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L.A. Ballet's Balanchine Festival follows in master's steps March 8, 2013 Los Angeles Times by Susan Josephs March 8, 2013 | By Susan Josephs Colleen Neary will never forget the day when George Balanchine articulated the blueprint for her life’s work. She was in her early 20s, then a respected New York City Ballet dancer. “He put me in to teach company class,” she says. “He said to me, ‘This is what you will do in the future.’ I said I wanted to dance, but he said, ‘You won’t dance forever. You will teach dancers my ballets.” Fast forward to 2013, to a rehearsal of Balanchine’s 1941 “Concerto Barocco” at the Westside headquarters of Los Angeles Ballet. Neary, now 60 and the company’s co-founder, surveys her dancers with microscopic scrutiny as they attempt to master the rigorously precise footwork, high-energy unison phrases and tricky group formations of the 18-minute dance. Both critical and encouraging, she invokes the words of her mentor during the section where three female dancers must weave around the sole male dancer in the work, interlocking hands and arms to create sculptural yet quickly dissolving tableaux. “Balanchine always used to say, ‘You should be walking around like Grecian goddesses,’ “ she tells the female dancers. “You’re missing this thing. In all his ballets, there’s this thing that’s more than the steps. It’s about feeling beautiful within yourself, and I can’t teach you that.” Neary, however, can remember how the famous choreographer known as Mr. B made his dancers feel beautiful, and it’s this firsthand experience that serves as the guiding force behind her company’s Balanchine Festival 2013. “Colleen has this great gift for challenging dancers to embody the Balanchine aesthetic,” says Ellen Sorrin, director of the George Balanchine Trust, which authorizes the staging of Balanchine’s ballets worldwide. “It’s an enormous responsibility to do what she’s doing, to disseminate Balanchine’s works as fully and wonderfully as possible.” DOWNLOAD PDF Home / News / New Item

Historic 10th Anniversary Season Announced July 1, 2015 Company News from the Staff at LAB On July 20, 2015, Los Angeles Ballet announced that the historic 10th Season will feature the Great Romantics. Included are LAB's critically-acclaimed productions of Giselle and The Nutcracker; a world premiere production of Don Quixote, choreographed by Artistic Directors Thordal Christensen and Colleen Neary; and the Los Angeles premiere of Frederick Ashton's Romeo and Juliet. "As we embark upon our tenth season and to celebrate this milestone, we thought that this was the perfect time to share the Romantics with the city," said Christensen. "Thanks to the support of our patrons, the company has seen thrilling growth over the last nine years. Our dancers have grown artistically and technically, and our audience has grown across the city," said Neary. Home / News / New Item

Shelling Out Dividends, Los Angeles Ballet's Version of The Nutcracker is a bright season opener... December 15, 2008 Los Angeles Times by Victoria Looseleaf James and the Sylph soon meet their destruction, however, James has deeply though mindlessly offended the witch Madge earlier during the wedding day. Now, seeking to bring his ideal Sylph into his arms, he drapes a veil he doesn’t know has been poisoned by Madge over the Sylph’s shoulders and winds it around her arms. The Sylph immediately loses her wings, comes to earth and quickly dies. James is stunned and collapses in grief. DOWNLOAD PDF Home / News / New Item

These Are The Ballerinas And Ballerinos Of Instagram February 5, 2015 HuffingtonPost.com by Katherine Brooks American Ballet Theater icon Misty Copeland has over 402,000 followers on Instagram. To compare, athletes like Venus and Serena Williams have 89,500 and 992,000 followers, respectively. Michael Phelps has 462,000. Danica Patrick has 26,900. Of course, ballet is easily the most photogenic of the sports. An art form that toes the line between performance and feats of athleticism, it’s filled with pirouettes and arabesques that when frozen in a frame appear like paintings or perfectly sculpted statues. Misty’s Instagram account is filled with shots both on and off a stage, flexing her muscles and practicing her craft. And she’s hardly the only ballerina — or ballerino — to grace the platform. One glimpse at the popular Ballerina Project account, followed by an impressive 641,000, and it’s easy to see why dance fans are quick to double click on the endless stream of posed portraits. We’ve explored the power of a ballet hashtag before. But now we’re focusing on the photos we share and their ability to communicate so much about a realm built on visual splendor. Below we’ve compiled a list of our favorite ballet and dance-related Instagram accounts, from principals and soloists across the country to the companies that document their every performance and rehearsal with the touch of an iPhone. For those not lucky enough to live down the subway line from Lincoln Center, it’s pretty astounding the degree of backstage access you can get from perusing your favorite dancers’ accounts. READ ARTICLE AT SOURCE Home / News / New Item

Los Angeles Ballet Braves the Balanchine Test May 26, 2007 Los Angeles Times by Lewis Segal Los Angeles Ballet aimed high with the final program of its inaugural season. In the first of four Southland performances, the company danced three masterworks by George Balanchine at UCLA's Freud Playhouse on Thursday. There's no place to hide in this repertory — you can't charm or fake your way through the steps. And everyone would notice if you tried. Familiar to local ballet audiences, "Apollo," "Serenade" and "Rubies" each requires a different attack — a different mediation between technical and expressive challenges — and many of the dancers on view were new to their roles. Inevitably, the results proved imperfect, but also entertaining, instructive, even redemptive. Certainly Colleen Neary's authoritative staging of "Apollo" made a stronger case for this historic 1928 collaboration between Balanchine and Igor Stravinsky than the wrongheaded, cutesy-poo Joffrey Ballet production recently danced at the Music Center. Oleg Gorboulev hadn't yet pulled together all the facets of the title role on Thursday, but his nobility of bearing and partnering skills sustained him even when interpretive issues became unfocused. Melissa Barak and Erin Rivera-Brennand easily outclassed their Joffrey counterparts as Polyhymnia and Calliope — and, as Terpsichore, Corina Gill scored the first of her two Balanchine/Stravinsky triumphs on Thursday. In staging Balanchine, Neary has to decide which versions of the choreography to adopt, sometimes opting to include passages that Balanchine deleted late in his lifetime (the birth scene in "Apollo," for example), but elsewhere incorporating the revisions he made (as in "Serenade"). Her sense of the dynamic contrasts within a work always yield maximum interest — the playoff between sharp footwork and floating arms in the crucial "Serenade" corps passages being especially artful. This 1935 creation to music by Tchaikovsky also benefited from Lauren Toole's varied, sympathetic portrayal of the central ballerina in distress — yearning for a connection with Gorboulev but preempted by the mysterious Elizabeth Claire Walker. Dancing a buoyant interlude with the technically accomplished guest artist Brooklyn Mack, the fleet, vibrant Kelly Ann Sloan offered further evidence of the company's careful casting and coaching. The playful virtuosity of "Rubies" (more Balanchine/Stravinsky, this time from 1967) found Toole a little too passive as a kind of classical showgirl but Gill positively radiant, untroubled by every hazard in the galvanic pas de deux and solos. Opposite her, Sergey Kheylik again demonstrated his ability to turn choreography into a passionate personal statement, a spontaneous act of affirmation. Sometimes the outcome can look impossibly willful — ragamuffin neoclassicism in this case. But it's never unsure or half-hearted, even when he ends the ballet and the whole evening one count behind everyone else. After the final repeat of this program on June 2, Los Angeles Ballet has scheduled no more performances until "Nutcracker" time nearly half a year from now. Plans for 2008 are pending. This first season has clearly been a learning experience for artistic directors Neary and her husband, Thordal Christensen. The number of performances was cut back from initial announcements, live music abandoned in favor of tape and the use of guest dancers curtailed. But Neary and Christensen delivered consistently fine dancing on every program, with the corps and the principals always matched stylistically (a virtue often missing in long-established, star-laden companies) and the prowess of leads such as Gill, Barak and Gorboulev something to cheer about. They've proved that they can give Los Angeles a classical company worth supporting in its growth from an underfunded 31- dancer ensemble offering sporadic performances to the kind of large-scale, year-round institutions that are the source of local pride in cities such as Houston, Boston, Seattle, Miami and San Francisco. They've done their job and so have the dancers. The rest is up to Los Angeles itself. lewis.segal@latimes.com DOWNLOAD PDF Home / News / New Item

Season 2012-2013 Christensen/Neary Mia Katz & Nicolas de la Vega in 'The Nutcracker' by Christensen/Neary Bianca Bulle in 'The Nutcracker' by Christensen/Neary Zheng Hua Li in 'The Nutcracker' by Christensen/Neary Snowflakes Ensemble in 'The Nutcracker' by Christensen/Neary Helena Thordal-Christensen, David Block & Nicholas de la Vega in 'The Nutcracker' by Christensen/Neary Julia Cinquemani & Alexander Castillo in 'The Nutcracker' by Christensen/Neary Allynne Noelle & Ulrik Birkkjaer in 'The Nutcracker' by Christensen/Neary Allynne Noelle & Zheng Hua Li and Ensemble in George Balanchine's 'La Sonnambula' Allynne Noelle & Zheng Hua Li in George Balanchine's 'La Sonnambula' Chelsea Paige Johnstin & Zheng Hua Li in George Balanchine's 'La Sonnambula' Chelsea Paige Johnstin & Zheng Hua Li in George Balanchine's 'La Sonnambula' Julia Cinquemani & Alyssa Bross and Ensemble in George Balanchine's 'Concerto Barocco' Julia Cinquemani & Alexander Castillo and Ensemble in George Balanchine's 'Concerto Barocco' Allynne Noelle & Kenta Shimizu in George Balanchine's 'Tchaikovsky Pas de Deux' Allyssa Bross & Ulrik Birkkjaer in George Balanchine's 'Tchaikovsky Pas de Deux' Ulrik Birkkjaer in George Balanchine's 'Tchaikovsky Pas de Deux' Kenta Shimizu & Ensemble in George Balanchine's 'The Four Temperaments' Allyssa Bross & Christopher Revels in George Balanchine's 'The Four Temperaments' Kenta Shimizu & Ensemble in George Balanchine's 'The Four Temperaments' Kate Highstrete & Christopher Revels in George Balanchine's 'The Four Temperaments' Chelsea Paige Johnston & Alexander Castillo and Ensemble in 'La Valse' Allyssa Bross & Zheng Hua Li in 'La Valse' Allyssa Bross & Zheng Hua Li in 'La Valse' Allyssa Bross & Zheng Hua Li in 'La Valse' Previous Gallery Next Gallery All photos by Reed Hutchinson Click on image for a fullscreen presentation.

The Nutcracker 2013 Mia Katz & Nicholas de la Vega Bianca Bulle Zheng Hua Li Snowflakes Ensemble Helena Thordal-Christensen, David Block & Nicholas de la Vega Julia Cinquemani & Alexander Castillo Allynne Noelle & Ulrik Birkkjaer Mia Katz & Nicholas de la Vega Bianca Bulle Zheng Hua Li Snowflakes Ensemble Helena Thordal-Christensen, David Block & Nicholas de la Vega Julia Cinquemani & Alexander Castillo Allynne Noelle & Ulrik Birkkjaer Mia Katz & Nicholas de la Vega Bianca Bulle Zheng Hua Li Snowflakes Ensemble Helena Thordal-Christensen, David Block & Nicholas de la Vega Julia Cinquemani & Alexander Castillo Allynne Noelle & Ulrik Birkkjaer Mia Katz & Nicholas de la Vega Bianca Bulle Zheng Hua Li Snowflakes Ensemble Helena Thordal-Christensen, David Block & Nicholas de la Vega Julia Cinquemani & Alexander Castillo Allynne Noelle & Ulrik Birkkjaer Christensen and Neary / Tchaikovsky Previous Gallery Next Gallery All photos by Reed Hutchinson Click on image for a fullscreen presentation.

The Sleeping Beauty 2015 Allyssa Bross as Aurora Allynne Noelle as The Lilac Fairy Fairy Ensemble Colleen Neary as Carabosse Allyssa Bross with LAB Ensemble Allynne Noelle Kenta Shimizu as Prince Desire & Allynne Noelle as The Lilac Fairy Allyssa Bross & Kenta Shimizu Allyssa Bross & Kenta Shimizu Bianca Bulle as The Diamond Julia Cinquemani as Princess Florine Julia Cinquemani as Princess Florine & Luke Schaufuss as The Bluebird Allyssa Bross & Kenta Shimizu Allyssa Bross & Kenta Shimizu Allyssa Bross & Kenta Shimizu Allyssa Bross & Kenta Shimizu LAB Ensemble Allyssa Bross as Aurora Allynne Noelle as The Lilac Fairy Fairy Ensemble Colleen Neary as Carabosse Allyssa Bross with LAB Ensemble Allynne Noelle Kenta Shimizu as Prince Desire & Allynne Noelle as The Lilac Fairy Allyssa Bross & Kenta Shimizu Allyssa Bross & Kenta Shimizu Bianca Bulle as The Diamond Julia Cinquemani as Princess Florine Julia Cinquemani as Princess Florine & Luke Schaufuss as The Bluebird Allyssa Bross & Kenta Shimizu Allyssa Bross & Kenta Shimizu Allyssa Bross & Kenta Shimizu Allyssa Bross & Kenta Shimizu LAB Ensemble Christensen and Neary after Petipa / Tchaikovsky Previous Gallery Next Gallery All photos by Reed Hutchinson Click on image for a fullscreen presentation.

LA Ballet Opens Fifth Season with Exuberant 'Nutcracker' December 16, 2010 Culturespot LA by Penny Orloff In an era of catastrophic personal belt tightening and calamitous corporate downsizing, too many promising arts organizations have fallen face-first into the chasm of disappearing dollars. When even an established, respected old organization like the Pasadena Playhouse had to close its doors for a time, it is beyond astonishing that a new classical ballet troupe not only survives, but thrives. Since the debut of its original production of “The Nutcracker” in November 2006, the Los Angeles Ballet has been met with critical and commercial success, nearly doubling its budget over five seasons without a penny of government support. “Considering the colossal events of the last five years – Katrina, the tsunami in Indonesia, the financial collapse and subsequent recession, the Haiti earthquake – LAB’s steady growth from $900,000 to $1,624,000 is nothing short of a miracle,” says Julie Whittaker, the company’s executive director. The central ingredient in LAB’s success is the consistent high quality of the product. Artistic Directors Thordal Christensen and Colleen Neary are clearly the stars of this enterprise. Their uncanny selection and inspired mentoring of some of America’s finest young dancers have resulted in a world-class corps de ballet and several important break-out soloists. Their vision and tireless dedication to the work have produced a large and reliable fan base, and ever-increasing ticket sales. LAB’s “Nutcracker” – playing in venues around LA County this month – is proof of the company’s stature as a game-changing force in the realm of international ballet. The original choreography by Christensen and Neary is fresh and exhilarating, demonstrating the technical skill, individual virtuosity, and razor-sharp precision ensemble work that distinguish this young company. After several reports, I am running out of superlatives to describe the exemplary work of the women’s corps de ballet in the Dance of the Snowflakes and the Waltz of the Flowers, two highlights of the production. Other highlights of this season’s LAB “Nutcracker” include the annual appearance of guest artist Sergey Kheylik as the Cossack Doll. The ecstatic cheers greeting his Act I entrance escalated to a roar as he flung himself into impossible leaps and turns. He was joined in Act II by LAB newcomers Aaron Bahadursingh and Christopher Revels, who matched Kheylik vault for astonishing vault. The off-the-charts athleticism of this Russian Dance whipped the audience into a prolonged, ear-splitting demonstration, literally stopping the show. Returning as Marie (Sugarplum Fairy), Monica Pelfrey remained serene and confident through the long and demanding pas de deux. Her dancing showed off clean stepwork, lovely ports des bras, and marvelous balance. She was partnered by Zheng Hua Li, her cavalier in last season’s Balanchine “Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto No. 2.” Li’s emotional physicality contrasts beautifully with Pelfrey’s cool elegance, creating a wonderful chemistry. The audience rewarded his big, floating jetees and effortless lifts with ample appreciation. Making her LAB debut in the Arabian Dance, Julia Cinquemani’s jaw-dropping beauty managed to stun a fairly demonstrative crowd into pin-drop silence. Wrapping her supple, snakelike torso in coils around her partner, newcomer Alexander Castillo, she mesmerized adults and children alike. The breathless silence was broken by an extended, vociferous ovation. Also new this season is Allyssa Bross as the Rose in the Waltz of the Flowers. This young ballerina clearly won over the crowd, her incandescent smile radiating throughout her performance. Thirteen-year-old Helena Thordal-Christensen plays Clara with fragile beauty and dramatic intensity. Having danced the role for the first time last season, this year she exhibits complete confidence and authority. Her long, slender legs extend forever, making an event of each arabesque. She has an arresting innocence about her, a lack of artifice which made her nightmare scene all the more harrowing as she darted, terrified, around the vast stage of Glendale’s Alex Theatre. Perhaps the most moving moment in the performance, for me, came when Clara’s mother – played by Thordal Christensen’s real-life mother, the great Balanchine ballerina, Colleen Neary – kissed the little girl before walking off the stage, a symbolic passing of the torch from the past to the future. Clara’s Nutcracker-turned-Prince is 18-year-old Jordan Veit of the Pacific Northwest Ballet School’s Professional Division. Dancing with strength and ease, and resembling a young Leonardo Di Caprio, this young man exudes charm. The long line of infatuated little girls waiting to meet him after the performance may be the harbinger of good things to come for Veit. Fans in search of guaranteed holiday magic have several chances remaining for performances of LAB’s “Nutcracker” in venues around LA: UCLA’s Royce Hall, Dec. 18 at 1 and 5 p.m., and Dec. 19 at 1 and 5 p.m.; and at Redondo Beach Performing Arts Center on Dec. 24 at 2 pm., and Dec. 26 at 1 and 5 p.m.. Tickets and information are available at (310) 998-7782, or at www.LosAngelesBallet.org . DOWNLOAD PDF Home / News / New Item

Ghada Irani to be Honored at LAB Gala 2015 January 1, 2015 Company News from the Staff at LAB Los Angeles Ballet's Gala 2015 will honor philanthropist Ghada Irani. In her capacity as a member of the Los Angeles Ballet Board of Directors, Mrs. Irani has been a generous supporter of not only its ballet programs, but also its outreach programs for children, families, low-income seniors, veterans and disabled persons. In addition, she she served as Co-Chair for the Los Angeles Ballet Gala in 2012 and has been a member of the Event Planning Committee for LAB Galas since their inception in 2011. The Los Angeles Ballet Gala 2015 will take place May 7, 2015 at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel and is chaired by Dina Leeds and Jeanette Trepp. The evening will include cocktails, dining, and a preview performance of master choreographer Jírí Kylián’s Sechs Tänze (Six Dances) Home / News / New Item

L.A. Ballet finds the poetry in 1955 version of 'Romeo and Juliet' May 9, 2016 Los Angeles Times by Lewis Segal While Los Angeles has become a world-class cultural capital with top-notch museums, galleries, opera, symphony orchestra and theaters, it has lagged in one important area - ballet. Despite herculean efforts over the years, ballet companies have struggled and ultimately failed to gain a foothold in Southern California. But all that has changed with the emergence over the past decade of the Los Angeles Ballet company, under the leadership of Artistic Directors Thordal Christensen and Colleen Neary, and Executive Director Julie Whittaker. Operating on a shoestring budget and performing without a permanent home, LA Ballet has managed through dedication and careful planning to establish itself as a vibrant, energetic and professional company on the national ballet scene. By carefully building a talented company over the past ten years, and relying on a core of supporters, LAB has emerged as a bright light of the performing arts in Los Angeles. Its most recent production of Don Quixote, originally choreographed by Marius Pepita for the Bolshoi in 1869 and repurposed by Alexander Gorsky in 1900, was performed for sold-out audiences in various venues around Southern California. As with its other ballet productions, Don Quixote showcased the talented ensemble company at its best, along with several promising soloists who highlighted this engaging ballet. Julia Cinquemani, playing the role of Kitri, is dazzling and charismatic, and her partner Kenta Shimizu is strong and solid in the role of Basilio. Other standout performances included Allyssa Bross, Bianca Bulle, Kate Highstrete and Erik Thordal-Christensen. Directors Neary and Christensen choreograph the piece with precision and grace, lifting both soloists and the corps to a high level of achievement. While Los Angeles Ballet still has work to do in attracting both money and talent to its company, it has wisely stuck to the basics of building a company from the ground up, carefully grooming its performers and engaging an audience for the future. It is already well on its way to fulfilling the mission of creating a world-class ballet company. READ ARTICLE AT SOURCE Home / News / New Item

Previous Artistic Staff Design Director Catherine Kanner Catherine Kanner worked as a founding Board Member and Design Director for Los Angeles Ballet from 2005 to 2022. During that period she oversaw and provided all promotional materials for Los Angeles Ballet. For more about Catherine Kanner catherinekanner.com Home / Staff / Artistic Staff