by Linda on December 28, 2009
A small miracle took place when Italian ballerina Marie Taglioni first rose en pointe. She elevated a simple shoe into a tool for conveying sublime artistry. While it takes a ballerina long years and endless hours of training to be able to perform such miracles let us not forget that her shoes will have also [...]
Tagged as:
Ballet,
Ballet Newbie,
Bloch,
Capezio,
Freeds,
Gaynor Minden,
Grishko,
Pointe shoes,
Russian Pointe
by Linda on December 23, 2009
If jumps and turns are generally favoured by bravura dancers who have a “need for speed” showing off their technical abilities, then adagio dancing, with its slow, lengthened and connected movements is where highly lyrical dancers make their mark. It is typically in the adagio, rather than in complicated combinations of double-quadruple fouettés, where [...]
Tagged as:
Adage,
Adagio,
Coupé,
dégagé,
Dégagé en tournant,
Dégage a l'arabesque en tournant,
Détourné,
Devéloppé,
Pas Tombé,
Penché,
Promenade,
Rond de Jambe,
Tour Lent
by Emilia on December 19, 2009
Dear Santa,
We know we had a lucky year with many wonderful ballet tickets filling our bags. We had a great time writing over here and making plenty of new friends on Twitter and Facebook some of whom we had the pleasure of meeting in person.
Having managed to strike a good balance between work & play [...]
Tagged as:
ABT,
Alexei Ratmansky,
Ashley Bouder,
Chanel,
Dances at a Gathering,
Diana Vishneva,
Ekaterina Osmolkina,
Evgenia Obraztsova,
La Sylphide,
Marcelo Gomes,
Mariinsky,
NYCB,
Onegin,
Primrose Bakery,
Rodarte,
Royal Ballet,
Social Media,
Song of the Earth,
Steven McRae,
Swan Lake,
The Little Humpbacked Horse,
The Sleeping Beauty,
Yevgenia Obraztsova,
Yvonne Borree
by Linda on December 15, 2009
In their final programme of the year The Royal Ballet celebrates Sir Frederick Ashton, the founder choreographer who gave this company a wonderful classical repertory and British ballet a defining style. Initially I thought of this double bill as a case of odd pairing since, on one corner, appealing to the Ashton addicts and older [...]
Tagged as:
Ashton,
Bennet Gartside,
Blue Boy,
Cindy Jourdain,
Clement Crisp,
Gary Avis,
Hunca Munca,
Jonathan Howells,
Kenta Kura,
Laura McCulloch,
Laura Morera,
Les Patineurs,
Mr. Jeremy Fisher,
Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle,
Paul Kay,
Pig-Wig,
Pigling Bland,
Rupert Pennefather,
Sarah Lamb,
Squirrel Nutkin,
Steven McRae,
Tales of Beatrix Potter,
Tom Thumb,
Yuhui Choe
by Linda on December 13, 2009
The Royal Ballet’s Sleeping Beauties have just drawn to a close, giving way to the usual Christmas special of Nutcrackers. Notice anything in common? Both are Petipa ballets, both are amongst the safest for box office purposes, with blockbuster works such as Swan Lake and The Sleeping Beauty, their lavish costumes, orchestral music and vast [...]
Tagged as:
Anastasia Kolegova,
Anton Korsakov,
Arthur Saint-Leon,
Coppélia,
Danila Korsuntsev,
Daria Pavlenko,
Elvira Tarasova,
Igor Kolb,
Imperial Ballet,
Jules Perrot,
La Esmeralda,
Le Corsaire,
Le Talisman,
Maria Alexandrova,
Mariinsky,
Mikhailovsky Theatre,
Nikolai Tsiskaridze,
Nutcracker,
Paquita,
Petipa,
Ratmansky,
St. Petersburg,
Svetlana Zakharova,
Swan Lake,
The Awakening of Flora,
The Little Humpbacked Horse,
The Pharaoh's Daughter,
The Sleeping Beauty,
Ulyana Lopatkina,
Vaganova,
Vaganova Academy,
Valeria Martynyuk,
Vikharev,
Vladimir Shklyarov,
Xenia Ostreikovskaya,
Yevgenia Obraztsova,
Yuri Burlaka
