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MARGOT FONTEYN CENTENARY

capybara
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bridiem

bridiem

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43 minutes ago, Lizbie1 said:

I think for those of us who would have to travel some distance (and at some expense) it’s very helpful to know the programme in advance.

 

But surely it's sold out? Do you mean you might try to get a last-minute ticket?

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bangorballetboy

bangorballetboy

Posted
Posted
3 hours ago, alison said:

Whereas the UK's Royal Mail is too busy producing Harry Potter / Star Wars / Marvel Comics / Game of Thrones stamps to bother with Dame Margot?

 

Fonteyn was on a UK stamp in 1996, as part of a series celebrating women of achievement in the 20th century.

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Dawnstar

Dawnstar

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Posted (edited)

60+ tickets currently available on the ROH website across all areas, from £5-£125. Goodness knows where they've all come from but weeks of checking have finally paid off! I've just snaffled a pair of £55 side stalls circle for me & my mother.

Edited by Dawnstar
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MJW

MJW

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16 minutes ago, Dawnstar said:

60+ tickets currently available on the ROH website across all areas, from £5-£125. Goodness knows where they've all come from but weeks of checking have finally paid off! I've just snaffled a pair of £55 side stalls circle for me & my mother.

 

I managed to get a ticket late Saturday - presumably a last minute cancellation.

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RHowarth

RHowarth

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17 minutes ago, Dawnstar said:

60+ tickets currently available on the ROH website across all areas, from £5-£125. Goodness knows where they've all come from but weeks of checking have finally paid off! I've just snaffled a pair of £55 side stalls circle for me & my mother.

Thank you. I already had a ticket but have been looking for one for my mum. Have now snapped up a rear amphi. 

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Lindsay

Lindsay

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Thanks Dawnstar.  I have a ticket in my basket but am umm-and-ahhing about it.  Other than Firebird (which we will see in any case in the triple bill) does anyone have any clue what else will be on the programme? I have been "bitten" by terrible gala programming before....

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Rob S

Rob S

Posted
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3 minutes ago, Lindsay said:

Thanks Dawnstar.  I have a ticket in my basket but am umm-and-ahhing about it.  Other than Firebird (which we will see in any case in the triple bill) does anyone have any clue what else will be on the programme? I have been "bitten" by terrible gala programming before....

 

Oh dear, now you tell me, I’ve snapped up a £55 stalls circle seat knowing only that the Firebird features (I’m already seeing what was to be the  three Firebirds until Tierny Heap had surgery) and have no idea what else there is other than the hint in the ‘Background’ paragraph. 

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Dawnstar

Dawnstar

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Given that the blurb on the website says "works indelibly associated with" Fonteyn I'm hoping that there won't be anything ultra-modern so decided I'd take the risk! I've never been to a ballet gala so it'll be a new experience. I'm assuming they'll wheel out a reasonable number of (the uninjured!) principals & 1st soloists.

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alison

alison

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1 hour ago, Dawnstar said:

60+ tickets currently available on the ROH website across all areas, from £5-£125. Goodness knows where they've all come from

 

Well, the balcony ones are the ones they release once they decide that there's probably no more demand for wheelchair spaces.

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Xandra Newman

Xandra Newman

Posted
Posted (edited)
46 minutes ago, Lindsay said:

Thanks Dawnstar.  I have a ticket in my basket but am umm-and-ahhing about it.  Other than Firebird (which we will see in any case in the triple bill) does anyone have any clue what else will be on the programme? I have been "bitten" by terrible gala programming before....

 

It would be great if the RB would announce the Gala programme as well as casting!

I'd be more inclined to buy a ticket as I am hesitating too.

Edited by Xandra Newman
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Rob S

Rob S

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3 minutes ago, Dawnstar said:

Given that the blurb on the website says "works indelibly associated with" Fonteyn I'm hoping that there won't be anything ultra-modern so decided I'd take the risk! I've never been to a ballet gala so it'll be a new experience. I'm assuming they'll wheel out a reasonable number of (the uninjured!) principals & 1st soloists.

 

Yes that’s what I was thinking 

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FLOSS

FLOSS

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Unless the event is advertised as a gala performance of a specific ballet those attending a gala take a chance on what will be danced and who will dance in it. It's the nature if the beast. The only thing that I feel pretty confident about is that the Rose adagio is on the cards. The publicity for the company's Japan Tour promises that a section of the Gala the company will  dance there will be devoted to Fonteyn and that it will include that section from the  Sleeping Beauty. After that it is anyone's guess, possibly the pas de l'Ombre from Ondine; a snippet from Daphnis and Chloe as many who saw her thought that Chloe was her greatest role;  the ballerina's solos from Scenes de Ballet;;the Bride's solo from Ashton's Baiser de la Fee; the final pas de deux from Sylvia is another possibility as is the ballroom pas de deux from Cinderella; Birthday Offering in full or the cut down version or Fonteyn;s solo. I don't think that we will see Symphonic Variations.I think that Kevin will try to get as many of the company on stage as he possibly can during the course of the evening.I know what I'd like to see but feel pretty certain it won't be included in the programme. I just hope that it does not include tacky gala fare like Le Corsaire or yet another performance of Marguerite and Armand. I am prepared to take a chance as are  many people I know.

 

If you go you may be disappointed. If you don't go  you may end up kicking yourself for not being there. It really depends on how prepared you are to take a chance. If you attend ballet performances  on a fairly regular basis then you have proved yourself to be a bit of a gambler at heart. I hope that these comments help.

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capybara

capybara

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11 minutes ago, FLOSS said:

I just hope that it is not tacky gala fare like Le Corsaire or another performance of Marguerite and Armand. However I am prepared to take a chance as are  many people I know.

 

 But the Le Corsaire pdd became legendary when danced by Fonteyn and Nureyev. So why not? It can't be all Ashton!!!!!

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bridiem

bridiem

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Just now, capybara said:

 

 But the Le Corsaire pdd became legendary when danced by Fonteyn and Nureyev. So why not? It can't be all Ashton!!!!!

 

It would be fun to see Le Corsaire pdd, I think! But I really hope no Marguerite and Armand (though I wouldn't be at all surprised).

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FLOSS

FLOSS

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I have to disagree with the idea that it can't be all Ashton. I think that it should be as Fonteyn helped create his choreographic style based on lyricism and supreme musicality in short the style of the Royal Ballet at the time when the company rose to international status. In the Kavanagh biography she quotes Ashton acknowledging the fact that Fonteyn had been a great influence on his choreographic style and that without her his style would have been far less lyrical. You only have to look at the Polka from Façade and the Ballerina's choreography from Les Rendezvous, both of which were created on Markova, to understand what he meant about Fonteyn's influence. I would argue that it was that style which originally gave an extraordinary dance quality to MacMillan's choreography for Romeo and Juliet, Manon and Mayerling as he made all of them on dancer's who were to all intents and purposes Ashton dancers simply because of the amount of his choreography they danced during a season.

Edited by FLOSS
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Beryl H

Beryl H

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28 minutes ago, FLOSS said:

 It really depends on how prepared you are to take a chance. If you attend ballet performances  on a fairly regular basis then you have proved yourself to be a bit of a gambler at heart. I hope that these comments help.

 

Love the expression "gambler at heart", you have to be these days :)

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Rob S

Rob S

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10 hours ago, Xandra Newman said:

Thank goodness for dancers' Instagram ( the ROH seemingly does not intend to put up any casting for the Fonteyn Gala :( )

Yasmine Naghdi's Instagram showed her in a studio with Vadim Muntagirov! 

 

Yes, there's going to be a piano recital 😂

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FLOSS

FLOSS

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Alison,

Yes Sleeping Beauty is a Petipa Ballet but it is central to the company's artistic identity as a classical ballet company and dancing it in  New York gave the Sadler's Wells Ballet Company its international reputation; made Fonteyn's reputation as a true ballerina and a great interpreter of the role of Aurora; put Fonteyn on the front page of Time magazine and in that initial season made the company one which no one who was anyone in the New York artworld could afford not to have seen. The late Freddy Franklin said that on that first night it became clear that the generation of dancers represented by the likes of Danilova and Markova had been supplanted by a new generation.

 

It was the company's reception in New York in what is arguably Petipa's greatest and most innovative creation which established the company's reputation and the ballet's significance to the young classical company it then was. It gave the company an artistic heritage which went back to nineteenth century Imperial Russia;established high technical standards and anchored it very firmly in a living tradition of classical ballet. The impact of that initial New York season in creating the company's identity and its understanding of itself goes a long way to explain the place the Sleeping Beauty has in the company's repertory and why making a company debut  in the role of Aurora is still seen by many as the equivalent of an artistic coming of age ceremony as dancing the role of the prince is for the male dancer.

 

As far as Ashton's involvement in the staging of the Sleeping Beauty is concerned he devised a new waltz for the first act ; created a solo for the vision scene which I read somewhere was based on a version danced at the Bolshoi which Elvin had told him about and  he devised the Florestan and his Sisters pas de trois for the third act which I think is something which Nijinska had created for the 1921 London staging of the Sleeping Princess. Ashton's waltz replaced a waltz for a mixed corps de ballet with one for an all female corps. In a short essay Joy Newton explained the reason for this change saying that it was for the purely practical reason that the young men in the corps were forever being called up and teaching their replacements had become something of a burden for the company's staff.

 

I trust that this goes some way to explain the reason for the likely inclusion of the Rose Adagio in this forthcoming Gala. Remember the influence of the Sleeping Beauty has run deep in the company's creative life ever since it entered the company's repertory before the war. Both Ashton and MacMillan said that they had learned how to structure their own works by studying the model the ballet provided. Ashton when asked why he watched the Fairy Variations as he had seen them so often and must have been familiar with them  is reported to have said that he was "taking private lessons with Petipa". The more I think about it the clearer it becomes that the Sleeping Beauty has played, and continues to play, an incalculable role in the artistic life and development of the company.There is also a practical explanation that preparing the Rose Adagio  kills two birds with one stone as the company has to prepare it for the Japanese Gala. Whatever happens they won't have to cancel its performance as they have an abundance of Auroras in the company.

Edited by FLOSS
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