    | Published: December 3, 2014 Category: profileBy Rachel Straus Thanks to Misty Copeland, gone are the days when a company dancer keeps her thoughts to herself and waits for the person in charge (usually a man) to give her the spotlight. The first Black, American Ballet Theatre soloist in more than two decades, Copeland has been increasingly vocal about two things: […] Published: December 17, 2013 Category: reviewBy Rachel Straus VIENNA—The former Paris Opera Ballet Étoile Manuel Legris took the reigns of the Vienna Staatsballett in 2010, infusing a company that had developed a reputation for being a ballet museum with a shot of 21st-century dancing adrenalin. Legris’s modernizing hasn’t bruised his financial support: the Staatsoper budget for opera and ballet is […] Published: July 1, 2011 Category: historyBy Rachel Straus At 14, Gillian Murphy remembers walking into her first class with renowned ballerina Melissa Hayden, whose intense demeanor could seem harsh. “She bounded into the room and electrified us with her energy,” says Murphy, now a principal with American Ballet Theatre. “We learned something very important about seizing the moment, pushing […] Published: April 21, 2011 Category: reviewBy Rachel Straus NEW YORK– “Swan Lake” may be the hardest work in the classical repertoire to do well. First, the plot is perhaps the best known in the canon (undoubtedly one reason “Black Swan” has done so well at the box office). Second, any ballet company worth its salt performs it – or tries […] Published: January 1, 2011 Category: profileIn a studio with garnet red walls that evoke a belle époque parlor, Valentina Kozlova coaches 16-year-old Veronica Verterich in the Grand Pas Classique. Kozlova danced Classique when it received its premiere with the Bolshoi Ballet. Now she is preparing her student, who will perform the solo in Moscow in two weeks’ time. Historic […] Published: November 7, 2005 Category: profileBy Rachel Straus A dancer laces a pair of size 11 double-wide pointe shoes around each calf. Making one last check in the mirror for makeup and hair, Ashley Merrill-Lynch moves with the other corps de ballet members to the stage wings. One by one, the dancers step under the blazing lights, each executing […] |
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