Meetmeatthebarre

Logged on just before 09:00, and got all the tickets I wanted for the performances I wanted after 5 minutes waiting (RBS, Morera's retirement, Carlos, Jewels and Dance with the Royal Ballet). It's been a while since I've been so lucky!

12 hours ago, Workhard_Dreambig said:

I love pointe work. It’s my favourite part of the exam, and adage.

13 hours ago, Workhard_Dreambig said:

If I practice at home on their own they never work and what’s frustrating is that I have pretty good balance in relevé. I think I panic and tense up! 

I could have written this! Are you, perchance, quite tall as well?

21 hours ago, LinMM said:

I’ve always been better when they were part of an enchainement with other steps in rather than just doing pirouettes across the room or as an exercise one pirouette after the other. 

The same - especially enchainments where there's no time to think. I used to find the most consistent doubles I had were where I aimed for a single on a good floor and then just let myself go round another time. But... I've landed nice triples on a handful of occasions, and there's just not enough force from my previous method to get round that extra time. (I'm really not a turner though; on bad days, even my singles are sloppy.)

22 hours ago, EverHopeful said:

Are you skipping Advanced Foundation then @Meetmeatthebarre? 

I am, part of it is history (I was probably more exam-ready a year ago than I was when I took it for various life reasons) and had already taken a term of Adv 1 which followed on from the Inter class I took. A related reason is timetabling. But a main reason is that I'm quite a nervy dancer - my weakness is transitions or losing technique because I panic, rather than lacking the technique to tackle steps in isolation. So I think I'd get a better end result by spending double the time on Adv 1, than AF and then Adv 1, if that makes sense. 

Whilst awaiting results, it's been so nice to go (back) to the Advanced 1 syllabus! For me at least, it's such a demonstration of how liking/feeling inspired by a piece makes dancing it so much lighter. 

London-region and yes, iPad in my case. It's been a little over a week now, but I have a lesson tomorrow and the school is quite traditional (forced to wear the bun flowers  - I secretly loved them, however). I'll keep this thread updated!

Does anyone have insights to share about how long this term's RAD exam results are taking to come through? I finally took my Inter recently. I can't wait to see the back of that syllabus, so rather desperate to have confirmation that I can leave it behind!

9 minutes ago, LinMM said:

It’s only the odd one or two who get really uppity though and there’s no getting through to people like that unfortunately as I think they enjoy annoying people!! 

 

I tend to have a word either before in the guise of "if I'm in your way, do tap me..." - the side tickets do get booked up so quickly but they might get transferred on to people who don't know "the code" - or during the interval.

Only once in many years did I have a seatmate who loved to lean so far forward, elbow on the barrier, chin on hand, who refused to move. I suppose that's the gamble taken.

Just before Friday's Turandot, a series of events unfolded which started off like a prime candidate for this thread, but with a rather touching ending. For background, this production starts with curtains opening, and the chorus slowly one-by-one taking their positions even before the lights dim. This was in progress, when across the mid-amphitheatre comes a very loud shout. Some turned heads, some grumbles. And then it happens again - it's a woman's name. It's only on the third time that we realise what is going on - two older ladies (sitting in the row behind me) waiting for their friend have seen her, but at the wrong door! The ushers spring into action, swiftly escorting her to the right door and up to her seat, but not before her walking stick catches in the wrong place, she stumbles on the stairs to some gasps (but is OK), and almost everyone in her row and the one in front try to assist as she shuffles into the end of the row (the angle of the seating there is quite steep!). So if you heard some commotion and then a ripple of warm applause that night, it was the excellent work of ROH staff, and one very happy opera-goer delivered to join what was a spectacular performance with her friends.

10 minutes ago, JohnS said:

A personal note if I may. When my wife Lynn died quite unexpectedly in 2017, one of the many things requiring my decision was what to do with her jewellery. It struck me that Lynn would have liked her favourite dancers to have some of her jewellery as we’d occasionally leave gifts at the Stage Door, particularly when up and coming dancers were multi tasking, taking on many roles during a major run. I put together some small gifts of Lynn’s jewellery for the start of the new season. For Laura it had to be Lynn’s pearls. A few months later Laura was dancing Masha and she let me know she’d be wearing the pearl earrings on stage. An astonishing gesture which I found extremely touching and I was delighted to be able to see her second performance albeit through rather teary eyes.

 

Laura: not only the consummate ballerina but one of the kindest, most generous people I’ve met, surely the most lustrous of pearls.

What a lovely story, JohnS. I'm sorry for your loss. 

I had thought that this morning's announcement was perhaps timed to avoid speculation/questions at tonight's Insight (which I am gutted to not have been able to attend). 

It was just over ten years ago when I was converted into an uber-fan after her Tatiana and vowed never to overlook her on casts lists again. And I've appreciated the interpretation she has brought to everything I've seen since. I'm glad her final company performance will be in Month, though sad that I won't be there in Japan. I've double-booked for her Cinderella, however, and will fight high waters to be at her final Anastasia. 

13 hours ago, Ian Macmillan said:

Well, David Jays is first up with a decidedly cool review in today's Standard - see Links.  "Decorous but dull." 

If it's of any consolation, I've rarely seen comments to the ES reviews, let alone ones which are so decisively critical of the critic. 

My viewings of the RB's Beauty alone must run into the teens, and I still can barely wait for the late runs for which I have booked (O'Sullivan/McRae and Takada/Sambe).

2 hours ago, Sophie_B said:

I wasn't seeing them as lions but as possibly a toned-down, not-too-scary version of "Krampus" who is St Nicholas's evil sidekick in Central Europe. On the ROH stage, they seemed to be carrying some sort of stick or trident to scare kids with, which I why that was my guess - but happy to be corrected by someone who actually knows! I believe depending on your alpine region, you can have more than one Krampus. [What is the collective noun for those? A "frightening"?  ]

You're entirely right, from someone who lived in the region for a few years (and was introduced to this tradition in a rather terrifying way - a surprise whipping on the bottom by two young boys in devil masks and broomsticks - rather alarming if one has no heads-up or context!)

On 09/11/2022 at 07:26, balletgremlin said:

Of course, completely understand you'd want an official source.

 

Click through from the RAD page  - https://mailchi.mp/rad.org.uk/jul-2022-focus-exams-2543909

Direct link - https://online.fliphtml5.com/fznc/sqoz/#p=1

 

A very belated thanks for this - really appreciated!

On 31/10/2022 at 21:17, balletgremlin said:

This is an old topic, but thought I'd share the good news. RAD have done away with requiring demi-pointe shoes or pianists for vocational exams, dancers may wear short skirts and for the graded syllabi dancers genders have been scrapped, anyone can do any exercise/dance. For vocational and repertoire exams, anyone can do either syllabus but has to stick to one gender per exam (i.e if you do pointe work you have to do the female variation and if you chose the additional allegro, you do the male one - this is as it is at the moment). Grade 6 and 7 can now be done as solo performance awards and it's candidates choice of sides in all exercises where examiners previously picked.

 

Taken from the most recent Focus on Exams.

Would you happen to have a link? All I can find online is Issue 2 from June, which doesn't appear to cover this. I'm looking to take Inter in the spring, so would very much like the reassurance (as well as not having to pay for new soft blocks and a tutu!) Thank you so much!

It's been a while since I took Anna's GEN class, and I only went a few times, but I found it was very much suitable to adapt for beginners/advanced beginners. I don't recall there being many pros. 

Another vote for Wear Moi, but also Grishko. Their fabric and stitching is incredibly generous with stretch. They also wash beautifully and look pristine after tonnes of wear. Bloch/Mirella are also a good option, but down to the cut, rather than the fabric. 

Sonata, Capezio, and especially Ballet Rosa, unfortunately, don't work in my experience for long torsos. 

All I have to add to this thread is on Month. It's always been my favourite one act, perhaps tied with Marguerite & Armand. Yet normally when a piece and a performance scale such giddy heights as Saturday night I rush out to book again, I hovered over the confirm button with both of Monday's performances in basket, then finally did not buy. I wanted to savour the memory of Saturday, put it into a glass box, and not risk its perfection being compromised by further viewings that would invariably fail to match. 

Without going into detail, I've recently had personal circumstances which, though not the story, have brought up similar kinds of emotions. Laura was Natalia Petrovna, but as the piece built to its inevitable end, so was I. It's so hard to think of Vadim inhibiting a malicious character having taken class from him and seen how utterly lovely he is in person, but even aside from that, I felt his characterisation was of a young man clueless rather than thoughtless or reckless. The last scene, where he rushes in and cradles Natalia's sash, had tones of innocent longing and brought up thoughts of Giselle cradling Bathilde's silks. I lost it, and to anyone who heard the loud, uncontrollable and ugly sobs before the music even ended on Saturday night, I am sorry!

On a totally different note, I am rather amused that Ms Osipova's patronymic is... Petrovna. So she is literally Natalia Petrovna (Osipova)!

4 hours ago, JohnS said:

But my expectations are sky high for Laura Morera and I won’t be at all surprised if she’ll give the definitive performance despite it being only her second and third. I’m afraid it really begs the question why she has had to wait so long to dance Natalia Petrovo, a role so ideally suited to her.

Same. So suited she is to the role that I was sure I had seen her in it before - a false memory only challenged when I was flicking through this month's Dancing Times and saw her interview!

(As an aside, whilst often lauded as a dance actress in the darker roles, I love Morera's interpretations of the lighter ballets as well - especially her Lise!)

Have you considered moving to the predecessor of the Streampointe, the Smartpointe? Starpointe is a polymer shank, but Smartpointe and Streampointe have the same last and shank construction, so may feel closer. Both Planet Dance and Dancing in the Street are showing the Smartpointe in stock in various sizes. 

Out of interest, where did you source the Starpointe? When I heard Grishko had crossed the Dreampointe polymer shank with the Smartpointe last it was as if my pointe shoe dreams came true, but I'm struggling to get any!

As the fitting is tomorrow, ideally you'd want to fit the shoe with the padding that she is going to wear. I'd say on this occasion, buying the pads in store might be more expensive, but as they last forever (my Ouch Pouches are 2 years and still almost as new after a wash) the extra cost will even out, and better than going away with the wrong shoe. 

If she has particularly tapered feet, lambswool is brilliant to fill up negative space, so definitely not an upsell if she needs it. 

Also highly recommend a mesh pointe shoe bag and charcoal drying inserts which you can get online for under £5 and under £10 respectively. The latter help avoid smells and also gives shoes a bit of structure to help them getting squashed at the bottom of a bag!

All these additional things last ages after the initial outlay. When I need a new shoe, I normally just get the shoe and extra elastic (I find it doesn't recycle as easily) and if I'm feeling lazy, extra stretch ribbons. Everything else is still the same as the first purchase. 

Belated thoughts on last Friday. I love DGV, and it was my primary reason for going. It's also been a bit of a lucky ballet in terms of setting off coincidences, and it did so again on Friday. But I digress. 

The Weathering was overly long, and didn't stand out in any way. It felt like someone had compiled a list of dance steps that look pretty/impressive and thrown them randomly together. All very nice, but what was the message? At some point halfway through, I started to think that the staging and costumes would not look out of place if Kayne West had commissioned a ballet company to model his next Yeezy collection, and it was a lost cause after that. 

Solo Echo was new for me, and I would want to see again. I am not the biggest fan of contemporary ballet for the sake of it, but Pite has a unique way of uniting dancers into a singular entity. It's one of the first times I've walked out of a new piece with a friend, both coming into it completely blind, and having similar views on the interpretation (of how previous experiences shape a present and future person). That's when you know someone can tell stories. 

On to DGV. Maybe a decade since I last saw it, but I've always loved the story behind, the sense of urgency and optimism that the event, music, and choreo seeks to show. JM Puissant's minimalist staging works for me here, showcasing what I think of as the "ribbons" of dancers in the corps in the background. And as the staging glowed a bit more yellow and blue than I previously remembered, and the corps ribbon went from the arms crossed to raised in the air in welcome, I found myself in tears, both mourning the state of the world today, yet uplifted. I cried during an abstract ballet for trains. That says it all.

I had hoped to get tickets for tonight (and attend only for the latter two pieces) but work got in the way. 

Are you referring to transparent wide elastic like this? https://www.justballet.co.uk/products/gaynor-minden-imperial-elastic

1 hour ago, MissEmily said:

Wear Moi camisole leotard with bow back, black, microfibre and mesh, size M - £10 + P&P

Grishko cap-sleeved leotard, mid blue with unusual mottled floral mesh design, microfibre, size M - £15 + P&P

 

 

Would it be possible to PM me photos or send me the model numbers of these? Think I have both already but in different colours so can be confident on sizing/fit if so. Thank you!

6 hours ago, Jeni said:

Hi is the ballet rosa leotard still available. If so do you have any photos please

Hello! So sorry but this leo has been spoken for. Only the items in my last post remain (for now - I might have another clearout soon!)

With my usual shoes on backorder, only my current pair, and stock only looking to get worse, I've been thinking about alternatives. I have really difficult feet to fit, but I remember two Bloch models being previous contenders, the Heritage and the Suprima, so was hoping to order a couple of pairs to reassess. 

Unfortunately, I can't remember the exact size I tried on! Both were the narrowest (X and B respectively) but I don't recall whether they were a size 4.5 (i.e. matching my soft shoe Bloch size) or a 5.5 (i.e. matching my usual brand's pointe shoe size) or one of each! 

If anyone has experience with these models and can help me make a more educated guess, I'd be extremely grateful. Of course, the Bloch store in London is out of both models in my size(s) so I can't try in person...

I forgot about public booking today as well, and was astounded to find so many value amphi tickets for my top priority, Morera & Bonelli's last Month in the Country. I wasn't given a choice of new vs old booking system, and was able to secure a pair side front amphi for that performance at 10:30ish. Again, amazingly, the seats right next to mine were still available at 12:30 for a friend+partner who was going to join, and then again at 14:00 for another friend + partner. So all went well, but the booking pattern has me confused as well...

A Month in the Country is jointly my favourite single act ballet - on a par only with Marguerite & Armand. Strange, as in some ways it is the anti-Onegin in terms of plot, but elicits much of the same emotions in me, though much more through tableau than motion.