Marshall’s Musings

Today we begin our dance workshop for the Artists of Atelier Ballet in preparation for our fall production of Handel’s Acis and Galatea. Our dancers will be particularly closely integrated with the singers in this production, consequently, this opportunity to have the dancers by themselves in order to explore various aspects of baroque dancing becomes doubly important. The complexity and sheer number of steps in baroque choreography is already daunting for most professional dancers. When you add a totally new way of using the arms it presents a huge learning curve. On the surface, the work looks extremely balletic (which in some ways it is) but kinetically it is a brand new world.

Jeannette and I can’t wait to begin and we’ll be certain to post some videos of our experiments as we prepare for this 25^th Anniversary kick off!

Heads up! Just want to remind everyone that we have two more performances of Degas and his Dancers at the Art Gallery of Ontario as part of the Drama and Desire exhibition.

This gorgeous exhibition has been designed by OA set designer Gerard Gauci and features paintings, sketches and engravings from the late 18^th century through until the first world war – all of them inspired by theatre productions and personalities.

Opera Atelier was invited to “bring to life” the paintings of Degas and two of our beautiful young dancers – Julia Sedwick and Jack Rennie are featured in the gallery doing a short barre and pas de deux in the style of 1870. This excerpt has been choreographed by my Co-Artistic Director, Jeannette Lajeunesse Zingg and is accompanied by the tremendously talented young pianist Ben Cruchley.

Audiences have been so large that the AGO has stopped telling patrons when our performances take place, but I intend to break the rules for you! Degas and his Dancers will be performed at 1:30, 2:30 and 3:30 this Sunday, August 15 and next Sunday, August 22.

Click here for full admission details.

For a sneak preview with Artists of Atelier Ballet Jeremy Nasmith and Julia Sedwick click here.

On Thursday while I was in New York meeting with Ralph Rucci (more on that later) Jeannette was in Toronto for a shoot with photographer Tara McMullen. Jeannette had been invited to model one of the evening gowns designed by Toronto’s spectacular couturiere Rosemarie Umetsu.

Jeannette had been invited to be part of Iconic Beauty 2010. The project was started 3 years ago as an ongoing project to celebrate the individual style and art of the Canadian female artist through the medium of fashion photography. Every year Rosemarie picks 20 Canadian women representing a wide range of artistic disciplines. and in collaboration with a different fashion photographer each year, dresses and fashion photographs each subject.

I had seen Rosemarie’s gowns on numerous singers who work with Opera Atelier and was excited to see what she would give Jeannette to wear. I expected something spectacular but nothing could have prepared me for the “geranium red stretch silk satin” creation which she chose for Jeannette.

I’ve only seen some blurry Blackberry photos thus far, but if they are any indication of what we will see on Tuesday, we can’t help but have some thrilling photographs. Jeannette looks more glamorous than ever!

I don’t want to give too much away until we post some of the images next week but in the meantime thank you to Rosemarie Umetsu, photographer Tara McMullen and makeup artist Ivy Lam for their wonderful work.