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Scheherezade

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Everything posted by Scheherezade

  1. A great review Bridiem. I’m going tonight and it’s fired up my anticipation far more than the brief extract that was shown on last night’s news.
  2. Agreed. And thank you Marie (and Nina 99 who has also just posted) for putting forward such positive reactions. Before my earlier post, the total absence of any mention of Yasmine and Vadim was utterly deafening. I shall also look forward to next Friday. And to the reprieve of Fumi Kaneko and William Bracewell on Saturday. It will be interesting to compare them within such a short timeframe.
  3. Back to the Naghdi/Muntagirov reactions, and, oh dear, I've booked to see them next Friday and now I'm wishing I hadn't. Strange, isn't it, that he and Bracewell are both masters of the understated style and yet Bracewell conveys emotion so well. Having said that, I have previously been extremely moved by Muntagirov's Lensky, and he and Nunez certainly tug at the heartstrings in Giselle so perhaps it's just a matter of chemistry - or lack of - between the leads.
  4. Maybe not a pretty face but I'd say that chemistry scores considerably higher than personality. After all, its not as if they had enough time for compatibility or personality to work their magic, is it? 24 hours and they're married, another four days and they're dead. And before someone points out that 4 days somewhat eclipses poor Britney Spears' 55 hours of marriage to Jason Alexander, she and Jason were supposed to be childhood friends, not to mention friends with benefits. Coming back, then, to Romeo and Juliet, although still at something of a tangent: is "Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou Romeo?" the literary equivalent of the first bar of Beethoven's 5th? Discuss.
  5. I so agree. Such terrible and shocking news. Heartfelt condolences to his family and, indeed, to all who knew him.
  6. i think it’s true to say that generally she will not appeal to the purist but ballet, as much as any other art form, is equally about communication or it becomes sterile and Osipova can most certainly communicate.
  7. Her Don Q with Vasiliev gave a new meaning to the word "thrilling". And her Giselle was so spine-chilling that four of my daughter's male friends who would normally have needed a pistol to the head to persuade them come to the ballet are now total converts. Surprisingly her Swan Lake didn't do it for me and, again unexpectedly, I preferred her Nikiya to her Gamzatti but she never gives less than 100%, is always - but always - watchable and, dubious repertoire choices aside, I love the electrifying, edge-of-the-seat unpredictability that she brings to her performances. We need someone who is not afraid to take risks and who can always be relied upon to challenge, stimulate and surprise.
  8. Ooh, I love Ghost Dances. Not sure about anyone else but I personally find it heart-rendingly sad rather than creepy.
  9. Agreed. Without enjoyment, what, frankly, is the point? Given the choice between a work of arid technical perfection and a flawed performance that touches the soul, I know which I would choose every time.
  10. The only productions I’ve attended so far at the ROH since the September open-up have been operas where, due to the eye-watering price hikes for amphitheatre tickets, I’ve been sitting right at the back in row W and I have to say that most people around me have been wearing their masks, so I was somewhat surprised to read that this hasn’t been the norm.
  11. I could be wrong, Dawnstar, but I’m somehow picking up that you liked the opening night’s performance. 😜
  12. Use of the words "when commenting" would seem to presuppose that comments are permitted - and perhaps even expected. With the exception of negative comments and spoilers, I can't see why comments shouldn't be posted.
  13. Not the dancing, Capybara, but the impact. The hard work, commitment and talent of the virtuoso is a given but it’s surely hard to deny that the immediacy of the virtuosic thrill will generally have a bigger initial impact than a nuanced interpretation.
  14. This does sometimes happen. At one performance a youngish daughter was apologising profusely to everyone nearby for the audible comments made by her mother, explaining that she suffered from dementia. It would have been a hard heart indeed that would have voiced their disapproval and fortunately no-one did.
  15. There are others to be found to the sides of the auditorium, often between the various levels, and, of course, a larger set behind the amphitheatre bar.
  16. It’s easy, of course, for dancers with a flamboyant, virtuoso style to make a big impact but those with a more restrained style can often bring more nuanced characterisation to the party and the impact is frequently something of a surprise. I think that this is why Bracewell, as one of the latter, is mentioned so often.
  17. True. And of course new partnerships have to be tried out to see whether they can reproduce that magic.
  18. Mmm, much as I was wowed overall by the Hayward/Corrales/Sambe/Hay/Ball pre-Covid combo, I do think that Hayward and Bracewell work better together as a pairing: every action feels spontaneous, every reaction unforced. They really do sing from the same songsheet, which takes the narrative impact to a different level. I can't help feeling that Kevin O'Hare has missed a trick here.
  19. Given their obvious chemistry and mutually instinctive response to music and narrative, as shown in Romeo & Juliet Beyond Words and Dances at a Gathering, I wonder why Bracewell and Hayward weren't cast together in this season's R & J?
  20. If they didn’t, they should have. It was dreadful. Personally I found Carbon Life far more bearable, possibly because it didn’t take itself so seriously. Was this down to the music and costumes?
  21. I’d say that a bit of bling - or something equally trivial- thrown in was exactly what this production needed. Something contrasting and mood-shifting to provide even a soupçon of relief from the all-encompassing gloom of this harrowing tale. Light and shade. And, in comparison, the cautionary morality tale would have been all the more effective.
  22. I don’t think you need to lose any sleep over that, Lizbie. Like so much at the NT lately, I felt that it somehow missed the mark.
  23. I've lost count of the number of National Theatre productions I've been tempted to walk out of since the departure of Nicholas Hytner.
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