Celebrating Rubies, Emeralds and Diamonds

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In Attending the Ballet in Florida: Miami City Ballet's Program Three 6 March 2017 Gita Mistry wrote:

"Having seen an American company in action I think I now understand what is meant by the American style. The dancers are very athletic, very polished, very precise and seem to project a measure of pride and showmanship that I have only seen in dancers from Russia. When the corps moves it moves in sync with military precision. When the dancers turn they are ramrod straight. The English style is softer more lyrical. It is difficult to say which is better. They are each pleasing in their own way, but different."

The American style is celebrated in the second act of George Balanchine's ballet Jewels.  Each style is represented by a jewel: the French by emeralds, the Russians by diamonds and the Americans by rubies.  Emeralds represent the romantic style and is danced in green with the women in long romantic tutus to Fauré's music. Diamonds is in sparkling white to the music of Tchaikovsky.

I have only managed to see the ballet on a live streaming from Moscow. Here's my review of the performance with a YouTube clip featuring the American ballerina Merill Ashley (see  Emeralds, Rubies and Diamonds - "Jewels" streamed from Moscow 22 Jan 2014).  The Royal Ballet will perform this work between 1 and 21 April 2017 and it will be streamed to cinemas on 11 April 2017.

We think we have found a ruby in the Miami City Ballet who have included this work in their repertoire since 1992.  The company has just announced that it will launch its 2017-2018 season with that work.

Theatre Street

The Vaganova Academy

Author: OperaJoeGreen
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What makes Russian ballet so special? In her memoirs Theatre Street, the great Russian ballerina Tamara Karsavina supplies at least part of the answer. The training that is given at the Vaganova Ballet Academy (formerly the Imperial Ballet School) in St, Petersburg and the Moscow State Academy of Choreography.

Theatre Street gave a remarkable picture of Russian training in the past. For a modern insight I can thoroughly recommend Tala Lee-Turton's beautifully written blog.

Those of us who lack Ms Lee-Turton's talent can still get an idea of the Russian tradition without travelling to Russia by taking Kristian Ratevossian's classes at Danceworks. These take place on Sundays between 16:00 and 17:30.   According to Danceworks's website:

"Kristian graduated from the world famous Vaganova Academy of St.Petersburg. He attended the full program from 1980 – 1990 under the direction of Oleg Sokolov and Benjamin Zimin directed by Constantin Sergeyev. Upon his graduation, having received outstanding accolades, Kristian was invited to join The Bolshoi Griogorovich Company."

I have another opportunity to take a lesson from a Vaganova graduate when I visit Hungary in two weeks time.  Mel Wong, who now lives in Budapest, has offered to take me to her adult ballet class which takes place the same day as the première of the Hungarian National Ballet's new production of Sir Peter Wright's The Sleeping Beauty (see The Hungarian National Ballet's Sleeping Beauty 24 Feb 2016). I can't pretend that I am not a little apprehensive but I am looking forward to the class with a Vaganova trained instructor at least as much as I am looking forward to the show.