SheilaC

Odyssey, it's not Elmhurst. Yorkshire Ballet Summer School was set up by David Gayle (as Yorkshire Ballet Seminars), who came from Ilkley in Yorkshire, to help other boys from the region to improve their ballet technique and performance skills so that they could enter the profession, as he had (he became a dancer at the Royal Ballet). Eventually the former Royal Ballet dancer, Margeurite Porter, also from Yorkshire, took over running the Seminars, which she renamed Yorkshire Ballet Summer School. Many eminent dancers have gained early additional training through the scheme; Kevin and Michael O' Hare, Samara Downs, Elizabeth Harrod, James Barton, Brandon Lawrence, Reece Clark, I believe, amongst many others. But you are right that there is a Birmingham connection, since Iain Mackay was such an eminent dancer at Birmingham Royal Ballet.

Six masterclasses by major dancers, past and present, will be open to the public to view for only £5, at the Yorkshire Ballet Summer School in July. Iain Mackay, the new director, has invited former colleagues to contribute to his programme. The series is: Iain Mackay (Tuesday 17 July); Zenaida Yanowsky (Wednesday 18); Irek Mukhamedov (Thursday 19); Joseph Caley (Monday 23); Leanne Cope (Tuesday 24); Kristen McNally (Wednesday 25); Leanne Benjamin (Thursday 25) No need to pre-book, the £5 contribution will be taken at the door. The masterclasses start at 6.30 and are likely to last until about 8pm. The venue is Askham Bryan College (YO23 3FR), a few miles from York. There are 3 buses plus a Park and Ride bus from York. The college is very accessible by road, not far from the A1, and has good parking space. Taxis from York are £15 each way. There are frequent trains to York station from all parts of England and Scotland. Visitors may also watch the summer school classes (£12 per full day; £9 per half day). Teachers are; first week: Cira Robinson (Ballet Black); David Peden; Neil Westmoreland (Matthew Bourne); Zenaida Yanowsky Second week: Samantha Raine; Ricardo Cervera; Laura Morera. Additional teachers are: Jenna Roberts; Callie Roberts; Joseph Caley Further information can be found on the YBSS and Askham Bryan websites

In the latest email I've had from La Seine Musicale I note that a Mozart festival is planned for 20-30 June next year. Normally the dance festival starts towards the end of June. This year the festival is shorter than usual but it would be odd if the dates were confined to July when Parisians depart for their summer holidays. I've not been able to track the announcement to which Sophoife refers, otherwise I was beginning to wonder if the festival would have a different venue next year. This year's festival starts on Monday, so perhaps those of us able to attend will glean better information then.

Although casting information may only influence a small proportion of the audience, the appalling delay in providing cast details (only made available on the Monday before the season) will have been a factor for some ballet lovers. I needed to know if there was a cast I wished to see, as arrangements for child care, hotel and expensive trains would be necessary if I had gone. In the end, in desperation, I contacted the company but still got no information until the day the press release came out. Far too late. Under David Bintley casting information has got later and later (apart forJapan!).

To my astonishment I was given a set of earplugs at the Paris Opera Ballet mixed programme, prior to Schechter's piece, The art of not looking back. (The message on the plastic cover said, in French, 'So that the music remains a pleasure"). Has anyone been given ear plugs at the ballet before? Unfortunately the ear plugs didn't prevent someone in the central stalls being seriously incapacitated during the piece. Like the music, the choreography was often dark and aggressive, and contained words blaming his mother for leaving him. Danced by nine women it contrasted utterly with a ballet by another angry man, Robbins, for eight female dancers, which I had seen just three weeks before at the Robbins festival. Antique Epigraphs is brightly lit, has varied pastel coloured costumes, is joyous and serene, to lovely music by Debussy. The programme opens with a site specific work by the circus artist, Thierree, with a wide selection of POB dancers slithering about the steps and locations of the Garnier dressed as mystic creatures. The third item is The Male Dancer by Ivan Perez, to music by Part, for 10 males, including etoiles, all in extravagant costumes. The solos include references to L'Apres-midi d'un faune and Le spectre de la rose. The final piece, my reason for doing a day trip to Paris, was Crystal Pite's The Seasons' Canon to Max Richter's version of Vivaldi's Four Seasons (which is also the music Kenneth Tindall is creating his new ballet on), as impressive and moving as ever. This programme was filmed last week and will be available to watch on line for several weeks. The music is all recorded.

The annual summer dance festival in Paris, Les Etes de la danse, which has traditionally only invited companies from the Americas, has announced that the companies next year will be the Australian Ballet and Hong Kong Ballet. The festival is held at the end of June and early July. The venue will be La Seine de la Danse, which is hosting the festival for the first time this year (Robbins festival with multiple companies and Pacific North West).

One of the performances I shall always remember was of Lynn Seymour and Peter Martins performing Sleeping Beauty with Festival Ballet at the Coliseum. At that stage she still had that unique luminous, melting quality to her dancing (quite as special as her dramatic genius, which is mostly what people still recall) and she truly was a wondrous vision in the vision scene. Macmillan was sat very close to us in the stalls and seemed as overwhelmed as we were. (She has a passage about that performance in her autobiography, Lynn, when she states that she only did one performance, guesting at 2 days' notice. Although she was not noted for her Aurora, the Nureyev film I am a Dancer includes them both dancing the Act 3 pas de deux and it shows how wonderfully musical she was,)

Thanks for the reminder, Amelia. It is well worth watching, not least for the moving performance of Novikova in the final act. But there is also fascinating archive material shown, during the intervals, of Gennady Selyutsky himself, in different ballets at various stages of his career, including the ballet I will always remember him for, La Bayadere, in his silent movie interpretation of the Brahmin.

I have read that the dancers were unhappy that the media were presented with the results of the survey before the dancers, and without their permission. Re the school, I attended a performance last week at the Opera Garnier which consisted of three works. Although the first ballet was classical (Ivan Clustine's Suite de Danses, 1913, very influenced by Les Sylphides, but in turn being a perceptible influence on Lifar's Suite en blanc), the second and third were more contemporary, Kylian (Un ballo) and Neumeier (Spring and Fall). It is true that the repertory for next season is very disappointing.The programme for the school next year ( Two Pigeons, the version of Merante and Aveline, Bournonville's Konservatoriet and a contemporary piece to Rameau) is once again more interesting than most of the company's rep, apart from the Robbins triple.

I managed to get to see the Saturday matinee, with Miki, who was charming and danced well, but I'm not sure she's a soubrette with the lively mischief ideal for Swanilda. I particularly wanted to see Shang who was scheduled to dance Dawn, but although she danced it at the rehearsal apparently Brooke Ray did it at all performances; it seems that Shang was the (non-dancing) doll Coppelia at every performance, is she injured? The standout, for me, was Valentin Olovyannikov, an unusually tall Dr Coppelius, but who gave a powerful performance, very funny without overegging it.

As ballet.co decided it wasn't appropriate to post my theme on this topic I wrote to Alex Beard. His reply said the London Living Wage had been granted in January 2014 (I didn't realise it had started that early). It is unfortunate that the outsourcing group, Kier, has such a poor reputation. Just a few weeks ago it was in the news for illegal blacklisting of trades union workers. I fully understand why people attending ROH find the demonstration annoying. The cacophony last Friday made me think I was at a Paris demonstration! However, I find the cleaners very efficient, working in the Ladies toilets during the performance so that they are clean for the intervals, and as far as I can make out, the reasons for the dismissals are not strong. The cleaners and porters help to make the opera house work efficiently; yet their daily wage rate is less than the cost of many ROH tickets.

You can get the card for £35 if you agree to pay by direct debit. Although this means ATG will automatically deduct money 12 months later it is easy to cancel. The first night discount only applies to some seat prices (middle of the range). It is an infuriating organisation. I recently paid for another card but when trying to book on-line my new membership number is not recognised so 2 weeks ago I emailed them for help. No response. It costs a lot to phone them; but the agents can be quite helpful. The booking fees are ridiculous so you can save a lot by membership if you can't book in person at an ATG theatre (I rejoined to book for ENB at Manchester Opera House).

Not sure if this is the right thread but watching Richard Alston's wonderful dance, Carnaval, at the Wells on Saturday, which was more balletic and far more musical than some new pieces the Royal does nowadays, I thought it would be interesting if Kevin O'Hare invited him to choreograph for the Royal in the future. (K O'H was at the performance)

Sharon mentions seeing Nureyev dance in Manchester. It was probably with Northern Dance Theatre (now Northern Ballet) which was then based in Manchester. In 1986 he became Artist Laureate for that company and in December that year he danced three performances of Swan Lake in Manchester, his first time performing there. He had been scheduled to dance Nutcracker in Manchester in December 1985 but had to cancel, at 33 hours notice, because of flu (Aids-reated?), surely a rare cancellation. One of his proteges at Paris Opera Ballet, Laurent Hilaire, took his place. The ballerina at both programmes was Elisabeth Maurin, the most English of French ballet dancers, in my view. In January 1987 they danced Swan Lake in Sheffield. On the 25th anniversary of his 'leap to freedom'' from the Kirov in Paris, June 17, 1986, he gave his second performance at the Bradford Alhambra, in Les Sylphides and Miss Julie. In 1987 he danced The Lesson with NDT. I first saw him dance Giselle with Fonteyn at the Golders Green Hippodrome in 1964; the last time in Sunderland on his final tour, in a programme that included Moor's Pavane and The Lesson. Vivi Flindt was his partner. It was reported at the time that there was loud booing at Sunderland but I was at every performance there and that didn't happen, although he was way past his prime. In truth, he lost his Kirov style early in his performance career in the West but his reputation was long protected by his charisma and magnetism. He was avid to try all styles but couldn't do full justice to some choreographers such as Paul Taylor and sometimes overacted in pieces such as Petrushka and Pierrot Lunaire. His passion for dancing was amazing and at the time he was filming Valentino he would sometimes dance Dances at a Gathering despite not being officially cast, dancing with Seymour, Wall, Dowell ,Sibley, Connor and the other Royal dancers who were so wonderful in that masterpiece in those days. Some of his productions for the London Festival Ballet and Paris Opera Ballet are not well choreographed, crammed with too much detail, unmusical and with too many steps, technique for technique's sake, reducing emotional engagement (I remember one performance of his Romeo and Juliet performed by LFB in Newcastle where the audience laughed in the bedroom scene). Yet his production of the Shades act of Bayadere has rarely been bettered and gave the Royal corps the chance to shine and win awards. He turned the Paris Opera Ballet round and nurtured some wonderful dancers there, such as Legris, Le Riche, Hilaire, Guillem, Loudieres. Guerin, Platel. Fiery though he could be, if dancers were not so passionate and hardworking as he was, he was a great friend and support to dancers he admired, if they fell on hard times, such as Seymour and Fonteyn. We will not see his like again.

Managed to get to the Lowry, despite multiple train cancellations, and saw three performances, each with a different conductor. At the Saturday matinee Maureya Lebowitz was a delightful Aurora, embodying joyous charm, and in command of all the technical perils. In the evening Yaoqian Shang's musicality, phrasing and lyricism produced a lovely reading of the choreography. In Act 1 her wonderful smile radiated as ever but she tempered it at moments, such as when she learns she is to marry, and of course in her anxiety after she has pricked her finger. In Act 2 her dancing was eloquent, even innocently seductive as she beckoned the prince to follow her. In the final act she was serenely classical. Chi Cao partnered her well and proved that he still has formidable technique. Across the 3 performances the dancing of the fairies varied in standard but most were good. Jade Heusen was an impressive Carabosse, Delia Mathews an authoritative Lilac Fairy, Michael O'Hare a masterly Catalabutte, and Valentin Olovyannikov a hilarious Gallison. The dancers must be exhausted, so many performances of such a demanding ballet, so many changes of role. It is good that they are on such good form.

On Saturday night Northern Ballet continued its innovatory trajectory by showing ten works of eleven of its dancers. There had only been a four week period for creation, interspersed with rehearsals for different works in the main repertory to be shown in Leeds and on tour. The workshop was co-curated by David Nixon, the director, and Kenneth Tindall, former NB dancer, now an increasingly successful choreographer. They both spoke before the performances. They stressed the need to be 'relevant', so some of the works related to political developments and current social issues. They talked of the increasing importance of film and digital developments. Consequently there were several films of the new works. David Nixon stressed how valuable the active engagement of the dancers had been in the creative process, even stating that in the future, instead of 'dance artists' he would call his dancers "collaborative dancers'. Surprisingly, perhaps, given NB's tradition of dramatic classical ballet, the company had brought in as teachers for a week each, a former Forsythe dancer and an Akram Khan assistant. This influence was evident as a number of the works were more contemporary than pure classical, most notably in the work by Sean Bates, one of the most classical dancers in the company. His work, Khadija, was influenced by the Grenfell Tower tragedy, and at the opening his use of a group of dancers was not unlike that of Crystal Pite. There were only a couple of classical style works, one, by Nicola Gervasi, inspired by words by Margaret Atwood, and portraying coping mechanisms in experiences of trauma, passionately danced by Victoria Gibson and Dreda Blow amongst others. Dreda Blow provided the most hilarious piece, funny despite her comments that it was initially inspired by Trump and widespread misogyny. Three of the most charismatic male dancers cavorted around in original movements. Other works were also influenced by reaction to Trump- Gavin McCaig's piece, which was also shown at the start as a film, used clips of Trump, Garage and others. Other social issues that inspired pieces included the personal alienation (my word) caused by undue dependence on digital communication (Data Flow, by Mariana Rodrigues) using quite mechanical movements, plus others focusing on sexual harassment If this account makes the evening sound rather worthy, it wasn't, it was very varied. All pieces were interesting, the dancers were very well rehearsed and showed their technical and performing qualities, The music was varied, one piece was to Tchaikovsky, others to Rachmaninov, one to minimalism (possibly Nixon in China: unfortunately there was no information on the cast sheet on the composers), others to popular music. One piece, by Mlindi Kulashe, was danced in silence. He told us that he was preparing a ballet for the mixed bill of new ballets programmed for September. This season has seen Northern Ballet develop in exciting new ways, with new works and the excellent MacMillan triple. This workshop demonstrated that the company is continuing to evolve , investing in its future.

First, apologies, my original posting contained an error. The details for the 2nd programme were correct but the 1st programme does not include In the Night (which is just scheduled for programme 2) but Glass Pieces (Joffrey). Second, I visited the Seine Musicale yesterday, to book seats and case the joint. Apparently the stalls area (parterre) is fairly flat so I was advised to book further back where it is more tiered, (Tribune, rows I, J, K) for the top price: Or/gold category) The best seats at the next price are apparently in Mezzanine: category 1). I'm afraid I don't know about cheaper seats. If you are able to book for both programmes there is a reduction in price for both tickets (approximately 15%) The venue is in an area with a lot of construction going on, big office buildings and blocks of flats. It reminded me of the Lowry some years back. The journey on the metro (line 9) doesn't take long from the centre of Paris, it took me just 26 minutes from Richelieu- Drouot, 2 stops before the nearest one for the Opera (not the Opera metro station, which is a different line) the Chaussee d'Antin La Fayette, from where it probably takes 22 minutes. When you get to the terminus, Pont de Sevres, take exit 1. At the exit turn back and then turn right soon, from then on the venue is well signposted. It takes about 12 minutes to walk. There are quite a few steps in some places, especially to get to the pedestrian bridge over the Seine to reach the venue, but there are lifts. As the area didn't especially appeal to me and the journey from the centre is quite good I will stay in the centre.

You beat me to it , Janet! It is well worth watching, Abigail Prudames and Mlindi Kulashe dance Cathy Marston's interesting choreography beautifully. The colour-blind casting of Mlindi is ironic given Mr Rochester's family wealth stems from slavery. The excerpt should encourage ballet goers to see Northern Ballet's Jane Eyre at Leeds, Sadler's Wells (May) and many other venues.

It will be great to see Hobsons again and Fille will be a delight. But no Balanchine once more even though BRB used to dance a wide range of his masterpieces, and dance them well. . But the biggest disappointment for me is that the North East is virtually ignored. Just one programme in Sunderland, instead of the usual two, and no doubt only four performances at that (they used to do eight a week, plus perform at Newcastle) and no midscale performances at all, although York and Durham were successful venues. Most of the venues they are going to are in areas which enjoy far more ballet and dance performances than the North East or North Yorkshire.

According to the Sadler's Wells website, David Hallberg will be dancing with Osipova. There will be 2 brand new works, including one by Ratmansky. There is no information on the other pieces, other than that they are rarely performed in Britain.

According to the website for the Jerome Robbins Foundation, The Concert is scheduled to be performed from 18 December 2018. I was hoping that a wider choice of Robbins' ballets could have been performed by the Royal Ballet next season , but it will still be a Christmas treat to have one of the very few funny ballets whose humour doesn't pall.

Replying to MauriceC, no I don't know the venue yet. It's brand new, just a year old, very modern architecture, looks a bit like The Sage at Gateshead, and the centre as a whole holds a lot (6k or 4k, depending on what you read) but I think there are different spaces within the venue so the theatre area may be ok. The director, Choplin, has just resigned which may not augur well; he was (may still be) the director of the Chatelet. It's in a suburb a little way our of the centre of Paris, on a small island of the Seine (which previously housed a big Renault factory!) and seems to be accessible via metro line 9. There are hotels and restaurants in the vicinity. I am going to have a 'reccy' next month, between 2 performances of Onegin, so if you, Bruce W or anyone wants further information, just get in touch.

This is an update of a previous topic but I'm starting a new one as the title of the first one focused on the possible participation of ENB, which is not now taking place; will moderators amend it if necessary. The website of La Seine Musicale, the venue for the Paris summer dance festival this year, now lists the companies and ballets to be performed in June. Programme 1: June 25-27 Programme 2 : June 28-30 Miami City Ballet :In the Night : Miami City Ballet : In the Night NYCB : Dances at a Gathering :Pacific North West : Opus 19/The Dreamer Joffrey: Interplay : Miami City Ballet :Other Dances NYCB : Suite of Dances : Perm Opera Ballet Theatre :Four Seasons So ENB will not be involved. But at least they are doing The Cage at Sadler's Wells whereas the Royal are not doing any Robbins this season, not even Fancy Free in the Bernstein triple. At the same venue, July 3-7, Pacific North West will be presenting 2 programmes of ballets by contemporary choreographers including Pite, Jessica Lang, Forsythe, Millepied, Tharp

Sorry Amelia I can't provide a link as I booked in person and the box office adviser had to check with her supervisor as she wasn't sure the accuracy of what she read on screen. Unfortunately it's not usually possible to claim back a concession or reduction after one has bought the tickets. Often extra concessions seem to be introduced after sales have started: when I got my tickets for the ENB winter season there didn't seem to be a reduction for booking more than one production at the same time but I have a feeling that a deal was introduced later- I may be wrong. I think I was lucky with the box office adviser last week, they vary in how helpful they are in seeking concessions, I generally ask them to check.

And a great friend to Mr B.