Tatiana

I was an idiot and forgot that December was coming up. Would have skipped Nutcracker this year, but my girlfriend just mentioned that she’s never seen it and that’s unacceptable! Bit of a long shot but looking for 2 tickets, any night or weekend matinee, below £30 each but I can be flexible.

Other, more sensible thoughts - I thought the entire show was delightful. I've never enjoyed a mixed bill so much, or enjoyed each part as equally. I think A Month in the Country was my favourite (but I'm a big Nunez fan), but I also enjoyed the Balanchine far more than I expected. Sarah Lamb was to die for, and I really enjoyed seeing Romany Padjak in a solo role for the first time - I think she's wonderful. As for the men... it's almost mean to put Joseph Sissens in a group. He was so good in the first movement of Symphony in C that he made the other male dancers look practically clumsy (which of course they're not!)

Edit - forgot to say - would love to see Hirano in more leading roles. He went straight from a dark and almost irritatingly sexy villain in Medusa to a very darling Prince Ivan with ease.

I thought I knew the plot of the firebird. As it turns out... I did not. I have never seen a ballet without knowing the plot before. What follows is a very hurried note of my thoughts written out in the interval, which reads not unlike a five year old watching her first pantomime.

Anyway I think the Firebird is 500% more fun when you don’t know the plot. It starts off pretty simple - we’ve got a bird, and a prince, the prince is trying to catch the bird. Standard ballet fare. Then there are lots of dancing girls in nightgowns. Up to this point I thought I knew exactly what was going on, possibly because I’d confused the Firebird with the Twelve Dancing Princesses somehow. Then there were apples? We’re dancing with the apples, okay. Prince boy shows up. There’s a nice dance. There’s a VERY long kiss by ballet standards. Enter Koschei. He points at you and you get a stomachache, so he’s a baddie. But it’s okay! The Prince has a feather! This... changes everything, for some reason! The bird shows up! At this point I’m the most confused I’ve been all night, because I thought the bird and the princess were the same person. There’s some fantastic angry dancing from the guards in costumes that make me feel like I’m in a Studio Ghibli movie. Everyone goes to sleep? Then they wake up for a bit. Then everyone goes to sleep again? THE PRINCE FINDS A BOX. What’s in the box? Gold? Jewels? His delightfully ineffectual crossbow from the previous scene? It’s an... egg? WE HAVE TO BE VERY CAREFUL WITH THE EGG. He breaks the egg. MAYHEM ENSUES. Curtain goes down. Curtain comes up. Prince has a crown now and is using his newfound powers to get dates for all his new friends. Then we stand still for what felt like ten entire minutes until the music ends. They shouldn’t have put this first on the bill. I’m now too confused and delighted to concentrate on anything else. I could not tell you how good the dancing was, the story was too thrilling. 10/10, would watch repeatedly for the costumes alone, or at least until I understood what was going on.

Thank you for these lovely reviews. I'm beyond jealous as I couldn't afford tickets and I love Profokiev's Cinderella.

Completely forgot to say, but I did manage to go to this! It was absolutely rammed, hardly any room to move, but a very fun and convivial atmosphere. I was pretty late in getting to the ROH stall and there was nothing left but a few bottles of olive oil (can't remember why now) and one pair of pointe shoes. Imagine my delight when I was told the last remaining pair belonged to my absolute favourite dancer! I now proudly own a pair of Nuñez's pointe shoes. Very sweet of her to donate a pair - as I understand it all the stalls were supporting a theatrical charity.

Oh also, on the subject of cast changes - I was in Covent Garden last night and the cast change was only announced via loudspeaker about 10 minutes before the show started - no slips printed - so I'm not sure there was enough time to put the names on screen for the cinema. Hope Cuthbertson et al are all right, although I do love Francesca Hayward so it was sort of good news.

Golden Hour - lovely. I don't have strong feelings but would happily watch it again.

Medusa - Underwhelming. Not a strong narrative at all, and the plinky plonky harpsichord music made it feel like I was watching a background scene in a film where two main characters happen to be attending a ballet. Really jarring and I didn't feel like it fit the dance at all. It was saved (mostly) by the Medusa and Poseidon pas de deux, which is really something special. I might watch it again just for that but I'd do so reluctantly. Costumes also brilliant, minus the see-through onesies.

Also - I think this was my first time seeing Hirano? SUCH a powerful performance. I'm going to be sure to book casts with him in when I can to see more.

Flight Pattern - have seen it before and loved it, and had an even better experience this time because I was up in the slips - I think it's much better viewed from above. Totally different perspective, and there's something very poetic about only getting the best viewing from the cheap seats. My partner was completely transfixed, just as I was the first time. I'd put up with a hundred slightly watery Medusas for Crystal Pite!

On 15/05/2019 at 16:51, RuthE said:

 

It's not particularly loud, as opera singing goes (I say that as somebody used to hearing much louder voices and orchestrations) but as it's with two high voices both generally quite high in their respective registers, I wonder if the intensity rather than the volume of sound may make your companion wish to use ear defenders.  Without knowing their specific tolerance levels I'm not sure I can be any more specific than that.

 

Please be aware that there is also a brief passage in Flight Pattern involving an operatic soprano's voice.

Thanks for this! I did end up taking my ear defenders as it's the pitch rather than the volume, and she had a great time

Could someone do me a favour and tell me a little more about the singing in this performance? I'm going with someone who has a sensory processing disorder and any kind of operatic singing makes them very uncomfortable. Just need to know if I should bring ear defenders or not

3 hours ago, FionaE said:

 

Apologies.  I didn’t mean to be patronising to you or any particular person on here or elsewhere.  A lot of the responses I’ve had on here have been quite rude to me.  I’ve tried to remain polite.     

 

I realise he is a deeply complicated person and possibly quite immature (viz. rants on Instagram).   I have a different interpretation of the Instagram quotes you mention, as explained by Sergei himself in subsequent interviews.  He is very aware that he has damaged his public persona and commercial opportunities.  I believe he felt Instagram is a not very serious place and they he could have a laugh without consequences.  I’m sure he sees his friends using social media that way.  Sadly that turns out not to be true for public figures, and he is the only one suffering because of his own actions.

 

As I understand it, his comments about fat people, were a misunderstood use of language to encourage people to exercise more.  Well I know I need to!   His comments about homophobia were about him not liking seeing two men kissing publicly.  I don’t like seeing any snogging male/female/whatever combination publicly, so I agree with him there. and also about men wearing pointe shoes and wanting to dance female ballet roles.  I’m sure that could be a whole separate forum discussion.  Not sure the general public (oh dear another sweeping statement) is ready for the corps de ballet of swans at RB to be a mix of male and female dancers.  Discuss.

Mods, can we please not have people excusing homophobia in this forum? I like this community a lot (most of the time) and I'd like to continue to enjoy it without my identity being put up for debate.

I can't believe after that abysmal show at Sadler's Wells two (I think?) years ago he's managed to secure a run at the Palladium. (I know this thread is 8 pages long and many people have already said that - I've been away!)

Also, I guess the Palaldium doesn't care about ticket sales from the LGBT community. I feel pretty let down by anyone who chooses to stage him right now.

1 minute ago, alison said:

Yep.  Would be even nicer if I can afford to sit down for it  

I'm usually a "cheapest seat on the bench" girl, but I'll definitely spring for decent seats for Onegin. My girlfriend's never seen it before and I'm dying to introduce her to my favourite ballet.

Well, you know which announcement I'm most excited about... roll on Winter!

18 minutes ago, wildflowers said:

if these are still available, I would very much like them for my daughters and am happy to pay! Many thanks

They’re yours, I’ll message you

Calamity, I have to run a work event that night. Free to a good home as they were only £3 each.

E-Tickets,

• LEVEL 5 Upper Slips 5F, DD-30 |
• LEVEL 5 Upper Slips 5F, DD-31 |

Let me know if you're interested in the comments and I can forward the tickets on.

Yeah, there was a lot of prerecorded stuff... Though it was great to see some of Nureyev. Very different from the recent Canadian production.

There's FINALLY going to be a DVD of Onegin?! That's the best news I've had all year..

I've been up since 3am - missed Tokyo sadly, but managed to catch a bit of Australia before going back to sleep! I have this playing on my phone while I'm at work.

@Amelia Hi! I'm on the programme for Documenting Performance 2017 at City, University of London. It's spread over two days (I'm on the second day), and there are going to be some FANTASTIC speakers, all talking about how we document theatre, live events, and ballet. (It's also my first ever time presenting and I'm terrified, but looking forward to it!) I think there are still some tickets left -would you please send them this link? It's got information on speakers and tickets. https://documentingperformance.com/ 

If they (or you, or anyone here) come I would love to meet them - I spent months interviewing and surveying ballet memorabilia collectors and still haven't got bored of it. Such a fascinating subject.

PS: My talk is on social documentation and I do use this forum as an example, so come along if you want to see your username in lights!

On 10/18/2017 at 15:46, alison said:

Hi Tatiana, good to see you back.  That sounds an interesting job you're doing, though I'm sorry about the lack of ballet.  Can you get to Southampton at least relatively easily?

Not as easily as I'd like! Saw a dreadful version of TSB two weeks ago here, but I've got tickets to (finally) see Ballet Black in a few weeks and I'm really excited for that.

You are all absolute gems. I hadn't even thought of the Dancing Times, though I've combed The Stage pretty thoroughly. I'd love to go look in the Westminster Library - I'm presenting a lecture in London next week on ballet documentation, so perhaps I'll have the time to go and enquire!

@FLOSS - I read Albion Dances a few months ago and absolutely loved it - would recommend it to anyone.

@Jane S - Thank you, I will definitely look that article up.

Hi all! It's been a while. I had to move from London to Portsmouth and we've got very little in the way of ballet here so I'm feeling rather out of the loop.

However, I'm doing some archiving work at the King's Theatre, Southsea, and I wanted to know if anyone had any old programmes or cast sheets or anything from performances by the Markova-Dolin company. They toured to Portsmouth in '36 and while I have the programmes from that run, they don't include a lot of cast information and I'd quite like to sort out the soloists from the artists and so on, as well as find out more about the company. So any reading recommendations would be greatly appreciated!

5 hours ago, toursenlair said:

 

I think this comment would come as a big surprise to the dancers in Mayerling.

To clarify - not that there wasn't some breathtaking dancing in the performance, it's just that there was also a lot of... well, standing around. And posing. Not an attack on the dancers by any means, just not my thing.

On 5/3/2017 at 07:44, Mary said:

 

Hello Tatiana

I'd be interested to hear more, if you felt like it, about why you say that.. I do know what you mean ( I think)...I am not wholly convinced by Mayerling either.

There has been overwhelmingly positive reaction on the thread and most reviews but perhaps less positive feelings are not being posted up? Maybe.

Hi! Replying a little late, sorry. I was excited to see Mayerling despite how much I disliked Anastasia, which is the only other Macmillan proper I've seen, but it did end up disappointing me. I think my problem with Mayerling, (and Anastasia, for that matter,) is that it felt very much like performance art theatre and not dance. Far too many characters, all dressed too similarly, lots of static scenes and heavy staging. Even knowing the historical context very well, I found it hard to follow, and it failed to really grab my attention until the last act.

I do think it was a beautiful spectacle though, especially the costumes, and of course the cast (when they actually got to dance...) were absolutely wonderful. It's just not something I'd go and see twice.

All right, I think I have to finally admit it. I'm just not a Macmillan person. Gorgeous costumes though, and any performance with Nunez and Lamb in is a good performance in my book.