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It would seem from her Instagram posts that Leticia Stock has left the Joffrey Ballet after one year and is re-joining the RB. Not sure if this was originally the plan, but I will be very glad to see her back on the ROH stage next season.

Good decision!!

In which case I hope you and Mrs BBB have done a crash Berlitz course in Japanese.....😲

Thanks TTP....so interesting to hear what the finalists have to say. Good luck to them all!

Love it! Thank you Amelia!

Gosh so would I. Maybe they will film it eventually, as they did with Onegin...

Wow.....thanks for that beautiful review, Bridie. I feel like I was there, and now I wish I had been!

Yes I assume the visa cost I quoted above is for two people. The cost adds a bit of a whack to the total cost of the trip, but as others have said the hassle and the cost are worth it to see that beautiful city!

I highly recommend the Alexander House hotel. Very comfortable rooms, fabulous food, wonderful staff who all speak English, right on a canal at the end of which are the Maryinstky theatres, so only a 10-15 minute walk. Not too far from there into the centre (but as someone said, it depends on how well you walk). When I went, it was early February and there was snow on the ground, but it was still fine to walk everywhere just in normal boots. It is a beautiful city and as with most places the best thing is to walk around, and you do come across all kinds of places/things. I walked across the frozen Neva river and it was somehow an incredibly emotional experience. I would go back like a shot. I was there for three nights and saw the Maryinsky each night, but I don't suppose I will ever be that lucky and privileged again! Here's a link to the hotel: https://www.a-house.ru/ Something to bear in mind: quite a few places were closed on a Wednesday, so make sure you look things up before you go. Of course, it might be different in the summer time. Another thing to bear in mind: my friend has just had to stump up £250 for an entry visa. When I went four years ago, it was £70!!

I would definitely try it, Sabine. Of course, as you say, you might order a G&T now and then on the night prefer a glass of wine....but I guess it's a risk you take. It's like when you go to a wedding and have to choose your food way in advance....you might not feel like eating what you've ordered on the night, but you are stuck with it!

BalletcoForum had a quick chat with dancer/choreographer Karole Armitage, whose piece From Dirt to Soil is currently touring as part of a triple bill with the Trinity/Laban Transitions company. First of all, can you please give me a little information about yourself; whatever you think is important for our readers to know! I am a choreographer, but also an opera director and businesswoman having successfully run a dance company for 30 years that pays dancers a living weekly wage - not just a stipend as is becoming common practice in the US. I enjoy nature tremendously. I count hiking and camping along with seeing new art, both visual and performing, as my greatest pleasure. I like discovery. Nothing bores me more than watching something I already understand. You have been referred to in the past as 'the punk ballerina.' Can you explain why you have been/are perceived as such? I was a ballerina, having danced in the Geneva Ballet under George Balanchine’s direction, performing his repertoire exclusively and training in his technique from age five, when the Sex Pistols came to my delighted attention. At the time, I was a member of the Merce Cunningham Dance Company. Three forces shaped my desire to choreograph at that time: 1) rock n roll was becoming staid, commercial and unoriginal, but punk brought back an exciting raw power; 2) official forward-thinking dance of the downtown world was preaching a moralistic, repressive, very white aesthetic of “no”- no theatricality, no meaning, no emotion, o music, etc. and I wanted to bring communication about the larger world back to the audience experience. I wanted to do so with a cast that reflected the world around me, a multi-cultural rainbow that embraced both the raw and the refined, high and low, punk and poetry; 3) I wanted to present a woman’s point of view, changing the elusive muse into a woman of erotic and independent standing. Do you think classical ballet still has a valid place within dance? Some sections of press and audience who particularly enjoy contemporary dance often say it is a dying art form. What do you think of that sentiment? Classical ballet is a style with a history and a repertoire on the one hand, but it is also an extraordinary technology, allowing the body to move with great freedom and articulation. We can use the technology of ballet to show thinking in ways that reflect our time. Naturally, the status quo resists change. This can be damaging to ballet’s future in finding an audience, especially a younger audience. I am a black sheep for many in the dance world as some think I betrayed ballet by bringing in new influences; the same is true about the world of modern dance. However, art, like culture is always changing and to deny change is to deny life. It is imperative to keep the history of ballet alive through classical repertoire presented at the highest level AND to reinvigorate it with thinking of today. We must know history in order to advance. This applies to art as well as politics. Turning to your own work, what inspires you? Where do you get your ideas from? Have you ever had a dance hero/heroine, be it a dancer or choreographer? I am a great admirer of my two mentors with whom I had the great good fortune to work: Balanchine and Cunningham. But that doesn’t mean I have to copy them. My inspiration comes from curiosity – I want to understand what makes people tick and to glean ideas about how culture and the world operate. I am very interested in bringing ideas and the discipline of science into the dance arena. How do you put a piece together? Do you get an idea, then start thinking of the music, then the steps, then the design....or???? There is no formula and every piece is different. Dance is an activity I engage in as way to understand something I do not know. Can you tell me about the piece you have made for the Transitions Company, From Dirt to Soil? From what I have read, it is to do with the current state of the Earth, with special reference to the ecology. Perhaps you can tell me how it was conceived, and what you are trying to convey to the audiences. From Dirt to Soil is danced to a text by a brilliant scientist, Wes Jackson, based in Kansas in the US. He is reinventing agriculture so that people will be able to eat as the devastation of global warming changes farming practices irrevocably. He is not only a radical thinker in science, but is a true spiritual leader, reframing the questions of how society thinks about itself. From Dirt to Soil is a movement journey reflecting the urgent conceptual change required for humans to see themselves as a part of the planet, not as its dominator. It is a meditation through dance with humour, intense athletics and the glory of pure dance, which is its own delight. If there is anything else you'd like to say that I haven't covered in the above questions, please do so here. I loved working with Transitions. The company includes a wonderfully diverse group of dancers bringing a variety of spices from many different cultures and dance experiences into the room. They worked very hard and with great dedication. The process was a joy. The Transitions tour dates/venues are as follows. Please see website below for further information: 1st May Mercury Theatre, Colchester 19:30 www.mercurytheatre.co.uk 4th May Dance House, Cardiff 19:30 https://dancehouse.wales 14th May University of Chichester To book tickets, please email s.francis@chi.ac.uk 29th May The Albany Theatre 19:30 albanytheatre.co.uk 5th, 6th, 7th June Laban Theatre www.trinitylaban.ac.uk/whats-on For further information: http://www.trinitylaban.ac.uk/transitionsdc Photo of Karole Armitage by Marco Mignani

Am really looking forward to being there on the night, but I too have always been a bit bemused by how they are describing an emerging dancer. Surely someone at the top echelons has already emerged, and shown themselves in their full artistic splendour?? Maybe they should think of re-naming this competition. In any case, it's always a great evening and my how it's changed since the very first one, which I attended in Jay Mews all those years ago. Just a rehearsal studio then, now big London theatres!

I have seen this ballet many, many times over the past 40 years, and I can't remember any performance where the audience didn't laugh when Juliet jumps under the sheet. I think we can all just relate to being teenagers and getting totally fed up with being nagged by our parents. I guess this is the balletic version of stomping up the stairs and slamming the door whilst shouting "What would you know, anyway? You just don't understand anything...so leave me alone!" I think the reason Juliet gets a laugh in Act 1 is that she is miming a headache, not that she is tired, and the audience all picks up on the 'not now, I have a headache' idea!

Thanks so much for posting that, TTB. What an interesting 10 minutes. I didn't realise Miko is now studying biology at Berkeley! Best of luck to her.

Geoff, in response to your question above to the Mods, as the Sinclair presentation has been removed from the public domain and is password protected, we would prefer that it isn’t uploaded here on a public forum. Thanks.

Graham Norton will be talking to them about the R&J cinema broadcast. Their segment is due to start at 12:05. https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0004lxp

Looking promising! From Andrej Uspenski’s Instagram page. Melissa and Timofej in rehearsal for R&J.

Yes I got that. But implicitly, if they have decided that these men don’t merit their contracts being terminated instead of suspended, they are saying that their actions are acceptable and that it’s fine to return them to dance in a company that they have dishonoured and tainted. I wonder what you have to do to get fairly fired at NYCB?

I am not at all happy about this. The disgraceful and disrespectful way they treated some of their female colleagues seems to be acceptable because it wasn't in direct relation to their work. At least Catazaro did the decent thing and declined the offer. I will be interested to see how Ramasar reintegrates. If I were a ballerina in that company I would refuse to dance with him and could never trust him, counselling or not. But as Bruce says, let's hope the company can now move forward in a positive way.

Very nice it was, too! That’s all I will say.

And to you Mandy. Thanks for your lovely reviews.

Probably because there isn’t enough time to teach it to a dancer if he doesn’t know it. It’s only a week until Reece’s first scheduled performance. Having said this, Alexander Campbell knows the role. Perhaps Melissa is too tall for him?

And Matthew Ball.... but I guess they are already fully occupied by their Juliets!

It was most probably during the stage call (full run-through in private).

That final photo really gives me chills and goosebumps....