Category: dance

“In a move signaling continuity, Hubbard Street Dance Chicago on Wednesday promoted staff member Glenn Edgerton to the role of artistic director, the third person to hold the title in the troupe’s 32-year history.”

“At just 23, Steven McRae has been promoted to principal dancer, only the third Australian man to be so honoured. Robert Helpmann was the first.”

“Thomas takes the refinement and technique of his ballet forbears … and mixes it up with pop, rock and hip-hop, unapologetically shoving ballet into the 21st century. […] Thomas’s eclectic program looks nothing like your grandmother’s night at the ballet. One number features blow-up dolls.”

“Held every four years since 1969, this is the 11th International Moscow Ballet Competition and about 120 of the top aspiring ballet dancers from across the world are in competition for the gold medals.”

The company, which needs to raise $750,000 by the end of this month to avoid the risk of closure, has put together a major benefit, with top dancers from the likes of New York City Ballet, San Francisco Ballet and Pacific Northwest Ballet, in record time – and with virtually zero in out-of-pocket costs. “Jon Ulsh (OBT’s executive director) woke up one morning with the idea… and the next morning we were lining up companies.”

Trisha Pancio of Portland Center Stage suggests “Eight things nobody has tried yet to save the ballet.” For example, here’s no. 3: “Tutu trick or treat? Like Unicef but for ballet? Couldn’t the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence… spend an evening or two going door to door in tutus to collect for the ballet?”

The former director-designate of Sydney Dance Company, who was killed in a road accident just weeks before taking up her post, took honors for outstanding achievement in choreography and outstanding achievement in independent dance for her 2007 piece construct, which also received an award for outstanding performance by a female dancer (Kristina Chan).

“A Russian oligarch who mysteriously vanished from his Moscow dacha nearly six months ago, and who is wanted by both the Kremlin and Interpol, has been spotted at a gala ballet performance at London’s Covent Garden.”

“The Brooklyn Ballet will officially open its new headquarters on June 16 on the ground floor of the Schermerhorn House, the company announced on Monday. The 11-story building in downtown Brooklyn, which also houses low income artists and the formerly homeless, is a collaboration between a real estate development company and a nonprofit affordable housing project.”

“Readers were asked to pick which of four scientific articles was being depicted in a dance (you can watch the performance again here). The good news is that 54 percent of Lab readers correctly guessed that the dance, which was professionally choreographed (by Jinn Liang Chaboud) and performed, was an interpretation of a study of DNA polymerase salt kinetics by Vince LiCata of Louisiana State University.”