Monday, January 21, 2013

Balanchine









So nice to be able to pull my sweetheart away from his work-till-six-am workdays for an hour of free ballet demos, "The Balanchine Ballerina".  There were excerpts from the Nutcracker, Swan Lake, and others I can't recall*, but my favorite was Western Symphony.  Mike's still analyzing to determine his fave. Sometimes I feel sorry for our future children, being software engineering ballet dancers will be a hard life, no doubt.

And this post would not be complete without mentioning the winter weather day perfection - cold enough to bundle up and stay comfortable lounging by the Lincoln Center plaza fountain.

*Update: Found this so the others included Allegro Brillante, Mozartiana, Symphony in C, and Tchaikovsky Suite No. 3. Also, it wasn't an excerpt from the Swan Lake ballet, but an excerpt from Balanchine's Tchaikovsky Pas de Duex choreographed to long-forgotten Swan Lake music.


1 comment:

Mike McG said...

Our poor kids... Programming at a stand-up desk, en pointe.

It's hard to pick a favorite. They followed in such quick succession, I couldn't really get into the pace and mood of each one. The barefoot one with the seven spirits created a good atmosphere of affection with eeriness. I'd never noticed the smoothness of the wand's motion as much as I did in the Sugar Plum Fairy excerpt. Mozartiana excerpt was sweet with the little students. Symphony in C felt the most formal to me, which made it easy to get into, although I did spot a mistake. Western Symphony was surprisingly good, but in that short amount of time I couldn't escape a nagging perception of corniness.

I think Tchaikovsky Pas de Deux was my fave, the music was fun, both male and female parts looked really challenging (the jumps and catches) but they pulled it off.

So glad you found it, love!