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Jewels – Berlin State Ballet


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(May 21st)

 

At last, after all a chance to shine!

 

“Jewels” was eagerly awaited, and the house was packed at opening night. Although the performance began with somehow subdued Emeralds, the Rubies then sparkled and the Diamonds were truly radiant!

 

The Emeralds lacked softness and charme… the mood seemed quite formal, I felt there was no real romance and everything looked a little stiff, even the exquisit solos for the women. The pas de trois brought some spirit into it but in the whole I felt a little sleepy afterwards.

But I’m sure they will grow into it and let loose, and the orchestra will find a way to make Fauré sound not quite as mushy.

 

(Soloists: Krasina Pavlova / Marian Walter, Aurora Dickie / Arshak Galumyan, Cecile Kaltenbach / Danielle Muir / Arman Grigoryan)

 

Afterwards, the Rubies showed the required amount of bling. What a marathon this ballet is, a true test of stamina and precision! They seemed to have much fun doing it, I was so happy for them.

 

Iana Salenko was flirty and sharp and playful, albeit a little too cute and girlish for my taste, but this is just my taste…;-).

 

Her partner was Dinu Tamazlacaru, a dazzling virtuoso and quite a charming guy. They were lovely together.

 

The “Tall Girl” was a young dancer still in the corps, what a talent! Julia Golitsina is her name and I’m sure we will see more of her soon. Very strong and fast and funny. She’s lovely.

 

The only small drawback was the male quartet which seemed to have some difficulties with Stravinsky’s ever-changing rhythms, but that can easily be polished, I hope.

 

When the curtain opened for Diamonds, everybody went “Aaaaw…!”, The costumes for the corps dancers were so beautiful – no pancake tutus but gorgeous bell-shaped skirts and a lot of glitter, they looked so elegant and serene with the blue background. The waltz was marvellous.

 

As the squad of female principals is so thinned out at the moment, I was happy to see that they got Shoko Nakamura back to Berlin for Diamonds, as a guest.

I loved her when she was here during Malakhov’s time and she was greeted with a big applause. She danced with Mikhail Kaniskin who is the nearest we have to a danseur noble, with solos grand and confident.

He was so much into it, watching her with adoration and rapture as she floated on the music. Wondrous how she could look somehow otherworldly and at the same time warm and radiating. She’s a miracle, I got all teary-eyed…!

 

Unfortunately the big defilée at the end was a bit messy but that couldn’t spoil the overall impression.

 

They have only four performances until the end of season, and will resume “Jewels” in December.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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I couldn't imagine Diamonds without the pancake tutus so I've just looked at the Staats Ballett website to see their Diamonds tutus, they are very different.

 

I'm very much looking forward to Jewels at the ROH next year - who knows, we might even get Iana Salenko.

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Thank you for the review Petunia - great to hear from Berlin - I didn't make it over for this run maybe at Christmas....

I love Dinu Tamazlacaru and Mikhail Kaniskin so am delighted to hear about their performances, 2 really classy dancers IMHO!  (I'll never forget Dinu in Le Bourgeois!)  I did notice from tweets from SBB that they have new design costumes - not the usual Karinska ones.  Apparently there is a display of the costumes near Zoo this week only.  

Was the theatre full as there were a lot of tickets still available when I last looked a couple of weeks ago?

Edited by Don Q Fan
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The original Karinska tutus for Diamonds, New York City Ballet version, are not pancake tutus either. Even the soloist, who has a short tutu, doesn't really have a pancake tutu. See this pic:

http://www.nycballet.com/ballets/d/diamonds-%28from-jewels%29.aspx

These are the same designs used by the Royal Ballet. except the RB soloist tutu skirt is a bit bigger.

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Thanks, DonQFan, I wouldn't have known how to link to the photos. They are quite dark, the Diamonds background was this bright blue and it looked very festive, actually. The Emeralds skirts looked a very light green (I much more prefer the Paris skirts, with dark blue netting), but the overall lighting was a sinister fir-green, the wings looked like mossy trees!

 

The new costumes are by Lorenzo Caprile, a Spanish fashion designer - this was his first comission for a ballet.

The stage and lighting are by Pepe Leal, also Spanish.

 

Was it sold out? I don't know, but it looked full. The stalls surely were.

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I couldn't imagine Diamonds without the pancake tutus so I've just looked at the Staats Ballett website to see their Diamonds tutus, they are very different...

 

 

The original Karinska tutus for Diamonds, New York City Ballet version, are not pancake tutus either. Even the soloist, who has a short tutu, doesn't really have a pancake tutu. See this pic:

http://www.nycballet.com/ballets/d/diamonds-%28from-jewels%29.aspx

These are the same designs used by the Royal Ballet. except the RB soloist tutu skirt is a bit bigger.

 

Oops, I was mixing up Diamonds and Symphony in C. I must watch more Balanchine!

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