Thanks, Linda.

In Birthday Offering, both dancers rehearsed the pas de deux. Ansanelli was a delight to watch, her technique was clean and neat. Her balances were very assured. Valeri Hristov provide more support than dancing in this pas de deux. As much as Anasanelli is a technically strong dancer, I believe firmer handling from Hristov would be helpful.

In Sleeping Beauty section, Ansanelli rehearsed Aurora's solo from Act 1. She did a slightly different version from the Royal Ballet's, which MacLeary then amend and re-rehease. Ansanelli's strength lies in her prolonged balances which most of the audience hold their breath as she holds hers. Strong technique, joyful and pleasant personality, I believe her future is bright with the Royal.

MacLeary shared some nostalgic memories of his, when he was a dancer and student, personally I appreciate greatly, as I believe the heritage of ballet needs to be preserved and shared amongst the generations.

MacLeary mentioned an issue, which I strongly agree, that ballet is an art form and not an atheletic presentation. "We are dancing to tell a story, we are not training dancers for the olympics." Which is very very true. There is no pleasure watching a person getting their legs by their ears or doing world-breaking record of fouette pirouettes when they cannot even show any emotions on their face.

I am personally very grateful to have this ticket to watch the Royal Ballet Masterclass, it was highly informative and inspiring.

Donald Macleary is someone I could listen to all night, full of stories and anecdotes and clearly in love with his art. It is always fascinating to listen to someone who has a whole bank of experience which, as he said, he carries in his head all the time...he doesn't need notators' notes for the classics because he's done them all so often every step is in his head! He said he can't remember what he did yesterday, but he remembers all those steps! He is a joy to listen to.

There was an article about it in the NYT or so a few years back. I'll see if I can dig it up. But *bless* her for being so open and honest about it.

Too often we get caught up in 'having the perfect ballet bodies' - but often the best of the professionals themselves don't - or were even put in ballet to correct some of these issues... and they prove to us mere mortals that dreaming isn't such a bad thing - I know that Ansanelli's story has been used to inspire and encourage many young girls also faced with scoliosis.

eta:

The link: http://www.nytimes.com/2004/03/14/arts/dance/14LIES.html?ex=1146888000&en=79ca406465fe476e&ei=5070

You need to register but it's free. One of my friends has commented that it's interesting that often students think they won't get into vocational school X because they have (bad feet, bad turnout, bad posture... whatever) - but then, you have people like Ansanelli (among others), who flourished in one of 'those' vocational schools... Thank goodness for it, I say!

ami:
>Too often we get caught up in 'having the perfect ballet
>bodies' - but often the best of the professionals themselves
>don't - or were even put in ballet to correct some of these
>issues...

I strongly agree with both these, too. Too often these days it seems that people get obsessed with the "perfect physique" for a dancer and forget about the artistry, the line, the emotional involvement, etc. etc. I was pondering only the other day, partly as a consequence of the "Ballets Russes" film, on a) how many former dancers of great merit wouldn't even have made it through into today's companies because of their less-than-ideal shape and b) whether many of today's dancers would be rather more interesting if there had been less concentration on the physical aspects of dancing.

True indeed - sometimes we're left wondering whether some of today's dancers wouldn't have made it through into yesteryear's companies for lack of artistry!

Happily, there are many more in very recent times who have taken on a truly artistic sensibility.

Another amazing scoliosis story, also out of the NYCB, is Wendy Wheelen.

Didn't Deborah Bull dance it at some stage, though?

Amen to that! I would add there is no beauty to an oversplit grand jeté - I find that just plain gross. It's the arc of flight that is captivating - that says something.

Or a balance that is held beyond the music. Or dancing an adage in which the the music has been stretched almost beyond recognizability to cater to the dancer's desire for self. Dance is part of the music and neither should be distorted in service to the other.

Ballet is about so much more: beauty, artistry, conveyance of emotion, characterization, etc.

I do believe I recall that Fonteyn once said that she would never have made it into the company based on the standards of the last couple of decades. Well, for those of us who saw her that would have been an incalcuable loss. And you can probably add to that Pavlova, Karsavina, Ulanova, Markova, Danilova, and so many more great names. None of them did "leg to ear" dancing. They considered pirouettes with more than 2-3 rotations as vulgar. Perhaps we are learning that they had a point.

An extension a la seconde beyond 90 degrees distorts all the triangles that are created (the negative space has been disorted by the positive space) - and where or where does one put the arms that are supposed to compliment the triangles if the leg is to the ear?

In a 6 o'clock penché - where or where do you put the arms to complement/compliment that shape? You don't! However, in a penché which is less than perpendicular, the arms go very nicely indeed.

Perhaps the pendulum is swinging back to recapture the beauty of shape rather than the distortion of tricks. I hope so. At least we dare to speak of it and that's a start.

Turning to another of Donald's remarks during the masterclass (and they were many), he was critical of certain Russian conductors for slow tempi and for trying to follow a dancer too carefully, resulting in a progressive slowing down of the music to such an extent that the dancer was left struggling. In his opinion dancers sometimes need to be pushed musically in order to be able to give of their best.

I really wish I'd been able to go to this, now. It sounds as though it was an interesting evening, and I can imagine just who he was thinking of.

I remember some years ago discussing these matters with the late Joan Lawson, a lady who knew a thing or two about ballet injuries and the effect of ultra high extensions etc, and what she had to say about what they did to the hips and pelvis did not make for happy listening.

Absolutely!

Emotional involvement is shown in other ways - not height of leg, oversplit of grand jeté or multiple pirouette rotation.

And Wulff is correct that this road of extreme physicality is strewn with injuries to dancers. Excessive anything leads to problems. We shouldn't wish this on our wonderful dancers.

"And Wulff is correct that this road of extreme physicality is strewn with injuries to dancers. Excessive anything leads to problems. We shouldn't wish this on our wonderful dancers. "

Definitely not, we would not wish that.

I agree with you both regarding artistry ,hence generosity to your audience, control and looking after one's body.These are central to every dancer's training.

What I was refering to however was energy and passion and every dancer brings out these qualities differently.