An International Celebration of Kenneth MacMillan...

Ten years since his tragic death a major celebration of his life and work is underway. There is much to celebrate and we tell you all about it over several pages at: www.ballet.co.uk/macmillan

Family Heirlooms... this month Susan Crow, RAD Revealing MacMillan Conference Coordinator, concentrates on MacMillan, the importance of capturing knowledge before it is lost and keeping hold of what we've got already...

Jackson Competition

In June Renee Renouf and Richard Finkelstein covered the Jackson USA Ballet Competition for us - 39 pieces later they still had enough energy to fly home. As part of it Renee scooped many interviews (all on-line) three of which we present as full pages below...

Interviews

Tom Sapsford... Catherine Hale catches up with choreographer and dancer 6 months on after leaving the cosy confines of the Royal Ballet...

Frank Anderson... Rennee Renouf practices Bournonville with The Royal Danish Ballet Artistic Director...

David Howard... a master teacher talks with Renee about Jackson, New York, RB and Ross Stretton..

Galina Samsova... well known to UK audiences, Samsova is the UK juror at the Jackson Competition which is where Renee caught up with her.

Anthony Russell-Roberts... the RB Administrative Director interviewed by Phyllida Ritter at a Lunch and Listen Friends event. Suzanne McCarthy listened in

Darcey Bussell on ABC radio... everything you ever wanted to know about the Golden Girl (well nearly)

Features

Ross Stretton's first season at RB... Lynette Halewood thinks things through...

Siobhan Davies 'Plants and Ghosts'... Jane Simpson sees Siobhan Davies' new work in rehearsal

Conducting for Ballet, Music Matters on BBC Radio 3... we recorded a discussion on conducting for dance and ballet between Ivan Hewett, Ismene Brown, Barry Wordsworth and Thomas Edur

Who Needs Friends... Margaret Lumley looks at Friends organisations up and down the land: the good, the bad, and those that do opera too...

Bay Area Dancing, from 1915 to 1965... Renee Renouf at a 2 day conference in SF

‘On Angels and Devils and Stages Between’... a memoir by David Wood reviewed by Renee Renouf

Ballet in 1952... Jane Simpson on what was happening when Queen Elizabeth II entered service

Diaries

Message from Japan... Hiromi Matsumoto returns with tales from afar

Christopher Hampson... 'Nuts in private'

Ballet Black... 'That kind of month'

Cathy Marston... 'Painting, decorating 'n steps...'

Reviews

The Royal Ballet in Australia...
The Royal Ballet has been on tour in Australia, visiting Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne...

Valerie Lawson was impressed by Alina Cojocaru’s debut as Odette/Odile in Swan Lake.

Michelle Potter, who saw Swan Lake, Giselle and the triple bill by English choreographers, is struck by the Royal Ballet’s classicism and the quality of its production values.

Nadia on the Brisbane performances of Swan Lake. Janek saw Giselle in Sydney. As did Roddy.

Alvin Ailey Dance Theater... Jane Simpson on the company’s return visit to London. Is there creative life after ‘Revelations’?

Nederlands Dans Theater
Lynette Halewood on NDT’s recent programme at Sadler’s Wells. Bruce Marriott is impressed by NDT’s dancers but has doubts about the programme

Rosemary Butcher... Catherine Hale saw ‘the diva of conceptual dance’ at The Place.

Trisha Brown Rachael Jefferson-Buchanan on a programme of Brown’s work at the Grand Theatre in Geneva.

Bavarian State Ballet... Sonja sat in on a Swan Lake master class in Munich with the legendary Maya Plissetskaya

White Oak Dance Project Renee Renouf saw the company at San Francisco’s Zellerbach Hall. “"If ever anyone represented intelligence in movement”, she writes, “Baryshnikov is it."

English National Ballet
Ann Williams finds the emotional appeal of ENB’s 'Swan Lake' undiminished in the arena setting of the Royal Albert Hall. Margaret Lumley on the delights of a schools matinee performance. Bruce Marriott was at the first night for Svetlana Zakharova

Opera North... Trog on an evening of opera and dance at the Lowry Centre in Salford, part of the "Amaze Me!" season.

Bejart Ballet
Rachael Jefferson-Buchanan on ‘L'heure exquise’, Bejart’s choreographic adaptation of Samuel Beckett’s ‘Happy Days’, at the Theatre Vidy in Lausanne.
Bruce Marriott set aside his misgivings at Bejart’s work to fly to Switzerland for the premiere.

Kirov Ballet... Kevin Ng on a rare opportunity to see some Soviet-era ballets at the Kirov’s recent Gala at the Royal Opera House.

Royal Ballet of Flanders... Viviane was unimpressed by the Jan Fabre 'Swan Lake' at the Ghent Opera House which, she says, was “stripped of all emotional power or expressiveness”.

Scottish Ballet... Trog saw 'Carmen' in Stoke-on-Trent – “not a Carmen to die for, but it is very watchable.”

The Royal Ballet in London
Lynette Halewood on the final triple bill of the season, which included the premiere of Christopher Wheeldon’s Tryst. Ann Williams is struck by Wheeldon’s debt to Balanchine. Tryst is not to Wendy Glavis’s taste on a first viewing Sylvia is struck by the detailing of Tryst rather than by its overall impact.
Romeo and Juliet... Darcey Bussell’s Juliet delights Sylvia.

Preljocaj Ballet and Bianca Li Dance Co... Kevin Ng on two performances by visiting French companies in Hong Kong.

Rambert Dance Company... Lynette Halewood on Rambert’s recent programme in London including the premiere of Glenn Wilkinson's Tree Finger Soup

San Francisco Ballet School... Renee Renouf on a student show in San Francisco.

Royal Danish Ballet... James Huw Jeffries on a recent Gala at the Royal Theatre in Copenhagen.

RB Cohabitants 2
Having seen ‘Between Shadows’, Cathy Marston’s dance version of LP Hartley’s ‘The Go-Between, Catherine Hale decided that Marston will be “the future darling of British ballet.”
For Lynette Halewood the real surprise of the evening was Lauren Cuthberston, who has recently joined the Royal Ballet.

First Class Air Male... Ann Williams is disappointed by the programme, but is impressed by Russell Maliphant's 'One Part II'.

Birmingham Royal Ballet... Trog on BRB in Stanton Welch’s ‘Powder’ and David Bintley’s ‘Carmina Burana’

Welsh Independent Ballet Trog travelled to Tewkesbury to see this company’s ‘very watchable’ Taming of the Shrew

Amanda Miller: ‘A Midsummer Night's Dream’... There were no pointe-shoes in sight in this very post-modern take on ‘Dream’. Rachael Jefferson-Buchanan saw it at the Grand Theatre in Geneva.

Ballet.Co Postings Reviews

ENB School... Philip B
NBT’s ‘I got rhythm’... Flight
Manon: Bavarian State Ballet... Sonia G
RB in Class... Wendy Glavis
POB Stravinsky Bill... Katharine Kanter
On Your Toes/Leicester Haymarket... Suzanne McCarthy, Anne Welsh
Cohabitants... Brendan McCarthy, Philip B

The ballet.co Screensaver

What professional site would be complete without a screensaver! Courtesy of Louis we bring you the ballet.co screensaver and it's absolutely free.

You need to be running Windows 95 and we can deliver it in 2 ways depending on whether you have the capability to handle zip files (or not). Zip files are smaller and hence load much quicker, but you need special software to decode them. If you are not sure, best to use the larger exe file.

Once it's on your machine, double click on install.exe, it will tell you the screensaver is installed, then go into the control panel, double click on display and follow your nose to the screensaver section where you should find our ballet one listed. Here are the links to get the screensaver;

      ballet.co screensaver as an zip file (1132Kb)
      ballet.co screensaver as an exe file (2293kb)

These are not small files and might take more than a few minutes to load. The screensaver has been produced using professional software and as such should work on all (Windows95) machines. We can't however offer guarantees (though we would be gob-smacked if there are any probs). Enjoy!