Sebastian

8 hours ago, Sebastian said:

The late Beryl Grey. A clip of her Lilac Fairy has sometimes been on YouTube but gets taken down. However she can be seen in at least one of the “historic” complete RB Sleeping Beauty’s available on DVD.
 

Just check the cast list and buy in complete safety that you will have a wonderful experience, not just with Lilac but also the rest of the cast. You may however have to search secondhand/Ebay etc, not sure what is available retail at the moment. 

Just checked. The 1955 recording is currently available, with among others Margot Fonteyn, Michael Somes, Frederick Ashton (a wonderful Carabosse) and Beryl Grey.

2 minutes ago, JohnS said:

 I’m still not convinced by Lilac fairy’s solo and would be very interested to hear which Lilac Fairy solo readily available on DVD/film others would recommend. 

The late Beryl Grey. A clip of her Lilac Fairy has sometimes been on YouTube but gets taken down. However she can be seen in at least one of the “historic” complete RB Sleeping Beauty’s available on DVD.
 

Just check the cast list and buy in complete safety that you will have a wonderful experience, not just with Lilac but also the rest of the cast. You may however have to search secondhand/Ebay etc, not sure what is available retail at the moment. 

Work commitments mean the following tickets are now available:

- Saturday 15 April 2023, 1pm |  Naghdi, Matthew Ball,
Amphitheatre Upper Slips, AA-2 £22.00
Amphitheatre Upper Slips, AA-1 £22.00

- Saturday 22 April 2023, 7pm |  Takada, Nicol Edmonds
Amphitheatre Upper Slips, CC-2 £22.00
Amphitheatre Upper Slips, CC-1 £22.00

Would prefer to sell pairs. Please send a PM as well as posting here if interested. 

51 minutes ago, bangorballetboy said:

 

Whilst the correct answer is magic, the practical answer is that there is a mobility scooter inside the back of the carriage and there is somebody sitting on it driving (we learned this at a props insight day where we were let loose in the props department).

 

On a similar vein (and as @zxDaveM has already intimated), the Nutcracker sledge is powered by the battery from a milk float.

And when we were doing ROH's La Donna del Lago in the early 1980s this production had, unsurprisingly, a lady on a lake. The lady was supposed to be drifting across the lake in a sort of punt, which was radio controlled from the wings but rarely worked (or rather it worked in rehearsal but then repeatedly got stage fright). This led to a colleague of mine lying between the lady's legs in the punt, dressed in a black monk's cowl in an attempt to hide his presence, working the motor by hand. Happy days. 

Not sure how tactful it is to point this out but those interested in Petipa might like to know that the Mariinsky is about to premiere The Pharaoh's Daughter (the Bolshoi have a production, available on disc) See here:

1 minute ago, Sophoife said:

Thank you, @oncnpand @Sebastianbut I do prefer when possible to support a local independent bookshop because if we don't they'll disappear, and as there isn't one locally I'll support the one 757km (as the crow flies) away. Realistically it's over 1,100km because, you know, roads and, well, water 🤣

My post was, as I thought I made clear, about the UK. It is highly likely that if amazon.co.uk are currently showing the book then independent UK bookshops will also be able to obtain the title. That was what I meant, sorry for being unclear. 

2 hours ago, Sophoife said:

Sadly, per Marina Harss directly, it is only being published in the US at this stage.

Happily, we in the UK may be ok - the book is currently showing as a possible pre-order on amazon.co.uk (both in hardback and Kindle). 

Just a quick heads up that Marina Harrs's forthcoming book on the life and work of Alexei Ratmansky is set for publication this October:-

https://us.macmillan.com/books/9780374102616/the-boy-from-kyiv

I am great admirer of Ratmansky's work and am much looking forward to reading this.  

Ah, Alain. Readers with long memories will recall we have over the years discussed such aspects of Alain several times and most interestingly. I just did a search for him and his umbrella and learned a lot from what people have posted in the past.

Might it be ok if I now add a comment relating to the subject of this thread? There are some remarks in a 2015 Dance Tabs review of the then new production of Sleeping Beauty by Ratmansky which might be relevant:

https://dancetabs.com/2015/05/american-ballet-theatre-the-sleeping-beauty-new-york/

The review is by Marina Harrs, who is the author of the forthcoming book on Ratmansky and someone who has interviewed him at length. She opens her discussion of the production with these observations:

Perhaps the most striking element in Alexei Ratmansky’s new Sleeping Beauty for American Ballet Theatre is its musicality, the way the steps, peppered with accents and breaths, unspool within the music. In most productions of Beauty, the tempi are constantly being adjusted to accommodate the size or difficulty of the steps...Another striking quality is an overall danceiness that we don’t usually associate with the high classicism of Sleeping Beauty. Nothing is static or grandiloquent, and every instant is filled with movement...The choreography just bubbles along, more concerned with exemplifying an emotion or a thought – warmth, happiness, yearning – than with impressing upon the viewer the skill of the dancers.

Thanks for your reports Jeannette and Ivy Lin. I still haven’t yet managed to catch up with this recording so wondered if you had any comments in regard to what I asked earlier…

On 18/02/2023 at 13:44, Sebastian said:

My particular interest is in…the nature, amount and timing of the mime. How does this aspect compare to Ratmansky's work?

Thank you very much Jeannette, this is most helpful. My particular interest is in detailed work on meaning, for example on the nature, amount and timing of the mime. How does this aspect compare to Ratmansky's work?

The digital program notes are informative. The répétiteur I mentioned (the Titus document you refer to as "one other") is described along with much else. Here is a small extract about it from the program notes (within copyright limits I hope) for the interest of people on the Forum who haven't read Marian Smith's original paper:-

The Titus manuscript. According to the Theatre Museum in St. Petersburg—where it is housed today— this 156-page manuscript (for violin and cello) was brought to Russia in 1842 by the ballet master Antoine Titus to aid him in the staging of Giselle in that city. Its great value lies in its copious annotations (in French), which describe the mime scenes, showing specifically how the action matched up to the music...Such annotations disclose not only what music and mime were intended for each other in Giselle in particular, but also open the door to understanding in general how composer and choreographer worked in complementary fashion to create Parisian ballets of this era. Indeed, every note, every phrase, every shift from loud to soft or major to minor is designed to provide the dancers with a vital resource for communicating the drama, moment to moment—a resource that is not always recognized today as such.

3 hours ago, Jeannette said:

My lone complaint about the PNB recon of Giselle, compared to the 2019 Bolshoi-Ratmansky version: no Fugue des Wilis in Act II, as at the Bolshoi (or the later Ukrainian-Ratmansky version, I’ve read)…but the PNB recon includes the drunken villagers episode in the middle of Act II, before Albrecht’s entrance. 

Thank you Jeannette, although it’s a rather busy time I am very much hoping to catch this. Do you happen to know who was responsible for the “historically-informing”, what they used and how they worked? Maybe there is a programme note online or such like? 

Since Marian Smith’s important 2000 publication “The Earliest Giselle” we have known about the répétiteur (annotated violin score) so together with the later Sergeyev/Stepanov materials there is a fair bit to draw on. Fascinating to see what use this company makes of the research. 

On 14/02/2023 at 17:01, Sebastian said:

This confusion seemed worth drawing to ROH's attention. So I wrote to the ever helpful Graham Boland of ROH Customer Services. He replied (and I told him I would update the Forum with what he said):

 

>>Whilst we encourage all to attend our performances, we do have an age guidance of 5 years and above. Sometimes, it is difficult to gauge a child's exact age and occasionally when asked, a parent might provide a slightly older age which can prove difficult for a member of staff to decide upon. This is why the team will advise customers with young children to be aware of their environment with fellow audience members close by and request politely that they leave at the first sign of noise or irritation. I am sorry if this was not explained clearly to the customer before the performance on this occasion. 

In response to your request for clarification, please be assured that the matter is being addressed at this very time. Our Visitor Experience department, Front of House and Digital teams are working to ensure we have a consistent, departmental approach for delivery of this guidance for all our customers, both online and when visiting. We are aiming for this to be concluded in the coming weeks...It would be remiss of me to comment on this until the group has come to a fuller explanation. 

As a follow up to this discussion I just noticed this post on another thread on the Forum, which is perhaps related:

On 04/02/2023 at 12:18, Geoff said:

Last night, in the slips, we had the youngest child I have ever seen at Covent Garden in some fifty years of attending...

In the first interval I spotted a couple having words with an usher and heard that "our rules are relaxed for these ballets". 

On 04/02/2023 at 15:55, JNC said:

ROH should really be banning children that young to be honest, and the mother shouldn’t have thought it was acceptable. 

I also find it a bit of an odd comment to say exceptions were made for sleeping beauty... But while sleeping beauty is a fairytale it’s a long ballet, over 3 hours with long acts. Doesn’t make sense to me! 

On 04/02/2023 at 16:07, oncnp said:

 

Last night I saw a child, probably (hopefully?) the same one being breast-fed in the lobby. 

 

And the ROH does have a policy and lacks either the staff or the will to enforce it. 

 

1.8. Children aged 5–14 must have their own ticket and must be seated next to an accompanying adult. Children aged 0–4 will not be admitted to the auditoriums unless otherwise advertised.

On 04/02/2023 at 18:07, MJW said:

With regard to young children, I can't see anything specific mentioned regarding "relaxed" rules for SB but the website states 

"Children age five and above are permitted into our auditoria. They must have their own ticket and sit next to an accompanying adult. Some events are open to families with children younger that five. This will be clearly stated on the production or event web page"

On 04/02/2023 at 19:17, Sim said:

On the website it says...  Guidance: Suitable for All.  So some people take that to mean toddlers as well, I guess!!  

This confusion seemed worth drawing to ROH's attention. So I wrote to the ever helpful Graham Boland of ROH Customer Services. He replied (and I told him I would update the Forum with what he said):

>>Whilst we encourage all to attend our performances, we do have an age guidance of 5 years and above. Sometimes, it is difficult to gauge a child's exact age and occasionally when asked, a parent might provide a slightly older age which can prove difficult for a member of staff to decide upon. This is why the team will advise customers with young children to be aware of their environment with fellow audience members close by and request politely that they leave at the first sign of noise or irritation. I am sorry if this was not explained clearly to the customer before the performance on this occasion. 

In response to your request for clarification, please be assured that the matter is being addressed at this very time. Our Visitor Experience department, Front of House and Digital teams are working to ensure we have a consistent, departmental approach for delivery of this guidance for all our customers, both online and when visiting. We are aiming for this to be concluded in the coming weeks...It would be remiss of me to comment on this until the group has come to a fuller explanation. 

As ROH is engaged in a discussion about the issue I presume they would appreciate feedback from its patrons. Graham will no doubt be pleased to feed in any new ideas (I suggested they check the discussion here). 

I am looking for one SCS ticket for this performance. Please let me know if you can help out. Many thanks!

Ticket spoken for now

(Bumping up as the show is tonight now)

I picked up SCS D15 here but am now unable to go. Face value £12.

Please leave a message & DM me if interested.

On 02/02/2023 at 17:32, art_enthusiast said:

Slightly off topic here but are ROH programmes worth buying? 

The current programme for Sleeping Beauty includes colour photographs of current company in the show, the original 1946 Sadler's Wells production and a lovely painting by Watteau. The articles are a typically marvellous piece of writing by the late Clement Crisp; Roy Strong on the designer Oliver Messel; Gavin Plumley on the music; Amanda Holloway on how the designs were refreshed; and a piece on Petipa by Nadine Messel, the author of the recent biography. There is also a historical article by yours truly, but you don't need to read that. 

So if you have not seen these writings before, that's under £2 per piece, with nice pictures thrown in. This is either a bargain or, alternatively, £8-is-a-lot-of-money. 

Quickly, to follow up on the above, it's all good. Production as before, and as before good in parts - the Venusberg opening is very good (and avoids so many pitfalls). Some of the rest is baffling (at least to me): why for example are the pilgrims carrying guns? Given the rest of the production, their guns are maybe to protect themselves from creatures of hell, who...all work at the Royal Opera House? (Yes, that's where the show is - sort of - set.)

The singing was of a pretty high standard: Vinke made it through, and sometimes was really very good. He only had me anxious a few times, so well done him. The rest of the cast solid and good, somehow not sensational, even voice of the moment Davidsen, but that may be me. The chorus spectacular, and very well handled by conductor and whoever did the restaging. The orchestra the usual hit and miss (the first fluff by the brass came in the second bar). The audience sounded like they had a great time. 

The production is, as they say, good in parts. No idea what is happening now, given the difficulties the tenor has been having. I will be there this afternoon and will report. 

Yes please

On 27/01/2023 at 08:20, DD Driver said:

Great speech here by Konstantin Kisin at the Oxford Union debate

Having worked in this area (at a high international level, not as a research scientist) I should point out that the speaker makes one claim which is likely to lead his audience astray. It is true that the UK's contribution to CO2 emissions is comparatively small, but the implication he would seem to want people to draw from this (that we in the UK are wasting our time) is wrong and not for sentimental reasons.

Not wanting to divert this ENO thread into a climate change debate, if anyone wants to discuss, just send me a DM with their email address. 

This one-act ballet, written by Glazunov for Petipa in 1900, has disappeared, says the impeccable Nadine Meisner. However the music is happily still available and there are several wonderful recordings. Recommended listening for fans of the score to Raymonda. 

Does anyone know if there have been any subsequent attempts to set a ballet to this tremendous music? 

First response from a friend about a film which does not seem to be that obscure:—

>>Amazon has the Pavlova film listed but it appears to be unavailable on dvd at present. I bought my copy back in 2013.

>>It's a sad mess. Michael Powell didn't really have a lot to do with the filming, but worked with Thelma Schoonmaker to edit the feature in a London cutting room.