Lizbie1

Penelopesimpson - I agree with much of what you say. The position I’m coming from is simply that I want to see the widest possible pool of talent presenting and performing ballet and opera to the widest possible audience, and I think we’re a distance away from either.

I was thinking of the difficulties Shostakovich, for example, faced when he produced music that was insufficiently uplifting.

Well no - I never said it was easy! What employers should be doing is examining what is holding people back from applying, being recruited, staying or being promoted and where possible modifying their processes - and behaviour - to minimise these causes. One famous example is the orchestra which started holding auditions with the auditionees behind a curtain to counteract conscious or unconscious bias, with the result that recruitment of women shot up as an result. You could argue that this was simply because women felt they’d have a better chance and applied when they wouldn’t have before, but it’s the outcome that matters. I’m aware of the Spectator’s process and motives (indeed, I introduced it to this discussion) and I didn’t cite this as an example of positive action as such, just the kind of thing that counteracts inequality of opportunity. In studies blind testing in controlled settings is the best way to level the playing field: people from disadvantaged backgrounds do relatively well in them, surprising as many find this (I don’t).

Sounds like the familiar problem of Latin alphabet names being transliterated into Cyrillic and back out again - the “English as She is Spoke” effect, if you like.

I think that’s precisely the opposite of “Soviet” thinking about the arts!

The legal form of “positive discrimination” is called “positive action” and it’s that which I’m advocating. The Spectator - not known as a hotbed of radical leftism - has a no-CV policy when it recruits its (paid) interns: that’s closer to the spirit of what I’m talking about. There’s no point anyone trying to define class as you’ll find umpteen views about it in any given committee - but that doesn’t mean there aren’t many examples who nobody would hesitate to categorise as middle class.

'The lack of diversity in the governance, leadership and workforce receiving public funding “remains intractable and unacceptable”.' I actually think there's something in this. As Geoff (I think) has pointed out in the past, arts chiefs are obsessed with attracting a more diverse audience but make appointments in their own image: middle class, white and frequently male. (The juxtaposition of this point with the photo at the top of the article made me laugh.) I can't be the only one to have noticed that the upper reaches of the ROH, RB and RO are awash with that very type. Until quite recently I'd have said that positive discrimination is not the answer - then I realised that many white, middle class males (nothing against them, but they *are* over-represented in senior positions) have benefited from a form of it their whole lives without even noticing. I'm not arguing for appointments to be made on the basis of a candidate ticking the right boxes, but for the selection process to acknowledge inequality of opportunity when assessing CVs.

Is there some confusion here between the Young Friends scheme (and whatever it’s been called previously) and e.g. student standby lists and student only performances?

There’s a large chunk of Act 3 which I’d happily do without - it adds nothing to the narrative and I don’t find it musically worth it either. In fact I’d jettison the character of Preziosilla altogether, though that would leave us very light on women.

What she means is you can't narrow the results further using the same category of filter. Checking multiple boxes brings up all results for all of those types chosen rather than just the results which fit all the boxes checked. There's a type of search/filter called faceted search which allows you to filter search results - many online retailers use it - but it might not have been considered cost-effective or possible to implement on the chosen platform. (Apologies for the boring explanation.)

She does a fair amount of coaching at the RB too of course. Maybe she’d like to do more of that, or just have a bit more down time.

I do wonder what the reception to the new-look house might have been had that Arts Professional article about ticket prices never appeared, or at least had it appeared without those rather injudicious quotes from the ROH. My view is that I don’t care much either way about the physical changes to the building, but it’s the other stuff which has left a sour taste: the needless tinkering with the cast list format; the ongoing confusion about cast changes - and enough posters have said they still find it a problem that we can’t argue that it isn’t one; the across-the-board price increases; the inept absence of limits on Forza ticket purchases; the expected late announcement of next season, which looks unprofessional; and most of all the many problems with the website. This all adds up IMO to an organisation which appears to have taken its eye off the ball. In answer to BBB’s question, I’m going as much as ever this year but as Penelope says it’s because if you want to “buy” the Royal Ballet or the Royal Opera you don’t have a choice: the ROH has an effective monopoly on the supply of them. What I have cut right down on is programmes, which I used to buy nearly routinely and now buy not at all; and refreshments, which I used to buy more than half the time and now buy rarely. I’m also a lot less likely to donate money in future and once the new season is announced I’ll renew my Friends membership grudgingly and only if I decide it’s worth it.

You could well be right but in a way that’s even worse - I’d rather have my five minutes back! Building late starts in is like adding excessive slack into a train timetable, putting your customers out so you can claim to have met a target without pushing yourself. It’s self-indulgence. After a while it also encourages people to cut it fine when arriving: in Russia, where lateness is endemic, the expectation was you could arrive 5 minutes late without fear of missing the start.

I think that delay amounted to about 15 minutes - do we know why the restart after the interval was also similarly late? (I do feel slightly churlish mentioning it as the evening was such an overall success.) ROH starts are now pretty consistently about 5 minutes late: other - large, less well equipped and fully-booked - theatres manage to start on time so I don’t understand why they can’t. I’m not sure that we can blame front of house either as I’ve not noticed people coming into the auditorium after the appointed start time in any numbers. (Sorry for being off-topic!)

Big disturbance mid-aria at this afternoon’s Berenice when a lady with a sides standing ticket was asked not to sit on the standing platform with her legs over the side towards the stage (difficult to explain unless you’re familiar with the set-up). She was very angry about it - I gather she claimed to have been told by the box office that there were stools available.

I enjoy reading Jann Parry’s reviews but sometimes I think she mistakes opinion for authority. Edited to add: I know she is an authority on MacMillan but isn’t it a large part of the MacMillan legend that he allows his dancers a great deal of freedom of interpretation?

Has anyone noticed the timings please? The Sadler's Wells website says 2h 30 - is that reasonably accurate?

I don't know if it's worse than usual but the effects have possibly been more noticeable because of the absence of some dancers on planned absences (such as Cats filming, Matthew Ball appearing in the NAMP Swan Lake and Bonelli's sabbatical).

Beautiful! It’s probably heretical to say it here but I think the Georgiadis RB designs have had their day and I was very pleased to hear that Juergen Rose would be designing the Stuttgart production. I’ve never seen a design by him that I didn’t love.

Assoluta, you appear to be suggesting that you on the contrary are in such a position, yet you offer no credentials or sources for your earlier statements. Without these, it's very difficult to treat what you have posted as anything other than rumour or conjecture rather than facts or evidence. Would you care to offer us some substance to back up your claims?

Me too on both counts: the Cherubino part on principle and the baroque opera part because a) on the whole (though not always) mezzos are better singers than the countertenors I've seen cast and b) I find the authenticity argument for casting countertenors pretty spurious. IMO if casting in that range were based purely on merit - as I believe it should be - there'd be quite a few underemployed countertenors. There are of course some excep to this. Can't believe Keenlyside is nearly 60!

I love The Bright Stream - its pure unlikely joy IMO. You could have made a much less wise impulse buy. I'm with you there, though he did give a very charming interview in the Friends magazine, where he said he'd be eternally happy with "viable" as a response.

I've just noticed that we now have a title: https://www.roh.org.uk/productions/medusa-by-sidi-larbi-cherkaoui (I don't think it's been posted here yet.) The page contains the following guidance: "Please note the piece contains moderate, stylised physical threat and discreet sex references. It is not generally suitable for children under the age of 12." I'm not sure if this is new; I don't recall receiving an email about it such as the Opera has been known to send.

FWIW I understand there’s an upper limit of 9 tickets (per performance, I assume) so while probably over-generous, it’s not limitless.

I don’t think it’s unreasonable to expect printed material to be available, and it’s not just the old or staid who like it - or at least the likes of Screwfix and Argos don’t think so!