leading Couple: Megan Fairchild, Joaquin De Luz
Soloist: Teresa Reichlen
Four Men: Harrison Coll, Spartak Hoxha, Ralph Ippolito, Giovanni Villalobos
Eight Women: Sara Adams, Likolani Brown, Baily Jones, Meagan Mann, Jenelle Manzi,
Kristen Segin, Sarah Villwock, Claire Von Enck
Diamonds, Bolshoi Ballet
Leading Couple: Olga Smirnova, Semyon Chudin
Soloists: Olga Marchenkova, Yulia Grebenshchikova, Ana Turazashvili, Alena Kovaleva,
Vladislav Kozlov, Artemy Belyakov, Klim Efimov, Ivan Alekseev
Friday, July 21 at 7:30pm
Emeralds, Paris Opera Ballet
First Pas de Deux: Dorothée Gilbert, Hugo Marchand
Second Pas de Deux: Léonore Baulac, Germain Louvet
Pas de Trois: Valentine Colasante, Sae Eun Park, Marc Moreau
Rubies, Bolshoi Ballet
Leading Couple: Ekaterina Krysanova, Artem Ovcharenko
Soloist: Yulia Grebenshchikova
Four Men: Mikhail Kemenov, Batyr Annadurdyev, Anton Savichev, Mikhail Kochan
Eight Women: Margarita Shrainer, Xenia Zhiganshina, Anastasia Denisova, Daria Lovtsova,
Ilona Matsiy-Kiryushkina, Xenia Kern, Bruna Cantanhede Gaglianone, Victoria Litvinova
Diamonds, New York City Ballet
Leading Couple: Sara Mearns, Tyler Angle
Soloists: Emily Gerrity, Laine Habony, Mary Elizabeth Sell, Lydia Wellington, Devin Alberda,
Daniel Applebaum, Aaron Sanz, Andrew Scordato
Saturday, July 22 at 2:30pm
Emeralds, Paris Opera Ballet
First Pas de Deux: Laëtitia Pujol, Mathieu Ganio
Second Pas de Deux: Myriam Ould-Braham, Mathias Heymann
Pas de Trois: Hannah O'Neill, Sae Eun Park, François Alu
Rubies, New York City Ballet
Leading Couple: Megan Fairchild, Joaquin De Luz
Soloist: Teresa Reichlen
Four Men: Harrison Coll, Spartak Hoxha, Ralph Ippolito, Giovanni Villalobos
Eight Women: Sara Adams, Likolani Brown, Baily Jones, Meagan Mann, Jenelle Manzi,
Kristen Segin, Sarah Villwock, Claire Von Enck
Diamonds, Bolshoi Ballet
Leading Couple: Alena Kovaleva, Jacopo Tissi
Soloists: Olga Marchenkova, Yulia Grebenshchikova, Ana Turazashvili, Angelina Karpova,
Vladislav Kozlov, Artemy Belyakov, Klim Efimov, Ivan Alekseev
Saturday, July 22 at 7:30pm
Emeralds, Paris Opera Ballet
First Pas de Deux: Dorothée Gilbert, Hugo Marchand
Second Pas de Deux: Léonore Baulac (Étoile), Germain Louvet
Pas de Trois: Valentine Colasante, Sae Eun Park, Marc Moreau
Rubies, New York City Ballet
Leading Couple: Megan Fairchild, Joaquin De Luz
Soloist: Teresa Reichlen
Four Men: Harrison Coll, Spartak Hoxha, Ralph Ippolito, Giovanni Villalobos
Eight Women: Sara Adams, Likolani Brown, Baily Jones, Meagan Mann, Jenelle Manzi,
Kristen Segin, Sarah Villwock, Claire Von Enck
Diamonds, Bolshoi Ballet
Leading Couple: Olga Smirnova, Semyon Chudin
Soloists: Olga Marchenkova, Yulia Grebenshchikova, Ana Turazashvili, Alena Kovaleva,
Vladislav Kozlov, Artemy Belyakov, Klim Efimov, Ivan Alekseev
Sunday, July 23 at 2:30pm
Emeralds, Paris Opera Ballet
First Pas de Deux: Laëtitia Pujol, Mathieu Ganio
Second pas de Deux: Myriam Ould-Braham, Mathias Heymann
Pas de Trois: Hannah O'Neill, Sae Eun Park, François Alu
Rubies, Bolshoi Ballet
Leading Couple: Ekaterina Krysanova, Vyacheslav Lopatin
Soloist: Olga Marchenkova
Four Men: Mikhail Kemenov, Batyr Annadurdyev, Anton Savichev, Mikhail Kochan
Eight Women: Margarita Shrainer, Xenia Zhiganshina, Anastasia Denisova, Daria Lovtsova,
Ilona Matsiy-Kiryushkina, Xenia Kern, Bruna Cantanhede Gaglianone, Victoria Litvinova
Diamonds, New York City Ballet
Leading Couple: Sara Mearns, Tyler Angle
Soloists: Emily Gerrity, Laine Habony, Mary Elizabeth Sell, Lydia Wellington, Devin Alberda,
Daniel Applebaum, Aaron Sanz, Andrew Scordato
So excited to see the casting for Jewels - I have tickets for Saturday night and am thrilled that Megan, Joaquin, and Tess are headlining Rubies. I do wish we could've been treated to Maria in Diamonds - I've only seen it performed by Sara and Wendy/Philip Neal back in the day (when Maria was partnered with Charles Askegard, so really way back when). Do you know if each company will use their own costumes? Can't wait!!!
Posted by: NS | May 21, 2017 at 08:19 PM
Hi, NS. I don't know the answer to your question for certain, but I assume they will all be wearing their own costumes. They will be using the NYCB sets and the NYCB Orchestra with Andrew Litton conducting. I recall Martins speaking about how he explained to Litton that it was absolutely important to be accommodating to the POB's and Bolshoi's wishes.
This certainly is going to be an interesting set of performances. I'm not expecting to enjoy it as much as when I see any one of the companies do the whole ballet, but it sure will be interesting.
Posted by: Haglund | May 21, 2017 at 08:25 PM
I kind of wish each company for Jewels got to show three different casts for each movement.
Posted by: Sara S-R | May 22, 2017 at 05:22 AM
Totally agree with you Sara, although I can never watch enough of Dorothée Gilbert and Hugo Marchand.
Posted by: Haglund | May 22, 2017 at 08:13 AM
I'm so happy Tess is headlining Rubies! Tragically I'm out of town for all the performances but I can't wait for your review Haglund. Excited to see her this week as Titania.
Posted by: iris | May 22, 2017 at 10:26 AM
I hope Cornejo will be back soon. He's one of my favorites. If he's out for the rest of the season, I really hope he'll be back in the Fall, and not excluded from the principals list like last year.
Posted by: yukionna | May 22, 2017 at 01:14 PM
Hi, yukionna.
Herman has reported on his FB page that he incurred a calf injury but expects to return soon. That's good news. Let's hope that he doesn't come back too soon and ultimately blows out that calf completely.
Posted by: Haglund | May 22, 2017 at 01:42 PM
I am coming form Canada to attend the Saturday evening performance of Jewels, and I am beside myself with excitement. This is a dream cast for an absolute masterpiece. My first performance at the ballet was when my father drove through a blizzard to take me to see NYCB when Baryshnikov was recently defected and the company was full of Balanchine's legendary dancers. This may be my next most favourite performance!
Posted by: Mahadywilton | May 22, 2017 at 09:06 PM
Hi, Mahadywilton! Great to hear that you're coming down for Jewels. I'm especially looking forward to that Saturday evening performance, too.
Posted by: Haglund | May 22, 2017 at 09:55 PM