A performance can often feel like a sleight of hand: you only see what happens on stage without any hint at all the things that aligned in order to make it possible. It takes no stretch of the imagination to understand the hours of practice required to get on the stage, but this kind of understanding sheds little light on the things artists must do to bring a vision to life. The difference between practice and rehearsal is metaphysical.
I recently sat in two working rehearsals: one for an upcoming production of a new ballet called Extraordinary Women, which will feature 11 short pieces focused on the lives of, well, extraordinary women. In the new Martha Graham studios, I sat in the second of two lines of chairs to watch American Ballet Theatre principal Chloe Misseldine run through the two parts of a dance inspired by the iconic prima ballerina Anna Pavlova. The choreographer was Isabelle Fokine—the granddaughter of Michel Fokine, the iconic ballet master of the Ballet Russes, whose greatest legacy may be creating the most famous ballet solo of all time, “The Dying Swan.” Pavlova performed that piece an estimated 4,000 times, traveling all over the world to spread her love of the art form.
When Saint-Saëns began to play on a speaker and Misseldine, dressed in a rehearsal tutu, stepped out in a bourrée, I realized that everything I thought I knew about this famous work—the choreography, which I taught myself and performed at 17—was wrong. That is because, Fokine said to us after, at least 90 percent of “Dying Swans” that are performed today don’t use her grandfather’s choreography. Instead, they follow the choreography that the late Bolshoi dancer Maya Plisetskaya first performed in 1943—nearly 40 years after Fokine choreographed the work.
Plisetskaya’s version is more sinuous and stately than Pavlova’s original. It looks like it could be a variation from Swan Lake (and, indeed, many have incorrectly assumed it to be a part of Swan Lake). It also, Isabelle Fokine says, misses the whole point of the work. It is not a ballet about a dying swan maiden. It is a ballet about the fear and loneliness of dying as any living thing will do. It’s about something universal, not something ethereal.
The notes that Fokine gives Misseldine are mostly along these lines. She points to moments where the dancer should express more timidity, explains how her gaze should fall. When Misseldine’s hands skim her arms and her torso, she is to think about self-soothing, for she is alone and facing death alone—she is her sole comfort.
Around two weeks later, when I sit at the front of a rehearsal studio not far from Union Square, in American Ballet Theatre’s offstage home base, I observe a work that couldn’t be more thematically different. Helen Pickett’s “Petal” is about the vibrancy of life—a cataclysm of energy, I described it her afterward. The piece is propulsive and entrancing, especially as the dancers, in pairs, weave around each other’s arms of legs. Some partnering passages have the effect of a Rube Goldberg machine; a small tap or brush of the leg sets off a more complex sequence of folding and unfolding.
Pickett’s notes for the dancers are minimal and, for the most part, she gives them out individually. When the dancers stretch their arms, they are to “paint part of the atmosphere” with their hands. When they consider their spacing, they should think about “enjoying each other” and their shared presence.
She told me ahead of the rehearsal that some dancers might not go full out, so as to not be too hard on their bodies ahead of the season. I don’t see anyone hold back.
It makes sense. I’ve had plenty of rehearsals myself, and I know the importance of dancing like I would the day of a show. If you’ve never done it that way before, how can you expect to do it on stage? If you don’t show up as the person you want to be when just a few people are watching, how will you to it when all eyes are on you?
Big moment for music in literature. The New York Times interviewed Yiyun Li and Barbara Kingsolver about how the piano influenced their latest works, Music Against the Night and Partita, and how playing the instrument shaped their writing. I’ll add one more musical new relesase: Countertenor, a mix of criticism, history, and memoir, by Anthony Roth Costanzo is out later this month.
One ring to rule them all. Actually, there’s at least two. Both the San Francisco Opera and the Metropolitan Opera will be putting on Wagner’s Ring cycle for the 2027-2028 season. It’s a team of women behind it in SF: it will be conducted by Eun Sun Kim and directed by Francesca Zambello. This Ring will be set against American history. According to San Francisco Classical Voice: “Das Rheingold is framed around the California Gold Rush, while her Die Walküre is set in the industrial revolution and her Siegfried shows the destruction of nature... but with a glimpse of redemption at the end, which will not be spoiled here.” Okay!
As we discussed a while ago, the Met’s Ring will be directed by the visionary Yuval Sharon, who produced the sold-out Tristan und Isolde this past spring. Its version will explore “folklore or legends that are everywhere in the world, not only in the Western world, and not only in the colonialist world,” conductor Yannick Nézet-Séguin told the NYT.
Dua Lipa was at the premiere of Missy Mazzoli’s Lincoln in the Bardo because, well, of course. I am increasingly feeling like I need to bite the bullet and buy a ticket rather than relying on the lottery…unless?
The Calgary Opera replaced Gabriel Sanchez-Ortega in its production of Tosca after the singer waved a Palestinian flag during curtain call. You may recall this also happened at the Royal Opera House a year or so ago.
Sanchez-Ortega wrote on social media that he didn’t regret his decision: “After the theatre, (political or otherwise) we all have to go home, and look at ourselves in the mirror. It was my honor to play the role of Angelotti, an escaped political prisoner.”
Over in France, protests over declining conditions and quality of public education and the cost of living have a full-on musical accompaniment. The Orchestra de Nouveau Monde, which formed in 2022, has been helping amplify the protests. “We use music not as a sacred object of beauty but as a tool for activism rooted in current events,” the orchestra wrote on its website. Over the weekend, police tear-gassed the more than 200-person group.
The Philadelphia Orchestra now has one of the biggest endowments in the U.S., as it just closed a $344 million fundraising effort with Ensemble Arts, which included a $55M gift from an anonymous couple, the Inquirer reported.
Less good news: Opera Australia has lost Japanese billionaire Haruhisa Handa as its chief patron, reportedly because the businessman and religious leader grew frustrated by programming that started to lean more toward musical theater rather than traditional opera.
The Phoenix Symphony has also suspended the rest of its season for financial reasons. All musicians will be laid off November 2. Although the symphony says it’s received donations to its endowment, this money cannot be used to cover operational costs, which have increased beyond its revenue.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art announced a new show: “Rembrandt and the Ancients” will open next November and be the Met’s biggest Rembrandt exhibition in 20 years. It will be presented in partnership with the Louvre.
what's happening in france right now is so wild and inspiring. i cried when i saw the orchestra playing the hunger games theme and i can't believe they were tear gassing them