The Beginnings of a Whiplash Week Two
I don’t think I will ever forget the afternoon of Sunday, August 1.
I knew that the weather would be somewhat menacing and I was a bit concerned about how the Celebrate the Beat kids would fare that night, opening for Pacific Northwest Ballet in their Broadway tribute. The festival had provided each child with two vouchers for lawn seating, and I was terrified that all those parents who had waited weeks to see their kids perform for the first time would drown in a torrential downpour and swear off dance forever (…ultimately quite the opposite). So a bit apprehensively I went on my way to the amphitheater on Sunday and resolved to spend as much time inside as possible, getting everything ready for the children.
I was going backstage when I heard the strains of a violin playing Arvo Part’s “Spiegel im Spiegel.” There are a few pieces of music that always make me cry; this is one. Of course I dropped everything and ran to the stage. There, PNB Soloist Rachel Foster and Principal Jeffrey Stanton had just begun to rehearse Christopher Wheeldon’s After the Rain Pas de Deux. Before my eyes the wind grew more and more forceful, the trees behind the two swayed with the rhythm of the breeze, and every strain of the violin was suddenly complemented with this haunting swoosh. Rachel’s hair billowed in the wind every time Jeffrey rocked her in his arms in those carousel-like spinwheels. There were about twenty people in the audience and you could hear a pin drop. As Rachel and Jeffrey stood facing each other motionlessly, Jeffrey gave her a silent kiss on the forehead and I heard the first bolt of lightning. Then the thunder came. No one dared move. The downpour had instantaneously become so strong that it was hard to hear the violin, but magically and very naturally it became a necessary extension of the music. As they lay on the floor at the end, a final clap of thunder resounded in the mountains, and all I could make out on the faces around me was otherwordly awe.
Rachel Foster and Jeffrey Stanton of Pacific Northwest Ballet rehearse After The Rain during the 2010 Vail International Dance Festival. Choreography by Christopher Wheeldon. Photo by Caitlin Kakigi.
Here is a video I compiled of those unforgettable moments:
PNB Rehearses ‘After the Rain’ in a Thunderstorm
In summary: weather hasn’t stopped the dance. Yesterday at the performance of the Paul Taylor Dance Company, all audience members with lawn tickets were upgraded to regular seats. I would even venture to say that the thunder only heightened the drama. A ballet needn’t have a name like After the Rain to benefit from some precipitation; Paul Taylor’s Promethean Fire is a lesson in atmospheric dance. Dancers shot up into the sky to Bach’s “Prelude” and it was as though thunder was written into the score. What an exhilirating and passionate performance by all the Paul Taylor dancers; it was justly rewarded by one of the most instantaneous standing ovations I’ve observed here yet. Promethean Fire was preceded by Company B and Piazzolla Caldera - lucky for me as The Andrews Sisters’ “Bei Mir Bist Du Schein” and Astor Piazzolla’s “Michelangelo 70″ top ninety percent of my On-the-Go playlists. Company B evokes the vibrations of the 1940s as America was drawn into the Second World War; my favorite section is still “Rum and Coca-Cola” which was danced with so much instinctual charm. Piazzolla Caldera got me really excited for the tango program next week, Romper el Piso, brought here by Natalia Hills and Gabriel Misse from Buenos Aires. When I was 16 I traveled to Buenos Aires with my parents and fell in love with the tango- my mom and I spent 6 nights straight at tango clubs then, so I am very excited for the public milonga in the Betty Ford Gardens on Saturday, led by Natalia and Gabriel.
The Paul Taylor Dance Company performs "Promethean Fire" at the Vail International Dance Festival. Photo by Erin Baiano.
Several PNB dancers are still in the house for either International Evenings of Dance or Tuesday’s $20.10 program, which will feature a range of dances from Black Swan Pas de Deux to Balanchine’s Who Cares? PNB Artistic Director Peter Boal has remained in Vail with his six dancers who will perform this week; this morning he taught company class on stage, which was joined by several of the dancers who have already arrived to prepare for the gala, including American Ballet Theatre Soloist Daniil Simkin. PNB had a fantastic residency; I loved watching Damian coach PNB Principal Lucien Postlewaite as Riff in ‘Cool’ from West Side Story Suite and I could watch millions of interpretations of Tharp’s ‘That’s Life’ section from Nina Sinatra Songs. Corps dancer Carli Samuelson’s fuschia tulle dress in “Forget Domani” was gorgeous and I’ve been listening to “One for my Baby (and One More for the Road)” on repeat for the past two days. I’m beginning to think that all ballet should be seen only in the mountains.
Damian Woetzel coaches Lucien Postlewaite of Pacific Northwest Ballet in "Cool" from West Side Story Suite. Choreography by Jerome Robbins. Photo by Caitlin Kakigi.
Check back for a video montage of PNB in class and in rehearsal.
Olivier Wevers and Carla Körbes of Pacific Northwest Ballet rehearse Duo Concertant during the 2010 Vail International Dance Festival. Choreography by George Balanchine. © The George Balanchine Trust. Photo by Caitlin Kakigi.
Lastly, School of American Ballet (SAB) Faculty Member Suki Schorer arrived on Sunday and taught two morning master classes for dancers in the Vail area. Suki was my teacher at SAB for five years and I never in a million years could have believed that I would take her class once more.The dancers loved Suki’s Mr. B anecdotes- i.e. the $10 note in between a dancer’s thighs to ensure that the fifth position stayed nice and compact back in the days when a $10 bill actually amounted to something - and now there’s word Suki might teach company class this week. She’s also been dancing the tango - in New York and in Buenos Aires - for over a decade and will be joining Natalia and Gabriel at the Up Close: Tango rehearsal this Saturday.
Oh yes- Wendy Whelan, officially landed and checked-in. So looking forward to seeing her in After the Rain again…
That’s all for now, check back soon! Remember to check the Vail Valley Foundation YouTube Channel/Vail Internation Dance Festival Playlist for lots more performance footage, as well as the Flickr channel for photos from the resident photographers, Caitlin Kakigi and Erin Baiano.
Erica Sheftman
Dispatch from an Intern
Hello everyone,
The Winger calls. I am stepping out of longtime lurkdom to document some of what is going to be a whirlwind two and a half weeks in Vail, CO at the 2010 incarnation of the Vail International Dance Festival, spearheaded by Winger blogger, and Festival Artistic Director Mr. Damian Woetzel. Damian has been shuttling back and forth between all the different (gorgeous) venues around here and confirming that everyone is settled with piano accompaniment, studio space, rehearsal time, smooth check-ins, etc., so I’m here to provide some running commentary.
ABOUT ME:
Erica Sheftman, 20. Former School of American Ballet student (‘99-‘08), Fiorello H. Laguardia HS grad, current Harvard undergrad and festival intern.
My first intern experience was helping to register close to seventy elementary students for Celebrate the Beat!, a dance workshop initiated by Jacques d’Amboise with an annual summer residency at the festival. Directed by the amazing Tracy Straus, the week-long program culminates in a special presentation by CTB dancers this Sunday, August 1 at the Gerald R. Ford Amphitheater, Vail’s stunning outdoor amp housed amidst the Gore range of the Rockies and the beautiful Betty Ford Alpine Gardens.
The kids will open for Pacific Northwest Ballet, in their “Broadway, Ballet and Beyond” program, featuring The Winger’s Carla Korbes in Benjamin Millepied’s 3 Movements and Mr. B’s Duo Concertante, as well as Christopher Wheeldon’s After the Rain Pas de Deux, Robbins’ “Cool” from West Side Story Suite, and my personal favorite, Twyla Tharp’s Nine Sinatra Songs. In tribute to the ballyhoo of Broadway, the kids are rehearsing a group dance to a medley of Leonard Bernstein and Marvin Hamlisch, among others; they shuffle between A Chorus Line and West Side Story as though they’d been born doing it, they mambo like nobody’s business. It’s hard to believe that some of them have been dancing for only four days, and all of them are high-kicking to One (singular sensation) for the first time in their lives. It’s been so inspiring to have the kids run to class out of breath in the morning and to watch them feel more and more at ease with abandoning themselves to impulse.
Savion Glover and Eddie Palmieri, along with their respective ensembles Bare Soundz and The Otherz, opened the festival this past Tuesday. I’d seen Glover perform once at ABT’s Opening Night Gala at the MET Opera House, preceding Alessandra Ferri and Julio Bocca in Roland Petit’s Carmen Pas De Deux; it was an altogether different experience this time around at the Gerald R. Ford Amphitheater. The interplay between Glover and Palmieri was unbelievable; they fed off of each other, and undoubtedly the air of the place was inspiring. People dancing and popping champagne, cooled in ice buckets, on the lawn; the occasional vehicle and the less frequent mosquito; the suspense of an impending thunderstorm and a final champagne reception with “Empire State of Mind” reverberating through the mountains….it’s a one-of-a-kind experience. There’s nothing like it.
Savion Glover, Eddie Palmieri, Bare Soundz and The Otherz rehearse at the Gerald R. Ford Amphitheater during the 2010 Vail International Dance Festival. Photo credit: Caitlin Kakigi
On Wednesday, I watched Damian rehearse NYCB principals Tiler Peck and Joaquin De Luz in a suite of Chopin/Robbins dances, including excerpts from Other Dances, Dances at a Gathering, and a piece originated by Mikhail Baryshnikov and Patricia McBride that hasn’t been seen since 1979, but was filmed live for the well-known “Baryshnikov at the White House” telecast. The last time I saw Other Dances was at NYCB in 2008, when Julie Kent joined Damian in it as a guest in his farewell season, so I loved watching him demonstrate once more. Damian spoke a lot about Robbins; his specialized form of cool nonchalance and reticence in musicality, in movement, and in gesture….
Tiler Peck and Joaquin De Luz rehearse at the 2010 Vail International Dance Festival. Photo credit: Caitlin Kakigi
Pacific Northwest Ballet arrived late on Wednesday night, and was already in the studio on Thursday morning. Artistic Director Peter Boal taught company class, which was combined with the dancers rehearsing Larry Keigwin’s Aug. 6 world premiere (set to Aretha Franklin!): Peck, De Luz, NYCB Principal Robbie Fairchild, and Sokvannara Sar (of Dancing Across Borders). VIDF staff finally loaded-in the amphitheater following the NY Philharmonic’s residency (lots of us went to hear Andrey Boreyko conduct selections from Prokofiev’s Romeo and Juliet; Boreyko closed with an encore of the Garland Waltz from The Sleeping Beauty that had all of us ballet nerds doing balancés on the lawn). PNB company class took place onstage at the Amphitheater and dancers rehearsed Balanchine’s Square Dance and Serenade, and Ulysses Dove’s Red Angels.
Peter Boal teaches PNB company class at VIDF 2010; Carla Korbes, pictured. Photo by Caitlin Kakigi
Finally, on Thursday night, Larry and Damian led more than one hundred spectators at the Arrabelle Square in Lionshead Village in Fosse’s Rich Man’s Frug at what has become a traditional VIDF event, “Dancing in the Streets.” Afterwards, Damian, Larry and his dancers broke it down to some Gaga, Beyonce, and yes, some “Empire State of Mind”. Lots of the Celebrate the Beat kids were in attendance; they got to fouetté and put a ring on it with some of the leading dance stars in the country.
Artistic Director Damian Woetzel and Artist-in-Residence Larry Keigwin led Dancing in the Streets, a free, interactive evening of dance during the 2010 Vail International Dance Festival. Photo credit: Caitlin Kakigi
More to come soon. In the meantime, follow the links below to enjoy festival photos and videos.
GISELLE- BALLET DE SANTIAGO SEASON 2010
We just finished Giselle performances. It was really nice to us work with Ivan Nagy and his wife Marylin Burr again. I took some pictures and also made a giselle video, so I hope to post the video very soon and you can see this beautiful production. Well I hope you enjoy these pictures, and I will post some new ones very soon.
PRINCIPAL STAR DANCER LUIS ORTIGOZA
PRINCIPAL STAR DANCER LUIS ORTIGOZA AND PRINCIPAL NATALIA BERRIOS
PRINCIPAL STAR DANCER LUIS ORTIGOZA
PRINCIPAL NATALIA BERRIOS
PRINCIPAL STAR DANCER LUIS ORTIGOZA AND PRINCIPAL NATALIA BERRIOS
PRINCIPAL STAR DANCER LUIS ORTIGOZA
PRINCIPAL NATALIA BERRIOS
PRINCIPAL STAR DANCER LUIS ORTIGOZA AND PRINCIPAL NATALIA BERRIOS
BALLET DE SANTIAGO
BALLET DE SANTIAGO
PRINCIPAL STAR DANCER LUIS ORTIGOZA AND PRINCIPAL NATALIA BERRIOS
BALLET DE SANTIAGO
PRINCIPAL STAR DANCER LUIS ORTIGOZA
BALLET DE SANTIAGO
PRINCIPAL STAR DANCER LUIS ORTIGOZA AND SOLIST DOLORES SALAZAR
PRINCIPAL NATALIA BERRIOS
BALLET DE SANTIAGO
PRINCIPAL STAR DANCER LUIS ORTIGOZA, PRINCIPAL NATALIA BERRIOS AND SOLIST DOLORES SALAZAR
PRINCIPAL STAR DANCER LUIS ORTIGOZA
PRINCIPAL STAR DANCER LUIS ORTIGOZA AND PRINCIPAL NATALIA BERRIOS
PRINCIPAL STAR DANCER LUIS ORTIGOZA
PRINCIPAL STAR DANCER LUIS ORTIGOZA AND PRINCIPAL NATALIA BERRIOS
PRINCIPAL STAR DANCER LUIS ORTIGOZA
PRINCIPAL STAR DANCER LUIS ORTIGOZA AND PRINCIPAL NATALIA BERRIOS
PRINCIPAL STAR DANCER LUIS ORTIGOZA
PRINCIPAL STAR DANCER LUIS ORTIGOZA AND PRINCIPAL NATALIA BERRIOS
PRINCIPAL STAR DANCER LUIS ORTIGOZA
Ballet Zaida
My good friend, Oliver Endahl, started his photography business a few years ago under the name of Revilo Valentine Photography. We danced together at the San Francisco Ballet School and he left to pursue his love for photography. He has started a collection of his photography called Ballet Zaida and has really captured some beautiful photos. When i took a trip to SF on a layoff week, I worked with him and my friends Myles Thatcher and Kristina Lind who are with San Francisco Ballet and Nicole Voris who dances for San Francisco Ballet School. Here are some photos of our shoot and some of his other photos that are my favorites.
Please visit his website balletzaida.com and become a fan on facebook and of course follow him on twitter. He’s very talented and updates with new photos pretty often.
Dylan Ward (© Oliver Endahl)
Dylan Ward and Myles Thatcher (© Oliver Endahl)
Elizabeth Powell (© Oliver Endahl)
Kristina Lind (© Oliver Endahl)
My fellow "Winger" Madison Keesler (©Oliver Endahl)
Eva Burton (© Oliver Endahl)
Nicole Voris (© Oliver Endahl)
Kimberly Braylock and Robert Goodman (© Oliver Endahl)
Elizabeth Powell and Evan Hewer (© Oliver Endahl)
GISELLE REHERSAL
Hi, well we’re about to start the 2010 season with Ballet de Santiago. Next week we have Giselle premiere, so all these photos are from the same rehearsal and very soon I will post from performances, I hope you enjoy. Here in Chile all the people are trying to go back to normal life after the earthquake, and I want to give thanks for all the messages I received from people wanting to know if I was ok, thanks so much.
GISELLE (ADAM - NAGY)
PRINCIPAL STAR LUIS ORTIGOZA
PRINCIPAL STAR LUIS ORTIGOZA
PRINCIPAL STAR LUIS ORTIGOZA
PRINCIPAL STAR LUIS ORTIGOZA
PRINCIPAL STAR LUIS ORTIGOZA
PRINCIPAL STAR LUIS ORTIGOZA
PRINCIPAL STAR LUIS ORTIGOZA AND PRINCIPAL NATALIA BERRIOS
MARILYN BURR AND PRINCIPAL STAR LUIS ORTIGOZA
PRINCIPAL STAR LUIS ORTIGOZA AND PRINCIPAL NATALIA BERRIOS
PRINCIPAL STAR LUIS ORTIGOZA AND PRINCIPAL NATALIA BERRIOS
San Francisco Ballet is jumping into the world of new media
I’m very excited to share a new section of San Francisco Ballet’s website that is dedicated strictly to new media!
http://www.sfballet.org/interact/index.asp
I believe that new media is a wonderful way for the ballet world to connect and I’m very happy to be part of a company that is exploring everything new media has to offer. Within this new section you can find videos, pictures, blogs, podcasts, and more. I would definitely suggest you check it out!
At The Ballet
This summer I’ve shot everything from angry water creatures to the occasional roadside seductress, but the one thing I didn’t shoot much of during my time in Montana is what I spend most of my time shooting in New York: dance. That all changed yesterday when I did a promo shoot for one of the local studios with a few of the most senior girls and a few of the youngest. It was an exciting challenge and I’m more pleased with the results than expected.
Vail 1st Three Days Photos
Here are a few of my favorites:
Chris at work. Photo by Caitie Kakigi
Savion. Photo by Rex Keep.
Celebrate the Beat education program kids Photo by Caitie Kakigi.
Morphoses rehearsal- Tiler Peck and Ed Watson Photo by Caitie Kakigi.
Miami City Ballet just landed, they’re next onstage with an all Balanchne program on Saturday. Serenade outside under the moon… yes!
Damian
Paris in Spring
Our week long engagement of Martha Graham Dance Company at the Theare du Chatelet ended last Saturday evening. It was a wonderful run for the company and for Parisiennes.
Cherry Blossom over Notre Dame
It was a perfect season for visiting Paris. Flowers are blooming, it was warmer than NY and no rain( except 1 day)!!!
We left Saturday night, arrived on Sunday afternoon. It was “Easter Sunday”. In France, following Monday is also a national holiday. So our day off was a holiday… that means NO SHOPPING… well museums are open! Some of us went Rodin Museum, Picasso Museum, Luvre… you name it. It’s all there so which ever you pick, you will have tremendous time. That is Paris!
For me, it was a day to see few of my friends. So I had nice time with my friends, walked Marais area to Montparnasse where we stayed( Hotel Concorde Montparnasse). Passed Notre Dame, Jardin de Luxemburg, cafe…
On Tuesday, our heavy days are starting.
Company class, Dress rehearsal and the opening performance. We started at 10:30am.By the time we finish the day, it was 10:30pm. It was a sold out performance!
The last time we were here was 1991, we danced at Paris Opera Theatre, Garnier. So it has been 18years…actually we were here in 1994 or 95 at out door performance at Palais Royal. So not that long ago I guess but still more than 10 years?
We opened with “Errand into the Maze” beautiful music by Menotti, and set design by Isamu Noguchi. I recently read Isamu’s biography(?) by Japanese woman. I wished that when I met him back then, that I knew he could speak Japanese… so I could ask him a lot of things in Japanese… Oh well…
Second was ” Divirsion of Angels” music by Norman Dello Joio. This ballet has three acpects of Love which indicate the color of white, red and yellow.
There was a trail color film by Kodac, moving film with color and first trial was MG’s “Lamentation”. It was not a complete ballet but appear as her study of this ballet. Janet Eilber, who is the artistc director of MGDC had a concept that choreographer inspired by this particular film to creat new works for MGDC is called ” Lamentation Variations”.For the first time, we had Richard Move, Aszure Barton and Larry Keigwin from New York. They each had 10 hours of reheasrsal time and use public domain music and casual attire for the costume. I was involved with Larry’s and Aszure’s pieces. Very different approach. I will need to write about this experience later as an entry.
then forth was “Cave of the Heart”. I danced Medea, who were heart broken by her husband Jason to take a young princess as his new wife. Beautiful music by Barber, set by Isamu. I danced a role, the Daughter of the King, now called Princess. Originally created for Yuriko, who taught me when I was casted to dance this role. I did not learn from video. Yuriko talks about when Martha told her about making this ballet,
” Yuriko,this dance is about Medea and her husband, Jason, and he will leave Medea to marry this young, beautiful princess. This whole story is about what jealousy can do to a woman. Then character you will portray, the princess , is pure, very innocent, not tained in anyway. She has no malicious feelings towards anyone/anything, and does not suspect anything. Medea is going to try and kill her. You do not see her as a dangerous person, you gesture - do that to me in a very inoccent way. The princess is very beautiful but she does not realize her beauty and she loves Jason blindly and totally and does not know the background that has taken place between Medea and Jason.”( Yuriko an American Japanese Dancer: To Wash in the Rian and Polish with the Wind/ by Emiko Tokunaga )
I remember Yuriko told me how innocent you could be, that makes Medea’s Jealousy stands out. It is a dance of 4 charactor and each of us has such a role to complete this work. and to me, this work is full Dance/Drama work. Has prologue, story and epilogue. And to dance Medea, I could get lost in dance, which I started to experience when I danced in “Deaths and Entrances”.
Then the last ballet was the last ballet that Martha created and completed,” Maple Leaf Rag”. Music by Jopplin, famous rag time music. When Martha gets stock with her creation, she used to call “Louis, play me the Maple Leaf Rag”. So this dance starts with that. We have MG’s voice, everytime I hear it, that makes me smile. Actually when she was working on the ballet ” Eyes of Goddess” she got stock and could not go on. Then we had a tour to Charleston, SC where she found Juggling Boad. SO she shipped it to NY then immediately we started to work with it. In the beggining, I thought it was for “Eyes of Goddess” and how we can put this boad( actually a big bench) on the stage? But I realized it is a new ballet!!! Oh well it was! We did many different things on it, under it or standing on it… many things. It started to form the piece, and finished very quickly. and it was her own ballets’ parody. She can make fun of her self in the end of her own life!!! That is amazing.
And that was our opening of Paris, Theatre du Chatelet. Of course I have more to share.
But What happened to NY Spring???
Eiffel Tower in the dusk
La Bayadere by Luis Ortigoza Ballet de Santiago rehearsal
Ballet de Santiago open the season 2009 with LA BAYADERE, Luis Ortigoza choreography. The premiere was in 2007 and after big success Marcia Haydée the Ballet de Santiago artistic director, choose La Bayadere to begin the celebration of the 50 years of the Ballet de Santiago.
- Luis Ortigoza Principal Star and The Bayadere choreographer
The Shades II act Ballet de Santiago
The Shades II Act Ballet de Santiago.
Lidia Olmos and Luis Ortigoza Ballet de Santiago
Marcela Goicoechea Principal Star Ballet de Santiago.
The Shades II Act Ballet de Santiago.
Luis Ortigoza
The Shades II Act Ballet de Santiago
The Fakir I Act Ballet de Santiago.
Luis Ortigoza Ballet de Santiago.
The Shades II Act Ballet de Santiago.
Marcela Goicoechea.
Luis Ortigoza.
The Shades Ballet de Santiago.
The Shades Ballet de Santiago.
Ballet de Santiago.
Ballet de Santiago.
Luis Ortigoza Ballet de Santiago.
La Bayadere Backstage 1 - Coreografía Luis Ortigoza - Ballet de
