Lizbie1

17 minutes ago, Bluebird said:

A friend has just let me know that the programme and cast list are now on the ROH website:

 

https://static.roh.org.uk/digital/cast-sheets/Royal-Ballet-School-Summer-Performance/RBS-Summer-Performance-cast-sheet-16.07.23.pdf

No mention of the grand défilé?

1 hour ago, Dawnstar said:

 

Is Forza a ghastly one? I was considering it for the autumn, as Radvanovsky's singing Leonora.

I thought it was OK.

7 hours ago, oncnp said:

If you are communicating by email (and if you haven't already) try the customer service address....

 

customerservices@roh.org.uk

 

In the past this has been answered by Graham Boland, Customer Services Manager, who has been quite helpful. 

 

I agree, he has always been exceptionally helpful and courteous when he's answered my questions. I've never knowingly met him or spoken to him but he's a real asset IMO: always makes you feel worth his time.

6 minutes ago, oncnp said:

 

Thank you for posting the link. I can't seem to get that view (with the drop-down date box) to come up. 

Nor I!

Are all the standing places £26 or are those in the Rear Amphi/Lower Slips cheaper?

2 minutes ago, Lizbie1 said:

 

That's odd because IIRC this was the price published in the Friends magazine (I don't have it with me but it was discussed on this forum).

Here:

1 minute ago, LinMM said:

I’m currently at ROH and they just told me the Don Q issue is not yet fixed but that the standing price for Don Q is probably wrong and should be the same as Nutcracker standing…apparently the over price all part of the current issues. 

That's odd because IIRC this was the price published in the Friends magazine (I don't have it with me but it was discussed on this forum).

If memory serves it's quite a dull production? And with a somewhat distracting water feature (though indeed not a urinal!) in one of the acts.

It's not my favourite opera - or my favourite Massenet opera - so my memory may not be reliable.

1 hour ago, Geoff said:

In case people haven’t seen this review, here is Fiona Maddocks in today’s Observer:

 

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2023/jun/10/il-trovatore-royal-opera-house-adele-thomas-review-the-planets-philharmonia-emilia-holving-bold-tendencies-dennis-gnasher-unleashed-at-the-orchestra-bbc-concert-orchestra-jackson-colin-currie-gavin-higgins-beano-concerto

 

 

I would read it but it's more enjoyable speculating about the URL instead.

50 minutes ago, Ondine said:

There’s something about the title of the new 35-minute work by Wayne McGregor that slightly sets the teeth on edge. Untitled, 2023: it feels archly self-negating, but also rather over-eager for the piece it represents to be regarded as a Work Of Art. Still, what’s in a name? And visual artists have, after all, been deploying the same trope for decades: why should they be entitled to all the untitled fun?

 

Mark Monahan here appears to have not much clue about the link between the title Untitled, 2023 and the fact McGregor stated it was his homage to Herrera and her work?

I don't see that this is so? It just means (and I don't wish to open old wounds) that, like others here, he's not keen on naming a ballet thus. You don't have to be ignorant of Herrera's work or McGregor's source of inspiration to think that. (In fact I read it as him being fully aware of both.)

22 minutes ago, Peanut68 said:

Oo I remember them… striped green & white spearmint chews from 70’s childhood? 

and 80s!

The McGregor costumes remind me of Pacers.

1 minute ago, capybara said:

How I wish that the June triple could have been differently composed and more inclusive of the RB company as a whole.

This will sound very negative but its composition at least allowed me to have no regrets about not going (other than missing Morera's farewell of course).

17 minutes ago, Sim said:

This is clearly how they think they will attract new audiences.

I'm not sure it's that well-intentioned! There was in interview with Kasper Holten a few years ago where my main impression was that we need to put up with this barrel of Regietheater cliches so that Kasper isn't bored. (I don't mind good Regietheater but a lot of it is just duff and unimaginative.) My reading is that there is a prevailing taste among superintendents for this kind of thing and the audience is a lesser concern.

I do get the impression that Oliver Mears is a little more inclined to compromise on this than his predecessor, but time will tell.

Top price for the Sleeping Beauty rehearsal was £26.

4 minutes ago, Lynette H said:

I haven't managed to spot any details of what dates the Friends rehearsals are for the 2023/24 season. They don't seem to be up on the ROH web site.  Can anyone point me to where these might be ? 

According to the Magazine:

Don Quixote 30 September 12.30pm

Anemoi/Cellist 20 October 12.30pm

Dante 17 November 11.30am

Nutcracker 5 December 11.30am

I can provide opera dates too if you like.

Returning to the timings and interval question: the ROH page now says:

RUNNING TIME
This performance will last approximately 2 hours, including two intervals.
APPROXIMATE RUNNING TIMES:
Act I: Emeralds : 30 minutes
Interval : 20 minutes
Act II: Rubies : 20 minutes
Interval : 20 minutes
Act III: Diamonds : 30 minutes

(I'm slightly sceptical of these timings - is the ROH capable of keeping to a 20 minute interval? They usually have more leeway in the Act timings - and would allow a bit extra.)

No exactly a laugh a minute, but it was well done.

On 22/05/2023 at 13:13, Lizbie1 said:

One tip for SW booking: the Peacock box office is open for I think an hour before each show there. If you're in luck with the timing while in the area - maybe for something at ROH - you can buy your SW tickets in person there. (I don't know if they'll be charging the 50p "levy" in person.)

 

I realise that this won't work for everyone (it doesn't always work out for me!) but it could help some.

The 50p per ticket levy was indeed added, but no other charges.

9 hours ago, Emeralds said:

You don’t even like The Winter’s Tale or Woolf Works, Lizbie1? 

 

For the short ballets, it depends....Wheeldon’s Within the Golden Hour, Polyphonia and Ghosts (not in the RB repertoire-it’s in San Francisco Ballet’s) I like, but not Strapless or CG. I like DGV and After the Rain if it’s a cast I like. For McGregor, it actually depends on the cast too....I have seen one cast whom I’m afraid were quite wrong for Infra apart from Yasmine Naghdi, who absolutely understood her character, the style of the piece and was utterly moving, and I thought Infra was “easy” to dance, so that was an interesting discovery. I haven’t seen all his one act works nor do I like all of them, but Chroma, Infra, Limen, Yugen, Terractys (which I liked) are very different to WW (I like) and Dante Project (not sure). I liked the music for Obsidian Tear but not the choreography.

 

I think perhaps if you’re the sort of person who enjoys Forsythe, Dawson, Tetley and a lot of the abstract works often danced in North America and continental Europe, you might like their one act works, but if you don’t like them then you might feel similarly about WM & CW ballets. I guess that if one believes the best ballet should be less abstract and more like Ashton, Fokine, Petipa, Bournonville, MacMillan, Perrot (Giselle, Esmeralda), maybe the one act ballets feel too..... boring? (Actually Infra is very interesting-different people in the city, including one young woman who may be suicidal - and is almost more like Fokine or MacMillan.....a really sad one, that is.)  Then again, MacMillan did abstract works too, as did Ashton, so there’s some overlap. And oddly, I like Bournonville, Petipa, etc but also like CW & WM.

 

Wheeldon and McGregor sometimes use music that isn’t classical (sometimes quite loud!) or may be borderline classical (eg is Michael Nyman film music or classical?) and both use Joby Talbot who has his distinctive sound that one might not like. I’m ok with what they’ve picked- have endured worse - and a lot of Wheeldon’s classical picks are beautiful. 

 

The other funny thing is that I find Chroma doesn’t look as interesting on screen as it does in real life, while I appreciated WTGH more only after the being able to see it onscreen during the pandemic and appreciate the fine details.

WW enjoyed as a spectacle. I didn't think much of Winter's Tale.

I like a lot of abstract choreography very well and I'm OK with a lot of the music though I find the repeated use of Joby Talbot a bit of a mystery (I think his music is straightforwardly boring rather than distinctive). I assume Wheeldon finds him good to work with, which does count for something. My problem is with the quality of the choreography itself, which I don't think is in the same class as, for example, Forsythe or Ratmansky.

I find McGregor limited and repetitive, but I'm happy enough to watch his shorter works "in the moment" (though I'm not keen on the overuse of manipulating the women into extreme positions). Wheeldon is IMO bland for the most part, OK sometimes and wilfully ugly at others.

I don't normally air all this because I realise it's down to personal taste, but since I was asked...

I'm not a fan of either Wheeldon or McGregor, so I have a question for those who have enjoyed their ballets. Is there a sense of diminishing returns with their one-acters? I get the impression from a lot of the discussion here that, setting full length ballets aside, their earlier works are more appreciated.

Perhaps they've just run out of things to say outside of a full length narrative (narrative-ish in McGregor's case) framework.

9 minutes ago, alison said:

Oops, sorry, just realised that I didn't ask the question: has anyone found a way round this that allows you just to switch between the individual cast sheet and the date list?  I'm hoping that I'm missing something somewhere ...

Have you tried right click > open link in new tab?

44 minutes ago, Ondine said:

 

But it was controversial at the time (Nijinsky).

 

Wasn't the point about works that were once controversial but have subsequently been acknowledged as masterpieces? Because though Stravinsky's score is now canonical, Nijinsky's choreography for it isn't.

5 minutes ago, Ondine said:

Well Rite of Spring is a good one to quote. So why not?

Because it was the choreography rather than the music that caused the riot (or so I was taught).

28 minutes ago, Lizbie1 said:

 

The credits are for Xavier Ronze (costumes) and Paul Gallis (set).

...and I've just found the cast sheet, which says that the Who Cares? sets are presented with the authorisation of DNB; and that the sets and costumes were made by the ONP studios with the exception of the Who Cares? sets.