The Laughing Stops When the Dancing Begins
Claire Berlinski, Ed. ·
Jun 7, 2011 at 8:44pm
Make all the Russian jokes you like, but when it comes to ballet, no mockery is possible. They win. There is no sight on earth like a corps of top-flight Russian ballerinas doing what Russians do best.
(That's not the ballet I saw, but I did see her. It's not easy to leave me speechless, but Ulyana Lopatkina may claim for the rest of her life that she left Claire Berlinski in the full, speechless recognition that she was in the presence of a superior human being.)
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Nov '10
Re: The Laughing Stops When the Dancing Begins
Ballet is the Formula 1 of dancing....you have to get it to get it.
Mar '11
Re: The Laughing Stops When the Dancing Begins
Play chess? Steal atomic secrets?
Feb '11
Re: The Laughing Stops When the Dancing Begins
I saw her version of Swan Lake's Pas de Deux on youtube and was also left utterly speechless. I think many people underestimate the level of physical prowess required to be a ballet dancer. Its been said that a ballet dancer's athletic ability is akin to that of an Olympic athlete.
Re: The Laughing Stops When the Dancing Begins
The other art form at which Russians proved dominant--or did until the Revolution: the piano. (The 1987 defection of Vladimir Feltsman, who played his first concert in the United States at the Reagan White House, demonstrated that the tradition remained, in some way, alive.) Will you be visiting the St. Petersburg Conservatory, Claire? Or checking in, in any other way, to see what remains of the Russian love of the keyboard?
Aug '10
Re: The Laughing Stops When the Dancing Begins
Really? Now I've got to try.
Claire Berlinski, Ed.: There is no sight on earth like a corps of top-flight Russian ballerinas doing what Russians do best.
What, drinking?
Aug '10
Re: The Laughing Stops When the Dancing Begins
In some ways, superior, I think.
In those Olympic events which require moving gracefully to music, it's evident that even the best Olympians (the best of the best) struggle with performing their feats gracefully and in a way that relates to the music. (Not that there's anything wrong with them being like this -- they aren't dancing, after all, but performing routines.) Elite dancers, on the other hand, must maintain enough "effortless" control to be always graceful and expressing the music.
That in itself is a physical feat, as well as an aesthetic one.
Mar '11
Re: The Laughing Stops When the Dancing Begins
Being in the presence of excellence is one life's few great, cathartic experiences. Sublime.
Sep '10
Re: The Laughing Stops When the Dancing Begins
And if you want to know why the Russians produce so many top flight mathematicians and engineers (hey, doesn't one of our editors know a mathematician?) here's one reason:
Kieslev
I'm also curious on Claire's father David's thoughts on the late Morris Kline
Sep '10
Re: The Laughing Stops When the Dancing Begins
Oops. Hope I wasn't too off topic. I suppose there's a tie in as ballet could be thought of as a study of applied projectile motion.
May '11
Re: The Laughing Stops When the Dancing Begins
My mother and I saw the Kirov four years ago on a trip to the Baltics and Russia. For my mom, a long-time ballet fan, watching them do Swan Lake (her favorite ballet) was a dream come true. Finally we were seeing the A-team in the ballet world and any one of those dancers would have been a major star in the US. I know this was a high point in her life. Sadly, she died suddenly about nine months later but I know she died happy, having seen the very best. Thanks for bringing back some great memories!