Jan McNulty

This is a fascinating article (to me anyway) about an artist using ballet to reflect on modern times: http://uk.phaidon.com/agenda/art/articles/2015/september/29/how-jr-uses-ballet-to-break-down-barriers/

I prefer the traditional version of the choreography to that shown in the Russian clips. I think it was on Makarova's Ballerina programme years ago that there was a clip of Alicia Markova rehearsing a London Festival Ballet dancer (Janette Mulligan?) and I just loved that version without the shoulder lifts, even more than Sir Peter Wright's very similar choreography. It was probably for Peter Schaufuss' production, whose snowflakes are still my absolute favourite.

As a ballet-watching newbie I was very privileged to see Altynai Assylmuratova dancing Kitri in 1986. I have never forgotten her deft, sparkling and incredibly fast footwork. I don't think I've seen anyone else dance as fast!

If you tried to clap in time to Momoko Hiram's fouettes you wouldn't stand a chance she is soooooooo fast!! But I wouldn't anyway, honest!

Oh dear Wulff, some of us clap along and tra la la la at the end of Fille and sing along to Lily of Laguna in Hobsons. I hang my head in shame...

Hello BlueLou and welcome to the Forum! Thanks for the information.

Thanks to member Toursenlair for this thought-provoking read... https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/music/ivory-at-the-tip-of-a-complex-issue-for-traveling-orchestra-members/2015/12/30/fb0c818e-8a49-11e5-be39-0034bb576eee_story.html

Hello Mumofthree and welcome to the Forum! I do hope you will share your DD's progress with us.

Hello Ozzee and welcome out of the lurking shadows. I hope that you will continue to join in now that you have broken the ice!

Funnily enough Jacqueline I was in a pizzeria in Leeds on Saturday within the cinema complex. One of my companions came back from a visit to the facilities and said they were unisex. We waited till we got to the theatre!

I think the number of curtain calls are fixed! I've often been at performances where the applause looks set to continue but the curtain stays put and the house lights go on...

Great posts Floss and GTL!

Brilliant thank you Emma!

Thanks Amelia.

Hello Emma, Thanks for the information. In accordance with our Acceptable User Policy could I please ask you to add a signature to your profile? http://www.balletcoforum.com/index.php?/topic/417-the-balletcoforum-acceptable-use-policy/ Members who have commercial interests must indicate that by adding a Signature line to their postings, stating the name and type of their business and giving their website and/or business email address for enquiries. (You set up a Signature via My Settings in the dropdown menu under your name.) If members wish to contact businesses, associate schemes or other commercial enterprises this should be done via the vendor’s website or email, not by starting threads on the forum.y

I don't know whereabouts down south you are cavycapers but NB are performing 1984 in Southampton and at Sadler's Wells and Swan Lake in Norwich and Milton Keynes. The new production of Jane Eyre is coming to Aylesbury and Richmond: http://www.balletcoforum.com/index.php?/topic/11067-press-release-sadlers-wells-sampled-returns-29-30-january-2016/?hl=sampled

Amelia, is that choreography for the gpdd standard in Russian companies. I am sure I have seen something similar donkeys years ago.

Exactly Bill. I have heard people starting to clap at this point but fortunately most seem to realise and stop. Mind you, I have to confess that I have been equally noisy at that point on occasions, not clapping but sobbing out loud.

My fault Alison because clapping etiquette had been mentioned on another thread. That's partly why I asked Bill later in the thread if the clapping he was referring to was the claque-type clapping I have read about as being common in parts of Russia.

She most certainly is Tulip - she stands out from the crowd for all the right reasons!

I haven't seen any performances in Italy but I have in the other countries you mention (albeit only one in Geneva) and also Denmark and Hong Kong and I do not remember any huge amounts of what I would consider inappropriate clapping (i.e. huge amounts of clapping while dancing going on, enforced pauses for dancers to acknowledge applause etc) in any of them. Could you please give us some specific examples.

Perhaps Shakespeare could write a play on that subject Nina! I don't want to get into a discussion of the discussion but both longer and concise posts have been OK with me on this thread.

I was agreeing with Bill's examples of where I believe it is inappropriate to clap as it ruins the dramatic intention. As someone said somewhere on another thread a concise post can say more than a post the length of War and Peace!

I can appreciate that different cultures have different etiquettes but it does ruin the flow of a true narrative ballet if the audience claps during the drama and ruins the flow. There are some ballets that lend themselves to clapping as they move along - e.g. Don Q and some ballets have applause gaps built into them, whether I agree with those gaps or not. But, if people are continually clapping (however stellar the performance) how are they "feeling" the dramatic narrative or are they just interested in the technique of the dancers on stage? Does the clapping continuously become meaningless because the audience and the dancers expect it, rather than it being a spontaneous burst of the approval at the end of something wonderful? Do standing ovations become meaningless if every performance gets one? I would love to know how the different clapping patterns occur. We clap "free hand" here but when I went to Russia the audience did a fast co-ordinated clap and in Budapest they started clapping slowly in unison and got faster and faster! Bill, on the dvd you were watching, which caused you to start this thread, was it the claques I have read about that were doing the clapping?

I agree with Bill on this one!