Obligatory link to Sarah Kaufman's complaint about the dominance of the Balanchine aesthetic in contemporary ballet.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/conte...9050704620.html

[moved from a continuation of another thread]

She says everything I believe . . .

I have to say, I think she is exactly right (except about Bourne).

If ballet is stagnant because there aren't any geniuses among Balanchine's choreographic disciples, what leads her to believe that imitating Ashton or Tudor is going to produce that genius?

It's hard to imagine that Kaufman has been watching ongoing performances of Balanchine by San Francisco Ballet, Pacific Northwest Ballet, and Ballet Arizona when she writes:



That's not to say I haven't seen emotionally inscrutable performances by Natalia Magnicaballi at BA or Batkhurel Bold at PNB, for example, but time after time, I've seen anything but skinny, emotionally guarded dancers. (They are fast, though.) And I'll take the naked stage over Tony Walton's sets for SFB's "Jewels" any day of the week.

When she wrote



I doubt she had seen Ginger Smith and Astrit Zejnati or Tzu-Chia Huang and Ross Clarke in the Kay Mazzo/Peter Martins roles in one of Balanchine's most abstract creations, "Stravinsky Violin Concerto", in which each couple painted a strikingly different portrait of a relationship through choices in phrasing and dynamics in complete service to the score. The audience met the end of Aria II by the first couple with an intense silence and by the second with audible sighs. I doubt the ache of real life escaped anyone.

These are not isolated examples that I've seen in the last decade.

Looking toward Ashton and Tudor for inspiration may not lead to genius but at least it would offer an alternative to the wall-to-wall Balanchine and pallid Balanchine imitations we see today.

Possibly, but I suspect you'll end up with pallid Ashton and Tudor imitations.

A couple of the best ballets I've seen since the death of Balanchine had his mark on them: Paul Gibson's "The Piano Ballet", and a wonderful little piece to Webern than Daniel Duell choreographed for a small group of dancers at Jacob's Pillow in the mid-80's.

Ah, volcanohunter, but at least the pallid Ashton and Tudor imitations will be different and less routine imitations . . .

Seconding the post by Helene, above, and having seen those particular examples at Ballet Arizona -- if it is all that abstract, why do people cry? Oh yes, they do. Men, too. They laugh, they cry, they sigh, and all the rest. Recorded music and all, well-performed Balanchine allows dancers, in all their humanity and individuality, to both stimulate the intellect and resonate with the soul, plot or no plot. In fact, when dancers are emotionally guarded in Balanchine pieces, it is noticiable and unsatisfying. For instance, also at Ballet Arizona, Chelsea Wilcox, while fully physically capable, is not yet up to the level of other company principals, specifically because of this. Roman Zavarov, as Apollo, for all his physical beauty, would be little without the range of expression he provided.

I'll buy some of it, including the relationship to artists working contemporaneously -- but not the blanket condemnation.

I take some of Kaufman’s points, but it was depressing to see her exhuming ancient criticisms of Balanchine as being abstract, remote, and lacking in good old human feeling. (“Ballet needs to get its humanity back,” etc.) It became harder to take the article seriously when Kaufman offered up the notion of hiring Matthew Bourne as “thinking outside the box.”

I will allow that I haven’t seen any gas station attendants or ranch hands on the ballet stage lately, but I don’t often meet them in real life, either, unless I’m filling up the tank at one of the rare places where full service is available or attending the rodeo.

I suppose if ballet were to reflect truly the realities of contemporary American culture, we would have ballets about life in office cubicles (“Dilbert: the Ballet”? Maybe somebody could have a go at “Office Space”?)

Thanks for the comments, everyone. Keep talking.

Isn't the Balanchine Ballet a bit of a straw man for Kaufman? Dancers' limited acting skills may be, for instance, more closely related to specialization as ballet, like all arts and all sports, has become more demanding in pure physicality. One can imagine a number of other contributing societal causes, some relating to performers, some to audiences, others to the funding (which is mentioned). In other words, accepting the legitimacy of her concerns, wouldn't it be the case that the causes have societal roots ... rather than a causal connection to performing or preferring Balanchine works.

Interesting to contemplate Dirac's comment -- is urbanization itself a cause, as lack of colorful "characters" recede and the relative anonimity of the city takes over ....

Bourne isn't the answer to anything; his work is something between the drawing of mustaches on the Mona Lisa and the self-referentiality that the article decries. Balanchine, while "dabbling" in movie choreography, produced an uproarious version of Swan Lake which a lot of people have taken for a veracious picture of what ballet actually is!

But something seems to be missing, here. Ubiquity is disparaged and yet, the realization that propinquity begets ubiquity seems to have been forgotten. Balanchine was working in America, and it's a big place! Lots of wannabes were bound to be produced simply by the process of imitation being the sincerest form of flattery. What I would like to know is: Where are the Ashton wannabes? Wheeldon seems to be a natural heir apparent, but doesn't pretend to the title. The UK can't depend on getting a genius like Ashton - indeed, no place can - every quarter-century; even he came to England via Ecuador and Peru. Balanchine came to America by another sort of track, but it's largely good fortune that both ended up where they did! Americans and Britons both saw both choreographers at their best, and practically simultaneously. Perhaps it is simply because short story ballets are so much work to produce.

Actually, dirac, the "ballet" about contemporary life you describe sounds pretty close to Anna Sokolow's Rooms . . .

I agree with dirac. While I feel Kaufman has some valid points, I disagree with her line that Balanchine favored "fast, skinny, emotionally guarded dancers." I don't doubt she sees this sometimes but it's because Balanchine choreographic followers (I'll call them post-Modern ballet creators) miss the whole, encompassing view of Balanchine's work. His work was not devoid of story (think of his famous quote - just because it's abstract doesn't mean there's no meaning. When a man and a woman are on stage together, there's already a story), not all of them were devoid of scenery, and for a man who worked so closely with Karinska and other designers, he cared about costumes too. But post-Modern choreographers just riff on Agon (without any of the skill that ballet showed) and forget all the other ballets like Steadfast Tin Soldier or rethinks of ballets such as La Source or Raymonda Variations. Not every Balanchine ballet is a slash and burn, like William Forsythe or Jarmo Elo or even some Wheeldon. In fact, it is those performances of Balanchine's works that treat Agon or 4Ts like an Elo ballet that I find unacceptable.

However, it would certainly behoove ballet makers today to explore all of the great repertoire.

Isn't this the strongest argument against ballets that "reflect the realities of contemporary American culture"? Wouldn't Office Space: The Ballet seem equally alien to audiences 25 years from now?

Haven't Balanchine's ballets "aged better" precisely because they're abstracted and more archetypal as a result?

<<Haven't Balanchine's ballets "aged better" precisely because they're abstracted and more archetypal as a result?>>

Fancy Free and Jardin aux Lilas have help up pretty well even though they are narrative dances set in very specific times and places.

Have Balanchine's ballets aged better than others'? It's a matter of opinion. I think some have, and some haven't.

There must be some reason why so much of Balanchine is actively performed while most of Massine, sad to say, has disappeared.

For the record, I have absolutely nothing against narrative ballets. I also believe that the narrative vs. non-narrative dichotomy is a false one. The problem isn't that today's choreographers favour abstract ballet. The problem is that there are no choreographers with the genius of a Balanchine or an Ashton or a Tudor out there. Why would shifting emphasis to short narrative ballets succeed in manufacturing that genius?

It wouldn't. It might, however, start a trend of producing expressive, emotionally satisfying ballets rather than ones that are little more than technical exercises.

Not if the characters were well drawn.

Couselor Troi senses An Agenda.

Kaufman’s article is not the most internally consistent argument against House of Balanchine that I’ve encountered. There’s a lot to chew on and respond to, but four quotes struck me immediately in this regard:









1. I defy anyone to figure out what’s going on in “Lilac Garden” without reading the plot synopsis in the program notes.

2. Yes, it happens, but how many young Americans today must give up the person they love for the one that they don’t? Kaufman is talking about something most of us learn about from stories, not from our lives. Disappointed love? We've all been there. But the kind of renunciation going on in "Lilac Garden" is different from that; which is not to say that the story doesn't move us or that it doesn't resonate with our own experience. It just doesn't do so in the way Kaufman suggests it does. At the end of the day, how different is "Lilac Garden" from "La Bayadere"?

3. Kaufman needs to be explicit about the ways in which “Concerto DSCH” is an “exemplar of human relationships explored in ballet” or “has true characters and a palpable sense of drama” in a way that “Concerto Barocco” or "Apollo" is not / does not. We can use “Central Park in the Dark” if she needs a more in-your-face example from the Balanchine canon. If Ratmansky isn't using "atmosphere, musical response, pattern" or "the body" to tell us something about "the person" then what the heck is he using, and why isn't Balanchine doing the same thing.

4. I hope her argument doesn’t hang on the presence or absence of a bare stage (surely one could to “Lilac Garden” without the trees and frankly, I don’t even remember whether “Concerto DSCH” had scenery or not) or the presence or absence of “the common men and women.”

To quote Balanchine, how much story do you need? I suspect that Kaufman and I simply answer this question differently, or perhaps are moved by different stories.

I too get weary of ballets in the "Lifecasting," "River of Light," and "The Fifth Season" mode, but I'm not inclined to blame Balanchine for them, just as I'm not inclined to blame Pollock, De Kooning, and Rothko for half-baked abstract expressionism.

PS: A thought that I haven't worked out yet. Balanchine relied on any number of formal elements to help us with the “story.” Hierarchy is one, for example: we usually get a central couple, soloists & corps to help us map out the internal organization of the onstage community. “Hierarchy” in this sense doesn’t tell us who ranks higher so much as who and what we need to pay attention to sort out the story. Many of Balanchine’s heirs have abandoned hierarchy, but Ratmansky most certainly has not.

Here in New Jersey, all gas stations are "full service". It's illegal for the driver to pump their own gas.

But the attendants are no longer recognizable as such, I haven't seen a uniform in years.

Just thought you needed to know this...........

Seems to me that Kaufman's central argument is really nothing more than:

"I like some types of ballet more than others......why, oh why, isn't there more of the kind I like?"

OK, I get that you feel that way, and that you even know why you feel that way, but that doesn't make it truth or even criticism.

I, for example, don't find too much Balanchine on the program.....in fact, if anything, I wish there were more. That's me. And that's all it is. It surely doesn't mean that today's Artist Directors have lost touch with the genius of Balanchine, or that today's choreograghers are obsessed with telling a contemporary story (with too much emphasis on characterization) instead of sticking to the purity of neoclassism, or that today's dancers have lost touch with their basic art as they search for ever more challenging acting roles. It just means that I like Balanchine a lot.

I know what I like, and clearly she knows what she likes. I see nothing wrong with that. Perhaps the real issue is answering the challenge to find something to love in any ballet that has stood the test of time, or that has created a new sensation, in spite of what I happen to like.

Oregon is the same.

Can't believe we have to read yet another one of those "Balanchine ruined ballet" pieces that crop up every so often...this has to be one of the most useless of the lot. It's significant that Ms. Kaufman mentions the "visual" and "musical" joys of Balanchine choreography and dancing, but clearly that combination of the visual/physical and musical holds no drama for her. Edwin Denby once wrote that to be susceptible to poetic values in dance one had to be sensitive to both poetry and dance - these don't seem to be Kaufman's cup of tea. It's fine that she doesn't care for Balanchine, but does she really think she's going to convince anyone to share her narrow view? I think Balanchine's plot to take over the world's stages from beyond the grave will keep working in spite of her......

I thought Kaufman's important (and long overdue) essay raised two interesting questions:

1) Are the works of George Balanchine overrepresented in the active repertories of American ballet companies, and

2) Are today's choreographers (both those who danced w/ Balanchine and those who came of age after his death) looking too much to one mode of creative expression; thereby limiting their own potential creativity in the process?

Obviously, the members of this board will answer these questions differently based on how you feel about the entire Balanchine enterprise. I would offer an unequivocal "YES" to Question # 1 and I don't see that situation changing anytime soon. Given that former Balanchine dancers now sit in positions of power in New York (Peter Martins), Washington DC (Suzanne Farrell), North Carolina (Robert Weiss), North Carolina (Jean-Pierre Bonnefoux and Patricia McBride), Miami (Edward Villella), Chicago (Daniel Duell), Colorado (Damian Woetzel), Arizona (Ib Andersen), Los Angeles (Colleen Neary), San Francisco (Helgi Tomasson) and Seattle (Peter Boal), the tidal wave of Balanchine productions will likely continue for the foreseeable future.

As to the Question # 2, I would also answer with a resounding "YES". If I'm a ballet choreographer (particularly a young choreographer) trying to find work in the United States, I'm going to look at the collective listed above for clues as to where the road to commissions lies. And the answer would appear to be (to me, anyway) non-narrative dance delivered in the manner of George Balanchine. That's fine as far as it goes but it prompts me to ask a question of my own: If Balanchine's ballets are in fact "archetypal" and represent ballet taken to its absolute apex and limit, then what's left to do or say in that particular mode of ballet? Like the old saying goes: You can beat a dead horse all you want -- it ain't gonna give you a ride.

Maybe the way forward for choreographers (especially young choreographers) would be to look toward undertapped areas of exploration such as those mined by Ashton and Tudor. But that's the catch. If these young choreographers rarely see other modes of expression, how would they ever know that these modes may be more suited to their creative gifts than the Balanchine aesthetic is???

It's ironic. The ex-Balanchine dancers obviously love the Old Master. But I have to wonder if, in their zeal to spread the Master's work to the four corners of the world, they aren't unintentionally inhibiting the advance of the classical ballet in the 21st century.

Heading off to put on my fire retardant suit . . .

It seems to me that what Kaufman is saying is that artistically, following Balanchine is only going to take us so far. Many of Balanchine's creations are quite dazzling the first few times one sees them, but after that, his conventional choreographic devices start to wear on one, and there is frequently not much else there to support them. (His formulaic 'homage to Petipa' tutu ballets come to mind.) I find that the 'less is more' formula really did seem to work well for Balanchine: when he doesn't have sets or costumes or 'easy' music, his choreography is much more interesting, albeit perhaps only from the point of view of choreographic and/or technical theory. Unfortunately, his choreographic imitators do not have his ability with abstract and plotless dance, and while 'The Four Temperaments' and 'Agon' pushed the notions of what ballet was (and is), ballet choreographers have not taken us beyond that, and even their imitations lack his perfect, diamondlike structure. Thus, whereas Balanchine's black and white ballets have (IMO) the most choreographic substance even if robotically performed, his imitators give us expressionless dancers performing choreography that is not even interesting from a theoretical standpoint. However, skilled dancers and choreographers, even if not geniuses, can take even conventional steps and use them in service of expression. Tudor, Ashton, Bournonville, and Petipa all did this very well, but the electricity their ballets (and plenty of dancers performing today) can create is largely ignored by AD's and choreographers who think high legs, spinning, and fussy choreographic embroidery are the only things that sell tickets.

In short, Balanchine's ballets are lovely, but empty imitations of his style are just pale, lifeless copies, however fast the footwork and however contorted the limbs.

NOTE: Apologies, miliosr posted whilst I was writing.

It seems to me that what Kaufman is saying is that artistically, following Balanchine is only going to take us so far. Many of Balanchine's creations are quite dazzling the first few times one sees them, but after that, his conventional choreographic devices start to wear on one, and there is frequently not much else there to support them. (His formulaic 'homage to Petipa' tutu ballets come to mind.)

Couldn't disagree more - Raymonda Variations, for example, is an endlessly enthralling "homage to Petipa" that uses "conventional" steps in wonderfully witty, surprising and brilliant ways. I could watch it every night. Do agree that "following" Balanchine is pointless, in the sense of copying superficial aspects of his art without substance of ones own.

That is funny--I find Raymonda Variations nearly unwatchable but love Apollo, even though I find it dated. Different tastes. Perhaps it's because I grew up with Balanchine's style--I generally find his 'surprises' predictable.

I had the same thought. The Soulless Balanchine Ballet is like that Purist Balletomane of John Rockwell’s that Leigh used to talk about.



Couldn't agree less. As you say, Hans, different tastes.

Nice to see that we're getting so many different points of view here.

Seems to me that this "criticism" could be leveled at any discipline. Every field has its geniuses (thank heaven). My field is physics. I admire Richard Feynman in physics as I do Balanchine in ballet. Every physicist since Feynman uses "Feynman diagrams", does that limit the thinking of new bright physicists? I suppose it does. None the less, following the master Feynman is just what they ought to do, and want to do since they knew they stand before his genius. Newton held sway for a few hundred years, and probably held back some new idea or other (see the incredible film version of "Rosencrantz and Gildenstern Are Dead" for hilarious and apt demonstrations of this). But should Newton's ideas of absolute space and time have been put on the back burner so as not to limit new ideas? I don't think so for a minute.

ADs and choreographers don't limit themselves by the devotion they have for a master genius -- they do it because they know no one has fully fathomed the depths a once-in-a-era genius such as Balanchine or Newton hath wrought (edit: originally I said "wroth", clearly I don't know my Biblese). And we be fools to think we had. One of the hallmarks of the next dance genius will be that they are able to overthrow the master's sway without the help of us lesser beings. Einstein did it to Newton, and that's one way we knew Einstein was genius too.

Have patience. The man has only been dead for some 25 years!

Wow, such wise and heartening words. Thanks, Sandy.

Great post, Sandy, but I don’t think that those here who are questioning the omnipresence of Balanchine are suggesting that. No one is saying that the next great genius of ballet, assuming there is one, will be unable to cut his way out of the forest raised by Balanchine’s heirs. The concern is that over-emphasis on the work of one man and one aesthetic limits the vision of contemporary choreographers, who may not be geniuses but might be doing more varied and interesting work if ADs and other lesser beings were more open to the different approaches represented by Ashton and Tudor.

I think Kaufman does have some very good points about the necessity of healthy "genetic
diversity" in an art form. But I don't think Balanchine's overrepresented in American ballet. Would you rather see Valse Fantaisie or Dracula? THAT's overrepresented in American ballet.

I'd also argue his influence - I could understand Kaufman saying that 20-5 years ago, but frankly, Balanchine's influence is waning fast. Most companies aren't working any longer on a NYCB model, even those that once did such as SFB are moving from it. I see a lot more faux and fourth-tier Forsythe derivatives out there such as Jorma Elo. Or just bad dansicals.

Balanchine can look more third-tier than it is if the coaching and casting is bad, and that happens the farther we get from the source.

I agree in many ways with Kaufman's observation of symptoms but not of cause. Balanchine is not stifling artistic creativity. Bad, insular artistic direction and lack of funds are.

Well, that interests me. I've never cried at a Balanchine ballet, with one exception. And that was 20 years later, and had to do with the performance and specific elements of that performance only, not the work; or rather the work was secondary, and I know it was because I love the work, but don't 'cry over it'. But I don't 'require that I cry' for judging the merit of something, although I've cried at the work of others (one at least, and that was more because of wonderment at how it could ever be done, not that it was 'sad'). It's not that it's the 'abstract', because I might weep at something that was abstract. I knew a woman who cried at 'The Prodigal Son', but only when Baryshnikov was in it, and only because of that. And she'd cry every time she saw it on tape.

Edited to add: Having now read the article, I think it's very good and thought-provoking, whether or not all of it is 'perfect'. Good paragraph on epaulement in particular. She should have stopped short of the overdone title, that was bad strategy, because it probably stopped a lot of people from paying attention to the many very worthwhile details even before they started reading it. Lots of good ideas in it.

Exactly. As though the reason for the absence of great composers today is orchestras playing too much Beethoven. If only they played more contemporary program music (is there such a thing?), the talented would-be composers out there would feel less inhibited and start composing great music. Somehow I don't think that Beethoven needed to be shielded from Palestrina, Monteverdi, Bach and Mozart in order to thrust his artistic revolution on the world. I'm sure that the young composer of today loses nothing by immersing him- or herself in Beethoven, just as the young choreographer can only gain from prolonged exposure to Balanchine.

:volcanohunter

I like that...especially in reference to Sarah Kaufman's comment:



Stravinsky and Bach I thought was amusing.

A few other things about the article. Rubies is a complete ballet, not an excerpt. Balanchine was immersed in Russian avant garde influences in Russia, as well as 19th century ballet forms, well before he went to France--SK skips over this. The Bauhaus was not a unilateral school, and indeed had deep humanist traditions. Paul Klee and Johannes Itten both taught there alongside Mies. (Moholy Nagy was the bad guy who telephoned in his paintings to be fabricated offsite and scared everyone by this cold way of making art.)

Crying is a funny thing.

As a male, I've always felt at odds because I cry so much. I enjoy crying. It's a sort of release while feeling overwhelmed by beauty. I don't accept the premise that crying equates with being sad (as you implied elsewhere in your post). Surely sometimes it does. I cried when a friend died not too long ago -- that was sad, but far more often I cry because I am moved by something that "feels" universal. Sometimes it's about awe, sometimes about love, sometimes it's about truth, sometimes about exquiste beauty. I can tell you one thing, it's always about emotion. I'm a bit of an emotion junkie. I enjoy feeling it. It makes me feel alive. So for me crying in a ballet (which I do often) is a tribute to the power of what I'm seeing. The ballet, be it the choreography, the dancer's performance, or the story, has moved me in some profoundly human way. For that I am grateful. Perhaps I am not your "typical" guy, but for me one common way I acknowledge being moved and feeling emotion is to cry. And if I cry, you can be pretty sure the observed has merit......that particular reaction has been a pretty reliable barometer for me over the years.

Okay, if I put it with your remarks, you see I said exactly the same thing you did--both things. It's sometimes about sadness, but in the other matter, I used 'wonderment at how something could be done', instead of 'feels universal'. They both have to do with beauty or truth or both. I just cry if I do, I don't do it often, no matter how moved, but I'm not ashamed of it either, else I wouldn't have written that I do it at all. Has nothing to do with male or female, despite the stereotypes. Well, as for it being 'about emotion', it has to be about emotion, there isn't anything else crying could be about. Interesting that you say you 'enjoy crying'. I do in some cases, but that's changed over the years. It used to be more of an indulgence, now I never cry unless I'm overwhelmed, and that doesn't feel like an indulgence (no judgment on anyone else's crying, we can't know most other people in those ways. It is true that the one Balanchine ballet I mentioned that made me cry 20 years after seeing it had to do with sadness--which doesn't mean that the vehicle, the choreography, was not well-suited for carrying that emotion forward, but that was secondary. It's one of my favourite ballets, but if I saw it danced again, I wouldn't cry, I'm sure of it. It had to do with that specific performance and circumstance and no other.

I think that was what Kaufman was saying about the influence of Artistic Directors. Genius doesn't sit around waiting for an invitation or a contract. A creative genius creates because he or she has to, and s/he gets a bunch of like-minded people to collaborate, if s/he needs performers. S/he rents a warehouse, or in Balanchine's case, a high school, or finds another place to perform. Or s/he has a day job (Balzac, Ives, Zola, Tharp) and funds his/her work. If they are inspired by narrative, they'll choreograph narrative ballets.

A very talented choreographer/Principal Dancer at PNB, Olivier Wevers, is forming his own small company to perform his choreography. He's making it happen, not waiting to be handed a main stage.


Ashton was very varied in his work, and did abstract as well as story ballets. Assuming this means narrative ballets, Artistic Directors are chomping at the bit for new story ballets, to which I can attest having done the Calendar for the last three years, some of which makes me cringe.

Balanchine protegees are cited as having a single aesthetic, but I don't think that is borne out by the rep or by the most talented resident choreographers (Possokhov, formerly Wheeldon, Ratmansky). The more workman-like AD choreographers might, but Ballet Arizona's programs this year included three full-lengths, a Wheeldon/Fokine/Tharp triple bill, and an all-Balanchine. (I think we lost a new Andersen ballet when program six was canceled.) Robert Weiss at Carolina Ballet is the principal choreographer, but the rep this year was five full-length story ballets, a Robbins/Weiss/Bongar triple bill, and a Weiss/Taylor-Corbett program. Taylor-Corbett's work is described as "inspired by Amnesty International...At times dark and disturbing, this piece also explores our ability to endure and persist, allowing hope for humanity to flower in our hearts." Hard to imagine which Balanchine ballet that would describe.

This year's PNB triples bills have been "Jewels", an all-Tharp (including two new works), a Broadway mixed bill (Robbins/Stroman/Wheeldon/Balanchine), and a Robbins/Wheeldon/Balanchine closer. Next season, we get Maillot's "Romeo et Juliette", three full-length story ballets, a Kylian/Goecke/new Caniparoli/Robbins program, a 4-Dove program, and an all-Balanchine. The only things I've seen by Caniparoli are "Lambarena" and "The Bridge", neither of them terribly Balanchinean, and the latter with a story.

The throw-out-the-baby-with-the bathwater syndrome happened in those companies that were tied to the legacy of their genius choreographers: the Royal Ballet with Ashton, who was accused of quelching the young, maverick talent of MacMillan and was quelched himself, and ABT with Tudor. The closest thing to protegees who are protecting the seedlings are New York Theatre Ballet with Tudor and Iain Webb in Sarasota for Ashton, if choreographers need exposure to these.

What does it say about the classical ballet as a major art form if it cannot generate diverse choreographers of stature (or even talented craftsmen) on a more regular basis? I can only speak for myself but an artistic discipline that has to wait 25/50/75/100 years for a "savior" to come along to rescue it is a discipline doomed to minor art status.

If the nature of the art form is so rareified that very few (Ashton, Balanchine, Tudor) can do it well, then a "savior" who comes along to overturn the apple cart (which, by the way, I don't believe is what Balanchine did) will only ever be a singular success -- the followers cannot replicate the "genius" and the result is a floodtide of mediocre imitations. (Evidence A from the prosecution: The former New York City Ballet dancers. Is anyone going to make a serious case that the existence of Balanchine resulted in lasting work from Peter Martins, Helgi Tomasson, Kent Stowell or Robert Weiss? Or that the work of second generation Balanchine adherents like Melissa Barak and Benjamin Millepied will be any more lasting??)

If Balanchine was, in fact, a "once-in-an-era genius" then I get back to one of my original points: He has said everything that can be said in that particular key and it's time to move on to something else. What Balanchine wrought may represent the apex of what the classical ballet can achieve and express. But it may also be a vein of creation in which no one else is suited to explore.

As for the examples presented by Helene, the same names (Balanchine/Robbins/Tharp/Wheeldon) appearing over and over again says it all about the increasing homogenization of ballet repertories. (I'll give Peter Boal a mild pass because of the Ulysses Dove evening. Feckless but at least different.)

Though I could watch a different Balanchine ballet every night of the year and be very happy, I tend to agree with Sarah Kaufmann, in that making mediocre Balanchine ballets is easier than making mediocre Ashton or Tudor short story ballets, because stringing together an unrelated series of steps is easier than putting together a coherent story, so probably it would be better training if young choreographers tried to tell a story--though I would never ever want to sit through that San Francisco Ibsen ballet again! Though she didn't say so, I think economics is another big reason for so many bad baby Balanchines (I tend to put Forsythe and the egregious Elo in that camp since Forsythe says he learned from Balanchine), because story ballets tend to needs sets and costumes which are expensive, and abstract ballets just need leotards and lighting, which are cheaper.

These two together get to the core of it all. However much we may wish to disdain 'relevance' in some sense, relevance in terms of being able to generate choreographers, etc., as miliosr has put it so well, has to then do this. If it is finished with Balanchine (I don't kinow if it is), then there will just be the museum-piece prestige item continuing. But the 'genius not waiting around for an invitation or a contract' is part of the equation too. If ballet has real validity in further continuance, rather than just preservation and pleasant tinselly effllorescences from time to time, it will find these geniuses, as per miliosr and Adorno. The artist conveys, carries the artwork forward by virtue of the form not having been exhausted. He CANNOT do it in a vacuum. Ballet's greatest days could well be over (and I imagine they are), while still having other 'symptoms' that make it seem 'greater than ever'--such as dissemination to all the provinces and many more competent companies all over the world.

It's as with concert pianists and others. There were many great pianists in the 20th century, some Olympian like Horowitz and Richter, but even these came nowhere near the sheer hugeness of ripeness and incomparable fulfillment of Franz Liszt, whose very life was an adventure in richness of all kinds, all of which only enhanced his virtuoso playing. He was like a rock star as a celebrity. The great pianists of the 20th century and beyond are very circumscribed as they develop new packaging and specializations, try to find something 'that nobody has gotten around to yet'. The great days of concert piano, in other words, were OVER even though great work continued anyway. It's definitely true of all the major traditional arts, opera, ballet, and also in the more popular arts. I believe dirac was talking a while back about the exhaustion of film noir, which I agree is finished. The Broadway musical still has occasional charm, but its great days have long been over, and there's really no reason to think there will be any reversal of this. And do we really even want it, if it truly is exhausted? Of course we do not. The only question is then to find out if a form is exhaused, and can just exist as a 'minor art form', a kind of 'backwater'. Media is outstripping culture very fast, this is unarguable. The masses are more interested in how they get their culture than what it is. Right now even John Kerry's talk about the newspaper being an endangered species (I think that's what he said) has all the op-ed people going to town. CD's are a;ready outmoded by iTunes, and DVDs are going the way of all becoming-obsolescent phenomena (and, of course, these are only media forms themselves, not culture). When you've got Japanese girls writing cellphone novels and making money on them, a lot of numbers begin to feel as if they're up (and that's already 2-3 years since I heard that vile report.)

Even so, miliosr's 'singular suceess' is still to be hoped for, as when a new film comes along which proves that someone can pull up something even if the form itself seems to be steadily degraded.

One possibility that hasn't been mentioned much is that someone from way out in a seemingly non-ballet nation or situation might be able to transform all the old stuff, seeing it all anew, but I agree with miliosr that none of Balanchine' proteges have done it, even when they've run companies well. It has to be fresh are just get MANNERED, which happens to all art forms at some point (or in some movements of them, because obviously painting only continued all the more robustly after Dutch Mannerism's glory days.)

I think Helene is onto something that SK's aesthetic focus de-emphasizes: that repertory decisions are made by myriad actors in particular cultural contexts. SK uses "ballet" often as the subject of her sentences--"Ballet Must Make Room Onstage for More Than One Genius," "Ballet has to get its humanity back"--fuzzing the focus on the people who create, distribute, maintain, and promote the art: ADs, independent choreographers, EDs, and presenters. Like many dance critics she shies away from digging into and discussing the material conditions that shape repertory decisions, which are never as straightforward as they seem. The roots of a stagnant repertory problem are deeper than SK will admit (such as the problems of little-to-no training for choreographers in ballet, a lack of artistic/institutional long-term vision or leadership, reduced opportunities to allow choreographers to collaborate and/or to fail, etc.).

I don't think SK's aesthetic arguments are compelling at all--abstraction can be deeply moving for many, whether rendered on canvas, in music, or bodies on stage, and furthermore people have been talking about this for more than a century--but her piece is suggestive in re the lemminglike qualities of many dance EDs and presenters who will blame all but themselves for poor or uninteresting repertory: audience expectations, money, lack of talent, etc.

"Ballet started out here on a decidedly human scale: It nosed around gas pumps Lew Christensen's "Filling Station"), sailing ships (Eugene Lorings's "Yankee Clipper"), and farm folk (Catherine Littlefields's "Barn Dance")"


So Cowboys (Western Symphony), athletic contests (Agon), Majorettes (Stars and Stripes), and commercial theater (Who Cares?) are not "human scale" or down home enough?
I love how Balanchine would look at these "American" topics with affectionate humor and create a ballet that endures.


"Most of his works evoke a cool, purified, distant universe. And always, refinement:"


Is this a bad thing?


If the creative side of ballet is stagnant because of too many Balanchine imitators then it seems ridiculous to blame the original. Balanchine's vision was a reaction to AND a compliment to the ballet aesthetic that came before him, just as the next ballet creative genius will move it forward.

And miliosr, lucky for you my flamethrower is out of gas .

Yes, glad you repeated that, the one truly loathsome sentence in the piece, truly a howler. She's almost contradicting everything else she calls for in her 'asking-please-for' post-Balanchine rant.




Yes, but important to point out that it's moving in a different way. Fact is, some abstract work can seem 'romantic' to some. But nobody responds to Xennakis and Stockhausen the way they do to Tchaikovsky or Chopin. It's not even possible. Being moved to tears is something we've been discussing as the thread has progressed, but I doubt that anyone was ever overcome with emotions of the heart from Boulez's 'Repons'. I've heard it performed twice in concert, and conducted by Boulez, but while totally dazzled, certainly it's not about any of the 'human themes'. A modernist film like 'Last Year at Marienbad', is clearly all sex, even when 'x' says 'I loved you' to 'a', he is not talking about getting married and starting a family. In other words, you can definitely be moved by this film, for example, because it's HOT, but not because the relationship of the two knockouts is 'touching and tender'. A less extreme example, then, is Balanchine as opposed to the old Petipa classics. I know lots of people who would still much rather see a shabby Burger King 'Sleeping Beauty', than have to 'endure' Apollo or 'Davidsbundlertanze. There's already a coolness in Balanchine that is not in the work from which he evolved. And there all sorts of minutiae to this: You get a great partnership between Farrell and Martins, breathtaking yes; but it is in no way that fully realized duo that Fonteyn/Nureyev had, who were dancing together, not together and apart, which is what Farrell and Martins were doing (I liked it, and it expresses different kinds of things, but it's not the same kind of warmth. I saw Nureyev and Fonteyn only separately in person, Martins and Farrell numerous times, but even on video, Rudi/Margot partnership is more intertwined. You can feel their real personal affection, and smoe could say that is irrelevant, but it is there for all the world to see, and you can't miss it, it is adorable.) Things like that. But there was still, even with the Balanchine coolness, a lot of Romanticism in many of the ballets--maybe even most of them. They are not as plangent as some modern dance works, but then they're not supposed to be. This happened less in music that was in the vanguard, and only the most kinowledgeable connoisseurs are going to call Boulez's Second Sonata 'romantic'. Atlhough it is, it is never going to be popularly hears as such--until there is a lot more robotic and singularity-type evolution, so that all that difficult High Modernism seems to be 'quaint' at some point. But with things like 'Jewels' and anything done to Tchaikovsky, you have instant Romanticism no matter what, so that the works in the vanguard of the Arts at a given time do not nearly always parallel each other.

Maybe not, but they've done what Artistic Directors have done over time: create rep to feed their company at no cost above their salary. I don't know Weiss' at all, and I think Martins' is limited in keeping the dancers' chops up to speed for a large range of styles.

Tomasson and Stowell, at least, are talented craftsmen -- Ib Andersen is more than that, especially with his story ballets, since he hasn't seen to jettison his Danish roots in story-telling and creating a community onstage -- and they feed/fed their companies a range of rep that was needed at any give time and which keeps the dancers' skills honed.

I think there might be a few works of each that were in the standard rep if AD's would put on each others' work, already. It never ceases to amaze me that the promising things in the low-cost/abstract genre I see aren't shared/traded.

Balanchine's other genius was as a producer. Sure he was inspired and had a series of piano reductions in his back pocket, but he fed the company with what it needed -- populist hits, star vehicles, cameos, openers, closers -- all to a wide range of music and ranging the gamut from abstract to "Nutcracker". The best of the craftsmen do the same and stretch their dancers.



I don't think it's a coincidence that Martins was charged with "The Magic Flute" for SAB when he started to choreograph. That wasn't his interest, and he let it slide until "The Sleeping Beauty", and not again that I can remember until the next full-length classic beckoned.

There are some opportunities for young choreographers: every major company has a school, and those kids give performances. (Whether there is a full-time job in it is another story.) At PNB, the Choregraphers' Workshop is the last performance of the year, for the last few years using students from the school in the works of company members and staff. Ballet Master Paul Gibson -- sadly nothing from him this season or next, at least for the main company -- and corps member Kiyon Gaines have had their works produced in recent seasons.

Pre-Raphaelite ballet?

How can you go back to narrative ballet when you really don’t have a narrative culture anymore? There is, rather, an atomizing one -- of “tweets” -- bits of knowledge about the world but not a sustaining narrative, not even a shaggy-dog ones anymore (except for Roberto Bolano’s novels). Yes, Wheeldon’s ballets of snippets speak to this.

Where do you find the actors to bring off even “abstract” ballets (as pointed out in a previous post)? We have to draw on countries who haven’t moved so head-strong into the future to find dancers who know how to possess the stage and project character.

Mark Morris seems to be the last of the interesting actors or characters to give birth to some unique work--out of the tradition of Merce Cunningham and Viola Farber and Tudor. And what is said about Balanchine eclipsing other choreographers can be said of Cunningham downtown. The life of art just happens like that.

And per Cargill I couldn't bear to sit through another SF Ibsen ballet either!

I mentioned my background is in science. There is a famous occurence in the world of technology which has entered the popular lexicon:


It's stunning to think how wrong Mister Duell was, but at the same time it's relatively easy to imagine that at the time his statement seemed reasonable. Predicting the future is tricky business.