Yaffa

Unfortunately I will not be able to go to the international ballet schools gala at the Palais Garnier in Paris tomorrow (Friday), so I'm selling my ticket at face value of 25 euro. I have arranged for it to be available to the buyer at the Palais Garnier.

Looks as though this man is threatening our strange signs: https://www.theguardian.com/education/2017/apr/03/banksy-of-punctuation-puts-full-stop-bad-grammar-bristol

Definitely - and sometimes, you don't even need a medical condition to need the loo in a hurry. I am often relieved (no pun intended...) to see 'Priority for disabled' or similar notices in toilets in different parts of the world.

For me it went smoothly - though like last year, the navigation is a bit clumsy. Clicking a seat gives you a message which implies you've added it to your cart, but you actually need to press the 'add to cart' button lower down on the page. There's a £3.50 fee per booking. There's an option to print tickets at home. According to what's written on the website, printable tickets are not refundable/exchangeable/transferable and can't be sold via their ticket exchange. Also if you choose to pick up the tickets at the box office, you need to bring the card that was used for the booking. However, I just spoke with the box office and they said that if you give authorisation that you have transferred any types of tickets to someone else (not above face value, of course), it is fine. You can also leave tickets at the box office in someone else's name. [Edited to add correction and update about transferring tickets]

From the English version of a theatre website: "It is not allowed to enter the auditorium in upper garments." The mind boggles

And of course Margot Fonteyn...

The Paris Opera Ballet School just posted details of what looks like a very interesting set of activities for 4th and 5th April. See: https://www.operadeparis.fr/en/news/the-programme-offered-for-the-2nd-edition-of-the-gala-des-ecoles-de-danse-du-xxie-siecle-is-available - Tuesday 4th from 14h to 17h00 at the Palais Garnier: come and watch the live rehearsal of the Gala and the Schools March. - Wednesday 5th at the Paris Opera Ballet School: o From 10h to 13h : panel discussion with all Directors on the following subjects : the relationships between schools and companies, evolution of the training compared to the evolution of the repertoires, the increasing difficulties of the auditions… o From 14h to 15h30 : observation of ballet classes (POB's students and guests) o From 16h to 18h : observation of our guests rehearsals. o From 19h30 to 21h : screening of pieces of POB's repertoire and Q&A about the French style There's a link at that page to the registration form. It costs 100 euros for the 2 days... [edited for typos]

I'd be interested to know how people in Russia would answer this... Tsiskaridze (even though he's basically retired as a dancer)? Or perhaps Vishneva? Lopatkina? Or one of the younger dancers who are rapidly rising through the ranks?

From tomorrow (from 0.01 a.m. Thursday, 9th March) until 11:59 until 14th March, Virgin will be holding another sale of selected tickets on its West Coast Mainline. You can travel between 25th March to 24th August, which of course covers many good ballet dates in Birmingham, Manchester and more. Sample fares are: London to Birmingham, £4 London to Manchester, £10 There's also a discount for first class and for children. More details at http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/deals/virgin-trains#seatsale Before booking with Virgin, you might want to look at details of cheap train tickets at: http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/travel/cheap-train-tickets Also, if you want to buy a West Coast Mainline ticket which is not covered by the sale, and there isn't a better deal on the Virgin app or a railcard etc. - you can currently get 10% off many such routes if you're a member of Virgin Money. (To join Virgin money, you can just set up a £1 savings account.) There's no further railcard or other discount on such tickets. More at: http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/team-blog/2016/09/30/travelling-on-virgin-trains-without-a-railcard-heres-a-quick-trick-to-get-10-off-west-coast-routes/ Membership of Virgin Money also gets you free access to stocked Virgin Money lounges with free wifi at Manchester, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Norwich, Sheffield and London (two -at Haymarket and Eagle Place). You do have to be a UK resident (not just a UK citizen) to join Virgin money - I found that they are very strict about that - but members can bring a guest into the lounges. No connection to any of the above - just passing on the info [edited for clarity and to correct typos]

When people overseas (several countries) hear that I'll be going to a ballet event in England, they still often ask if I'll be seeing Margot Fonteyn... Don't think I've ever been asked if I'll be seeing Darcey Bussell.

Just saw that as well as the International Ballet Schools Gala in Paris on 7th April - there'll be another International Ballet School Gala in Milan on 3rd May. More details at: https://www.nph-italia.org/notizie/625/3-maggio-ore-21-teatro-alla-scala-gala-internaz/ [edited to correct link]

The 'feel' of the £5 notes might also not last for long, following protests against the use of beef tallow in their production (But apparently, the vegetarian equivalent is just as good, though more costly to produce...). See: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/new-5-pound-note-animal-fat-petition-fiver-not-vegetarian-friendly-tallow-a7445646.html

It is particularly problematic with the larger banknotes. Very few people overseas have heard that the £50 Houblon note was withdrawn in 2014, and the £20 Elgar note was taken out of circulation in 2010. So when they arrive in the UK on their next visit, they are told that their money is worthless. There are of course people around who will take it off their hands at high commission rates, as the old notes are fully exchangeable at face value at the Bank of England, and other places accept them at their discretion... More about bank notes withdrawn from circulation on the Bank of England's site: http://www.bankofengland.co.uk/banknotes/Pages/withdrawn/default.aspx

Oh dear, so will we start to see miniature high-priced hankies meeting new size regulations for taking on flights? :-)

Also the paper £5 will stop being legal tender on 5th May (but can be exchanged for new notes at the Bank of England afterwards). More about the changes and dates at: http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/team-blog/2017/02/14/youve-piggy-bank-coin-jar-watch-1-coins-will-soon/ Also tricky for folks overseas who save money from one trip to the next...

A ballet student once told me that her hand luggage had been flagged as suspicious, so she had immediately produced printouts showing why her needles should be allowed and why she needed them to protect her ballet shoes. The screener then said it wasn't the needles, but the hammer in the girl's bag that had triggered the alarm, and didn't seem too impressed when the girl said that it was to break the pointe shoes....

I'm really looking forward to the 2nd Gala of Ballet Schools in the 20th Century in Paris on 7th April: https://www.operadeparis.fr/en/season-16-17/ballet/gala-des-ecoles-de-danse-du-xxie-siecle Featuring the Paris Opera Ballet School and: The Royal Danish Ballet School, The Vaganova Academy (Saint‑Pétersbourg), The Royal Ballet School (Londres), San Francisco Ballet School, Canada’s National Ballet School, John Cranko Schule – Stuttgarter Ballett, Ballettschule des Hamburg Ballett Hope they'll announce details of other activities surrounding the gala soon...

If anyone's fortunate enough to be able to get to Vienna over the holidays - there are still some tickets available for the world premiere of Alma Deutscher's opera Cinderella (http://www.cinderella-in-vienna.com/). There's an early chamber version of the opera, which was performed in Israel a couple of years ago, at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-IzTR8qdVLs (It's in Hebrew, but with English subtitles.) So hard to believe that the composer was then just 8 years old! For anyone who's not familiar with Alma Deutscher's work, you might want to look at: - the Google Zeitgeist broadcast from last year: - a Guardian article: https://www.theguardian.com/music/2016/feb/05/alma-deutscher-10-music-world -her own website (http://almadeutscher.com) Since I first heard Alma Deutscher's music some years ago, I often find myself humming her haunting melodies, e.g. the duet of Cinderella's wicked stepsisters at: (In this clip, the stepsister singing along with Alma Deutscher, is the Dutch Amira Willighagen, also a very gifted musician, who taught herself to sing opera via Youtube.) Alma Deutscher often says that she can't compose on demand - her melodies comes to her effortlessly when she is skipping, speaking with people, falling asleep or in her dreams. Then comes a huge amount of work developing them into polished pieces. In interviews she come over as such a likeable, confident, mature, creative and intelligent young lady with very special parents, who are departing from the 'norm' for her training, to nurture her outstanding gift while making sure she enjoys a real childhood (probably more than many children see these days). This combination of maturity (e.g in her grasp of harmony and her ingenious twist to the plot of Cinderella, which is set in an opera house) and childhood innocence and imagination comes through in so much of her work. In the Guardian article above, she says she hopes to work on a ballet. Obviously these things can't be rushed, but I do dream about the possibilities....

Just saw that the London to Nottingham East Midlands train (including the 10:15 a.m. train) is one of a few routes that is offered at a discounted rate by Megatrain/Megabus (http://www.megatrain.com). The tickets are for exactly the same journey, but (unlike normal rail tickets) they can be cancelled/changed for just £1 (50p rebooking fee and 50p. change fee) until 48 hours before the journey for train journeys, 24 hours for bus journeys. The booking window is smaller than for regular booking sites and they have very limited number of routes and times, plus there is no discount for children/seniors etc. or for return journeys (you need to buy two singles).

Megabus (http://www.megabus.com) is again offering 20,000 free tickets on their bus (but unfortunately not their train) journeys, for travel between 9th Jan and 9th Feb. There's a 50p booking fee per order (not per ticket). You can book only 60 days in advance but they're adding free seats daily. Right now there seems to be good availability, including to ballet events.

National Express has just released a large batch of tickets at £1 each (plus £1 booking fee per transaction) between London and seven cities: Birmingham, Coventry, Edinburgh, Leeds, Leicester, Manchester, Nottingham, Preston, Sheffield. Valid for travel until 8th December on Monday to Thursday only. More details on the moneysavingexpert.com site: http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/deals/national-express#natexpress1 I've found good availability for several ballet dates including Nutcrackers in London and Birmingham... No connection to either company... just passing on the info.

If anyone was unable to see the live broadcast - it is still on the homepage of the Mariinsky TV site https://mariinsky.tv/e

The results were very interesting e.g. e.g. top girls and boys places in the senior division went to students from Korea. I'm really looking forward to watching the broadcast - would have loved to see a recording of the competition itself - So far there are just snippets on social media. With the unprecedented use of social media, particularly at Vaganova, it's been possible to follow the progress of all the contestants online over the last few years, which for me has been a real treat. Sorry, I only gave the Russian time of the gala. It is today (29th October) at 5 p.m. UK time at https://mariinsky.tv/e Mods, could you possibly alter the subject line of this thread so that people will know there'll be a live broadcast today?

The final was today at the Hermitage Theatre... Details of the winners are now on the social media pages... https://www.facebook.com/vaganovaprix/

The Vaganova Prix social media pages have updated info about the competition, including lists of the candidates who got through the first round: http://fb.me/vaganovaprix https://new.vk.com/vaganovaprix