Sebastian

Ticket gone

Hello Yumi. Yes the ticket is still available. Might you be so kind and send me a PM (Private Message, some people call them DMs, Direct Messages) as per my original request in my message? All you have to do is click on the envelope symbol top right of this page and you can see how to send a message. Hope this works ok!

Vsevolozhsky had read Perrault's stories in the original. Dore's illustrations (for the most popular French edition, widely available in Russian in the 19th century) were, so said reviewers at the time of the 1890 ballet, highly influential when it came to the stage designs.

If you might like to dig further @Roberta, you could do worse than look up this collection published the previous year (and reviewed by Duggan around the time her book came out, short extract below): Miracles of Love: French Fairy Tales by Women. Ed. Nora Martin Peterson. Trans. Jordan Stump. (New York: Modern Language Association of America, 2022. Pp. xxxiii + 244, introduction, collections in first fairy tale vogue [1690–1703], source texts and other editions consulted, suggested reading, translator’s note, works cited.) Miracles of Love: French Fairy Tales by Women is the first time the Modern Language Association (MLA) series Texts and Translations has published a collection of fairy tales by the conteuses of the 1690s. The series aims to make world-language texts available in English (as well as in the source language) for undergraduate and graduate classrooms. Miracles of Love presents a select group of tales by the conteuses, focusing on Catherine Bernard, Catherine Durand, Charlotte-Rose Caumont de La Force, Marie-Jeanne L’héritier de Villandon, and Henriette-Julie de Castelnau, Comtesse de Murat. As the title indicates, this anthology focuses on questions related to love and how tales by the conteuses challenge contemporary Disneyfied conceptions filled with good fairies, innocent romance, and happy endings. However it is only fair to point out that neither Duggan nor the Peterson collection will help one learn more about Perrault, or what he was up to with his stories. For this I recommend Jeanne Morgan Zarucchi, Lydie Jean, Jack Zipes, Lewis Seifert, Oded Rabinovitch, Morna Daniels, not forgetting Marc Soriano and other writers in French.

Might I add a few comments on the Lilac Fairy? When one looks back at the Perrault stories from which the ballet derives, there is no Lilac Fairy in the story La Belle au Bois Dormant, only a "good fairy". However another story from an earlier Perrault collection - Peau d'Asne, usually translated as Donkey-skin - features a fairy called Lilac. As it happens Donkey-Skin is listed as one of the fairy-tale characters in the ballet's Act III procession, so we can assume that the audience in 1890 were as familiar with that story as with the Sleeping Beauty. Here are some echoes from the story: -- The young Princess, beside herself with misery, at last bethought her of the Lilac-fairy, her godmother; determined to consult her -- The Lilac-fairy, who knew all, hastened to comfort her -- The Princess, confused by all these caresses and by the love of the handsome young Prince, was about to thank them when suddenly the ceiling opened, and the Lilac-fairy descended in a chariot made of the branches and flowers from which she took her name (from the 1922 English translation, easily found online).

For Sale ROH Swan Lake 4 May 1pm Sarah Lamb / Reece Clark Amphitheatre Upper Slips - AA1 £23 If interested please send PM as well as posting here. Thank you.

Yes Aurora pricks her finger on her 16th birthday, that’s what it says in the BRB programme (presumably reflecting the Sadler’s Wells 1946 production Peter Wright drew from, does anyone have a 1946 programme we can check?) But there is some confusion: the original Perrault tale does indeed say "fifteen or sixteen years" (Grimm later said fifteen) but the libretto for the 1890 premiere of the ballet clearly specifies she is twenty years old in Act I. Does anyone have any ideas as to why they choose a 20th birthday in 1890 (the manners of the Imperial court perhaps or the taste of the censor)? And why this was changed again in 1946 or more recently?

ROH Swan Lake Saturday 11 May 2024, 7pm Francesca Hayward, William Bracewell Amphitheatre Upper Slips CC, Seat 1 £23 If interested, please PM as well as posting here. Many thanks.

Tickets gone back to the box office

Friday ticket gone back to the box office

Friday ticket gone back to the box office

Based on the characters traditionally expected in the Act III procession, maybe Beast (as part of Beauty and the Beast)? In answer to your earlier question about the Prologue Fairies @Dawnstar you will be pleased to know that their music was played in the order given in the score, I.e. the variations came in the same order as usual.

Congratulations to conductor Philip Ellis for tonight driving the score at tempi which approach the authentic rehearsal metronome marks (rather faster than we have got used to at the Royal Ballet). Was every cast member to my taste? No, but all showed that speed is no obstacle to dancing this wonderful ballet, despite what we are sometimes told. Incidentally, three choreographers are credited in the programme. Petipa, of course, and also Peter Wright (it is his production and Wright in turn credits Frederick Ashton for an Aurora solo and a pas de quatre variation). But equal prominence is also given to Lev Ivanov, as if Sleeping Beauty is like Swan Lake or Nutcracker. Does anyone know why? As BRB will not have made a mistake, what did Ivanov contribute to this production?

Sunday ticket now gone, Friday still available.

Sunday ticket now gone, Friday still available.

I can’t use my standing tickets for the upcoming double bill in the ROH Linbury: LARMES DE COUTEAU / FULL MOON IN MARCH Friday 26th April 7.45pm - one ticket £8 Sunday 28th April 3pm - one ticket £8 Anyone interested please PM as well as posting here. Thank you.

I can’t use my standing tickets for the upcoming double bill in the ROH Linbury: LARMES DE COUTEAU / FULL MOON IN MARCH Friday 26th April 7.45pm - one ticket £8 Sunday 28th April 3pm - one ticket £8 Anyone interested please PM as well as posting here. Thank you.

Both tickets gone now

7pm gone now. 1pm Naghdi, Ball still available.

Sadly I can‘t be in London this weekend so selling the best Upper Slips seats (CC1): 1pm Naghdi, Ball - £23 7pm Lamb, Clarke - £23 If interested please send a PM as well as posting here. Thank you.

I booked two excellent tickets at £35 each for this event:- https://lpo.org.uk/event/gotterdammerung/ Now I sadly can't go. Will sell separately or together. Tickets in that area - side stalls - long since sold out. Anyone interested please send me a PM as well as posting here. Many thanks.

Thank you Amelia. Seems this wasn’t so far off.

Ticket gone now

Ticket gone

D13 SCS for next week's ROH dress rehearsal of the new production of the opera Carmen, 7pm Tuesday 2nd April. £9. Please PM as well as posting here if interested.