ToThePointe

I recently interviewed Hofesh Shechter for ToThePointe and he had some interesting things to say about 'Untouchable' - have a read here: http://tothepointemagazine.wixsite.com/tothepointemagazine/single-post/2017/12/20/ToThePointe-Meets-Hofesh-Shechter

I also found James Streeter and Tamara Rojo in Akram Khan’s Giselle extremely moving and was brought to tears by their performance and the brilliance Khan’s choreography

Yes Rojo sitting on the bed - completely agree!!

also Marianela Nunez and Thiago Soares in their most recent Onegin was something to see - they were both crying which of course made me cry too!

Great topic and so difficult to choose! I used to be a bit stone-cold but as I've grown older I seem to be moved by everything I see! Here are the ones that come to mind for me: Flight Pattern by Crystal Pite - again not a dancer specifically but it made me blub from the start! I also remember spotting Ashley Dean's face which conveyed the despair of the situation and this moved me a lot too. Johan Kobborg and Thiago Soares as Rudolph in Mayerling - I haven't seen this done better than these two. Perhaps not as technically impressive as others, but their acting and expressions said so much and they are the only ones to make me really pity Rudolph. Urgh that bit in the final scene when he's on his knees and the piano is playing makes me so emotional! I just want to give him a hug! Alina Cojocaru and Johan Kobborg in Giselle and Onegin - no words! Natalia Osipova as Giselle, particularly when I first saw her do it when she guested at the RB and did it with Carlos Acosta. She really became a spirit and there was something in the way she moved her body and expressed herself that made her seem so ethereal. She forgave Albrecht and you could feel that through her dancing and it made her seem like this great, heroic almost saintly martyr. I found that very emotional. Evgenia Obratzsova as Juliet when she guested with the RB with Steven McCrae - she was a revelation! So beautiful and I really felt like she was a child. There was a moment when she looked out into the audience almost asking us for help and she seemed so isolated and vulnerable. Just beautiful! Yuhui Choe in Requiem - the music alone gets me but Yuhui dances this so beautifully and with so much grace that this alone makes it a tearjerker for me! Lauren Cuthbertson as Juliet - has been bringing me to tears for years and years in that role Vadim Muntagirov as Des Grieux and as the Boy in Two Pigeons and to be honest pretty much everything! Yasmine Naghdi and Matthew Ball in Romeo and Juliet and I also found their debut in Sleeping Beauty so beautiful that it moved me to tears! James Hay and Frankie Hayward in Rhapsody - utterly divine and incredibly moving But I think above all something that never fails to move me and make me cry is Act 2 of Giselle during the Wilis dance and their famous 'crossing' section. I am so moved by their beauty every time and it is so beautiful to watch that I need a bundle of tissues to get me through it! (writing this very quickly at work as couldn't resist so excuse any typos I have in here!!)

Have taken this ticket thank you!

Hi there looking for a cheap ticket to the triple tomorrow evening for Gloria/Judas/Elite please let me know!!

Hi there looking for bayadere ticket, any date any cast! Thanks!

Hi There I had the honour of interviewing the fabulous Hayley Maloney. Recently retired to focus on motherhood, Hayley reminisces about her time with Norwegian National Ballet and The Royal Ballet, dancing to William Forsythe, raising her son and that unforgettable performance of Carabosse... Have a read in link below! http://tothepointemagazine.wixsite.com/tothepointemagazine/single-post/2017/06/26/To-The-Pointe-Meets-Hayley-Maloney-Forskitt

Thank you so much Capybara - not being a fraud at all!

Have a read of my interview with the finalists ahead of the final this evening! http://tothepointemagazine.wixsite.com/tothepointemagazine/single-post/2017/04/22/BBC-Young-Dancer-2017-The-Finalists-Have-Their-Say

Have a read of my interview with Chair of the Jury, Shobana Jeyasingh - a truly remarkable woman! Very excited to see the Final tomorrow http://tothepointemagazine.wixsite.com/tothepointemagazine/single-post/2017/04/21/BBC-Young-Dancer-2017-To-The-Pointe-Interviews-Shobana-Jeyasingh

If Osipova is 'one of the three', who ever said she was a bad dancer? She's a fabulous dancer, but I don't think her interpretation for Aurora worked at all. No-one in this thread, as far as I can tell, has attacked her ability to dance or labelled her a bad dancer. I still don't see how this is rude. My opinion of her performance is that the focus was more on showcasing her impressive talents to do fast pirouettes, high leaps etc rather than to adopt a classical style or to convey Aurora's character. I didn't at one moment feel that I was watching a sixteen year old Princess who is cast under a spell and then awoke to find her dream Prince, instead I felt like I was watching Osipova. I felt conscious that she was on stage - I never felt I was watching Aurora. To put it all to bed - I think that what is so fabulous about this Forum is that it sparks debate, brings out emotion and quite frankly acts as a little slice of escapism when you should be doing work! I think that if you disagree with posts, it's a shame not to say why as this would, and should, always be welcomed by everyone who posts on this Forum. I know my comments have sparked debate and I think that's healthy, but I would like to hear more about why some disagree - what have they seen that I didn't? I would like to know so that I can look for it in future performances - find that missing piece of the puzzle! We must all agree to disagree, but I think it's a shame that a dancer like Osipova causes a debate where if you haven't like her, you're made to feel like your post is wrong, when in fact, whatever we all write is valid and important. On another note, I've always found SB tiring and slow, but this recent run has really changed this for me and I would like to thank everyone at the RB for their commitment and dedication especially for such a long run!

I don't think anything I said is a personal attack on Osipova and let me be the first to say that I think she is a wonderful talent. I could say a lot worse about what I thought of her Aurora but it wouldn't be appropriate and it would be too personal - something which I'm not interested in doing. All of my comments have related to her as a dancer, not a person so I'm not sure how this is rude. Is it really rude to voice an opinion about an artists performance? In regards to the pirouettes, I counted as I saw them and to me there were more than there should have been. Maybe I'm mistaken. If other dancers do this too then I haven't seen them in the role, and I can't comment on Margot as she is way before my time

I was at Osipova/Hirano cast on Saturday Night and I'm still speechless. I hope my thoughts below don't give me too strong a scolding! For me, Osipova just didn't capture the nature of Aurora. Of course every dancer is different and every dancer interprets roles in their own unique way. This is why most of us see so many different casts - so that we can get almost a full circle of sides to that character. What frustrated me on Saturday night though was that Osipova was playing Osipova - I didn't get an ounce of courtly duty, princess elegance, sheltered naivety or longing for her prince. From the moment she leapt onto the stage, I thought to myself, and here is Osipova giving the audience all of the tricks she knows they will applaud her for. And this is exactly what happened. More fouettes, more leaps and the audience went wild. This type of dancing doesn't impress me at all. I'm interested in the feeling, what is this dancer telling me through their body? What can they convey? Is there any depth here? My dad is a guitarist and he always says that the musicians who get onstage and perform wild tricks always get rapture of applause, but the true geniuses are those with feeling, with something else, that elevates the performance and takes you somewhere else. This is how I felt on Saturday night. I was longing for Nunez or Naghdi - for the dancers who were Aurora, who gelled with the rest of the company and danced every move with beauty and grace. Using my binoculars also didn't help as I found Osipova's expressions very distracting and almost comical. She also made it look like work, focusing on her balances during the rose adagio and nodding when she was ready to let go of her partners hand. There wasn't the same effortless display as with the others I have seen. I was told it got better during the rest but for me nothing changed. What also really frustrates me is when dancers add extra choreography. We all know what Osipova is capable of. She's an incredible talent and has fabulous technique but the crazy turns weren't appropriate here. In the Rose Adagio when Aurora receives each rose from her suitors, she does a pirouette to mimic the amount of flowers she has received. She does one turn when she receives the first rose, two when she receives the second, three and then four. The music is building up to do her fourth pirouette and it's supposed to be slow and moving towards a crescendo. For Osipova, the number didn't matter, and she added many more pirouettes. She does the same in the final pas de deux, adding more turns, more leaps but for me this at the cost of the classical style and it looked too much. The choreography is so challenging and difficult and you want to see every element of it but here there wasn't enough precision or even respect for the choreography. I was really impressed by Hirano though, who I have overlooked a lot in the past. I thought he did really well, beaming smiles in the final act and nice high and graceful jumps. The rest of the company were lovely and it really made it clear that Osipova isn't gelling with the RB. She dances as if she is a Guest Artist, not a member of the company and for me, this is a big problem. Other Auroras communicate more with those around them on stage, Naghdi, for example, acknowledges her friends and there is a rapport between them all. I didn't see much of this on Saturday night and to be honest I left the ROH feeling pretty bemused. I will now prepare my head for the beheading that's about to take place for the above treason...!!!

I agree that the music is fabulous and helps to make it so successful... I focused more on the movement here as I wrote in depth when this was last on but I completely agree with you that I should have included it again!

It's a bit of a funny site! Hopefully the below will work, must change it at some point! http://tothepointemagazine.wixsite.com/tothepointemagazine

It could be interesting to see the swans being more aggressive to reflect their real nature. I loved that with the Australian Ballet's version - they were fiercely protective over Odette and there was some pecking and aggression towards Siegfried. I think Bourne's version does something similar. Obviously this isn't very classical but it could be fun to have something more realistic!

I'm listening to the music from Swan Lake while at work, looking out of the window (when I should be working) and thinking about how I would do Swan Lake...which has led me to wonder... ...If you were given Liam Scarlett's new task of creating a brand new Swan Lake what would you do/how would you do it? Which dancers would you premiere with? What types of costumes would you do? Would you keep the current story or turn it into something completely new? etc Please indulge me in some light-hearted creative thinking!

Review in link below for To The Pointe, unashamedly going over the top with praise for Hayward and Sambe's debuts.... http://tothepointemagazine.wixsite.com/tothepointemagazine/single-post/2016/10/10/Oh-What-A-Night-Hayward-and-Sambe-WOW-in-La-Fille-Mal-Gardee

I was at ENB Swan Lake last night and noticed Lauretta Summerscales dancing in the corps which I found strange as she's a 'Principal'. I know they have Lead Principal's at ENB but strange that the Principal's are still required to do corps work! Does anyone know why?

I saw Swan Lake in the round last night and loved it. I hadn't been for years and as you say Fonty, the way they keep coming out onto the stage is so breathtaking. You can't believe that more are running on! I thought Osiel Gouneo was magnificent. His jumps were high, his smile lit up the auditorium and he was very caring and delicate with his Swan Queen. I have to say that I was dissapointed with Alina, she didn't do much for me, came off pointe many times and just didn't seem to be that present on stage - something I've never witnessed from her. Perhaps performing in the round doesn't suit her...

Does anyone know if Rojo will be dancing on Wednesday evening? I've heard that she was injured last week and am hoping she has recovered for her show on Wednesday!

9?! Are these dancers human?!

I'm not sure if this has been discussed before but I was just wondering if anyone knew what the record is for pirouette turns on one pointe (or in one go).. I think I've seen 6/7 turns before without the foot going back down to touch the floor but has anyone seen more?