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A One Temperament Toga

7/28/2015

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Adam Luders in Phlegmatic
Saratoga Springs was as idyllic and charming as ever this year, but I was more than a little distracted by the end. My 15 year old cat Eddie was hospitalized late Tuesday night of the second week of our Saratoga run, and I was aching to get back to Brooklyn to say goodbye to him for the rest of the tour. I raced back to the city on Sunday morning and arrived an hour before he died in my arms. I've lost a lot of pets over the years but this one was by far and away the hardest. What a summer.  I feel I have become an accidental eulogist on this site lately, and I would very much like to stop writing about death!

The saving grace of the week was dancing Balanchine’s The Four Temperaments.  I have been doing the First Theme in 4T’s for such a long time that it feels like it was made on me, though of course it wasn’t. (This is one of Balanchine’s gifts: his ballets are so effortlessly habitable.  A mere hour after learning his choreography one feels intrinsically rooted in the movement and the music.) Balanchine created 4T’s for the inauguration of Ballet Society in 1946. He had privately commissioned the Paul Hindemith score in 1940 and only later decided it should become a ballet.  

The First Theme feels more like yoga than ballet, which is probably why it was such a welcome distraction.  It consists of sustained, contorted poses—one for each note in the score. It is pure and literal: when the strings’ notes ascend, I get lifted up. When the piano is heavily clanged, I am accordingly dropped nearly to the ground and dragged offstage during its lingering rumble.  Extended notes for the strings become slow promenades in which my legs wrap around my partner’s ankle, thigh, and neck. It is an impassive, asexual Kama Sutra. It requires an intense focus 



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GUEST POST: Kaitlyn's Graduation Introspection

7/14/2015

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Formerly of the New York City Ballet

 

Following the completion of my undergraduate studies this spring, I was inspired to revisit the essay I hastily wrote for admission to Columbia when I decided to leave the New York City Ballet in 2011. I feel reading it now much as I do when I watch old videos of myself dancing: embarrassed, slightly detached, and convinced that it was better experienced live. But also, despite these insecurities, glad I gave it the old college try. The essay was originally composed on December 2, 2011. It is slightly edited for length as presented here but otherwise untouched.

 

First, a few items worth consideration:

 

1)      From 2012-2015, I occupied four more positions within the New York City Ballet and associated organizations, including those of instructor and manager

2)      At the time I wrote the essay, I was applying for readmission to Columbia following academic probation (administered after I neglected to show up for a molecular biology class for an entire semester) and a brief stint at Fordham University

3)      During my time at Columbia, I changed my course of study three times, from Neuroscience/Premed to English to, finally, Psychology.

 

And, more importantly, I’ve included one very special memory that immediately resurfaced when I first reread the essay -- right after Albert Evans passed away.


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Albert's Legacy

7/2/2015

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Albert in Western Symphony, photo by Paul Kolnik
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Craig Hall, Megan Fairchild, and Callie Bachman in Western, photo by Paul Kolnik
I was going to move on and post a dance review today, but the response to my Albert Evans tribute has been so overwhelming that I wanted to thank everyone first. Several of you have commented on this site and many others have emailed, called, or texted me privately. I was astonished by the number of current and former dancers, ballet fans, old friends, teachers, musicians, stagehands, and volunteers who felt compelled to contact me and share memories of the universally beloved Albert.  This outpouring of love is a testament to his graceful spirit as well as to the intensity of the bonds one forms in the dance world.  We have lost one of the best of our ilk, yet the past week has served as a reminder of the magnanimity of those who remain. I am humbled and oh so thankful to be a part of this exalted community.   

We at the NYCB began our Saratoga rehearsal period on Tuesday with a Four Temperaments rehearsal, which felt appropriate if a little surreal.  As I have mentioned, Albert’s interpretation of Phlegmatic will always loom large in my memory, so to be able to dance this ballet for him in the upcoming weeks is a gift. And fortuitously, the beautiful Craig Hall will be dancing one of Albert’s 



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For Albert

6/23/2015

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Albert in Phlegmatic, photo by Paul Kolnik
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Maria Kowroski with Albert in Red Angels, photo by Paul Kolnik
I can’t believe that I am writing this, but Albert Evans has passed away. I am stunned and heartsick by the news. It makes me ache to think that no more blood courses through that once strong, beautiful body.  Albert was the kind of guy who would pass by a studio, notice a partnering issue, and step in to effortlessly hoist a girl in the air in demonstration.  He was incomparable in roles like Puck in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Ash, Bugaku, Herman Schmerman, Red Angels, Barber Violin Concerto, Stravinsky Violin Concerto, Agon, Fearful Symmetries, Jazz, Liturgy, Open Strings, the Russian pas de deux in Swan Lake, Symphony in Three Movements, The Waltz Project, and Russian Seasons. He was such an incredible artist, intense and a little mysterious. His noble mien contrasted with his animalistic power.  In my mind, nobody can top his Phlegmatic in The Four Temperaments.  Oftentimes when people perform the difficult attitude front balance in Phlegmatic they look like 

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Ode to Toga

7/30/2014

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Dancing in Saratoga Springs can be challenging. The SPAC stage is as hard as a rock and it has an extra panel of depth which throws off our normal spacing. The front wings are more recessed than the back ones which makes exiting and entering downstage labored (case in point: the downstage left grand jeté exit of my Raymonda solo was a real push). The backstage crossover is pure cement and very long so sometimes we get late when we have quick runarounds. The weather is often terrible too: sometimes it is so cold that we shiver and steam rises off our bodies visibly from the audience; sometimes it is so hot and humid that we can’t breathe and we slip all over the stage on our own sweat.  The lights go out on occasion. Stray bats fly around above us.  There is also no way to exit the amphitheater without climbing an incredibly steep hill—so after shows and in between rehearsals when our legs ache we are faced with yet another quad workout if we want to leave the compound.

Worst of all, bugs are everywhere (like a moth to a spotlight?).  Once during a Concerto Barocco performance a huge beetle landed on Albert Evans’s head at the very beginning of the adagio.  It crawled around on his face throughout his pas de deux while we corps women snickered behind him.  Panicked, he asked me to flick it off him when we got to the large winding circle midway through the piece.  But we had formed a giant chain, and he and the girl behind me had my hands.  I could be of no help, for there was no way to do it without resorting to a head butt! Eventually the beetle fell


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    Faye Arthurs
    - Faye Arthurs

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