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Royal Ballet in Sydney

The Sydney Morning Herald on the Royal Ballet's latest programme in Sydney. Darcey Bussell's Giselle, according to the SMH, is " a beautiful example of her seamless dancing as a sweet, luminously vivacious peasant girl in Act I, and a wistful spirit in Act II. She is partnered sympathetically by the tall and technically accomplished Jonathan Cope. They had a strong support team, including the steely Myrtha of Zenaida Yanowsky, a memorable debut as Giselle's mother by Monica Mason, and soloists such as Marianela Nunez and Justin Meissner leading the pas de six. But, well danced as it was, it had nothing like the thrill of the matinee, when a different cast made an intense emotional experience of this satisfyingly theatrical production by Peter Wright. Cojocaru is a tiny powerhouse of technique. She is one of those rare performers who can dance and act, bringing fresh emotional relevance to classic roles that she dances in exquisite style."
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2002/06/16/1023864378635.html

The Australian also contrasts Bussell's and Cojocaru's interpretations of Giselle. "The 21-year-old Cojocaru gives a young woman's interpretation. She is shyness incarnate, a girl nervous but excited by her first taste of love. She's already more than halfway to becoming a Wili, the spirit of a woman who has died before her wedding night. With her delicacy and pliant back, she looks as if the Act II choreography were made for her, with its emphasis on apparent weightlessness and yearning curves. Kobborg's Albrecht is entirely sympathetic (anything else would leave a nasty taste) and, in Act II, the fruits of his Danish training show in the astonishing height of his immaculate entrechats. Bussell's Giselle is suffused with the radiance of first love, untainted by the knowingness of flirtation. With her long limbs she seems to embrace all of humanity in her joy. Physics too. She commands time completely as it either slows to allow her freedom to soar, whips along with her whirlwind turns or stops altogether for long-held balances of supreme beauty.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,4521339%255E16953,00.html

The Australian Ballet

The Age marks Australian Ballet's farewell to its manager Ian MacRae. "Of all the accolades that Ian McRae will receive over the next few weeks, none is likely to be simpler and more telling than the one delivered on Friday night by a descendant of the Nunukul people and the Munaldjali clan, dance maker Stephen Page. "You are a decent, good man and fair," he announced to McRae from the stage where he introduced his new work, Totem."
http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2002/06/16/1023864378422.html

NYCB

Anna Kisselgoff of the NY Times on Morphoses, a new ballet by Christopher Wheeldon for NYCB."Essentially, the ballet is about highly compressed movement, but it is not just a formal work. The focus here is on the dislocated body. From the primeval ground, the figures rise up in a chaotic yanking circle, individuals formed out of matter to speak of the human condition. The detail in the movement is too dense to be grasped in one viewing. That is the choreography's richness, superbly rendered by the dancers and the musicians."
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/06/17/arts/dance/17WHEE.html

Also from the NY Times, Jack Anderson on "Concerto in Five Movements" by Robert La Fosse. "The propulsive ensemble sequences, based on lines of dancers assembling and dividing, looked as meticulously designed as graphs. A duet for Maria Kowroski and Albert Evans was crisp. Tom Gold commandingly headed a group of racing and leaping men."
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/06/17/arts/dance/17CONC.html

Time Out New York interviews Heléne Alexopoulos of NYCB. "Balanchine was a private man, but you definitely sensed that no matter where you were in the company, he had a feeling about you. I definitely saw that he had personal, specific relationships with corps dancers. It made you feel that you had your place, just like a family. I think that's why he engendered that fierce devotion and loyalty that people speak about."
http://www.timeoutny.com/dance/346/346.dance.seduction.int.html

Living on a dancer's salary

Chan Hon Goh of National Ballet of Canada talks to canada.com about how she and her husband budget on their salaries. "Chan and her husband , another dancer, bought this house six years ago for half a million. It's now worth about a million. All on a ballet dancer's salary. "You're right dancers don't make a great salary at all, but we manage it because we don't have kids. We have Dali –the dog and he eats a lot. But we work hard and on vacation time away from the company I guest appear with various companies. It's priorities, it's where you want to put your money," Says Doh."
http://www.canada.com/search/site/story.asp?id=87CA8BFB-CE32-49A8-8E70-3E401A6EF3B5

ENB's Swan Lake

From the Independent on Sunday, Jenny Gilbert's verdict on ENB's arena production."There is an aching hole in the middle of this Swan Lake, a hole as deep as the Albert Hall is high and wide. It lacks emotional tension. And no wonder, when its protagonists have to semaphor their desire across such a distance, and poor Odette has to take no fewer than 18 paces from the perimeter of the stage in echoing silence before she can start her solo number. Yet the bigger the talent, the more gruesomely fascinating it is to see artists surmounting these obstacles to their expressive goals. It's a cruel sport, really it is."
http://enjoyment.independent.co.uk/theatre/reviews/story.jsp?story=306214

Scottish Ballet

Nadine Meisner of the Independent on Scottish Ballet's Carmen. "North's choreography represents a pleasant and non-threatening modernism, guaranteed not to frighten the crankiest theatregoer. It may not offer the most exciting challenge to the dancers; it may, on the whole, be rather undemanding to watch. But it is aesthetically agreeable, and subtle in its absorption of Spanish elements. It also achieves real intensity in the final, fatal duet, in which agonised mime becomes part of the dance. That said, it must be admitted that character portrayal is not one of the ballet's strengths. North concentrates on narrative incident rather than psychological depth, and any acting is strictly prescribed in the dance steps."
http://enjoyment.independent.co.uk/theatre/reviews/story.jsp?story=306082

Bolshoi in Washington

Alexandra Tomalonis of the Washington Post on the Bolshoi's Bayadere and Swan Lake. "Anastasia Volochkova, the Kirov-trained ballerina now attached to the Bolshoi, danced the role of the temple dancer, Nikiya, with such dignity that her death was a tragedy in the true sense of the word. In the famous "Kingdom of the Shades" scene, when Nikiya, now a spirit, is reunited in a dream with her lover, Solor (the excellent Evgeny Ivanchenko), Volochkova's simple and pure dancing became a metaphor for Nikiya's soul.Volochkova is ballet's glamour girl, and she has a power over audiences. One can feel the sense of expectation in the house when she takes the stage. Saturday night, in a cast change for Yuri Grigorovich's dramatically confused "Swan Lake," she had another triumph. And she didn't need the glitter dust on her costume as the enchanted Odette nor the exaggerated facial expressions as the seductress Odile to do it."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A2001-2002Jun17.html

ABT

Jennifer Dunning of the NY Times on ABT's Merry Widow. "Subtlety and substance are not the point, either in Ronald Hynd's choreography or the Franz Lehar operetta from which the ballet is drawn. But it is always fun to watch dancers bring their own color and movement qualities to bear on what there is. Neither Susan Jaffe, who danced the title role at the matinee, nor Nina Ananiashvili, seen in the evening, had the kind of tantalizing sophistication one might expect of so merry a widow."
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/06/18/arts/dance/18MERR.html

NYCB

Jennifer Dunning of the NY Times on a NYCB all Balanchine programme. "Fashion passes, "Agon" remains. Forty-four years after its creation, this ballet is as coolly remote and intensely immediate, as crisply assertive and meditative as ever. The iconoclastic masterpiece was the highlight of an all-Balanchine program presented by the New York City Ballet last Tuesday night at the New York State Theater. For all the jagged astringency of the choreography and the Stravinsky score, there is a calm inevitability at the heart of "Agon." It is a singularly well-made ballet, for one thing, with one of the great pas de deux of 20th-century ballet at its center. Maria Kowroski and Albert Evans made clear the building eroticism of the duet and its chill extravagance, as the ballerina's legs and arms extend the lines of her partner's limbs, and wrap around his body. "
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/06/18/arts/dance/18AGON.html

Pascal Rioult Dance Theater

Gia Kourlas of the NY Times interviews the choreographer Pascal Rioult about his 'Bolero' to Ravel's score. ""He said, `I'm going to do "Bolero," and it's going to be about a machine,' and I thought, `Oh, God, this is not going to work,' " Ms. Herring recalled with a groan. "And then he did it. Pascal just seems to have a key to Ravel's music. When he does what he does with it, you realize: `Oh, yes! That's right! It's what it's supposed to be.' "
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/06/16/arts/dance/16KOUR.html

Indian Dance

Dancing Times now seems to offer some of its material online soon after publication. There are two pieces from the May edition, the first by Reginald Massey on Dancing in Delhi. "If, for example, a foreign embassy wishes to lay on at short notice an evening of Indian culture for a visiting trade delegation all the ambassador’s social secretary has to do is to make a few phone calls. Within a very short time an array of classical dancers and musicians will have been lined up for the event. There is, undoubtedly, a lot of work available and always the opportunity of making valuable contacts which might lead to lucrative foreign tours. This is the reason why some of India’s leading dancers and dance teachers are drawn to Delhi. They come from all regions of the subcontinent and represent many distinctive styles. It is not a question of being mercenary; dancers, like the rest of us, have the right to eat."
http://www.dancing-times.co.uk/dancingtimes200205-1.html

Rhythm Tap

Terry Monaghan writes for Dancing Times on Rhythm Tap. "Lodged in the heart of Rhythm Tap was the constant trading and challenging between tappers and their audiences, between different tap dancers and with accompanying jazz musicians. Social changes arising from the Second World War resulted in widening generation gaps, renewed racial tension and a growing division between the dance and music aspects of jazz which fatally undermined this diverse pattern of communication. Rhythm Tap’s emphasis on listening was increasingly out of fashion as post war developments in electronics eventually facilitated an enormous jump in the potential for amplifying sound, which inevitably gave rise to the easy option of turning up the volume to draw attention or drown out rival “noise”. Even Riverdance along with its derivatives, was able to re-invent the Irish tradition at the price of substituting recorded, but controllable “sound” for the freshly created original version."
http://www.dancing-times.co.uk/dancingtimes200205-2.html

Birmingham Royal Ballet

The Scotsman has a feature on BRB's Carmina Burana. 'From Bintley's choreography to Prowse's set and costumes, nothing about Carmina is predictable - including audience reaction. With such potentially blasphemous content - dog collars being ripped off, giant crucifixes, lascivious clergy - a religious backlash would seem inevitable. Instead, audiences young and old have been unanimous in their praise, because as Bintley explains, it's all done in the best possible taste. "We had a girl in the company who was a born again Christian and at the end of a dress rehearsal, when all the ashes and bleeding crosses come down, this girl ran shrieking from the stage thinking it was a re-make of The Exorcist. I had to explain to her that really it's a moral piece - the characters are in hell and it's the end of the world because of what they've done."

Http://www.thescotsman.co.uk/s2.cfm?id=666032002

American Ballet Theatre

Anna Kisselgoff in the NY Times on ABT's 'Corsaire': ' This "Corsaire" is sheer escapism, a colorful adventure yarn complete with a shipwreck on the bounding main. But it is also a wonderful context for set pieces of classical dancing that have come down from Marius Petipa's 1899 version in St. Petersburg. It will take some doing to match the trill of Maria Riccetto's traveling leg beats; Michele Wiles's clear, open shape; and Gillian Murphy's triple turns and blazing form in Petipa's gemlike trio for three odalisques in powder-blue tutus.'
Http://www.nytimes.com/2002/06/19/arts/dance/19CORS.html

American Dance Festival

Jack Anderson in the NY Times report on the Balasaraswati Award 'The award, established in 1991 to honor teachers who have helped shape modern-dance training, is named in memory of Balasaraswati, the 20th-century Indian dancer and teacher, and Ms. Beinecke, the modern-dance teacher.'

Http://www.nytimes.com/2002/06/19/arts/dance/19MYER.html

Royal New Zealand Ballet

New Zealand News' Bernadette Rae on NZ Ballet's 'Swan Lake':
'Mention the word "ballet" and most people think of Swan Lake.... It is the ballet with everything that makes classical dance endlessly magical: enchanting young lovers stalked by evil and inevitably doomed, but together forever in their mistily swirling lake ... fluffy white tutus in sylvan glades ... And the Royal New Zealand Ballet's production goes for it in all its traditional splendour — not a bald head or crossdressing boy in sight, as some of the wildest contemporary readings of the work have seen it. Artistic director Gary Harris has restaged Russell Kerr's highly successful 1996 production, with a little judicious trimming... Five guest artists from China and Japan bring a sparkling new focus'
Http://www.nzherald.co.nz/storydisplay.cfm?thesection=entertainment&thesubsection=&storyID=2046991

The Village Voice

VV's Elizabeth Zimmer on this week's varied New York dance scene, including Bill T. Jones and Doug Varone. On the former: 'Jones danced his Let Us Break Bread Together to a cappella singing by Cassandra Wilson, and Save the Last Dance for Me accompanied by Lou Reed and Laurie Anderson. Robert Wilson offered a minimalist poem lauding Jones, and Lauren Hutton vamped to cover scene changes. ......Jones's ensemble looked terrific in last year's Black Suzanne, to Shostakovich played live by the string octet Concertante. Though there was no cake onstage, you got the sense that the artist has blown out his candles, and that his wishes are coming true.'
Http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0225/zimmer.php

Ballet Mississippi

The Clarion Ledger (Mississippi) on the perenniel problems of young chaps dancing that sissy ballet stuff:
'David Keary, a member of the New York City Ballet for eight years and now the artistic director of Ballet Mississippi, says the misunderstandings about male ballet dancers can be chalked up to a "lack of cultural awareness." Keary, 44, explains: "Europe has an incredible history of hundreds of years of art and symphony and opera and ballet. It's a way of life. "What's our way of life? Well, I can look in the sports section on any given Sunday and there's a question in there like, 'Do you know how many times State has beaten Ole Miss in whatever?' There's just a fascination with sports in this country," Keary said. "And there's a lot of peer pressure. 'What do you mean you're not playing football? You're going to ballet class? That's for sissies!'
Http://www.clarionledger.com/news/0206/18/w02.html

Judith Flanders writes for the Standard on NDT1 at Sadler's Wells. "The dancers are wonderfully attuned to all three works, and show a rare quality of attentive seriousness: they are certainly one of the best contemporary companies dancing at the moment."
http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/dynamic/hottx/theatre/dance_review.html?in_review_id=610452&in_review_text_id=586929

From today's Times, (scroll down)an obituary for Thelma Litster, former dancer with Ballet Rambert.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/printFriendly/0,,1-45-331605,00.html

Ismene Brown in the Telegraph on NDT. On Kylian's 'Bella Figura': ' The Italian phrase means putting on your best face, putting on a show, and it starts with a woman, caught in only her knickers in front of the stage curtain, having a panic attack and getting swallowed up in the curtain. This is the sharpest thing in it. The caught-half-dressed theme continues, with the dancers sometimes in corset leotards and sometimes naked to the waist over large red crinolines. This gives long, leisurely viewings of NDT's uniformly superb physiques, with their unfairly long legs and unfairly big breasts. The courting duets are impermeably glossy, full of familiar kooky Kyliánisms, the peekaboo hands over the face, shoulder shrugs, cocked-up feet and random thigh-slaps. For all the plasticity of the pairwork, I sensed only the shallowest musical response, and no genuine communication between couples (not even in the rather yummy lesbian love-scene)'
Http://www.telegraph.co.uk/arts/main.jhtml?xml=/arts/2002/06/20/btisme20.xml&sSheet=/arts/2002/06/20/ixartright.html

Judith Mackrell in the Guardian on NDT: 'It is Kylian (still the company's resident choreographer) who sets the tone, occupying the programme's opening slot with his 1995 work Bella Figura. This impressive showcase is crammed with confidently surprising and expertly lovely moves. The dancers skid over the stage as lightly as dragonflies, torque their bodies into strident curves, bring a burnished beauty to their stretches, and crumple into exquisitely calculated distortions'

Http://www.guardian.co.uk/Archive/Article/0,4273,4444357,00.html

...and Donald Hutera in the Times: 'A programme note, rife with Pirandellian twaddle, emphasises Kylián's dream-like intentions. His subject is artifice, the cue for considerable play with black curtains lowered or drawn across the stage. A topless woman is lifted and wrapped in the folds, as if the curtain were alive. Other vivid images and encounters, as when two undulant, kneeling females recoil from magnetic contact, occur in isolation. Too often the dance seems a series of facile stunts and musically slavish physical choices.'

Http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,685-332093,00.html

Paciic NorthwestBallet

Anthony Thorncroft in the FT on PNB, prior to its imminent appearances at Sadlers Wells: 'There is a confidence about Pacific Northwest Ballet which reflects the flourishing arts scene in Seattle. Once a remote northern outpost on the Pacific seaboard, a combination of economic prosperity and a "can-do" spirit, linked to a strong sense of community, has produced a flourishing arts scene well supported by local business, including the big hitters in the region, Boeing and Microsoft'

Http://news.ft.com/servlet/ContentServer?pagename=FT.com/StoryFT/FullStory&c=StoryFT&cid=1024484355589&p=1012571727132

Royal Ballet in Oz

Valerie Lawson in the Sydney Morning Herald interviews Sylvia Guillem on her upcomin Sydney performances in 'Marguerite & Armand':
'Guillem rejected two offers from the Royal Ballet to dance in Marguerite and Armand, believing the memory of the creators of the roles, Margot Fonteyn and Rudolf Nureyev, was "too fresh in people's minds. It would have been like treason, like walking on dead bodies." Nureyev had shown her the video of the ballet, choreographed by Frederick Ashton in 1963, but when she finally agreed to dance the role of Marguerite, "I didn't want to look at the video, I forgot Margot and Rudolf. I went back to the book, the play and to the courtesan, Marie Duplessis," the lover of Alexandre Dumas the younger, author of The Lady of the Camellias. "I wanted my Marguerite - the way I would have behaved if had gone through all those deep emotions and violent ones." '
Http://www.smh.com.au/text/articles/2002/06/19/1023864454117.htm

The Bolchoi Ballet

Anna Kisselgoff in the NY Times on the Bolshoi's performances in Washington. On Anasiasia Volochkove - who is getting a better press there than she got here - 'Reputed to wield considerable influence at the Bolshoi, Ms. Volochkova is now a principal with that company in Moscow. She has preserved the dazzling glamour of her earlier years. She has the same forceful, exciting attack and the same careless attitude toward form, notably an inability to straighten her back leg in her jetés.'
Http://www.nytimes.com/2002/06/20/arts/dance/20BOLS.html

http://www.themercury.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5936,4538198%255E3462,00.html

Just found this in the Independent - John Percival on Bejart's 'L'Heure Exquise' at the Vidy Theatre in Lausanne (which Bruce reviewed a couple of weeks aga): 'You can't keep Gielgud women off stage. Maina Gielgud, former ballerina (and – not altogether incidentally – niece of Sir John), thought she had stopped dancing for good some 15 years ago. Since then she has been quite busy enough directing major companies, mounting her own versions of the classics, and becoming much in demand as a coach. But she had reckoned without her one-time boss Maurice Béjart, who decided that he wanted to put on a show with a dancer no longer young, and persuaded Maina that she simply had to make a comeback for the occasion'

Http://enjoyment.independent.co.uk/theatre/reviews/story.jsp?story=307174

Clement Crisp in the FT on NDT at Sadlers's Wells: 'It was a pretty tiresome evening on Tuesday with Nederlands Dans Theater 1 returned to Sadler's Wells for the week. For some years I have thought the company were better named Nederlands Angst Theater, so fractious and self-absorbed seems the choreography, so glum and.....' but you've probably got the point.
Http://news.ft.com/servlet/ContentServer?pagename=FT.com/StoryFT/FullStory&c=StoryFT&cid=1024484355498&p=1016625900929

American Ballet Theatre

Deborah Schoeneman in the New York Post on ABT principal dancers Helene Axoplous and Susan Jaffe, both of whom have retired/are retiring this season: ' So far, Alexopoulos has been easing into retirement - lunching with friends at Jean Georges, dining before 11 p.m. and making plans for Hamptons weekends. The mom of twin 8-year-old boys says she won't teach, but plans to keep taking classes. Meanwhile, Jaffe, who has no children, has already started an acting career - although no retired dancer has ever made it big on Broadway'.

Http://www.nypost.com/entertainment/50793.htm

Pacific Northwest Ballet

Caitlyn Cleary in the Seattle Times on PNB's planned move to more spacious accommodation: 'The plans, which PNB unveiled last night at Meydenbauer Center, include four studios with high ceilings for better acoustics, office space, waiting rooms featuring Internet connections for parents who want to work on their laptops, and conditioning studios where Pilates and yoga classes will be open to parents and the public. ..........The location, between Bel-Red Road and Highway 520, will be "fabulous" for commuting parents, Sacerdote said'

Http://archives.seattletimes.nwsource.com/cgi-bin/texis.cgi/web/vortex/display?slug=ballet19e&date=20020619&query=Pacific+Northwest+Ballet

Royal Ballet in Oz

Chee Chee Leung in Melbourne's 'The Age' reports on two young Aussie ballet students chosen to appear ithe the RB next week in Melbourne.

Http://www.theage.com.au/text/articles/2002/06/19/1023864457487.htm

Royal New Zealand Ballet

Bernadette Rae in the NZ Herald on RNZ Ballet's new 'Swan Lake' - it's a winner, she says:

'From a stunning pair in the principal roles to the youngest dancer in the corps, Auckland's opening-night performance was simply wonderful, breathing warmth, passion and spine-tingling life into one of the best-known dance stories of all time...... at the heart of Swan Lake is the feted and fated couple, Odette and her Prince Siegfried. They came to electric life on this occasion, thanks to Japanese guest artist Yurie Shimomura and Royal New Zealand Ballet rising star, Alex Wagner'
Http://www.nzherald.co.nz/entertainment/entertainmentstorydisplay.cfm?storyID=2047752&thesection=entertainment&thesubsection=arts&thesecondsubsection=reviews

Pascal Rioult Dance Theatre

Anna Kisselgoff in the NY Times reviews the Pascal Rioult group: ' "Bolero" is too distinctive a score to be used for an allegory about conformity. Eventually, each dancer has a solo, usually rooted to the spot. There is room for individuality, and as the group's movements expand, the assembly line becomes very human. At the end, each dancer holds a hand to an eye. The final crashing sound is accompanied by a startling red flash from David Finley, the lighting designer, upon Harry Feiner's striking backdrop of Cubo-Futurist aqueducts'

Http://www.nytimes.com/2002/06/21/arts/dance/21PASC.html

....and England are out of the World Cup..

St. Petersburg Times reports on the Vaganova Prix International Ballet Competition.

http://www.sptimes.ru/archive/times/779/features/a_6709.htm

Also the NY Times on Ben Stevenson becoming AD of Fort Worth Dallas Ballet.
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/06/21/arts/dance/21DALL.html?tntemail0

Darcey Bussell

Darcey Bussell is profiled by the Age. "Bussell reveals the visit could well be a trial visit before migrating to Australia a few years down the track. With her Australian husband, investment banker Angus Forbes, her late estranged father, the Carnaby Street fashion designer John Crittle, being Australian and her mother, former model Andrea Williams, marrying an Australian - although she's living in London - it must seem that all paths lead back here eventually."
http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2002/06/19/1023864453928.html

ABT dances Ashton

Last month Time Out New York published a feature (only now online) on ABT's rehearsals for Ashton's The Dream. "Christopher Carr's voice, sounding less like a ballet master's than a drill sergeant's, booms across a studio at American Ballet Theatre on a recent afternoon. "Glissade, brisé, cabriole!" he bellows while executing the steps himself. "Nimble fairy feet!" But the four mortals he's attempting to transform into fairies for Sir Frederick Ashton's The Dream haven't conquered the speed of the footwork. Sighing, he turns away in mock despair. "These fairies aren't super fairies—they're only ordinary old fairies."
http://www.timeoutny.com/dance/347/347.dance.open.dream.html

The end product: what Robert Gottlieb of the New York Observer thought: "The result is another miracle of recreation, authentic but not slavish. When the curtain goes up on David Walker’s exquisite forest glade and the 16 fairies rush on in their beautiful bell-shaped skirts, their hair piled up behind their coronets, you’re in enchanted territory. The choreography here is so fluent, so charged, so natural, that even before the entrances of Oberon and Titania and Puck, of the star-crossed lovers, of Bottom and his gang, you know you’re in the hands of a master."
http://www.observer.com/pages/dance.asp

A further review from the newswire UPI of The Dream and Fille: ""Both ballets work on so many levels," observed ABT artistic director Kevin McKenzie in an interview. "They're technically demanding, and they're also deeply humane and make you laugh. 'Fille' is one of Ashton's great masterpieces and long overdue for us to do it."
http://www.upi.com/view.cfm?StoryID=21062002-113722-7532r

Dance outside the proscenium arch

Sarah Frater in Friday's Evening Standard on "site specific choreography" ; Protein's Publife, the Greenwich and Docklands Festival's Dancing City, a day of dance events taking place in and around the buildings of Canary Wharf and 'city:skinned' set in the city landscape around King s Cross. "Site-specific choreography is a relatively recent phenomenon, although the use of unconventional venues, such as art galleries, museums, warehouses and lofts, for what is known as location-based dance, has a much longer history. These venues provide choreographers with a natural performance space, without the formality and conventions of the theatre. They also allow the audience to experience the performance in a different way. "
http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/dynamic/hottx/review.html?in_review_id=619550&in_review_text_id=589232

Techno Dance

Wired.com on techno dance. "Avatars tells the story of five archetypal video game characters making a journey of self-discovery. The characters represent the five Chinese elements: earth, wood, metal, fire and water. As each performer dances before a fight, a 3-D animation of the element mirrors the movements of the dancer on stage - creating a virtual counterpart, or avatar.
http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,53277,00.html

Capoeira

From Dance Today Marc Rattray on the Afro-Brazilian dance form capoeira. "There is little doubt that the ancestors of capoeira would have gaped in amazement at its snowballing popularity. In 1974 capoeira was recognized as the national sport of Brazil. Today, it has reached every continent in the world and is practiced in well over 100 countries. Classes, if my own experience is good testimony, are friendly and fun. They appeal to students on a number of levels, whether interested in dance, music, sport or martial art. It is entertaining and excellent recreation."
http://www.dancing-times.co.uk/dancetoday200205-1.html

Dance and its future

The Miami Herald on Dance USA's conference on the future of dance. "Survival was the main topic of conversation among the nearly 400 dance professionals gathered in Miami for the three-day Dance USA conference.However, often overlooked intangible matters such as inspiration and self-respect are just as important, said several of the attendees. ''Everyone has money problems,'' said Ivan Sygoda, a dance veteran whose organization Pentacle does everything from tour booking to fundraising. ``The problem is not money, it's attention, respect and validation.''
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/2002/06/21/news/local/3512999.htm

Nacho Duato

I found this on balletalert. It is a profile of Nacho Duato for the Korea Herald."He emphasized that mutual rapport between the dancers and the audience is the most important part of his performance, noting that he tries to overpower the viewers with his dance. "I like ballet that reflects what people feel. Once people can see themselves on stage, we can communicate with them. We can have a dialogue," he said. "My work is about life and people. It's neither about my ideas nor myself. I'd like to share with people what they feel and what inspires their everyday lives."
http://www.koreaherald.co.kr/SITE/data/html_dir/2002/06/20/200206200037.asp

Paul Driver, the Sunday Times' stand-in critic is similarly underwhelmed by NDT, but is kinder to ENB's Swan Lake. "The massed corps of 60 swans, immaculately together in their complex deployments, are a ravishing sight (the thunder of pointe shoes on the run notwithstanding); and the Russian guest stars Svetlana Zakharova and Sergei Filin, from the Kirov and Bolshoi respectively, led the company with thoroughbred performances. This is a sumptuous spectacle in which quality is not sacrificed to quantity. The buzz of excitement in an audience of thousands is a real thrill. Let no one say that classical ballet is a dying art."
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2101-331779,00.html

Ellie Carr of the Sunday Herald on BRB's visit to Scotland. "If the idea of a truly British ballet is dead, then Birmingham Royal's forthcoming visit provides interesting pointers for those wearied by the on-going machinations over Scottish Ballet's direction. On one hand Birmingham is a royal company that embodies all the creative heritage and elite, stiff-upper-back schooling that implies. Many of the company's dancers still come from the Royal Ballet's famous White Lodge school: this will change when the Elmhurst school relocates to the Midlands, giving Birmingham its own feeder school. On the other hand, like Scottish Ballet, this is a regional company which must supply a broad public with an equally broad repertoire without always looking like the B-team. 'You've got to strike a balance,' says Bintley. 'When we did Carmina Burana for the first time it was the talk of the season -- people hadn't seen new work like that before. That same season we did Swan Lake, which people will always want. But no matter how good a production of Swan Lake we do, it's never going to match the Royal Ballet's.'
http://www.sundayherald.com/25635

David Bintley also takes Scotland on Sunday's 'Culture Test' (Desert Island Disc: Newport Up by Duke Ellington )
http://www.scotlandonsunday.com/thereview.cfm?id=679882002

Jennifer Dunning of the NY Times profiles Thaddeus Davis of Dance Galaxy
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/06/23/arts/dance/23DUNN.html