Archive for san francisco ballet school
November 19, 2008 at 2:49 am · Filed under dance, san francisco, san francisco ballet, california, san francisco ballet school, DYLAN
Since our first show (in Golden Gate Park) the trainee’s have done shows almost once a week. We performed a show for the major donors at the Napa Valley Opera House, a few shows at private schools in Marin County and San Francisco and most recently went to perform in Sacramento with another ballet school.
Its always interesting to see the reaction of high school students to their introduction to ballet. There is always a sort of awkward mood in the audience when the first guy in tights takes the stage but usually by the end of the piece they are all calm and hopefully have enjoyed the ballet. A lot of younger students have never really been introduced to the arts like ballet students have and sometimes I forget about this just because I have been around dance since I was 10 and live in a dorm of 24 other ballet dancers. It’s not that these people are ignorant (although some are) they just have not been introduced to the art of ballet. I think its important to show the variety of ballet to younger generations to show that its not the stereotype anymore of little girls in tutu’s. The Trainee program’s rep is so great because it is so broad and shows so many levels of ballet. We are doing “classical” ballet like Grand Pas Classique and Helgi Tomasson’s Menuetto , more “Neo-Classical” like Tomasson’s Handel: A Celebration and some very new and beautiful ballet’s done by Neumeier and Parrish Maynard.
Our Next Shows are 3 performances in the end of the month with the San Francisco Chamber Orchestra’s Family Concert series in Berkley, San Mateo and San Francisco. We are performing 3 of Helgi’s ballets, Handel: A Celebration, 7 for Eight and Menuetto. I am dancing the male solo in Handel for two of the shows and I am really excited to be performing to a live orchestra for the first time. I hope that it will be exciting so wish me luck!
Here are a few photo’s from the past couple of weeks
The VERY small but very nice Napa Valley Opera House
Kristina Lind and Stephen Jacobson in Helgi Tomasson’s 7 for Eight
Kristina Lind and Stephen Jacobson in Helgi Tomasson’s 7 for Eight
Jordan Hammond , Steven Morse and Myles Thatcher in Helgi Tomasson’s Menuetto
Jordan Hammond and Myles Thatcher in rehearsal for Helgi Tomasson’s Menuetto
Stephen Jacobson, Dylan Ward and Harrison James Wynn rehearsing John Neumeier’s Yondering
Mattia Cambiaghi, Jordon Hammond and Myles Thatcher in Neumeier’s Yondering
Mattia Cambiaghi, Jordon Hammond and Myles Thatcher in Neumeier’s Yondering
Jordan Hammond and Koto Ishihara rehearsing
Steven Morse and Koto Ishihara in rehearsal
Kimberly Braylock and Harrison James Wynn in Edgar Zendejas’ Crumbling
Recent Posts by Dylan
October 10, 2008 at 5:03 am · Filed under dance, san francisco, performing, san francisco ballet, performances, san francisco ballet school, DYLAN, dylan ward, helgi tomasson
So this is my first post for The Winger and I’m really exciting to share my experiences as a SFBS Trainee for the next year. The Trainee program is somewhat of a bridge between the gap of school and company. The Trainee program consists of 12 dancers from all over the world chosen by SF Ballet artistic director Helgi Tomasson and SFBS director Lola de Avila and is led by Jean-Yves Esquerre. We perform from October to May throughout northern California and also perform in the SFBS student showcase at the end of the school year.
Here are the this years trainees (Boys L to R: Dylan Ward, Harrison James Wynn, Stephen Jacobson, Mattia Cambiaghi, Myles Thatcher and Steven Morse)(Girls L to R: Jordan Hammond, Brynn Gilbert, Koto Ishihara, Kimberly Braylock, Kristina Lind, Sylvie Volosov)
Our first performance was this past Saturday at the grand opening of the California Academy of Sciences on this beautiful outdoor stage at Golden Gate Park. Here we performed Helgi Tomasson’s Menuetto, a pas de deux from Tomasson’s Handel: A Celebration, a contemporary pas de deux called Crumbling and Parrish Maynard’s Fractals.
One of the greatest parts of being a part of the program this year is originating a new role in Parrish Maynard’s new ballet, Fractals. The Trainee Director Jean-Yves Esquerre asked Parrish, who has choreographed for SFBS Student Showcase before, to create a contemporary ballet for the trainee’s this year. Fractals is about 15 minutes long in one movement and is performed by three couples and is set to exciting electronic music. Each couple has a separate pas de deux and and everyone has their own solo as well as several group dances.
This show was so much fun and i feel like it went really well considering we only started the school year less than a month before this show and practically fried our brains trying to remember all of the choreography. Here are some pictures from our first performance.
The outdoor stage in Golden Gate Park
Myles Thatcher, Jordan Hammond and Steven Morse in Helgi Tomasson’s Minuetto
James Wynn, Brynn Gilbert and Dylan Ward in Parrish Maynard’s Fractals
Recent Posts by Dylan
June 6, 2008 at 3:09 pm · Filed under dance, hamburg ballet, san francisco ballet, companies, MADISON, cpyb, sanf francisco ballet, san francisco ballet school, madison keesler
I have some very exciting news! Starting sometime in late August I am no longer going to be a student. A little while back I was offered an apprenticeship with Hamburg Ballet in Germany! I can’t believe that I got so incredibly lucky, but I am very, very thankful. After working with John Neumeier in SFB’s 75th Anniversary Gala things just developed over time. The season starts August 25th so I will probably be moving out to Germany about a week before. Until then I will be taking a much needed break, followed by San Francisco Ballet’s five week summer program.
I know that it is going to be very different and probably very difficult for a little while but there was no way that I could turn down an opportunity like this. There is no guarantee that I will make it into the corps after this year so I am going to make sure to enjoy and explore everything in Europe while I have the chance. I am also going to make a point to tell you about all of it. So, be expecting more post and while I will be talking a lot about my experiences at Hamburg Ballet I am sure you will be hearing a lot about my new life and experiences living in a new country.
If you would like more information on the company go to www.hamburgballett.de
Tags: Germany, Ballet, Bio, Hamburg,
Recent Posts by Madison Keesler
October 7, 2007 at 8:26 pm · Filed under dance, san francisco, san francisco ballet, MADISON, san francisco ballet school, madison keesler
I am here in San Francisco! I am officially living here and I am attending the San Francisco Ballet School. I am in level 8 and I love it! It is very different from CPYB, with good and bad differences. Level 8’s main teacher is Parish Maynard, which is a blast. He has a very good class, and that is most definitely an understatement.
I think if I were to pick any year to come to SFB I picked the right year. It is the 75th anniversary of both the company and the school so there are many amazing things planned. The rep of the company is spectacular. I am so excited to be able to watch every single performance! The last program is going to be one of the best parts. They have 10 choreographers coming in and creating 10 world premiers. The choreographers are Julia Adam, Val Caniparoli, Jorma Elo, Margaret Jenkins, James Kudelka, Mark Morris, Yuri Possokhov, Paul Taylor, Stanton Welch, and Christopher Wheeldon. With a list like that I am sure you can understand why I am so excited. Another thing that is making this year so great is that they just renovated the Jackson house. The Jackson house is where the ballet can house some, about 25, dancers. It is located in Pacific Heights which is one of the best areas in San Francisco, so I feel very lucky to be able to live here. There are 24 of us living in the house this year and it has been so much fun so far.
Here is a picture of the outside of the Jackson house.
Below is a view of the bay…this view is what I see if I walk a block up my street.
So that is the first update about me being in San Francisco! I will write more soon!
Recent Posts by Madison Keesler
August 5, 2007 at 3:31 pm · Filed under dance, student, san francisco, MADISON, summer school, san francisco ballet school
Posted by Madison Keesler
San Francisco ended July 27. I can’t believe how quickly the summer went by. I have exciting news though; starting in the fall I am going to attend the San Francisco Ballet School! I was accepted into level 8 with full-tuition scholarship and a spot at the Jackson House. The Jackson House is located in Pacific Heights and it is where they house 26 dancers. I am ecstatic to start the year there!
This was my third summer in SF and some things about this summer were a little different then previous. I got the opportunity to work with Amy Raymond who taught a William Forsythe workshop to the top two levels at SFBS. It was an amazing experience. I have always loved the work of Forsythe, but now I have a completely different respect for it. We learned the concepts that Billy uses in all of his choreography, such as the laban cube, and inversion. We also got to learn part of Artifact Suite.
Another thing that was different about SFBS this summer were the teachers. I was in level 8 this summer, as well as last summer, and it was a very different schedule. We got teachers who normally only teach the Men and Partnering. For the list of excellent teachers there you could go http://sfballet.org/school/abouttheschool/faculty.asp
Over all I had an awesome summer and it being my third summer would obviously recommend it.
another view of the golden gate…
A sign on the way to the famous Haight Street
Recent Posts by Madison Keesler
