I was invited to enjoy the dress rehearsal for Giselle through my affiliation as an Ambassador to the Music Center LA. The below photo was provided by the Music Center LA. All opinions are entirely my own.
I think the last ballet I saw was the Nutcracker at Lincoln Center. That was probably over 30 years ago. I didn’t attend the ballet often when I was younger, and not at all as I got older. It wasn’t something on my radar. I took ballet lessons when I was young, but all I really wanted to do was get myself into toe shoes and that wasn’t going to happen until I had mastered everything that came before it. As a short, chubby little girl, ballet wasn’t really in the cards for me.
When I became an Ambassador for the Music Center Los Angeles, I rekindled my love for performance. I missed attending the theater and I was excited that I would get the opportunity to dress up and head over to the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, the Ahmanson, and the Disney Concert Hall. Last night, I attended my first performance of the year: Giselle.
This version of Giselle was performed by the Royal New Zealand Ballet Company with Gillian Murphy, Principal Ballerina with the American Ballet Theater. The ballet opens at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion today, January 31 and runs through the weekend, February 2nd. If you haven’t been to the ballet lately (or at all), this is a wonderful and beautiful staging of the ballet.
There is something about going to the ballet that completely consumes you. The calm you feel watching these dancers bring a story to life without words is mesmerizing. Granted, I didn’t know much about Giselle before seeing the show, but it wasn’t hard to figure out the storyline. I did come home and look up the history of Giselle and was surprised to find it was first staged in 1841. Incredible.
Last night’s performance was actually the dress rehearsal. I wasn’t sure what to expect, but while there were a few stops and re-starts, I kind of loved seeing the process going on. The orchestra (which doesn’t travel with the ballet) had to time the music exactly to the dancers performance. Not an easy thing to do. If the timing was even a little bit off, things didn’t look right. Perfection was the key. And other than a few glitches (which is why dress rehearsals are necessary), the performance seemed pretty flawless to me. I might not know much about ballet, but I know the time and effort and pain that goes into being a ballerina. And oh wow… are they all so stunning and graceful.
I don’t even know what to say about Gillian Murphy other than she seems like the kind of person I could sit and have a really fun lunch with. Gillian… I loved the leg warmers. I loved that you were adjusting your toe shoes and straightened the cross on the stage. While the ballet takes you away, it was also nice to see the reality of putting on a stage show of any kind. These people work damn hard and it pays off.
So what’s next? I’m ready to head back downtown. I’m itching for my next show.
Check out the entire Music Center line-up and let me know if you need a buddy to go see a performance with. You can also follow the Music Center LA on Facebook and Twitter.
Follow the Royal New Zealand Ballet and Gillian Murphy on Twitter.
