Category: dance

This weekend marked the close of Boston Ballet’s third season under artistic director Mikko Nissinen, and the change in the quality of the company’s performance over that time has been striking. “Without the kind of wholesale purge that could have left the Ballet reeling, [Nissinen] has slowly changed the company’s personnel both behind the scenes and onstage. The coaching staff he’s brought in — especially Spanish-born Trinidad Vives — is first-rate. Those additions have largely replaced the Russian teachers and coaches whose attitude was that their dance heritage alone made them superior.”

Dance executives across the country bemoan the modern-day public’s lack of interest in the form, and despair of ever again convincing large numbers of ticket-buyers to attend a traditional ballet not concerned with nutcrackers and sugar plum fairies. But Kennedy Center chief Michael Kaiser insists that the marketing of dance is not rocket science. The key is to trust the public’s intelligence, create a marketable identity for your company, and never to overestimate your own popularity.

“What started the recent exodus of administrators and board members was the company’s shelving of Christopher Wheeldon’s Alice in Wonderland as the season-opener at the new Ellie Caulkins Opera House. A flurry of finger-pointing followed and soon Executive Director Rick Tallman was gone, along with his ticket-manager wife Angela, prominent board members and others on the payroll or board.”

“The so-called “new” flamenco that has been developing over the last decade is mired in a crisis born of its success. As audiences have gotten bigger, a kind of artistic inflation has set in, with shows becoming more ambitious and more pretentious.”

“Over the last decade and a half, Matthew Bourne has virtually reinvented some of the sacred cows of the classical ballet repertoire: “La Sylphide,” “Swan Lake,” and “The Nutcracker” on his own markedly accessible terms. He’s aware, perhaps, that these works were probably never as “sacred” as purists would like to suppose, and he has invested them with a funny, sexy, surprising, mischievous, and even dangerous freshness. He has also discovered in them, and their musical scores, unsuspected and compelling story lines.”

The row over the use of taped music in ballet performances has leaped across the pond, and musicians in Glasgow, Scotland, were protesting this week outside choreographer Matthew Byrne’s new production of La Sylphide. “The union believes the music for the show could be provided by a group of just six or seven players, although an orchestra would be ideal.” Organizers say that, while live music is always preferable, the tour simply would not have been possible with the expense of an orchestra added in.

When Washington Ballet cancelled its planned tour of Italian summer festivals over a pay dispute with its dancers, it left a slew of Italian promoters and festival organizers in the lurch, having promoted the company as their centerpiece. Most of the festivals will not be able to secure comparable replacement companies, since most ballets are booked well in advance. The dispute between the company and its dancers centered around the amount of meal money to be paid during the tour.

Colorado Ballet seems to be in freefall, cancelling a major world premiere for lack of funds to pay choreographer Christopher Wheeldon, and attempting to dig out from under the weight of some major upper management resignations. And yet, only recently, the company was thought to be at the top of its artistic and financial game, and was looking forward to moving into Denver’s new opera house. So what happened? No one outside the company is entirely sure, but botched negotiations with Wheeldon seem to have been the catalyst for nearly all the subsequent problems, and its likely that more resignations are yet to come.

“One of the great challenges faced by the present curators is the way Graham’s work changed over the decades. Schooled in the show-biz exotica that was Denishawn, she launched her own career with stark abstractions, moved through patriotic flourish and nostalgic romance, ensconced herself in Greek tragedy, and slid into histrionic decadence during her last years. The technique developed, grew harsh, grew soft; costumes and sets were remade; music was recorded, amplified, scaled down. What we see as Graham repertory today is a composite vision drawn from co-artistic directors Terese Capucilli and Christine Dakin, the exemplars who survive from earlier generations, and a contemporary sensibility suited to today’s dancers and audiences.”

“The departure of Colorado Ballet’s executive director two weeks ago has set off a chain reaction of resignations, including the company’s board chairwoman, its head of sales and marketing and five other board members. At the same time, the company still owes the city of Denver $146,629 in rent and other fees from its fall production of “Dracula” in the Buell Theatre. And it will owe about $150,000 more at the end of the current run of The Hunchback of Notre Dame. As a backdrop to all this, Jane Hermann, the New York agent for internationally renowned choreographer Christopher Wheeldon, said the company is in breach of contract with him.”