Musings on ballet, classical music, the violin, and life
The Classical Girl Picture this. You are an American teen, utterly enthralled by ballet, Russian ballet in particular. You’re an aspiring ballerina and you’re really, really, really good. The Bolshoi Ballet Academy in Moscow, having seen you dance, invites you to study with them. And not just the program for foreigners; this is the prestigious mainstream training for … Read more
Ralph Vaughan Williams’s “The Lark Ascending” falls into that delicious category for me, of classical pieces I discover upon awakening. On weekdays I set my iPad alarm to an HD classical station and at 4:06am the music pierces my dreams, awakening me in the kindest of ways (until the “real” alarm blasts me out of … Read more
For a gorgeous, non-classical, ambient 12-hour recording that’s amazing for sitting beside the dying, scroll to the bottom of this post… I thought my friend Grace had died already. This past week I was away on a five-day personal retreat without internet, so I had to go with the old-fashioned news source: one’s instincts. In … Read more
I had the opportunity to sit and talk face-to-face with author Terez Mertes Rose the other day (okay so it was a mirror), about her recently released novel, Ballet Orphans, a prequel and Book 3 of the Ballet Theatre Chronicles series. Here’s what she had to say…. What was the most challenging thing about writing … Read more
I am using “entranced” as description for the second time in San Francisco Ballet’s digital 2021 season with the premiere of Danielle Rowe’s Wooden Dimes. As the second of two world premieres, as well as the second dance film of the season, it invites comparison to Myles Thatcher’s Colorforms. Both transported me. Entranced me. Wooden … Read more