Sophoife

It was in Melbourne, Australia, about 40 years ago @Sim🤭

It does appear to be a debutantes' ball @Sim. My German isn't great, but I can pick out words. There were parents in boxes with champagne and mobile phones 🤭

 

I would have liked to see them step off the stairs and into a waltz instead of that rather ungainly shuffle.

 

Here are some stats - 160 débutante couples! and here is some history of the ball.

 

I would have died of embarrassment if my deb ball had been televised - live or on delay! Also I'm shocked that some of the young ladies had strapless gowns and some gowns with spaghetti straps 🤭 We were allowed off the shoulder but the "sleeve" had to be a minimum depth/length. No plunging necklines and no very low backs either. This sort of style, minus the damn crinoline!

 

Links – Saturday 10 February, 2024

 

Review – The Royal Ballet, Manon, cinema relay: Jim Pritchard, Seen and Heard International

 

Review – Birmingham Royal Ballet, The Sleeping Beauty, Mayflower Theatre, Southampton:

Matt Davey, Southern Daily Echo
Lyndon Hogg, New Milton Advertiser & Lymington Times

 

Review – New York City Ballet, The Four Temperaments/Liebeslieder Walzer, David H Koch Theater, New York NY: Mary Cargill, danceviewtimes

 

Review – West Australian Ballet, Metamorphosis: Ballet at the Quarry, Quarry Amphitheatre, Perth WA:

Melinda Webster, The West Australian (paywalled)

Deborah Jones, deborah jones: FollowSpot

 

Review – Milwaukee Ballet, Genesis International Choreographic Competition, Pabst Theater, Milwaukee WI: Jim Higgins, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

 

Review – Madu, documentary feature: Carlos Aguilar, Variety

 

 

Preview – Royal Opera House, Festival of New Choreography: Teresa Guerreiro, CultureWhisper

 

Preview – Jamiel Lawrence Ballet Nights, Ballet Nights 004, Lanterns Studio Theatre, London: Vera Liber, British Theatre Guide

 

Preview – Ballet West, Swan Lake, Capitol Theatre, Salt Lake City UT: Les Roka, The Utah Review

 

Preview – Ballet Kelowna, Mustard/Delicate Fire, Kelowna Community Theatre: Dan Walton, Penticton Herald

 

Preview – DBDT: Encore!, Dallas Black Dance Theater, McMahon Auditorium, Lawton OK: Safak Costu, The People's Network

 

Preview – Avant Chamber Ballet, Walpurgisnacht/Swan Lake Act 2/Romeo and Juliet (Mejia), Moody Performance Hall, Dallas TX: Manuel Mendoza, The Dallas Morning News

 

Preview – Asian American Ballet Project, Beginnings, on-demand stream: San Francisco Examiner

 

Preview/Feature – Dance on Camera 2024: A Festival of Love, Water and Kinesthetic Empathy Starts Today: Caedra Scott-Flaherty, Observer

 

 

News – Backlash against Northern Ballet recorded music plans intensifies: Georgia Luckhurst, The Stage

 

 

Video News – Royal Winnipeg Ballet deals with online ticket fraud: CBC (Canada)

 

 

Feature – The Dance Locker: Tzu-Chao Chou: David Mead, SeeingDance

 

Feature – Jessica Lang’s Twinkle – A Star-Studded New Ballet: Teresa Guerreiro, CultureWhisper

 

Feature – WA Ballet presents George Williamson world premiere at Metamorphosis: Ballet at the Quarry for Perth Festival: Tanya MacNaughton, The West Australian (paywalled)

 

Feature – From Peruvian folk dance to Nina Simone: Miami-born choreographer comes home with new ballet: Christine DiMattei, WLRN Miami

 

Feature – How Cuban Ballet is Helping Latinos Preserve Their History in Miami’s Hispanic Cultural Arts Center: Rocio Magnani, The Latin Times

 

Feature – We have MS and we’re not invisible: We’re dancing at the Royal Ballet & this is our story: Stefan Kyriazis, Daily Express

 

Feature – Central New York Ballet ushers in era of artistic collaboration and community involvement: Emma Misiaszek, CNY Central

 

Feature – RNZB named ‘Bloody Good Workplace’: Sarah Griffiths, The Post

 

Feature – Interlochen ballet dancers reunite with their 1960s performance dresses: Alli Baxter, UpNorthLive

 

 

Video Feature – ‘Athletes are beautiful artists’: Kansas City Ballet challenges San Francisco Ballet to dance off: KSHB 41, YouTube

 

Video Feature – New film tells life story of New York City Ballet’s first Asian dancer: CeFaan Kim, The Citizen

 

Warning: 🔰

 

 

...not to forget the ol' contaminated meat excuse! Alberto Contador anyone? 🤭

Oh but Shane Warne's mum gave him one of her diuretics because he was bloated. NOT.

 

He got a year's suspension. The ban covered all organised cricket.

 

In addition to international matches, the leg-spinner was also ineligible to play for Victoria, English county Hampshire or his local district club St Kilda for 12 months.

!!! https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2024/feb/07/kamila-valieva-blamed-failed-drug-test-on-grandfathers-strawberry-dessert

22 hours ago, Neverdancedjustamum said:

Based on what I’ve read in another part of this forum and what I’ve seen on Instagram, I guess you meant one of the prize winners from ABT JKO School. In quite a unique move (I thought) I’ve never seen an AD of a well-known vocational school do, Stella Abrera posted on her Instagram and publicly acknowledged the candidate’s former school for the “wonderful training received prior….”.

 

To see the post in the *other* PdL thread (in Ballet news and information)...

10 hours ago, Sabine0308 said:

Since sooo many finalists had chosen "do you care?" as their contemporary piece, it bored me a bit.

 

10 hours ago, Birdy said:

As an aside about American schools training more for competitions…Natalie Steele only started at ABT this fall, coming from a school known for doing well at YAGP. ABT doesn’t train students for competitions and generally doesn’t allow students to compete. An exception must have been made for her.

 

I've reproduced Stella Abrera's post-competition Instagram post below. The photo shows Cynthia Harvey, Julio Bocca, Alessandra Ferri, Stella herself, and Sascha Radetsky. All ABT alumni/alumnae, and Harvey was Abrera's predecessor at the ABT JKO School.

 

Ms Abrera's comments in the post informed me that Do you care? was an ABT dancer's piece, and she also (and this is rare from a school AD) acknowledged Natalie Steele's previous teacher before she joined the ABT JKO School last year. I'd guess that her previous school was preparing her for PdL and when she was offered a place at JKO it was negotiated that she be permitted to compete, if selected from the video auditions.

 

Note that Miss Abrera herself trained for a time in Sydney, and won the gold medal at the Genée competition (as it was then) in 1995.

5 hours ago, Peanut68 said:

I prefer to hide amongst 1000’s outside & be able to wander to the bar anytime at a music gig!!

 

Oh I much prefer either an indoor gig or, if it has to be outdoors, an "intimate" one. I don't want to have to spend hundreds or (these days) thousands just so I can see the artist without a giant screen or binoculars!

 

And, @Peanut68, aren't we supposed to be intoxicated by the music? 🤭

 

I saw Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds in about 1990 in a former theatre turned nightclub in Melbourne and i felt punch-drunk, it was so visceral. 

At home over Christmas I copied some stuff from my old DVR and one of them was a broadcast of a documentary called Béjart : The Show Must Go On. It shows Roman and the company, including excerpts, in the years immediately post-Béjart's death in 2007. Quite interesting. Multi-lingual with subtitles.

 

Bolle seems to do Boléro whenever he feels like it including with the Béjart company. I missed him in Milan last year by two days.

 

It premiered in 1961, with the dancer Duska Sifnios on the table. The first man to dance it was Jorge Donn in 1979. The links are to YouTube videos.

 

In Paris last year I was booked to see Amandine Albisson and then Hugo Marchand. Due to minor injury I saw Mademoiselle Albisson twice, and I did wish I could have stayed on for Alice Renavand's [second] retirement show.

 

I also got to see both Germain Louvet and Mathieu Ganio as the blue man in Wayfarer and I can die happy now. The LINES my dears!

 

 

On 30/01/2024 at 10:54, Sophoife said:

 

There's a Portuguese boy, Gabriel Pimparel, in the senior boys' class, who is a student at English National Ballet School.

 

On 03/02/2024 at 07:55, invisiblecircus said:

 

This year, 4 girls and 1 boy entered from the UK but were not selected to compete in the live rounds in Lausanne. I don't know anything about who these candidates are, whether they're studying at UK schools or abroad, or are private candidates. 

 

ENBS student Gabriel Pimparel did indeed compete in the live rounds, representing and supported by his school.

 

@invisiblecircus I was curious about the source of those numbers, and found your initial PdL post in the Doing Dance sub-forum, which links to a pdf showing numbers of entrants and finalists by nationality (thank you).

 

The difficulty with quoting that is it doesn't show where the candidates train. So yes, 5 British students might have sent in videos, but as you say, no idea where they train. And on that same pdf the ENBS student would be counted as Portugal not Britain.

 

Hm. Wonder if I emailed them the PdL people would tell me how many British schools were represented in the initial 400+?

Paris Opéra Ballet performed a triple of Béjart last year: Firebird, Song of a Wayfarer, and Boléro .

 

We used to get quite a lot of Béjart in Australia when Maina Gielgud was AD of AusBallet as she had a personal relationship with Béjart. The company was filmed in Le Concours in the mid-90s.

 

Wayfarer is danced to the Mahler song cycle, but for some forsaken reason it is Song not Songs.

 

Alessandra Ferri performed L'heure exquise in the Linbury Theatre in 2021. 

Goodness, I wonder what Miss Gielgud thinks!!

On 01/02/2024 at 05:45, Emeralds said:

Valieva hasn't been barred from training or competing in Russia at all, as the official stance in her country is that she hasn't been banned nor done anything wrong but was simply a victim of foreign envy. She has continued to train with her 2022 coaches and choreographer and compete in numerous Russian competitions.

 

And this is yet another reason why bodies outside Russia are so anti-Russian participation.

1 hour ago, LinMM said:

As she is so young she could still take part in another major competition as there is nothing to stop her training. 

 

She'll have been long scrapped by coaches etc., and I think doping bans prohibit her from being coached and from using ice rinks. I know in other sports doping bans extend to training in facilities used by other pros, and to coaching services.

A 15 year old was given drugs by adults, none of whom are being sanctioned.

 

This young person, still not yet 18, will never compete again, as by the time the four year ban she has received expires, she will have been long consigned to the scrapheap.

 

TBH I think the ISU should further alter their age rules, and require all competitors in senior-level competitions to have turned 18 by the date of the competition or the first day of the season, e.g. 18 by 1 September or 1 October. 

There are two lists of accepted candidates: the one linked in the first post above by @Sabine0308, and another that is a quick three-page list, no photos.

 

At this link is the streaming schedule for live watching.

1 hour ago, SPD444 said:

Have any of the U.K.schools entered their students in this?  We seem to shy away from entering anything competitive, even ordinary schools do not have sports days anymore.

 

 

There's a Portuguese boy, Gabriel Pimparel, in the senior boys' class, who is a student at English National Ballet School.

Asking for casting two months in advance just reminds me, we in Australia are also going to see Johan Inger's Carmen, in Sydney, dates 10-27 April. We certainly don't expect to see principal casting made available until, probably, 5 April.

 

Link to AusBallet's production page here.

 

It's quite interesting to read AusBallet's provided info next to ENB's, as it makes no mention that Bizet's score has been augmented, it doesn't mention mirrors, and it doesn't mention the Benois de la Danse!

"Johan Inger’s award-winning production of Carmen is an exhilarating journey that thrusts Georges Bizet’s 19th-century opera into the modern world with a breathtaking display of athleticism and passion.

 

"Created in 2015, Inger’s contemporary retelling of Prosper Mérimée’s 1845 novella is a darkly compelling story of the dangerously seductive Carmen, whose love affair with Don José ends in brutal tragedy. Broadening its gaze beyond its fiery heroine, Inger’s Carmen is seen through the eyes of a boy bewildered by the ugly manifestations of machismo.

 

"Using Georges Bizet's famous score, Inger has reimagined the classic opera, transporting it to dance in a fascinating production. Including sublime passages for soloists and duos and ensemble sequences of consummate virtuosity, Carmen brings you the heat of southern Spain in a powerfully unique production.

 

"Content warning: Carmen contains adult themes."

 

Production credits

3 hours ago, MAX said:

Oh apologies, difficult sometimes for a french man !

 

I guess you would have the same kind of problems if participating on a french dance forum.

 

🤣 Le seul fois que j'ai rencontré Aurélie Dupont, j'ai dis "Madame!"

 

The only time I met Aurélie Dupont (at stage door at the ROH in 2017, I was leaving a note for someone, she was waiting for security to finish with me), I just said "Madame!" and then babbled something about Hannah O'Neill. To which she replied graciously. I got out of her way ASAP, I mean, Aurélie Dupont !

 

I didn't call her Madame Dupont, but Madame. She's Mademoiselle Dupont professionally, and Madame Bélingard (I think, still) privately.

Jannik Jannik Jannik!!

 

Phew, for an hour there I had thought it was going to be a quick 3-set demolition job from Medvedev. To their eternal credit both players turned it in to one of the Good Finals.

12 hours ago, Emeralds said:

Well done to Rohan Bopanna and Matthew Ebden! I hope they consider/plan to pair up for French Open  Wimbledon and US Open. (Who's Max Purcell partnering this season?

 

I believe they do.

 

Purcell played doubles here with Jordan Thompson.

 

Yes yes Leander Paes! What a lovely player to watch!

...and people think Federer, Nadal and the other one have career longevity!!

Zheng's fairytale is over, but Rohan Bopanna's continues. 43 years 340-something days old, oldest first-time world number one in men's doubles, and his first ever Grand Slam men's doubles title (he won the mixed doubles at Roland Garros in 2017, and he's the oldest man to win a GS men's doubles title). His daughter is old enough to enjoy watching him play, and they are precious memories the family will have in the future.

Forza campione! Sinner in four sets, will play the winner of the match now in progress (Medvedev v Zverev).

 

On a PR front, Tennis Australia and tennis orgs generally must be praying for a Sinner win on Sunday.

 

If Medvedev wins tonight we have a final between two guys who didn’t play in any of the lead up tournaments, which isn’t great for the Australian swing. And then there’s the whole PR win for Russia angle too.

 

If Zverev wins, there’ll be (rightly) even more attention on the charge he’s going to be contesting in May and that’ll make for bad press for Tennis Australia and for tennis more generally. Not the least being the ATP player council, to which he was recently elected.

 

I guess on the bright side, we know that given Melbourne, it’s likely to be a pretty friendly crowd for Sinner on Sunday.