alison

There are loads of reviews on the old Ballet.co site, if you want to get an idea of what the pieces are about: http://www.ballet.co.uk/cgi/reviews_database_search/db_search.cgi?return_to_frontpage=y

Years ago, I posted a link to a site where you could buy individual issues. I wonder if it still works? Edit: can't find it via Google, and I don't seem to have bookmarked it

Was. She still appears to be with ENB, according to their website, so I wonder how much she is doing?

I started off my balletgoing career(!) only going to triple bills where I was interested in all 3 works, until I realised how much I was missing out on by so doing. (I mean, my goodness, wasn't it a bill of Firebird, Enigma Variations and Rubies that I turned my nose up at back in the late 80's? :blush:) After all, my first experience of The Dream had it paired with Tales of Beatrix Potter ...

Oh no, not again (to Takada being injured, I mean). I did wonder the other day whether she was injured - and whether she was replaced as one of Juliet's Friends for the cinema broadcast, because I didn't spot her there.

I've moved this into a wider forum, because I think it's probably a matter of interest to more than those who just Do Dance

Or Sadler's Wells. I've spotted DT and Dance Europe in the odd WHSmiths, but it's pretty rare. Unfortunately, the bookshop chains which used to stock it seem to be the ones which have closed down.

Was it? Didn't they do Raymonda as part of the Nureyev bill in 2003/4?

I'd thought Calvert was only covering, but perhaps I misunderstood, or perhaps changes have been caused by injury or similar.

Aileen, you have an interesting point about access to attendance statistics. I wonder whether those companies which aren't linked to a theatre in the same way that the RB is have such good access to box office statistics and can process them, or whether the theatre holds tight to them? As for the suggestion that ENB offer discounts, it was pointed out to me a few days ago that, at least for the Coliseum, there is some sort of multibuy scheme covering, I'd guess, the whole year's programming. I must admit, I'd totally failed to notice this myself! As for publicity photos, which I don't think has been mentioned so far - I've only skimmed through - I'm a firm believer, for much of the time, in making life easy for people spotting these adverts by having something clearly balletic (although preferably not too clichéd) on them that would give people an idea of what they might see if they bought a ticket, and preferably something that will intrigue them. Advertising campaigns which didn't work, in my book, included the RB's Hammersmith Apollo season while the ROH was closed, when several of the dancers were made to look more like fashion models than obviously dancers, and ENB's 1989 (I think) London Dominion Theatre campaign, where the posters just contained the words "English National Ballet" to stress the change of name from London Festival Ballet (you can see examples of more traditional posters before and after that era if you're ever down in the lower studio at Markova House). I used to walk past bus stops with the ENB posters and they never made any impact on me - and I was someone who was potentially interested in going to see them! I know some people stayed away from that season in protest at the name change and/or the choice of venue, but given that ENB didn't have a huge core of regular fans I don't think that can have been the only reason for the poor ticket sales.

Hello, Eileen, and welcome. If you use the old Ballet.co search engine at http://www.ballet.co.uk/cgi/reviews_database_search/db_search.cgi, you'll find 1 review of the Nutcracker, lots of reviews of his other productions, and also a link to a review of the trilogy from 1998 which doesn't work, but might give you something to go on. It's from The Sunday Times, but I believe all their stuff from before they disappeared behind a firewall a year or two ago is supposed to be archived accessibly, so running a Google search on the information might come up with something. I'm not sure how things stand with the archiving of the old Ballet.co pages at the moment, otherwise I'd suggest you find the Links thread for that particular week, which ought at least to have a quote of some sort.

I was wondering earlier today how you would go about broadening someone's exposure to ballet in particular beyond the big full-evening warhorses, thinking of trying to persuade someone in particular to try a mixed bill, and then realised that this has become quite a serious topic in recent weeks. Mixed bills can indeed sell - witness the Royal Ballet's recent double bill of The Dream and Song of the Earth, where I think all performances sold out - but many struggle. So, leaving aside the more crass aspects like sex, violence and controversy, and assuming that you don't have the luxury of access to "big name" collaborators/performers to attract audiences, how *do* you sell a mixed bill, particularly to the general public rather than to afficionados? What attracts you as an individual, what did attract you when you were starting out, or, if you're a relative newcomer to dance, what *would* attract you? Why shouldn't you have just as good a time at a triple bill as when sitting through a full-evening Swan Lake (assuming that you find the latter a tempting prospect in the first place)? And how would you then persuade someone to come back and try another mixed bill?

Still no official casting for either of the new works on this programme, although I gather there are two casts for Sweet Violets, and I'm assuing that McGregor will be adhering to his usual strategy of having only the one cast, but it would be nice to know whether the cast alternations for SV match with those of Polyphonia or not. I do note, though, that Polyphonia is now at the top of the list on the page on the ROH website, so don't know whether this means the running order has been changed.

Yes, they even put me on it temporarily when I was going round on crutches after knee surgery.

Yes, makes sense (even though I can still only ever see Joe Cipolla in the role!)

That's certainly not uncommon. I've noticed a lot of French people there recently, but then it's a quick hop in Eurostar, and a lot of British ballet fans return the compliment, so to speak

I think you must be right, but would you say the mother is the third female role? It's last century since I last saw it, and I can't remember (plus may be getting confused with My Brother, My Sisters).

That's ridiculous. Surely 1 item a day isn't unreasonable?

Ridiculously unusual, I'd have said. When you think about all the fuss that's been made in the past about the Royal Opera House's selection processes for directors, executives etc., I'm surprised this meets standards.

Thanks, Jane. I'll digest them properly later, but obviously some indications of the new directorship in the casting: nice to see we now have Rothbart being announced: wonder if this is a sign of things to come for other ballets? So the rumours of Acosta's a) not being used next season and c) (because the site seemingly doesn't allow "b" without turning it into a smiley )not doing any more Classical ballets have turned out to be untrue. I intended to say this last autumn on the old site, but couldn't quite fit it in anywhere relevant: the "RB in rehearsal" featuring Requiem last autumn had Ed Watson standing in for Federico Bonelli (who wasn't injured or anything, but had been featured the night before), and even with the little we saw him do I decided I'd really like to see what he'd do with the role, so that's one wish fulfilled.

Never mind, Jane, you can feel virtuous . I look at it this way: I had a budget (which I actually exceeded for programme 1 because there was an offer, ahem), so the company hasn't actually lost out on my booking, although I gained a better seat for it. But seeing £10 offers is distressing. John, I don't know what it is about London ballet audiences either (except that it's obviously reflected in the regions, or this bill, or a mixture of the two, would be touring there too), but I'm certainly getting a feeling that despite the many of us who attend both there's something of a disconnect between Coliseum ballet audiences and ROH ones. (And it's not only mixed bills: BRB's Coppelia didn't sell as well as many had expected either.) The RB generally manages to sell its mixed bills rather better, but probably that is due to the recognition that they don't sell as well and are therefore priced a lot more competitively - and presumably subsidised by the much higher prices for full-evening ballets. I've never been convinced that the policy of ENB performing the "in the round" productions at the Albert Hall leads to much in the way of new audiences crossing-over even to full-length works at the Coliseum, so I'm certain that they would resist trying a mixed bill, especially if it's not made up of ballets with familiar names. It is a huge problem, but not one I think they can solve by ultimately capitulating and just putting on the full-length ballets their public seems to want.

Oh right, perhaps the other Clarke whose name escapes me was one of them, then. (Or perhaps I was just misinformed at the time) Thanks, Jane, for the information, too.

Leana and Vanessa Palmer in the RB, some years ago. And two of the three female dancing Clarkes - was it Simone and Jessica? - were sisters, I believe. Didn't both dance with BRB? Come to think of it, talking of Clarkes, did I see that a couple of the more recent "4-pack" of Clarkes, one of whom at least is I think still at the RBS, were dancing in the same company? I also think Leanne Benjamin's sister used to dance professionally, although I'm not altogether certain they were in the same company. And I suppose Adam and Simon Cooper sort of overlapped in AMP. I must admit that I hadn't made the association between Jenna and Callie Roberts, though.

Programme 2 begins tonight, so again your thoughts would be appreciated:

In another thread, aileen asked: "I know that this is off topic but could you tell me about the flower throw last night. I've never seen this at any performance by any company. Also, were there some debuts last night? Who were they and in what roles?" so I thought I'd answer it here. I don't remember, in all my years of ENB-going, seeing a flower throw there before, but it was highly deserved: the company made a great job of Rite. You get them occasionally at the ROH, although more rarely these days. It looked to me to be staff throwing them from the stage boxes, to judge by the colours they were wearing. As for the dancers, ENB tweeted last night "Special mention for @guimenezes15 and Pedro Lapetra for a tremendous last minute replacement tonight :-) #Firebird #RiteofSpring" so I guess that partly answers your query. I certainly noticed Pedro in Rite.