li tai po

I have just read through this thread and I am disappointed by the misrepresentation of Kenneth MacMillan's ballet, The Four Seasons, by the Royal Ballet School, by contributors above and by the critic, David Mead. The official Kenneth MacMillan website gives an accurate thumbnail sketch of the ballet, which MacMillan conceived as a showcase for the Royal Ballet's strength in depth from corps to soloists and principals. The ROH performance database records that the opening night in 1975 took 55 minutes, whilst the second production in 1980, designed by Deborah Williams aka Deborah MacMillan, lasted 44 minutes. https://www.kennethmacmillan.com/the-four-seasons The ballet was set in front of an Alpine Hotel, populated by some rather dubious ladies (this was barely a year after the premiere of Manon!), who tilted their heads very suggestively at the watching men (a movement changed to a brief nod at the Linbury). The body of the ballet comprises a series of classical ensembles and solos, a pas de trois for Spring, a langorous pas de deux for Summer (Monica Mason and David Wall), a pas de quatre for Autumn and three gypsies (I suppose they could not be pirates in the middle of the Alps) for Winter. There was one new lift which wowed the audience every night. You can get a flavour of the choreography from a clip of the summer pas de deux on you tube with Viviana Durante and Irek Mukhamedov. Excited by the publicity that the RBS was performing "The Four Seasons" and reiterated as such in the programme, I made a special effort to get to the Linbury that evening, as I did not want to miss a revival of a significant ballet, remembered fondly, maybe through rose-tinted spectacles. Imagine my acute disappointment, when I saw the young ladies of the RBS glide through the opening prologue and present a couple more corps numbers with not a soloist in sight. Talk about Trades Description Act! It was as if we saw the fairy dances from The Dream without a soloist in sight, and it was presented as a performance of Ashton's The Dream. The misrepresentation is compounded by your correspondent above, who described it as MacMillan's Macgregor moment (???!!!), presumably because it was "busy" with lots of dancers crowded on to a stage too small for the choreography. The original ballet was closer to a MacmIllan Petipa or Balanchine moment. David Mead describes it as "a somewhat unexciting series of small group dances". This describes what he saw, but it does not describe MacMillan's ballet. If the RBS repeats this performance at the ROH, maybe the choreography will be able to breathe on a larger stage, but I hope the RBS respects MacMillan by describing it more accurately as "Corps de ballet dances from The Four Seasons". Maybe one day the Royal Ballet will restore MacMillan's reputation with a new production of the complete ballet, which was significant in MacMillan's output.

and they will win the accolade of having the second cheapest theatre ticket in the West End again this year. You can buy an upper slip music stand (restricted view listening seat only) for Anemoi/The Cellist for only £4. What a bargain!

This issue raises serious questions about the role of the Friends, which appears no longer to serve as an advocate for their members. Susan Fisher operated a "focus group" and was active in listening to what the membership were saying and representing their views to senior management. She set up the occasional direct meeting between Friends representatives and Tony Hall. The annual introduction in the Linbury Theatre to next year's season afforded Friends the opportunity of a Q&A session and a dialogue with the artistic leaders of the ROH. The current arrangement has placed the Friends as an administrative department under a middle manager, which actively promotes the propaganda of the Royal Opera House, but is apparently not interested in meeting or listening to members. The annual introduction has been cancelled in recent years. The Friends department are lying very low in the current situation. No wonder contributors above are talking about cancelling their Friends membership. The organisation appears to add little value or show little interest, except in high worth members.

I will not be booking for Don Q this week. This production has never emulated the glories of the Mariinsky and Bolshoi versions. Others above have pointed out the weaknesses of the Royal Ballet production more eloquently than I could. I cannot stand the sugary orchestration by Martin Yates, replacing the sharpness of brass with the blandness of strings - this is Minkus (and Petipa, demanding strong technique) - and not Massenet.

Every time I hear the Royal Opera House bleating on about their current financial position, I suggest they approach BP for a donation.

Bruce - thank you for your comments above about tonight's performance. It summed up my thoughts entirely. What an unforgettable evening and Fumi was simply radiant!

Ernst Meisner, former Royal Ballet dancer and now Artistic Co-ordinator of the Dutch National Ballet Junior Company and Director of the Dutch National Ballet Academy has just choreographed his third full-length ballet for DNB, along with his hip-hop collaborator, Marco Gerris, which opens in Amsterdam on Thursday, 11 May. I believe that Anna Tsygankova has a major role in the ballet. There is an interesting introduction here

Blossom, don't miss two massive ceremonial Egyptian cloaks in the downstairs cafe from the magnificent 1968 production of Aida - beautifully hung to display their full size.

Those of us of a certain age remember Anita Young as a stalwart member of the Royal Ballet in 1970s, unflinchingly reliable in the corps and dancing a range of soloist roles. She appeared fearless and for several seasons she led out the Shades on stage in Rudolf Nureyev's production of La Bayadere Act III. When the Evening Standard Award for Ballet was presented not to an individual, but to the Royal Ballet corps de ballet, she was selected to receive the award at the public ceremony, on behalf of her colleagues. After a distinguished career as a teacher at the Royal Ballet School, she appears to be as busy as ever, coaching and sitting on international juries. In this inspiring interview, she talks about her life and work. She reflects on how the demands on a dancer's body have changed as the repertoire has morphed from story ballets requiring costumes to the modern repertoire with unitards. She worked with footballers, making them remove their boots and leaving them exhausted at the end of the training session. As an 11-year old, she danced in the Royal Academy of Dance Fundraising Gaia, where Margot presented Rudolf for the first time on the London stage. Towards the end of the interview, she has some warm reminiscences of Margot Fonteyn (she becomes a little emotional), but she is equally thrilled that her former pupil at the Royal Ballet School, Davi Ramos, is preparing to dance Prince Siegfried in Amsterdam. The interview (42 minutes) presents someone with a joy for life and the wisdom that grows from years of experience. I cannot recommend it highly enough.

Yes, Balletfanp, that was probably me.

Lynn will be remembered this afternoon (Friday) on Radio 4's obituary programme, Last Word.

Fonty, please will you provide a link to that article by the Guardian's chief theatre critic.

Thank you very much, Balletfanp, for your detailed and thoughtful review above. I endorse every word and every detail of it. I also waited after the second performance to have a quick word with Vadim - and he was so cheerful and so gracious with all those young dancers and fans - what a way to encourage the next generation! Just completed the long trek home - but worth very minute. Saturday and Sunday were days of warm sunshine in Plymouth and a former colleague took me on a very interesting guided tour of Plymouth Hoe and the Barbican - so I am doubly fulfilled.

I made a rare foray to Plymouth to see BRB in Swan Lake. I may be as long in the tooth as Odyssey, but I don't think I have ever seen the Peter Wight production before, so I don't have a wealth of experience to fall back on. In Act One, Riku Ito as Benno gave Vadim Muntagirov a run for his money in terms of energy, attack and virtuosity. Vadim produced all his customary fireworks in Act Three, including the pairs of double tours, which brought the house down. I was bowled over, however, by Celine Gittens and Vadim Muntagirov in Act Four, dancing the beautiful Peter Wright choreography, with its statuesque and sculptural poses. They were tragic and intense; Vadim, post-Mayerling, is plumbing new depths of misery and despair. The Plymouth audience roared with enthusiasm at the end of the show. After the curtain came down for the last time and we were leaving the theatre, there was a burst of applause from behind the curtain. Richly deserved!

I am heartbroken too - Lynn was such an expressive dancer, with an extensive interpretative range - so versatile. Lynn was a master of comedy, often played dead pan. I loved the humour of MacMillan's Side Show, which she danced so many times with Rudolf. She brought such fun and gaiety to the Green Girl in Dances at a Gathering. Then she was a virginal innocent in The Concert, preyed upon by Michael Coleman - becoming so wonderfully frustrated as she tried on those hats, thrilled at finding one she liked and then slinking off with sagging shoulders as she met someone else wearing the same hat. She was unforgettable as Anastasia, making her throwaway entrance on roller skates, and presenting the whole gamut of emotion from child, then on the cusp of adolescence at the ball and finally scarred and tortured by her horrific escape from the bolsheviks. She also allowed herself to be thrown up into the air by the officers in Act One - a daring and risky lift and roll which was toned down and tamed for the 1996 revival. The last time I saw her on stage was as the Queen Mother in an early performance of Matthew Bourne's Swan Lake. Three quick memories - After a performance of Onegin by London Festival Ballet at the Coliseum, there was a man drinking from a bottle of wine on the wall across the road from the stage door (before the Peabody Estate was redeveloped). Lynn emerged with her young twins and balancing a large bouquet in her arms. As she patiently signed through a torrent of autographs, she suddenly looked up and said, "Where are the twins?". They were sitting on the wall with the wine-drinker. She charged across, bouquet in her arms, to gather them back and then generously carried on signing autographs. She gave a masterclass at the Royal Academy of Dance of the R&J Balcony Scene to Mara Galeazzi and Ed Watson, neither of whom had danced the role at that time. A choreologist was lurking in the background. Lynn corrected Mara - enter from the second wing, not the third wing. Not according to the score, said the choreologist. "Kenneth definitely set a shorter entrance, because he wanted the lovers to have time to pull up short and hesitate about kissing each other". The choreologist amended the score. On my way to Budapest to see Onegin, I was astonished to see Lynn on the plane. She was apparently on her way to cast the first Hungarian performances of Mayerling. Remarkably I ended up sitting next to her at dinner after the show - I wanted to gush all over her, but somehow I controlled myself and we made small talk about the train service on the underground - maybe it was a wasted opportunity. This great ballerina of the Royal Ballet has left me with a kaleidoscope of impressions - she was second only to Margot.

I have just come back from the first night of The Rhinegold at the English National Opera, which in my opinion was a perceptive production and a thrilling success - good to be able to report this after the funding bashing the ENO have taken in the Autumn. But I have to report the bad behaviour of the ushers in the balcony during the performance. The Rhinegold is performed continuously for two and half hours without an interval, the music plays on without a break through three interludes between the four scenes. The prelude famously features an extended (136 bar) chord in E flat major, which begins almost inaudibly in the lowest register of eight double basses. The performance began with a couple of minutes of stage action without music and then the orchestra began "almost inaudibly". At this point the ushers flung open the doors and led latecomers down both flights of stairs through the audience, showing the way with a torch, allowing them to clatter down the stairs and then making a row of people stand up as they tried to reach their seats. Worse was to come at the end of the first scene. As the orchestra tried to be heard in the interlude and silent action continued on stage, the ushers flung open the doors again and led a herd of latecomers clattering down each flight of stairs, whilst the music played on. This is the fault of the theatre policy, not the ushers, and they should seat latecomers in boxes, as at Covent Garden. The ushers, however, loitered at the back of the balcony with their walkie-talkies on. Twice we had to ask them to turn their radios off, because they were interfering with the performance. I think the problem arises because the ushers at ENO are agency staff, more used to working in theatres presenting musicals or pop concerts.

If you search on you tube, you will find a complete performance of the Belyaevsky reconstruction, with period costumes based on drawings by Ivan Vsevolozhsky, staged in the beautiful Hermitage Theatre in St. Petersburg, with the stately Alexandra Iosifidi, no less, as Lucinda.

I loved the Ashton programme last Spring - Scenes de ballet/Month/Rhapsody - with excellent and changing casts - but I have to vote for Muntagirov in Mayerling - two shattering and unforgettable performances - sadly only two!

Someone refers above to the late Patricia Neary. As far as I am aware, she is still rocking on at the age of 80 [her birthday was exactly 3 weeks ago], large as life and full of energy. She created the second girl in Rubies at the premiere in 1967, but she always claims she was a baby ballerina!

I have just caught up with all the apprehension, anticipation and comments on this thread. I had a thoroughly depressing evening, saved only by Diamonds. Several people adjacent me left in the second interval and unfortunately for them missed the best part. The evening started promisingly with a delightful quotation about Fille from our own Bangor Ballet Boy, but the promise was immediately dampened by a pas de deux without sets or setting - and Lise's solo omitted, presumably because her friends were not there to support her with ribbons. The second part opened with a world premiere - See Us!! I found this ballet downright offensive, riven as it is with violence, rage and hatred, reflected in a deafening and discordant score and unrestrained, hysterical stomping in the choreography. It reminded me immediately of yesterday's violent blitz in Ukraine. It should have a health warning about its upsetting content. Given that this ballet was commissioned as part of a celebration, I find it extremely disrespectful to the audience and the Friends to serve up this poem of hatred. At least Pam Tanowitz and Valentino Zucchetti had the sensitivity to gauge the nature of the commission and the atmosphere of the evening. Thank heaven for Diamonds, with Marianela, Reece Clarke and the company on sparkling form. They helped me to forget the low points which preceded them.

Vadim was beyond expectations tonight. The third act was shattering. He may find it difficult to be angry, but he can convey suffering and despair in spades. A long-standing taboo of the Royal Ballet was broken this evening, capably witnessed by the curtain call photograph above. Vadim was presented with bouquets of flowers. Unlike the Mariinsky and the Bolshoi, the Royal Ballet has had a longstanding ban on flowers for men. It was a joy to see flowers presented to Vadim. Capybara has long campaigned about this in this forum and I am delighted to see her campaign succeed.

I am jealous too. We see NYCB in London once in a generation. During lockdown, we had a feast of NYCB performances online and I became acquainted with more repertoire and an entirely new generation of wonderful dancers. Vienna Waltzes is not allowed to be performed by any other company and it was a joy to see a complete performance in good quality.

I too noticed a tense atmosphere in the Coliseum auditorium yesterday. I suspect that many staff were unnerved by the Arts Council announcement on Friday about moving English National Opera to Manchester and are fearful for their jobs. Some of the front of house staff are on zero hours contracts and move around different venues, so they are less familiar with the Coliseum and its audience; maybe they are more used to marshalling customers around nightclubs in a rather more decisive manner. All of this was not helped by a 15-minute delay to the start, because the technical rehearsal over-ran. There were no less than 20 items in the show, all of which required technical and lighting programmes to be set up. They only got access to the theatre on Sunday morning. Nevertheless, the show was extremely satisfying and is garnering high praise from the reviews. I hope to post some comments soon in the Performances Seen section. "The programme selection was varied, international and fresh. Gone were the tired old gala staples; not a Corsaire pas de deux in sight."

Antony Tudor - the English choreographer who rivalled Ashton before the war, when he was a leading choreographer for Rambert, but went to America at the outbreak of World War II and forged a second career with ABT. He is sadly neglected in his native land. Lilac Garden is a very subtle ballet set to Chausson's ravishing Poeme for violin and orchestra, dating from his English period. There is a commercial video by ABT; but you can find a complete performance on you tube by the National Ballet of Cuba and about half of the ballet from The Royal Ballet in 2000 with Sylvie Guillem and Jonathan Cope. Check on the story, before you watch it. The Leaves are Fading is a beautiful ballet from his American period, set to melodious Dvorak chamber works. I am not aware of a complete commercial recording, but I recommend a beautiful performance on you tube of one of the pas de deux from the 1990s by Altynai Asylmuratova and her husband Konstantin Zaklinsky, at a time when the Mariinsky began to explore western choreographers. It gives a taste of the fragile lyricism of this ballet.

James I know exactly who you mean.