Colman

Well, I cleared up mine by starting ballet classes. :-) But yes, a knowledgeable physio will give you a much more useful answer - see if his teachers can recommend one, maybe?

Just realised I forgot about this, which is annoying. Back from stables too late and no time to arrange babysitting - doesn't sound like something the 4 year old is going to sit through.

Social media botherers displacing critics from their rightful place as arbiters of proper taste! Horror! Artistic directors worrying about opinions from mere mortals! Fall of civilisation. Whenever a critic talks about a silent majority you've got to assume that they mean the millions of readers they imagine hanging on every word they write. There's a chunk of the established media that consider "Twitter" a disparaging term. I'm looking forward to seeing Two Pigeons in the cinema - I like the Ashton stuff I've seen, even if it's not danced as well as in the good old days.

That Nutcracker shot (so to speak!) is not an absolutely terrible photo, which the other one was. Cameras always lie. Neither is erotic, assuming you're past the first flush of teenage hormones (in which case *everything* is erotic). As for the rest, possibly I've been desensitised by spending a couple hours a week with scantily dressed women, but I don't get it. And ballet *is* my mid life crisis. :-) (If we're going to go on a nether-regions-are-vulgar rant I'd rather see something done about the male assets on display. Seriously guys, get a decent dance belt.)

This is a great thread for a ballet newbie like me to read. Obviously, I don't care, so long as they broadcast or record them. (Since I'm not likely to make the trip from Dublin for more than one or two ballets!)

Having looked now, I can't tell: between a fort nights distance and the camera effects it's impossible. I don't think there was any significant revision.

We saw one of the Dublin shows, and it was great fun. I have the idea in my head that the the red ballroom scene had changed from the recording we have, but I haven't actually gone and checked. The attendance was awful, and Bourne tweeted later that they probably wouldn't be able to come back to Dublin on future tours. <sigh> If it's not Swan Lake, Nurcracker or Romeo and Juliet, Dublin doesn't want to know.

You haven't met our four-year old. He'd be very happy. And let's not revisit the teenagers chomping pop-corn during Romeo and Juliet's balcony scene, shall we?

Excellent. I know what we'll be watching in the office tomorrow morning then!

Do they normally archive these to their YouTube channel? 7:15 tonight is in the middle of classes for us!

This looks good: http://www.tringbrewery.co.uk Just around the corner.

Oh, I'm not being flippant: that's literally true. Many more people will be killed by stairs or cars than terrorists this year, almost certainly. There are always trade-offs on security - long queues are themselves potential targets, and there's no real way of stopping committed attackers anyway. I'm sure the security checks at Stade de France that foiled the two suicide bombers there were similarly cursory. Increased vigilance and bag checks forces security staff to interact with people, which is the main thing - remember that even the security checks at US airports still miss most weapons that are presented, so deeper inspection doesn't necessarily help as much as you'd think. The ROH approach seems sensible enough.

Or blow themselves up in the nice big crowd waiting outside queueing for the security checks. Or go hit a softer target down the street. Much more important to make sure you look both ways crossing the street and don't play at the top of the stairs.

Pilates is the obvious one. If you need ballet's brain work, a good tai chi class might fit the bill. You'd be suprised how often my tai chi and ballet teachers are saying the same things about posture. You won't lose skills quickly, but you will start to lose strength. Occasional ballet classes plus other stuff to maintain strength will pretty much hold you together until circumstances improve.

Good grief, the last thing I would have called that is confusing. If anything, I would have said it was overdrawn.

Saw this in Dublin last night in an almost empty cinema as a family of four relatively new-to-dance dancers, ranging from 4 years old to 44. Viscera was fun to watch technically, but between the annoying camera work and some local distractions I didn't really connect with it. To have Liam Scarlett talking about the dancers moving as a pack in the interview before and then to have the camera completely obscure that part of the choreography a lot of the time was maddening. I liked Morera in it, would have liked to have seen it either in person or with a fixed camera view. Faun was beautiful. For a quiet piece like that to hold the attention of four and seven year old boys is quite something. The Tchaikovsky pas de deux was just fun: the seven year old literally had his mouth hanging open watching McRae, so I'm not going to fault it! I like his dancing (wish I could be that good when I grow up :-) ), but McRae's grin always grates slightly. Carmen was the most Carlos Acosta thing ever. Big and brash and over energetic, bundling all his influences together. It reminded us in a weird way of Soviet stuff like Ivan the Terrible only decadent, crossed with some sort of Spanish/Cuban festival. Some of the party scenes were a bit flabby, but I often think that about the filler scenes in the traditional classics. Seemed a deeply personal piece of work (if you've read "No way home" it fits perfectly into his own story/myth), if a bit over indulgent. We all enjoyed it greatly. It was good to see his lovely send-off too - he's a great favourite of the seven year old, who is precisely the child who needs to be told that it's ok to make mistakes …

LinM, I found a version of the programme, including the ballet, on YouTube.