The Casual Blog

Tag: Carolina Ballet

June 26, 2011

Discussing open source ballet with Robert Weiss

Do open source software and ballet have anything in common? Sure, they have some obvious differences. But they share an imperative to collaborate and a creative spirit. Anyhow, I’m a big fan of both, and I’ve been thinking about whether some of the lessons of open source could be applied to ballet. Last week got a chance to kick ideas on this around with a great choreographer, Robert Weiss.

Weiss, who goes by Ricky, is artistic director of the Carolina Ballet, which plays out of Raleigh, N.C. He spent the early part of his career as a dancer at the New York City Ballet with its famous director, George Balanchine. In more than a decade with the Carolina Ballet, he has been a prolific choreographer, producing dozens of ballets. He’s also recruited superbly talented dancers from around the world and melded them into an outstanding company. When we met last week, along with my friend CB Board Chair Melanie Dubis, at Buku for lunch, I thought, this must be close to the world’s greatest job — working every day with beautiful, talented, dedicated people to create art for the ages. What could be more wonderful?

When we met for lunch last week, it quickly became clear that it would be more wonderful to not be constantly worried about money. If only, he said, he had better funding, he could spend more time thinking about dance and less about fund raising. Ballet is an art form that entails numbers of dancers, all requiring paychecks, and the same for musicians, costume designers and costumers, set designers and sets, lighting designers and lights, stage management and crew, and of course, choreographers. As an art, it is capital intensive. There are inherent barriers to reaching a wide audience, including lack of exposure to the form and its traditions.

As Ricky described the process of creating a new work, it was plain that it was highly collaborative. When he choreographs a new work, it is created on specific dancers, and the work is shaped in view of their individual qualities. The work draws on a tradition that goes back to the Renaissance, with a large vocabulary of movements that are available for re-use. (As Ricky warmed to the subject, he stood up from the table and showed a couple of classical gestures, and his sudden transformation from regular person to dancer was electrifying.) And of course, there’s collaboration with the aforementioned costume designers, set designers, and many others. It is in general an art of great idealism and unselfishness, at least in the sense that almost no one expects to get rich from it, and many are prepared to subsist on a shoestring budget.

But in ballet as in most of our endeavors, there is an unexamined assumption that intellectual property protection is important. Thus copying of videoed performances is subject to the draconian penalties of copyright law. The dances are kept locked down, on the assumption that making them freely available could result in lost value. I raised the question with Rocky and Melanie whether this really makes sense. Is copyright protection actually increasing the value proposition of ballet, or is it lessening it?

As I explained, the open source software community has learned some lessons about this that the rest of the world is starting to apply. Open source innovators, whose projects are based on freely sharing their code, realized that the traditional approach to intellectual property would not work for them, and so they created new licensing models, such as the GPL, that encouraged sharing and re-use. That approach has led to incredible growth in open source software. The model is spreading outward to other creative endeavors with such tools as Creative Commons licensing.

Could it be that less IP protectiveness could expand the audience for ballet and bring in new funding? What if, instead of protecting ballet as carefully as possible with copyright, the product was unlocked and made available under a Creative Commons license? For example, if well-produced video of the Carolina Ballet was readily available on the internet without charge, couldn’t that introduce many more people to ballet, with some of them eventually becoming balletomanes?

Ricky noted that even the best video of ballet is only a pale reflection of the experience of live performance. But he also admitted that he knew of people who had had transformative personal experience through a recorded performance. He also noted that it would require funding to make video recordings of a quality that he’d be comfortable presenting in public. (Footnote: a couple of days after our meeting, I saw a documentary on the choreographer Jerome Robbins called Something to Dance About, which is great, and illustrates how video can communicate something meaningful about dance.)

Open source innovation generally involves experimentation. I noted that there could be approaches to video and to funding that none of us has thought of yet. We agreed to talk more about what might be possible. It may be that you have ideas or experience in applying open source methods to artistic endeavors. If you have ideas, please share them.

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April 30, 2011

Open source ballet

A good conversation over a fine dinner is one of life’s true pleasures. Sally and I went out with our ballerina, Lola Cooper, for dinner at Solas last night and had a great time. By virtue of our donations to Carolina Ballet, we’ve become the sponsors of Lola’s pointe shoes, an essential tool for classical dance. We’ve talked with her several times, but hadn’t had a chance to break bread together before. Happily, Solas has a special menu for vegetarians, which they will produce if you ask.

Lola, it turns out, in addition to being a rising star, is a lively and interesting young woman. Ballet dancers are almost by definition highly focused individuals. The form demands a lot from its embodiers: years of rigorous training, physical stress, competitive pressure, performance anxieties, and unremitting discipline. In exchange, dancers get a shot at transcendence. It’s hard to be a great dancer and a scholar, for example. Not impossible, certainly, as I’ve been reminded recently in reading Apollo’s Angels, a history of ballet by Jennifer Homans, a former dancer. But challenging.

Anyway, Lola’s pursuing a bachelor’s at N.C. State and keeping her intellectual side engaged. We talked about travelling in South America, organic food, painting, yoga, and families. All interesting and fun. And dance, of course. She told us about some of her personal challenges with a grueling rehearsal and performance schedule. I told her the short version of my idea for open source ballet.

The idea is to adapt some of the concepts of open source software to dance. Open source software developers hold that the best way to make great software is to freely share code and ideas in a collaborative way. They use internet tools to leap over barriers of geography. Instead of holding onto the copyright in their work, they use open source licenses to encourage use of the code by others. As this methodology has spread through the tech world in the last three decades, it has resulted in an astonishing amount of creativity and innovation in software development.

How does this apply to dance? Dance is in part a collaborative art that draws on the creativity of others. Choreography uses a vocabulary of movement that has been developed by prior generations and that continues to be enriched by artists today. Although the sharing of movement ideas is not always acknowledged, it is a fundamental part of how ballet is made. Of course, each real artist makes work that is also in important ways original. But it is hard to conceive of a new ballet that owes nothing to ballets that came before.

So there’s an aspect of ballet that is already collaborative. In general, though, there’s a concern in ballet with trying to protect the intellectual property rights associated with a new dance work by limiting recording and forbidding copying of recordings. The background assumption is that the creative work could be stolen to the detriment of the owner. But is that likely? It might well be that videos of a ballet would proliferate, but this would only be bad if it hurt the market for recordings (which is negligible), or the market for live performance of the work. In fact, it would probably expand the audience for the work and enhance the reputation of the choreographer and performers.

This open source approach flies into the face of conventional intellectual property ideas. Those ideas are so familiar that they seem natural, and it seems unnatural to give up certain intellectual property rights and encourage free use. But open source has worked for software, and it’s being adopted in science, education, and the arts.

The ballet application could be tried as an experiment on a limited basis, even with a single DVD of a single performance. A license that allowed free copying and a marketing campaign that encouraged such activity could put the work into the hands of new potential dance fans and supporters. It could help ticket sales and budget challenges. And it would let the artists do more of what they’re good at: transcendence, and sharing transcendence.

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March 26, 2011

Technology, new art forms, food, and ballet

I’m fortunate to have a ring side seat as information technology is transforming the world, but it doesn’t always look pretty. It makes me wonder, at times, whether, as machines get smarter, humans on average are becoming more and more like the race depicted in the wonderful animated picture Wall-E: fatter, lazier, and dumber. But I haven’t given up all hope, and there are some signs pointing the other direction.

A case in point: this week when my son Gabe (pictured here at Alta last week) sent along his first self-produced short video, which is here. He shot it with a tiny body cam over the course of 3 days skiing in Telluride, CO. The finished product reminded me strongly of some of the beautiful skiing we did together. It’s hard to describe the complex sensations and emotions of skiing far from away from the crowd when its steep and deep, but Gabe managed to convey some of it. The flamenco score heightens the sense of edginess — wild joy with stabs of fear.

Good skiing sometimes seems like art, almost like dance, but the work is seldom shared with other humans by the skier-creator. Until recently, filming the experience was a costly and difficult undertaking. In the past couple of years, though, video cameras have gotten much cheaper as well as tinier, and easier to use, and the software for recording and editing has become highly accessible. The tools for communicating the work instantly and almost cost-free over the internet now exist. The learning curve for use of all this technology is short. And so a new class of artist is being born — the skier-auteur. Technology advances are likewise enabling new types of musical expression, and undoubtedly many other artistic expressions. Perhaps the day will come when everyone will be an artist.

Is food art? I argued about this years ago with my friend Tom, a gourmand who took a strong position that great chefs were artists. Over the years, I’ve moved closer to his position. A great restaurant is a multi-media experience, with sets, lighting, sound, and actors, and also smells and tastes.

Last night Sally and I tried a new Thai restaurant off of Moore Square — Fai Thai. It has replaced the Duck & Dumpling, an Asian fusion spot that was one of our favorites, and that we were sad to see close. The emphasis is less on standard Thai fare than on local ingredients and variety. The decor changes involved colorful parasols and lanterns, which were engaging. The menu had fewer vegetarian options than we hoped, but enough to get started. We found the three dishes we tried each quite different and delicious. The spiciness hit the Goldilocks point — not too much, not too little. Our waiter was friendly and attentive, and the manager took some time to talk to us about the aspirations of the place. He appeared to take on board our suggestions for more attention to vegetarians. Thai food fans should try it.

After dinner, we saw the Carolina Ballet perform Carmen. This is the third time we’ve seen the company do Weiss’s ballet, which is one of our favorites in the repertory. Bizet’s music is unforgettable, and the story is sort of perfect for ballet — love, jealousy, death. For all my admiration of Peggy Severin-Hansen’s great talent, I had my doubts about her as Carmen, who is a sensual, cynical heartbreaker. Peggy’s long suit is purity and innocence — the perfect Firebird. Her Carmen was sweeter than normal, not completely cynical, but this turned out to give the tragedy a new bit of bite — more tragic in a way. Richard Krusch as the Toreador was highly serious, and convincing. He’s a fine dancer who keeps getting better. As always, the story ended with a violent shock, but the production was wonderful.

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March 6, 2011

New dancers, and a new restaurant

On Saturday afternoon we went to the Carolina Ballet to see the same show we saw three weeks back, but with different dancers. The first work, the Ugly Duckling, by Lynn Taylor-Corbett, is a bright, jazzy ballet. It’s plainly engineered with children in mind, but the sweetness is balanced by stabs of darkness and menace. We saw Lara O’Brien, the original UD, at the beginning of this run, and on Saturday saw Lindsay Purrington in the title role. It was an interesting contrast. Lara was both regal and comic. There was never a question, though, that she was a swan. Lindsay brought to the surface more of the pathos of the story — the moments of confusion, hurt, and fear — and her transformation into a swan was a difficult journey. I found it surprisingly touching.

Margaret Severin-Hansen and Richard Krusch performed a pas de deux entitled Flower Festival in Genzano. It was very classical, and very beautiful. For moments the law of gravity seemed to be suspended, and the dancers seemed to be impossibly light, almost floating. Peggy is such an awesome technician that she makes you forget about technique, and get to the essence. She projected innocence, charm, and love.

Robert Weiss’s newest ballet is entitled Grieg: Piano Concerto. I played a version of the piece as a young piano student, and have never been overly fond of it since. But Weiss has put its somewhat diffuse Romanticism to good use. The ballet is in parts fast and furious, with dancers shooting about both horizontally and vertically. The allegro ensemble sections seem almost frighteningly complex. There are some wonderful quiet, tender moments as well. On Saturday, Lara O’Brien, Jan Burkhard, and Lola Cooper took the principal female roles, and were lovely. Lola performed the role created for Melissa Podcassy, which includes a long adagio solo. She radiated confidence.

After the performance, we talked for a while with Lola and her father, Brian, who was visiting from New York. She described days of five-hour rehearsals for the next show followed by a two-hour performance in the evening, and then the same again the next day. Grueling, clearly. But she wasn’t complaining.

That evening we ate for the first time at Market, a relatively new restaurant in Raleigh’s Mordecai neighborhood. It features fresh, local ingredients, and has a simply furnished dining room that makes you think organic. The service was friendly and helpful. The had the sweet potato latkes and the vegetarian stir fry, neither of which were like anything I’d ever eaten and both of which were delicious. We split a piece of pumpkin cheesecake, which was also unexpectedly delightful. We liked the place.

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October 17, 2010

Halloween and Dracula

Halloween is the strangest holiday. Its primary theme is death — normally a taboo topic. Even more amazing, children are encouraged to play with images that cause great fear, like skeletons, blood, and spiders. Although there is humor and sweetness to some of the customs, like trick or treating, the core of the holiday is not sweet. It is not had to imagine it’s descended from bloodthirsty ancient religious rituals.

Our floor at Red Hat is getting its Halloween decorations, in preparations for the employees’ little kids to come through collecting candy. There are lots of skulls, spiders, and witches, and lots of orange and black crepe paper. It’s sweet, but also a little unsettling. I think it’s a good idea to spend some time regularly thinking about death, but I’m not used to doing it on the way to the coffee machine.

When I first heard that the Carolina Ballet was going to do a new ballet for Halloween called Dracula, I had my doubts. I understand that the company needs to bring in an audience, and it needs to reach people who aren’t already committed to the art form. And it makes some sense to find a seasonal theme. But Dracula? I enjoyed the novel when I was a teenager, but the I thought that every bit of human blood had long ago been wrung out of the story.

It turned out not to be so. Sally and I went to the show last night, and heard the choreographer, Lynn Taylor-Corbett, give a talk prior to the performance. We’d previous seen a number of her ballets, and liked them all (especially Carmina Burana), but hadn’t seen her speak. She was really impressive — smart, funny, and thought-provoking. She’d started with the Bram Stoker novel and derived something of a feminist interpretation (though she didn’t call it that), which emphasized the importance of the main female characters. She took questions, and unfortunately for her and us, most of the question time was consumed by an audience member from Transylvania with a strong accent who launched into an extended-but-almost-incomprehensible exegesis that seemed to have to do with the historical Dracula.

Anyhow, the ballet was really good. Taylor-Corbett used a narrator to keep the story clear. The set was simple, but the lighting conveyed a variety of gothic moods. As in prior T-C ballets, the crowd scenes had a wonderful kineticism, but with a warm, human quality. And there were some memorable characters. Lara O’Brien was outstanding, so strong that it was hard to focus on anyone else during her scenes, which ran the gamut of emotional extremes. I was sad when she died — both times! Pablo Javier Perez was funny and scary as the mental patient. And Attila Bongar was a wonderful Dracula. There is usually a remote and serious quality about Bongar, and T-C played to his natural strengths. I found some of the business with crosses and stakes a bit goofy, but aside from that, it was entrancing.

We also liked Ricky Weiss’s new ballet that began the evening, the Masque of the Red Death. Again, I had my doubts about the idea, but it turned out to be inspired: a costume ball in the midst of the plague led to powerful drama. The production had a great look, with particularly beautiful and startling costumes.

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September 21, 2010

Welcome to fall and a new ballet season

Of the four seasons, fall is my favorite. Finally there’s a break in the hot weather, and the cooler temperatures make it easier to move. Days shorten, leaves change their colors, and migrant birds flock and prepare to move south. Harvest time is at hand. And the new arts season begins.

Our first event of the new arts season was Carolina Ballet’s performance last Friday of a program entitled Firebird. I was sorry to see the there were a good many empty seats. The audience is an important part of a performance. Those of us without dance training have a role to perform — that is, the audience role, absorbing and responding. I always feel like a better person after the ballet, with posture at least temporarily improved.

Why were there empty seats in Fletcher Hall? I do not know. People squander their precious life hours on the most amazingly nonsense yet pass up such richness close at hand. At any rate, those who made it were well rewarded. There were strong new works by Weiss and Bourtasenkov, as well as the repertory masterpiece set to the great Stravinsky score. And of course, the incredibly talented, disciplined, beautiful dancers.

As a Mahler fan, I was especially interested in Weiss’s new Sturmische Liebe, a pas de deux to a Mahler chamber piece with Lara O’Brien and Alain Molina. It was taut and tragic to the danger point, as though the end of love could only mean the end of life. It seemed to draw on the spirit of tango. I admired Lara’s intensity and her total immersion in the character, which was so somber that I briefly forgot it was acting and worried she might be a danger to herself.

I also particularly enjoyed the very different new Weiss piece Moving Life, a non-story to three enigmatic works by Erik Satie. Part of the music, the Gymnopedies, was familiar to me from a marathon performance I helped with years ago, and I went home after the show and ordered the sheet music online from Sheet Music Plus. Peggy Severin Hansen was again magnificent as the Firebird, in many regards birdlike — astonishingly light and quick, yet elegant and powerful.

Sal and I spotted Lola Cooper at the second intermission with a cast on her foot. She greeted us warmly and brought us up to date on her news. She’d had surgery a few weeks before to address a congenital bone problem. She seemed upbeat about the good progress she was making on her rehabilitation. It has to be so difficult for a dancer with such dedication to be sidelined even for a few weeks.

After the performance, Sally and I parted temporarily, she to hunt for her Mini Cooper and I my Clara. There was a street fair on Wilmingstreet called SparkCON. I spent a few minutes watching performers dancing with fire to African drumming. I couldn’t figure out how a flaming hula hoop didn’t case burns. It was fun to see the street performers, and I would have given them a few dollars if they’d asked.

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July 24, 2010

A ballet dress rehearsal

As part of our contribution to the Carolina Ballet, we’re sponsoring the pointe shoes of one of the dancers.  Ballet is not ballet without pointe shoes, and professional dancers go through them so quickly that they become a major budget item.  The ballerina we’re sponsoring, Lola Cooper, invited us to a dress rehearsal last Thursday for a program where she had a significant solo.

It turned out that Sally and I were the only non-company people there.  The rehearsal was in Fletcher, a small but elegant hall, where we had the best seats in the house.  It’s rare to see performers in the state of being in between simple practice and performance.  From my high school days at the N.C. School of the Arts, I was familiar with the basic ideas, but it was interesting to see how these artists used the precious time when the show is imminent.  The dancers at times left off steps and did simple blocking, getting a feel for the surface and space of the stage, the lights, and their costumes.  Ricky Weiss shouted a few specific directions during the run throughs, and after each piece went on stage to discuss refinements.

While we waited for Lola’s piece, we talked with our friend Ginny about other dancers struggling to succeed as artists and to get by.  For those just starting out, the wages are tiny, and for the more experienced, they are low.  There’s a huge disconnect between the inherent value of the artistry of these professionals, the amount of physical and emotional effort required for their art, and the economic rewards.  It’s depressing that their brilliant work is priced at a fraction of that of, say, professional baseball or football players (or doctors, accountants, or lawyers).   For those of us who care about ballet, it’s a reminder that we are a struggling minority, while the majority places little value on the art.

At the same time, the disconnect is a reminder that money is far from the only reason for work.  Artists almost by definition are pursuing something outside the realm of the senses, something beyond the everyday.  They explore these other realms and share with the rest of us their discoveries.  These deeper levels of feeling and meaning have no well-developed markets — there’s no effective system of pricing them in dollars.  But humans have engaged in this type of artistic commerce for thousands of years, and they keep on doing it.  This is an admirable characteristic of the species, and a cheering fact.  This does not, however, mean we shouldn’t worry about getting our dancers a living wage.  It’s in our best interest that they be well nourished, well clothed, in safe quarters,with reliable transportation, and with enough left over to have some fun.  Happy, healthy dancers are good for us.

At the rehearsal, Ricky introduced us to his wife and prima ballerina Melissa Podcasy, and  I felt really honored.  I’ve been very moved by so many of her great performances over the years (among others, Juliet, Carmen, the wife in the Kreutzer Sonata, the woman who yearns in Carmina Burana).  We talked a bit about our cats.  At the pauses, she worked with the performers.

Lola’s piece, from Balanchine’s Raymonda, was last.  She came out of the gate very strong.  Her jumps were big, and she had great quickness and speed.  Her solo was long and arduous, and after several minutes the strain was showing.  We talked for a few minutes afterward, when she was still breathing hard, and she was thinking about improvements.  She’ll be great.

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July 17, 2010

A bunion, a birthday, and an edible work of art

While we were at the class at the Carolina Ballet studio last week, at one point Peggy Severin-Hansen sat on the floor beside me and did some work on her feet.  We’ve been watching her for many years as she rose through the company ranks to become a soloist, and we just love her dancing.  Having the chance to see her working on the bandages on her toes was  intimate, like being in the family.  I thought of sharing with her that I too have foot problems (a bunion) but thought better of it.  She probably wouldn’t have appreciated the comparison.

One of the problems of a bunion, in addition to discomfort, is that it isn’t a good conversational topic. Other people’s health problems are usually uninteresting, but not all are equally off-putting.  There’s no particular stigma to talking about knee problems, wrist problems, or back problems.  But bunions are generally an older person’s issue.  Who likes to think about getting old?  Not me.  I do, however, now understand why there is a section for Dr. Scholl’s foot care products in the pharmacy.  It’s become one of my favorite sections.

As of yesterday, I know how it feels to be 55 years old.  I hate to make a big deal of birthdays, but I’m struck by how big a number this is.  It is clearly no longer the early fifties.  It is old enough to be a parent to two full-grown adults, and in theory old enough to be a grandparent.

But I feel young!  Both in good ways (plenty of energy and enthusiasm) and not-so-good ways (areas of uncertainty and insecurity).  In many ways, I’m healthier and happier than I was in my twenties.  I never completely lose sight of the possibility that there could be a piano hanging over my head and about to drop, in the form of a serious illness or random accident.  But with enough time and some good luck, perhaps I’ll someday look back over many years and think how young I was in 2010, but how I still feel remarkably young, all things considered.  Of course, this may turn out to be my apogee.

To celebrate the day, Sally got us a table at Second Empire, one of our favorite restaurants, and we walked there from our apartment.  It’s a restored grand old residence with elaborate ornamentation, and very traditional in a way.  But it avoids being stuffy with eclectic art, jazz, a great staff and highly imaginative food.  Our server was Katrina.  She was lively, smart, and friendly, and completely undaunted when I told her that we were vegetarians and wanted them to create something special for us.  She assured us they liked vegetarians and would enjoy the challenge to their creativity.  Music to my ears!

In fact, everything on the menu looked great except the animals, and our only suggestions were that there be pasta and perhaps a Spanish theme.  The dish that arrived had rigatoni and spices, with a unique combination of textures and tastes.  It was excellent!  For dessert, I planned to sample Sally’s cake, but they brought me delicious ice cream with a candle in it and a happy birthday message written on the plate in chocolate.  When we got the check, I thought they’d accidentally undercharged us, since there was just one main dish listed.  When I asked Katrina, she assured me that they’d considered the dish that we shared to be one.  Truly, this a great and wonderful restaurant.

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July 15, 2010

Ballet class and open source

This week Sally and I went over to the Carolina Ballet studio at lunch time and sat in on a class taught by Ricky Weiss.  We needed to return a borrowed DVD, and also to meet Lola Cooper, a dancer whose shoes we’d decided to pay for.  We sat in front of the class close to the first line of dancers, which felt awkward at first.  I wondered if we would be a distraction or otherwise be inhibiting.  I would certainly feel ill at ease practicing the piano in front of strangers.

I gradually realized that our presence mattered little if at all.  The dancers were deeply focused on their work.  Their dress was varied, with some in leotards, some in sweats, some in shorts.  It was, of course, an attractive group — youthful and graceful.  Also remarkably strong and powerful.

Weiss didn’t have to say very much to direct the dancers.  A couple of comments, a couple of gestures, and he’d have the dozens of dancers moving in a new complex pattern in unison.  There is, of course, a ballet vocabulary of movement that has a long history, in which all these  professionals have long been schooled.  But the complex combinations of movements were demanding.  There were, not surprisingly, struggle and mistakes.

Practice makes perfect.  This aspect of ballet is very like classical music.  The musician’s performance is the net of hours and years of diligent practice, considering each tiny detail, shoring up each possible point of failure, developing the mind and body to serve a particular musical message.  It takes repetition, with the challenge of somehow avoiding mindless repetition.  I think of practicing the piano as a tool for exploring something inside that is otherwise unreachable, for connecting with both the deeper self and something greater than the self.  But it also is a discipline that looks toward the future, and the possibility of greater transcendence, paid for by hard, diligent effort.

One important difference from music was the social aspect of ballet class.  The dancers worked very hard, but there was also laughter.    A few times, they applauded for the extraordinary sequences of their colleagues.  At one point, Weiss directed the dancers to spin and do enormous hurdling leaps towards the corner where we sat.  Teams of three dancers at a time came flying at a high rate of speed directly towards us.  I tried to stay cool, but I was aware that  a small miscalculation by one of them could result in serious injury — to us!  They came close.  Ballet is more dangerous than you normally think.

After the class, we met Lola.  In the class, she showed grace and powerful technique, and in conversation, she was poised and confident.  She told us about her early enthusiasm for horses, her six years as a student at the American Ballet school, and her time in Seattle.   Along with seeking her pursuit of artistic excellence, she’s also a communications major at N.C. State.

She asked what we did, and I told her a little about my work with open source software.  I tried out on her my idea that open source methods are actually close to how a ballet is made.  A choreographer borrows freely, taking preexisting ideas from all available sources, and modifies those materials to make something new.  It’s very similar to the method of open source software developers.  Lola didn’t appear to buy it, but I still think the idea has merit.  She invited us to see her do a solo in a couple of weeks, which should be fun.

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June 12, 2010

Money, and the ballet

There’s a tension between art and money.  Money is instrumental, a means to an end.  It’s associated with commerce and a variety of  tawdry of human attitudes and behaviors. Randy Newman’s song, It’s Money that I Love, is deliciously ironic, since it’s simply pathetic to love money.  Art is different.  It’s nourishing.  It opens doors.  It expresses our best, and makes us better.  Art feels ambivalent about money, but somehow they need to get along.

Last week I found myself reflecting on art and money after Ginny Hall invited Sally and me to take a tour of the studios and offices of the Carolina Ballet with Ricky Weiss, the company’s artistic director.   We’ve had season tickets for the last decade, starting shortly after the beginning of the company, and have seen all or almost all of Weiss’s ballets, some of them multiple times.  He’s a great choreographer in Balanchine tradition.  He has achieved something truly incredible in building a very strong company in our own Raleigh, North Carolina, and we’re so grateful.

As a longtime fan, I looked forward to talking with Weiss, but felt some anxiety about the money issue. I was well aware that the company needed it to survive.  Sally and I had discussed a possible contribution several times and agreed that we’d feel good about making a meaningful gift.  But it was not something I looked forward to discussing.  Where I’m from, we didn’t like to talk openly about money.  I’m not clear on the reasons, but we didn’t talk about things like salaries and prices for big ticket items.  It was taboo.

In the end, though, our meeting was surprisingly fun.  Weiss and Hall walked us through the studios and work spaces, which were not especially beautiful, but that was part of the point.  He made clear that he’s very conscious of managing money carefully, not spending it on things that don’t matter, and spending as much as he can afford on what counts.  He talked in detail of the cost of point shoes, costumes, and sets, of paying the dancers and staff, and of expenses such as disability insurance.  He compared his productions to those in New York, and admitted his sets were less elaborate, but he took pride that his productions cost a fraction of those.  As a person interested in the backstage, I found all this really interesting.

Weiss told us about falling in love with the ballet as a kid, dancing for Balanchine for 19 years at the City Ballet, leaving to become artistic director for the Pennsylvania Ballet, and leaving there under difficult circumstances.  He also described a six-year period of free lancing and searching without success for  the right position.  He said that during this time he considered leaving the field.  (This would have been a tragedy.)  He talked about the Ward Purrington’s long effort to bring professional ballet to Raleigh with no idea of the long odds against success.

I’d wondered whether Weiss, with his enormous and continual creativity, would find it interesting or helpful to have a philosophy of art and dance.  He did.  He seems to view ballet as not simply expressive, but also magical, transcendental, and yet at the same time basic to human existence, like food.  I was surprised, then, that he had no real trouble with the idea that some people don’t especially enjoy ballet, or even actively dislike it.  He didn’t feel compelled to win over everyone.  He noted lightly that someone once took him to a hockey game, and he didn’t particularly like it.

It turned out that Weiss had an unexpected gift for asking for money.  Without any hints from us, he at last said he’d like us to consider giving the exact amount that we’d already decided we wanted to give.  It was uncanny.  I felt happy and excited.  It’s wonderful that we can help with something that has brought us so much joy.

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