George Balanchine’s “Serenade” is one of my very favorite ballets. It’s the perfect marriage of music, choreography, costumes, mood, and lighting, casting a spell on all who watch it. Here are two short but fascinating videos that feature some visuals … Continue reading →
I’d never heard of ballet dancer Zenaida Yanowsky before. But I idly clicked on a video while procrastinating about something-or-other, and what I saw puzzled me. It was the “Black Swan” pas de deux, and I didn’t love her dancing. … Continue reading →
No, not whiteface mime of the Marcel Marceau type. Ballet mime, which is quite different and more like sign language. Ballet mime is almost never used anymore, which I think a pity. Ballets used to contain a lot more mime, … Continue reading →
I know I’ve posted a video of this dance (“Partisans”) before, but I want to show it again. This video is of better quality than those that were previously available on YouTube, which makes me happy because it happens to … Continue reading →
You’ve probably heard about Christy Sheats, 42, the Texas mother who recently killed her 17- and 22-year-old daughters in front of their father, citing as her motivation a desire to punish him (she committed the murders on his birthday). The … Continue reading →
…is Nadezhda, a Russian ballet dancer who burst onto the scene in the 70s dancing with the Perm Ballet and then the Bolshoi, and who revolutionized the “look” of ballet. I remember the first photos I saw of Pavlova, she … Continue reading →
When I was a child there were a lot of Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers movies shown on TV. I probably saw all of them (some, many many times), and I loved them. Most of these movies displayed Astaire and … Continue reading →
Ballet roles can be learned through video, but it’s insufficient. Most leading ballet dancers are taught their roles by coaches, ordinarily well-known retired dancers. It’s not usually a question of teaching technique; that is already firmly in place. It’s expression, … Continue reading →
It’s no secret how highly I think of the late and very great ballet dancer Violette Verdy (here’s a list of my previous posts). She was exceptional. I hadn’t seen this video before. It’s a production of Balanchine’s “Liebeslieder Waltzer” … Continue reading →
[Hat tip: Open Blogger at Ace’s.] When I was a child I used to greatly admire Degas’ dancer paintings. My family had a reproduction of one of them, and I used to study it and marvel at how well it … Continue reading →
Here’s a piece of ballet history that isn’t all that well-known anymore—the so-called “baby ballerinas” of the 1930s. I love these old clips. They’re blurry and short, but you get an idea of how much ballet has changed since then. … Continue reading →
I’ve written about the 1969 ballet “Dances At a Gathering” several times, and mentioned that I find today’s dancers, for all their fabulous technique, lacking the musicality and artistry of the past. A part of the ballet features certain lifts/throws … Continue reading →