Ritaza

 Good Swan Bad Swan.....One of the finest documentaries I've seen. Synthesizing dance, music and psychoanalysis to create a work of art.

For sure, he’s a young man struggling with quite a few demons but I feel that the music that accompanied this piece on Segei gave it an extra measure of bleakness. 

Changing tack a little. As readers of other threads will have gathered, I began the Bolshoi season really willing Olga to be an artiste to treasure and follow with interest in the years to come. But I have actually found it difficult to appreciate her as others clearly do. I should be really interested and grateful to learn from her admirers what it is that makes her special to you. What am I missing? What should I be looking for in her Swan Lake?

For me Olga is quite like no other ballerina I’ve seen, although she has qualities peculiar to some of my favourite. My experience of watching her is not unlike my experience of watching Gelsey Kirkland at her finest which I can only describe as transcendental. Smirnova’s sharp jaw line and startling eyes give her a wild and otherworldly appearance  that I find mesmerising especially in Swan Lake where she seems to capture the essence of the fated and desperate Odette. For me however, it was her perceptive understanding of the ‘Diamonds’ pas de deux (and her dedication to the coaching process) that really brought her to my attention. I had waited years (decades?) to see it danced with such revere. Thank you Olga.  

Indeed it isn't easy, but getting the group to work as a team was a terrific solution.

Yes and it should be done after every interval too. Am sure most people would take more notice of someone speaking from the stage than over a tannoy.

In case anyone has missed the news - Wednesday's Mayerling will be both Cojocaru and Kobborg's final performance with the Royal Ballet. Good luck to anyone trying to get a last-minute ticket, they'll be like gold dust!

I've had fairly rotten luck lately with tickets an cancellations...but the gods must have been on my side when I booked those tickets for THE 5th Joy of joys! 

 .... and, hey, just think of THOSE feet!!)  

Indeed...and that arabesque... the purity of line and the ability to fly.

Even when he delights with multiple tours en l’air it never comes across as a circus trick.

Gracious me! I really don’t know what else to say at the moment...
Remarkably, I’ve tickets for that performance on the 5th. I think I’m starting a grief process!!
 

I've found some of Polunin's recent comments about only dancing for the money and ballet being absurd pretty disrespectful to both the audience and his colleagues. I'm sure he's a nice guy, but he's not doing himself any favours with these comments.

Yes I was also saddened and indeed puzzled  by the comments. On one side of the stage you have his “comments” and on the other, a young artist whose performances (for me) are deeply sincere and show a deep respect for his craft. A schism perhaps

Thanks for the welcome Janet. The first post in a forum has all the elements of opening night nerves :-)

Hello Ritaza and welcome to the forum. That sounds quite logical. I wonder what our "Word Lady" thinks of that.

 

I hope you will keep posting!

I'd always thought that Diaghilev had used it as an expletive before a Ballet Russe performance ( possibly Rite of Spring) and that it had been adopted by dancers after that.