GailR

The new Vue website makes searching for 'events' a challenge !! If you are trying to find info about The Bright Stream they actually have it listed as 'The Bright Screen'.

I think my £3.00 subscription to The Times is really good value. It gives me paper copies on Saturday and Sunday and internet access every day including all their puzzles which can be done online. The Sunday culture section than gives me TV listings for the next 7 days.

Ahah - it was still in my recently deleted folder - 

I think it is all Picturehouses - I had a similar email which I didn't read properly as I used to be a member when I visited Brighton a lot - Gail

When I looked on Groupon this morning, they had a Cinderella Upper Circle offer.

I have been pondering whether anyone knows for sure that Yuhui wishes to be a Principal. There are so many more lovely soloist roles to go round that someone may prefer that level to waiting for a smaller share of Principal performances ?

Sorry - just read the previous post again to see 1973 !!

Thanks for highlighting this Australian Nureyev DQ, and thank you to the information about NowTv in a previous post. I was nicely surprised that this was specially made for filming so no applause and a bigger set than a conventional stage. The whole company were on fire and technically superb and a slight rearranging of the story flowed well. I had my eyes peeled during the credits to see when it was filmed but the only date I saw was 1999 which must have been when the film was remastered - does anyone know when it was actually filmed ? Interestingly I saw Gailene Stock's name flash by but I missed which role she danced. 

www.operahollandpark.com is now open for general booking

Yes - you are right Jane although David was at the upper school at the same time. Maybe he joined the company before the school performance ?

The last RBS summer performance (1965 or 66)  that I was lucky enough to be a part of was Two Pigeons. The young girl was Lesley Collier and the gypsy girl was Margaret Barbieri !! I think that David Wall performed the artist, but I am not sure as there was a lot of role sharing with that part. 

I loved the repeat of Pharoahs Daughter this afternoon. Granted it is a flimsy story line, just a great excuse for a full on spectacle of superb dancing from the whole company, challenging choreography, very danceable music, fabulous costumes and impressive sets. I love the way that the Bolshoi fully commit to a daft story. The benefit of the recorded performance was that the intervals were just 10 minutes and in the first one the lovely Ms Novikova  interviewed the choreographer, Pierre Lacotte, for whom she was interpreter for 3 years in her younger days. The second interval pulled at my heart strings as I realised that the production we were seeing was more than 2 years old as she was talking to the very beautiful Sergei Filin on whom Lacotte had created the role. I looked up the date when I got home and it was Nov 2012

Just a tiny note to say how much I enjoyed the outdoor performance by around thirty Tring Park students last night at the Tring 'Seasonal' fiesta where the high street is closed to traffic and packed with people and stalls and funfair. I was there to see my granddaughter dancing with the local school and they were great and then we were treated to the Tring Park students dressed in their loudest Christmas gear belting out a medley of festive numbers. Congratulations to all concerned and great to see the students participating in the life in Tring.

For North of London people, Watford Palace are showing Pharoah's Daughter the following Sunday, 30th Nov, at 3:00pm. They charge £15 with no concessions for live/recorded films. You could even stay for the evening showing of Gone Girl

... and Lesley danced the lead girl in Two Pigeons in the RBS matinee, around 1962. I think David Wall was the boy and Margaret Barbieri was the lead gypsy so yes, the school was very much used to the Ashton style.

Watford Palace charge £15 for all their theatre streamings - no concessions

I was looking on the Vue website to verify their prices which I seem to remember are less, but Watford Vue is not showing The Legend of Love - there were 14 Vues listed. However I did come across the story which was new to me -

When Princess Shireen is taken seriously ill, certain death awaits her – unless her older sibling hands Shireen her beauty. Queen Mekhmene Banu decides she must sacrifice her own vanity to save her sisters life, and must live the rest of her life hideously disfigured.

After making a full recovery, the now beautiful Shireen adds insult to injury, and steals the lover of her kind-hearted sister, a painter named Ferkhad. The Legend of Love is a beautiful ballet which combines stunning dance with a brilliant plot of intense sibling-rivalry, sacrifice, jealousy and deceit.

As one of Russian ballet-maestro Yuri Grigorovich’s earliest choreographic works, this fresh adaptation features the fancy footwork of the talented Bolshoi dance troupe, and beautiful costume and stage design, inspired by the Middle East. 

I look forward to some 'fancy footwork' !!

In my opinion this afternoon's performance of Manon with Sarah Lamb and Vadim Muntagirov was pitch perfect - the best reading I have ever seen. They both have open faces that project what they are feeling and bodies that use their solid technique to tell the story. Vadim developed his character through the first act from a shy approach to Manon to a full on mutual physical attraction. I found myself in the second act drawn into observing him observing Manon and her newly found riches, and later really understood the argument that arose between them about discarding the diamond bracelet. I do hope that their partnership will be nurtured - they look great together.

Hurrah - there are encore dates at Vue. I was just browsing 'Events' on the Vue website and found encore screenings of most ROH offerings. Manon is being encored at 2:00 on Sunday 19th October. Moulin Rouge and Billy Elliott are also having another showing

Watford Palace are showing Moulin Rouge on Sunday 28th September, but I will not be able to go as I had already booked for the live stream of Billy Elliot at Watford Vue.

Ballet and maths have been equally important and necessary components of my life.

Maths and sciences always came easily to me and my headmistress had pathed out my life to becoming a surgeon (I was very good at needlework too !!) but I was also doing well in my dancing life and followed my heart and joined the RBS senior school. After 3 amazing years I accepted that I wasn't a virtuoso dancer destined to be the next Fonteyn and a few years in a corps de ballet did not appeal so the next step was to find a job with enough money to stay in London - dancer now morphs into computer programmer.

After a few years of living a 'normal' life, then with 2 small children, I really missed my ballet. Happily, the local stage school which my little girl was attending was short of a teacher so my life became rounded once again, working days as a software engineer and teaching ballet at my daughter's dance school, 

Did you find parts 2 and 3 ? I discovered them when I scrolled down in the article

Happily there was a ticket left to see Fabulous Beasts take on Romeo and Juliet in The Pit which I would not otherwise have made the effort to see

Ballet Black have a one night visit to Watford Palace Theatre on Tues Nov 11th at 7:30. Top price tickets are £17.50. Booking opened this week.

Booking has opened at Brighton Dome for "Carlos Acosta - On Before" on Thurs/Fri 9th and 10th July 2015. Please do not make my error of turning up a year too early to see Mark Morris at the Barbican !!

Starting the journey again with my granddaughter

If anyone has finished with their RAD grade 1 new syllabus DVD and ideally book I would love to buy it from you.

Thanks - Gail