Two Pigeons

No dancers under 5'5"? By my reckoning that rules out Fonteyn, Makarova, Sibley, Park, Seymour, Collier, Penney, Tait, Donovan, Yoshida, Durante, Benjamin, Hydee, Terekova etc etc etc. Well, that's all the highlights of my ballet going then. However, I must welcome the trend for taller male dancers. This was badly needed at BRB and it has made a great deal of difference.

It worries me that we seem to be getting a generation of new ballet goers who seem to think that all dancers should be tall, leggy and dance very slowly. If you have a look at the recording of SB on YouTube starring Merle Park as has been commented on this and other threads some of the dancing seems near miraculous in terms of its speed and accuracy. However, if you also read some of the comments accompanying the ballet, some of which are grossly offensive, you may get the impression that for many posters this type of dancing is less than acceptable. Fashions come and go in ballet just as in every other area of life. However this does not mean that because previous dancers do not comform to the modem idiom they are any less marvellous.

I agree about Myrthe's solos but would add all those of Raymonda, especially the two variations in the last act. I expect most of us would love to be able to dance the Rose Adagio. I think that in my dreams I would be Ashton's Cinderella, Lise and the principal roles in Scenes de Ballets and Symphonic Variations. Oh yes, and Lady Elgar.

Trog - I have no words for your comments about Ashton.

I also concur about Sleeping Beauty. It is far too long and often made worse by far too many far too young children in the audience who are bored out of their brains and start fidgeting or worse. Others on my list if worst ever Edward II Arthur (both parts) The original, full length Isadora Any ballet, be it one act or full length, which is danced to a 'specially commissioned score) where the choreographer runs out of valid ideas before the composer.

Very impressive Janet but I am surprised you left Bintley's Sylvia off the list! For me Anything by Ashton, particularly if done in the correct style Onegin (and I agree about it being the LFB/ENB years) La Sylphide Giselle Raymonda Mayerling Le Bayadere Le Corsair Theme and Variations Symphony in 3 movements Symphony in C Serenade Hobson's Choice Tombeaux Galantaries I think that will do me for the time being too.

Really interesting. Always great to see a craftswomen at work.

Oh dear! This DVD smacks slightly of desperation, presumably being sold on the basis that Carmen is Acosta's farewell. Seems to be hugely overpriced too. Can't help but think that a mixed bill from either BRB or ENB would be more interesting than this combination. Oh, the effects of star power, even if the ballet itself is so far from being memorable.

Are there not stories of Ashton saying that to see the prologue of The Sleeping Beauty was like having a private lesson from Petipa? I wonder if with the rush for the new the past is getting slightly overlooked these days.

Now look Janet, it's bad enough that you saw Tyrone as Romeo. You don't have to rub it in further by reminding me that you saw Wolfgang as Onegin!!! I agree that this is totally off topic but I wanted her to know she has upset me (joke), but not as much as RC.

Please may say that I am seething with envy for those who got to see Tyrone as Romeo!

I may have been a bit parochial about Cranko. I saw Onegin a number of times with ENB and a couple of times with the RB. I am really looking forward to revisiting The Taming of the Shrew in June but there is also a wealth of one act ballet's that are very rarely seen. Actually Onegin is one of my very favourite and I would just love it if BRB took it into their repertoire. It's not going to happen though, even with a shared production with the Opera House.

This is a fair point capybara and I suspect that Christiansen is one of those people who start out watching a BRB performance automatically deducting 20 points just because they are not the RB. However, he is a professional critic and should be more objective when reviewing even a strange company's performance. I have just been re-reading this thread and I see that nottsballetlover and I saw both Iain and Jenna's performances between us. I find the differences between our reviews and Christiansen's so different as to be like the reports of a battle in a civil war as given by each side. I think I have given enough time and energy to this now. I must remember that Christiansen is someone who raves about the Anthony Dowell production of Swan Lake and says it is the best this country can offer. I feel we are fated never to agree but at least I can take the view that I am objective in my views. He cannot .

I have to agree with the wider point that FLOSS is making here. The standard and stamina of dancers may well have improved considerably over the years but there has been no choreographer emerge who can match Petipa, Bournonville, Fokine, Ashton, Balanchine, Tudor or Macmillan. There are others who could be added to the list but NONE of them has been alive or significantly creative since the 1990s. I do accept that a choreographer of genius is a very rare breed but how is it that with all the training and encouragement choreographers have at their disposal it could be argued that nothing of any real substance and longevity has been created since Mayerling, Winter Dreams, Rhapsody or A Month in the Country? I accept that the current trend is towards a more modern idiom, often hampered with a specially commissioned score which is too long for their invention (yes, I do mean you Mr Bintley). Although we must accept that the Royal Ballet companies were somewhat spoiled for choice having Ashton and Macmillan so close together as were the Americans with Balanchine, Tudor and Robbins all being within the same era, where are their replacements? Given the amount of ballet activity across Europe and Russia and including ballet centres such as Canada and Australia how come all the choreographic really passes beyond mediocre, especially in its use of classical ballet. Sorry but I cannot omit Cranko. It is almost as if his works have been dramatically under appreciated for decades everywhere except in Stuttgart but where is his equal these days? People may find works such as Pineapple Poll dated but for a comedy ballet it has been pretty much unmatched for decades. To be fair to a lot of company directors I am sure that if they could find a classical choreographer of this calibre they would welcome them with open arms so we must just accept that they are not out there. We had had a number of choreographic projects with BRB and they did throw up some minor gems (Oliver Hindle's interpretation of Summer from The Four Seasons springs to mind) but nothing much more has come out of them.

Now, this is all just not fair. I know I am a fan of BRB but I am not someone who will ignore their weaker performances (I was very critical of the second cast of In the Upper Room last year), I am not a huge fan of R&J generally and I have had issues with Koen Kessels but, I repeat, was Christiansen at the same performance I was? The literal answer may be no, I was there on Wednesday, he was on there on Saturday at the matinee. However, unless a company wide attack of food poisoning or ennui hit them, and the orchestra, this is just not the cast or standard of performance I saw. It is not for me to say so but I would recommend that the BRB hierarchy decline to offer Mr Christiansen any more press tickets if this is the response. This review is so unjust I think I need to have a lie down now or watch Happy Valley. It will probably upset me a lot less.

..........................'But elsewhere in this cast one was hard pushed to spot anything more than competence: Mathias Dingman made a puckish, cheerful Mercutio without any dangerous edge, while Tyrone Singleton looked bored and disengaged rather than somoulderingly vengeful.' ******************at this point I had to reach for my blood pressure medication******************************* He describes the corps as 'seemed to move by numbers, their energy levels blow normal.' Earlier in the article he described the production as 'lacklustre; it looks flung together, slapdash, and the coarse playing of Prokofiev;s marvellous scroe under Koen Kessels doesn't help matters either'.

I cannot find it on line. Anyway, the edited 'highlights' are as follows:- Under the headline 'wherefore are thou Romance?', he likes the designs but says 'if only the dancers inhabited them here with more imagination'. He describes it as 'altogether a bland and routine affair'........'never touches the beating heart of the drama'. 'a major cause of the low voltage was that neither Iain Mackay or Jenna Roberts projected sufficiently assertive characterisations of the title roles'. He says Iain was no more than a steady sort of average lad and Jenna was too insipid to succumb to a grand passion. Their first pas de deux 'never caught fire - no sense of transgression, liberation or ecstasy, no intimacy of rapport. All we saw were two competent dancers doing a decent job with some tricky steps'. If you want more I can give you more...........................................

Hi Janet, I'LL have a go but I am not that computer literate.

I have just read Rupert Christiansen's review of Jenna Roberts and Iain Mackay performing R&J in Birmingham. I am sorry to admit I have even seen the Mail on Sunday and even more sorry to see him give the performance two stars, deriding pretty much everyone except Marion Tait and the harlots. He ends by saying the BRB need to wake up as they can do better than this. I take it he attended a special performance which every single one of the rest of us missed.

P.s. I will always be eternally grateful to Peter Schaufuss that he gave me the chance to see Ashton's Romeo and Juliets at a time when the choreography could still be revised by him personally. What a real shame that ENB and the political struggles within the company effectively ignored it and the details Ashton stressed as important.

Is the Tudor version to music by Delius? That really would a refreshing change.

I am extremely tardy with my review of the opening night in Birmingham but I have felt more embolden now that a number of fellow posters have confessed that they are not huge fans of the ballet. I have seen R&J a lot over the years, I remember one week when I saw it at the Opera House 5 nights on the trot. Oh the follies of youth. However I cannot whinge too much because my first Romeo was Baryshnikov dancing with my first great heroine, Lesley Collier. Having said all of that I do find it very long and repeated viewings just make it seem even longer. Anyway, I digress. The opening night in Birmingham was excellent and the quality of the individual performances went right through the supporting cast. Iain Mackay and Jenna Roberts were a pair of dreams as the lead and I have nothing but praise for Mathias Dingman as Mercutio. Special mention must also be given for Michael O'Hare and Samara Downs and Lord and Lady Capulet. The Harlots were great, Marion Tait gave her usual tip top performance, this time as the nurse. The corps seem to be having the time of their lives and they were really throwing everything into it. I must concede that is becoming increasingly rare now to see a performance with so many of the company involved as the casts for ballets, even full length ones, seem to be getting smaller. Having seen the RB perform the ballet (admittedly not for about 20 years now) there is one area where I feel the BRB production leaves it standing and that is in the real importance of Tybalt as a character. When this production was first premiered in the early 90s Peter Ottavanger and Evan Williams who were alternating in the role made a real feature of the role and so Tybalt and Mercutio were valid foils for each other. I must confess to a personal preference for Tyrone Singleton in anything but this was one of the roles he was just born to dance. He was dangerous, insidious and absolutely magnetic to watch. When I say that I left after the second at this is absolutely no reflection on Iain and Jenna. Indeed, everything I heard about them afterwards made me think I had really lost out. Nor must it be conferred that Tyrone had been killed so I lost interest. Neither of these was a significant issue. I left for personal reasons linked entirely to getting home. May be I should have tried a bit harder but there you go. Having indicated that the orchestra was less than perfect for the previous week with the Ashton Double Bill I would say that the performance under Koen Kessels for R&J was pretty damn near flawless. I would also like to redress something else I wrote about the Ashton Double Bill. I watched that with my sister and we both agreed with my assessment that Nao Sakuma as Titania was very good but dull. However, my sister saw her as Juliet on the second night and she absolutely raved about her. She said she was 'delightful' and that her acting was very involving. I am more than pleased to be able to show appreciation for someone who has been such a shining beacon of the company for 25 years now. All in all the two weeks in Birmingham may be regarded as total triumphs. I will just finish with my usual peeve that so few of the national ballet critics bothered to attend either programme. Frankly it was their loss, not least considering that there were acres of coverage of 'Strapless' which were less than enthusiastic. Given that the average reader has far more chance of seeing R&J on tour than they do of seeing a triple bill at the Opera House and that there are some very interesting debuts coming up I take the view again that it is the critics' loss, not that of the audiences.

Indeed it does.

Now I am on the subject, one for Sir Fred as well would not go amiss.

While I have no issues at all with a plaque to honour Margot Fonteyn I would ask if there is one for Alicia Markova. If there is not, why not?