I snuck backstage yesterday afternoon to soak up the vibe of the last at-home performance of the 2007-8 season. My photos can't compete with Adrian's shot of the boys' tunic train, but here's what I got.


With all the excitement over the Raymoda tutus, the men's tunics could almost get overlooked-- but they should not be! I got my first up close look at them yesterday, and they are as stunning as the tutus.


Here is the tutu that Alison wore for the pas de deux. It is utterly gorgeous and must make her feel like a million bucks.

Up-close view of the tutu skirt:

And here's Candace, ready to go onstage. It's amazing to see the finished product of all those months of work on these costumes, complete with headpiece, armlettes, hair, and makeup.

I'll ditto what Adrian and Steven have said about the marvel of having seen another season pass under the bridge. I'll also echo what Steven is feeling about a sense of disbelief at what's happened over these past few months, though for different reasons, of course. I have a feeling of relief that this season is done now, because now I won't be missing any more ballets or performances! Even so, now we've all made it through another season of ups and downs, individually and collectively, and are facing the blank canvas of possibilities that will be 2008-9. I, too, will keep you updated on what happens during the long summer layoff for us all. My daily life won't change too much except that I will start spending a lot more time at the studio than I have since February. (It's kind of ironic that as the rest of the company scatters, I'll be coming back IN to work...). I'll keep on with daily physical therapy, plus adding some work in the studio and taking class myself. I will also be doing a fair amount of teaching in the SOBT summer course. So it will be a very full summer, which is how I like them to be. After a short amount of downtime, we dancers tend to get antsy!

Merde to everyone for OBT's Kennedy Center debut! May it only be the first of many performances there and elsewhere on the national stage.

The end is in sight!

Well, as Adrian mentioned, we closed our season yesterday (although for some of us we still have  a bit more work to do... something about Washington D.C.). All day yesterday I kept thinking about all the growth I've gone through in the past season, and in the past few years since joining OBT. It's been such an amazing time, and I've gotten to do so much. I've worked for and with some truly amazing people and wouldn't change most of it for anything. It's really hard to put into words all the gratitude I feel towards everyone who has helped me along the way. This season has been one of so many opportunities for me, and if a year ago I had been told I would have been dancing all this, I wouldn't have believed them. It almost makes me want to bypass summer entirely and just get right on with Swan Lake (well, maybe in a week or 2). 

I know the break will do my body a lot of good, but the beginning of summer is always so bizarre for me. I get so used to seeing everyone from OBT everyday that all of a sudden it feels like time stops and I'm holding my breath until I get to hang out and play around with all my friends on a daily basis again. I mean, of course we all see each other from time to time, but not with the frequency that I've become accustomed to over the 9 months of the season. On top of that, summer always feels very nebulous. I have some plans, but nothing very concrete. I'm so used to my days being scheduled for me that once I'm in charge of it I just don't really know how to fill all that time. It feels very daunting. 

So, my summer goals are to teach as much as I can. Make new friends and reconnect with some old ones. Try at least one new dancewear pattern. Possibly work with Adrian on putting together some video logs for all of you about the goings on at OBT. I've been thinking about trying to improve my German. And above all else, try to keep you all updated on what it's like for us in the off season! 

Well, I need to get back to cleaning and packing and all that fun stuff. I'm going to do my best to blog daily about our DC trip and include tons of photos!

Here's a picture my friend Jessica Flores took backstage during Rubies. That ballet was what we call a "gut-buster". It's one of the most exhausting things I've ever danced, but also one of the most fun!

End of the season...almost

Yesterday we closed our Russian Program, the last stop on our Grand Tour of a season. We had great audiences as we visited some former territory and broke some new ground. We revived Rubies from five years ago, premiered a new Stowell ballet entitled Tolstoy's Waltz, and premiered a new Raymonda by Yuri Possokhov. As the audiences stood to recognize our hard work and artistic leaps and bounds, it felt like they were sending us off on the right foot on the eve of our premiere at the Kennedy Center (later this week!). I will be updating you as much as possible from the Kennedy Center as we make this monumental premiere on America's stage.

I leave you with some behind the scenes photos from the Russian Program.



The girls rosin up before the curtains goes up

Kathi Martuza's Raymonda Variation

Anne Mueller mid-air in her Raymonda variation


The men fastening each other into their costumes

Opening Night

Although I hope it will be the last time, last night I once again had the experience of watching my colleauges and friends from the "civilian" perspective. The performance was glorious in every way. The costumes that Mark and the entire wardrobe crew have slaved over for so many months now looked truly heavenly, and of course the dancing was more than wonderful. I think I was better able to understand what the typical ballet-goer experience is like than I usually am, because of being so unfamiliar with the three ballets on this program. (I know Rubies well, but hadn't seen a single second of Tolstoy's Waltz and only one rehearsal of Raymonda). Usually when I've seen performances from the front I've gotten caught up in watching tiny details that are only visible if you know they're there, and therefore miss catching the overall impression and the impact of the piece as a whole. Last night I could only sit there and enjoy it. And so I did, with the usual amount of awe that I feel at watching my friends become superhuman artists up there on stage.

I've been off long enough now that it's getting hard to imagine myself actually executing those steps and choreography. I do remember this feeling from previous injuries--- after a certain amount of time away from dancing, it starts to seem incredible that you ever did that stuff, and that you will do it again. The neat thing is that all it takes is one step back into a studio, a few plies and tendus and port de bras, and though getting truly back in shape takes eons, that feeling of being a dancer comes right back. Also, as much sadness as I have at being on the other side of the footlights right now, it is also a wonderful way to re-motivate and reinspire. Exercises and rehab are boring and dry and it's easy to start to wonder if they are doing any good at all, so getting a reminder of what I'm doing them for is a really great morale boost. Got to get back in the race!

News from the Costume Shop...

By Kim Dawson, Stitcher

We're down to the final days before full dress rehearsal and opening night, and with new costumes being constructed for two of the three ballets on the Russian program, the costume shop has shifted into overdrive and is a whirlwind of nearly round-the-clock activity!

As you've read in previous postings, the most significant costume build for this program and for OBT is for the world premiere of Yuri Possokhov's Raymonda. Since the end of January, I've been responsible for constructing 10 new tutu skirts for this ballet. At the end of last week, I felt a sense of accomplishment and melancholy as I took down the very last layer of tightly gathered and carefully ironed light blue tulle from the hangers, where layers and layers have hung from the ceiling in various stages of preparedness over the past several months.

About eight weeks ago, the construction process also began for the women's bodices, sleevettes and headpieces, the men's tunics and unitards, and the preparation of yards and yards of decorative gold lace and rhinestone trims. In these final days we're completing and stitching all of the elements together; gluing remaining rhinestones; sewing hooks, eyes and snaps; attaching trims to bodices and skirts; attaching bodices to tutu skirts; attaching sleeves to tunis, etc. And the results? Simply stunning...if we do say so ourselves!

Fun Facts:

• Each Raymonda tutu skirt takes about 80 hours to construct -- not including trimming (decoration). A few photos (below) illustrate the process.

• If all of the layers of un-gathered tulle and netting for a single Raymonda tutu skirt were placed end-to-end, they would stretch nearly 120 yards -- longer than a football field!

• The longest single layer of the Raymonda tutu skirt is the "hoop" layer, which includes two overlapping pieces of tulle/netting that are about 60 feet long each, before gathering.

• If all 10 layers of tulle and netting for the 10 blue Raymonda tutu skirts were laid out flat, they would cover an area of abotu 2500 square feet -- nearly 1.5 times the area of the Keller stage floor.

• In total, the Raymonda costumes are trimmed with nearly 400 feet of gold lace and trim.

• In total, more than 12,000 tiny rhinestones have been glued on one-by-one and more than 600 teardrop-shaped stones have been hand sewn on to the Raymonda costumes.
  

Photos of the Tutu-Making Process

PHOTO 1:  

The base that all of the tulle/netting layers are sewn on to consists of two pieces -- the basque (top) and the panty, which are carefully fitted to each dancer and then sewn together. Note, the safety pins indicate where the lowest layer of tulle should be sewn.

PHOTO 2:  

This is a piece of 60' long tulle for the hoop layer, which has been dyed the appropriate color and now needs to be ironed flat in order to be gathered.

PHOTO 3: 

Once the tulle/netting is ironed flat, it is run through the sewing machine using a special gathering foot.  After this, another gathering thread is zig-zagged on top of this gathering so that each piece can be gathered even more tightly to fit the appropriate space on the basque/panty.

PHOTO 4: 

The narrowest/bottom layer, before and after gathering.

PHOTO 5: 

Layer in the process of being ironed.

PHOTO 6: 

In the ironing process, each layer is pinned securely to the ironing board, and then sections are gathered tightly and then steamed/pressed.  It takes a full day to iron all the layers for a single tutu.

PHOTO 7: 

Some layers for two tutus, in various stages of preparedness.

PHOTO 8: 

To create the hoop layer, two gathered pieces are sewn onto a flat piece of netting, and a casing for the hoop is then created underneath. On the long/right side of the flat piece you can see the zig-zag over gathering threads which will be used to gather up and position this very-long-layer on the basque/panty.

PHOTO 9:  

The positioning for each layer is carefully measured and drawn. At the narrowest part (the front leg), ten tightly gathered layers must be sewn into a space of only about 2.5 - 3". Here you can see the 10th (bottom) layer is pinned on and ready to be sewn. After this, we pin and sew on the 1st (top) layer and continue working our way down, layer by layer.

PHOTO 10:  

The 3rd layer being sewn on. Six more layers to add!

PHOTO 11:  

The hoop layer (4th layer) has just been sewn on.

PHOTO 12:  

The final layer is being sewn on. Once this is complete, panty is sewn together at the back seam and the crotch, and each individual layer is sewn together at the center back.

PHOTO 13: 

Once all the layers have been sewn on, we tie-up the top three layers so that we can insert the hoop into the 4th layer.

PHOTO 14:  

The hoop is inserted into the casting. The size of the hoop helps determine the shape of the tutu -- smaller for more bell-shaped or larger for more flat.

PHOTO 15:  

Once the hoop is inserted and the gathers are spread out evenly around the tutu and ironed, it is secured with tying down to the 6th layer.

PHOTO 16:  

Lastly, each of the layers is secured with individually tied knots...layers 9-10 together, layers 7-8-9 together, etc.

PHOTO 17:  

All the layers are now tied and the tutu has gone from fluffy to flat. Now the tutu skirt is ready for decoration...on the top side, of course.

PHOTO 18:  

Here's a sneak peak at the tutu skirt and bodice decorations in progress.

short video

For our German Program last October, I had a friend (Brian Simcoe) take some shots from the wings and he captured this video. I think it offers a glimpse into the camaraderie we feel for each other on a daily basis, but especially right before the curtain goes up. Circling up like this and "feeling each other's energy" was suggested to us by Noah Gelber specifically for this ballet, Forsythe's The Vertiginous Thrill of Exactitude. He told us to really connect with each other before we went on stage and also while we were dancing because it was such a difficult ballet to dance. A little eye-contact and a smile can help you pull out all the stops when you've got nothing left to give towards the end of a performance.



In this video: Candace Bouchard, Mia Leimkuhler, Kathi Martuza, Adrian Fry, and Steven Houser

Who's Your Dancer?

The three-year long series of "Who's Your Dancer?" profiles will come to an end with the final installment soon. Yesterday was the photo shoot, and I went along to help out and document the process for you all to see how these beautiful photographs come into existence. However, I managed to post my entries about it in the wrong order, so scroll down the page to get to the first post, called "The Making of a Mermaid".

Enjoy!