Bruce

I think that's what having a winning strategy in place does for you. My recollection was that (from an ACE persective) BRB was funded as a touring company that invested heavily in new work and takes risk. Ie David Bintley 3 act works and some for 3bills. And that ENB was seen as a touring compnay that did the classics and well known - things that would change less and sell more easily... so less money needed.

I don't believe that's true. The ACE document that covers this territory is here: http://www.artscouncil.org.uk/media/uploads/Analysis_of_Opera_and_Ballet.pdf And that states it was ENB's proposal to replace a week touring with more in London. ACE have gone along with it - hardly for them to say no. But ENB have standstill funding when the others who tour have more and I think that says a lot. Re Announcing Seasons I've checked and I was rather too sweeping: Rojo Year 1 - the announcement of the season rep was made in September 2012 - she only joined in the summer so it would have been hard to do earlier. http://dancetabs.com/2012/09/artistic-director-tamara-rojo-announces-english-national-ballet-new-season/ Rojo Year 2 - the announcement was made in June 2013. This is broadly in line with when all companies announce the following seasons rep. http://dancetabs.com/2013/06/english-national-ballet-announces-2014-season-and-new-barbican-performances/ I belive this is all pertinent to where the company lives and how it releases information on such plans.

17 July 2014 English National Ballet Announces Promotions and New Joiners Tamara Rojo, Artistic Director of English National Ballet, has announced promotions within the Company as well as details of new joiners: Yonah Acosta has been promoted to Principal. Shiori Kase, who last month won the gold medal at the USA International Ballet Competition, has been promoted to First Soloist. Yonah and Shiori will debut the lead roles in Coppélia at the London Coliseum 23-27 July. Junor Souza (winner of Emerging Dancer 2014) has also been promoted to First Soloist. Ksenia Ovsyanick has been promoted to Soloist and Alison McWhinney (winner of Emerging Dancer 2014) and Ken Saruhashi have been promoted to First Artist. Alejandro Virelles, currently a Soloist at Boston Ballet, joins the Company as Principal. Joining as Artists are Precious Adams, who won the Apprenticeship and Contemporary Dance Prize, Prix de Lausanne 2014, Yoko Callegari, of Boston Ballet, Adriana Lizardi, from Ballet National de l’Opera de Bordeaux, Sarah Kundi, formerly with Ballet Black who joined after appearing as an extra in Romeo & Juliet in-the-round, and Isabella Brouwers and Jin Hao Zhang who join from English National Ballet School (ENBS). Jenna Lee left the Company after the Madrid tour to found JLee Productions and Nancy Osbaldeston after Romeo & Juliet in-the-round to join Royal Ballet Flanders. Daria Klimentová retired after 18 years with the Company. Promotions effective from 1 September 2014. Ends

Re ENB more generally there is an interesting piece by Rupert Christiansen in the Telegraph about the latest Arts Council Funding review for ballet (and opera): http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/culturenews/10967940/A-blueprint-for-artistic-survival.html A quote: "... my view is that ENB needs to strengthen its core identity and decide whether it wants to compete with the Royal Ballet in commissioning new “niche-market’ pieces for metropolitan sophisticates or follow Northern Ballet in being out on the road." I think he identifies the problem with ENB at the moment and why, of the touring companies, they didn't get the £550/500K extra that Northern and BRB did. To be honest I was really flabbergasted that they proposed to do less touring and more in London at a time when the arts vibe is to get out there and not be so London centred. There has also been no press conferences about up and coming rep for next season, as there was in the first 2 years of Rojo's tenure. And now this news spills out without any press release or whatever. Nobody from within the company seems to be articulating what they are about. To my view the Arts Council had 'extra' money for ballet and BRB and NB put forward winning pitches to grab that money. ENB didn't. Back in 1990 Sadler's Wells Royal Ballet made a brave decision to move to Birmingham and become BRB. It would now seem a good time for ENB to think as seriously about opportunities outside London as it is in London.

Not sure where people are on links to this but the POB site has a copy of the entire performance: http://www.operadeparis.fr/en/saison-2013-2014/soiree-exceptionnelle-nicolas-le-riche I had a problem playing it on Firefox but all seemed fine with Chrome - both Windows7

The season programme has the casting in for all the ballets - unfortunately I don't have the time to transcribe or take pics. Sorry... but if somebody else does the info is there.

Les Saisons Russes Diaghilev Festival at London Coliseum I went to see the opening last night and had a terrific time seeing something very different - the opera ballet Le Coq d’Or (The Golden Cockerel) - as pictured above. There are 2 more performances (then the rep changes) - tonight and tomorrow and I think any jaded ballet lover would find this a tonic. If you like 'Looney Tunes' cartoons and opera and/or ballet this is for you! Booking page: http://www.eno.org/whats-on/other/le-coq-dor Jann Parry has just rather enthusiastically reviewed for DanceTabs: http://dancetabs.com/2014/07/les-saisons-russes-natalia-sats-opera-ballet-le-coq-dor-golden-cockerel-london/ Background to the London season and Le Coq d’Or can be found in an iv by Graham Watts: http://dancetabs.com/2014/06/andris-liepa-and-georgy-isaakyan-bringing-diaghilev-back-recreating-the-russian-seasons/ Finally there was earlier discussion in News about the season: http://www.balletcoforum.com/index.php?/topic/6393-russian-seasons-london-coliseum-july-2014/

Back in early June DanceTabs ran an interview,:by Graham Watts, about this season: Andris Liepa and Georgy Isaakyan – Bringing Diaghilev Back: Recreating the Russian Seasons There is a lot of info about Le Coq d’Or, which Graham saw in Moscow earlier in the year. If you are wondering, Isaakyan is the AD of the Natalia Sats Moscow State Opera and Ballet Theatre company - they providing the dancers for the season. I gather that the Swan Lake part of the season is cancelled, though have not seen that announced officially. The Coliseum site certainly shows those nights as dark at the moment.

Rapid thoughts... For ballet lovers this is the best doc to read - full of interesting observations: Arts Council England’s analysis of its investment in large-scale opera and ballet: Intro web age: http://www.artscouncil.org.uk/funding/our-investment-2015-18/national-portfolio/opera-and-ballet-statement/ Pdf doc (what you need): http://www.artscouncil.org.uk/media/uploads/Analysis_of_Opera_and_Ballet.pdf Although its not very overtly stated it seems to be a move of (ballet) money from London to the regions. Pleased for Northern Ballet and think the strategy words chime with me: "...we believe that there is a strong case for additional Arts Council investment to enable the company to introduce new choreographers for its main stage work, to pay its dancers more, to invest more in productions, and to take more risks." I would like to have seen BRB asked to widen its choreographic footprint for new work too, but pleased it will tour more. Interesting that ENB looks to do an extra week in London and tour a week less. I understand it's attractive to the company but good that ACE show no hunger to reward a more London centred output with any extra money. Interesting that RB/ROH are asked to work in partnership with other companies re developing new choreographers. Sad that Ballet Black is not being given any money at all.

See @ENBallet at Glastonbury on BBC iPlayer. ENB bit starts 12:20 in or performance only starts at 16:00 mins: http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b048sqb6/glastonbury-2014-english-national-ballet-and-caro-emerald

Late to the party but agree wholeheartedly with this. I'd also note that Ismene Brown trades under her real name - no sniping from the sidelines, hiding behind an anonymous Username.

Hopeless... having been given a poster yesterday afternoon, which I tweet about and use in my posting above, I then get told its old and needs to be replaced. You can see the latest poster in this tweet by Garry Avis: https://twitter.com/balletboy09/status/481447826866450433 Hopefully the new poster is below I'd repeat again that the site with details on, which may or may not be updated, is: http://www.coventgardendance.com/events/hatch-house That's it - I'm done.

Just had this come in as a pdf... Do excuse image size! More details are here: http://www.coventgardendance.com/events/hatch-house

As everybody says it was a special performance by Daria and Vadim yesterday and she was pretty shell shocked at curtain down and buried her head in his chest. After a while the company came out and Daria regained her composure and could enjoy the flower throw and love from 5,000 people all standing to give her their farewells. As she was taking her shoes off you could see a bloody knee and then her bloody and strapped up toes and you realise again the price of such elegant perfection. Two weeks ago Rojo tweeted a picture of her Juliet knees: https://twitter.com/TamaraRojo1/status/475890679361859584 During the performance I had my own little special moment: as Daria made one of her exits through the audience her trailing shawl fluttered over my shoulder - touched by one of the all time greats I thought. Great to see the production again which I liked all the more this second viewing. Its matured well and I hope it comes back more regularly. Re where to sit, I note the company put critics and writers in stalls rows 7, 8, and 9. They give enough elevation to see over the corps and street scenes. I think Row 9 is the best - ideally opposite the orchestra and on a gangway. But £60 a pop is not cheap.

http://dariaklimentova.com/

I once flew Aeroflot to Moscow. As we were coming into land the overhead locker burst open and my bag landed on a Babushka below. She smiled and shrugged, as if it happened all the time. No wonder Russians all clap the pilot when a plane successfully lands!

They use scheduled flights. I think I also heard they split the company over a couple of flights. Horrid to contemplate why you would do this but very sensible.

My goodness - nobody being taken on from Central School of Ballet.

Something intimately linked with the original version of this forum and I think people will want to know Some sad news - Jane Simpson is Retiring from Writing after 18 years at Balletco and DanceTabs: http://dancetabs.com/2014/06/jane-simpson-retiring-from-writing-after-18-years-at-balletco-and-dancetabs/ Might be easier if I give the text of the page... Jane Simpson Retiring from Writing after 18 years at Balletco and DanceTabs It's with a heavy heart that I have just run Jane Simpson's last review for DanceTabs. Jane, who has been with Balletco, and now DanceTabs, more or less from the start, has decided to retire from active criticism and it's a huge loss to us all. Balletco started in the summer of 1996 and within weeks an email of congratulation arrived and then Jane started contributing - initially not so many reviews and more standing information, terrific interviews and doing the weekly updates we ran at the time. The Legends of British Ballet pages were down to Jane as also were many of the Ballet Years series. It was a time when we all started with nothing on the net and there was enormous fun with Jane and others trying things out and steering the forum community forward as well. Jane also helped enormously when we put the 'Following Sir Fred’s Steps' book on the web. Over the summer we are going to do a piece about the early years that Jane helped make happen and made us not your average enthusiastic blog. Important to note also that Jane has contributed much elsewhere also, for me most notably as a regular at Dance Now - a hardcopy magazine whose demise I still lament. So, there is more to say but in the meantime I want to thank Jane enormously for all she has done and the quiet authority and professionalism with which she has done it. She will be greatly missed and I'm sure I and others will still have a quiet word when something comes up and none of us newbies has any clue about whatsoever. Jane, Thank you for everything. Bruce Marriott

Pleased to say that Dave Morgan was at the photoshoot... which included Alastair Marriott's Connectome, premiered tonight. Enjoy. Roberta Marquez and Bennet Gartside in The Dream © Dave Morgan. Courtesy of DanceTabs / Flickr Steven McRae (with Marcelino Sambe, Matthew Ball, Luca Acri, Tomas Mock) in Connectome © Dave Morgan. Courtesy of DanceTabs / Flickr Rob Clark, Sian Murphy and Sarah Lamb in The Concert © Dave Morgan. Courtesy of DanceTabs / Flickr See more... Dave Morgan: Royal Ballet in The Dream, Connectome (premiere) and The Concert Courtesy of DanceTabs / Flickr

Yep saw that - they are the Laureate winners and good on them. But my post started with "but I'm not sure if all winners have been decalred yet." and that's the point I was making - not all the Benois Winners are known yet.

Ernst Meisner's Embers which started the eveing...

All the pieces, but sadly not in their musical context.

Love Glass Pieces but never felt a particular musical or choreographic link to DGV I have to say. All creatives are influenced by others and sometimes we see connections strongly and sometimes less so. I think Wheeldon is his own man these days, but too early to tell where George Williamson is yet. Certainly Dawn Dances, like DGV, is a great celebration and sends us home happy with life and the wonderful efforts of dancers.

Final Details - hopefully... NATALIA OSIPOVA & IVAN VASILIEV in SOLO FOR TWO 6th – 9th August 2014, London Coliseum The world’s most celebrated dancing partners, Natalia Osipova and Ivan Vasiliev are re-united for this summer’s hottest ticket, at the London Coliseum, Wednesday 6th – Saturday 9th August in producer Sergei Danilian’s presentation of SOLO FOR TWO. The pair will dance three exciting, diverse pieces, all London premieres, commissioned by the Segerstrom Center for the Arts and Ardani Artists. The evening opens with extracts of Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui’s Mea Culpa, set to music by Heinrich Schütz and accompanied by l'Ensemble Akadêmia from France, conducted by Françoise Lasserre which explores the world that our ancestors and roots have bequeathed to us. This is followed by Passo by Ohad Naharin, artistic director of Batsheva Dance Company, danced to the British electronic music duo Autechre and English traditional folk music. The evening concludes with Facada by Arthur Pita, adapted specially for Natalia and Ivan, from his original piece God’s Garden. Original music and traditional fado will be played live by Frank Moon. Natalia Osipova graduated from the Bolshoi Ballet Academy in 2004 and joined the Bolshoi Ballet the same year, ultimately reaching the position of Principal Dancer. She has been a guest artist with the Mariinsky Ballet, Teatro alla Scala, Paris Opéra Ballet, American Ballet Theatre and Zurich Ballet and is currently a principal dancer with the Royal Ballet and American Ballet Theatre.