DANCE 101--Essay on Balanchine's "Jewels"----THE MARIINSKY BALLET THEATER

DANCE APPRECIATION 101

Prof EA Garza

University of Nevada, Reno

Spring 2018 08M18

JC Langelle

“Jewels”-- Three Part Ballet by George Balanchine

 

 

    Russia, not the birthplace of ballet but certainly a major contributor to its preservation and development. St. Petersburg, the Mariinsky Theater, where the art form has moved from the court of Romanov to the proletariat, although aesthetically and financially, it may still be beyond the reach of the masses.  I will be the first to admit to a complete lack of the basics of ballet, but have been able to review the three part performance in Photoshop so that an accurate timestamp of the movements could be recorded. Below, are those recordings. Hopefully, I have given credit to the various dancers as they appear in the sequences, and apologize for not being able to identify completely and correctly.

“Emeralds”-- Female dancers wear green costumes, the male dancers have light colors with dark vests. The stage is immense, dwarfing the performers, draped in large green curtains on each side with a large green backdrop, obviously alluding to “emeralds.”

[00:00] Open, credits run:

The Mariinsky Theater presents “Jewels” Ballet in three parts

Choreography-George Balanchine

Ballet Director -Makhar Vaziev

Art-General Director-Valery Gergiev

Orchestra Conductor- Tugan Sokhiev

Scenery-Peter Harvey

Costumes- Karinska

Director-Brian Large

Music by Gabriel Faure.

Cast: Zhanna Ayupova, Denis Firsov, Daria Sukhorukova, Dmitry Semionov, Yana Selina, Xenia Ostreikkovskaya and Anton Korsakov

[01:39]  Conductor enters pit

[02:10]  Curtain rises to Denis Firsov & Zhanna Ayupova, flanked by female couples, five in all; two downstage to right and left, the others upstage, all perfectly still.

Various stage maneuvers, up, down, hither and yon, away and together; eventually breaking at 7 1/2 minutes to

[07:38]  Ayupova solo, bows, exits stage right

[10:35]  Sukhorukova solo, enter stage left,

[14:44]   Dmitry Semionov

[16:58]  following a series of ballet moves, Semionov exits stage right leaving single female dancer, she is replaced by the second dancer.

principal male returns with first dancer from stage right and second dancer exits stage left  All dancers soon are onstage to complete the sequence, taking a bow upon exit stage right.

[18:45]  Korsakov enters from upstage left and is joined by Yana Selina (?) from upstage right. Movement, exit stage right.

[22:00] 2nd principal male and female dancers enter stage left, go through routine, exit stage right.

[25:24]  Firsov returns for solo, stage right. He is joined by two male, two female dancers. More females, males exit. Males, females platoon on and off the stage.

[29:34]  end.

                                       **

“Rubies”--

[00:00]

Again, the performers begin from a freeze frame, wearing tight red (ruby) outfits, an extreme from the classical first "emerald" cut. Stage curtains and backdrop in red. Zhanna Ayupova appears to be the lead again.

The movement is far more risque and suggestive compared to the seemingly innocent patterns of "Emeralds." The stage clears except for a happily bouncing duet. While in the first part, the flute played a key role in the composition, the piano is more noticeable here.

[06:18] principal female , flanked by the rest of the troupe, is placed into a number of positions by four male dancers.

[07:21]  male female duet slinking center stage to piano. The two appear to be Xenia Ostreikkovskaya and  Dmitry Semionov.

 

[14:19]  Ayupova is back with the troupe in a rather avant-cosmo off Broadway style.  Piano enhanced by the string section. One segment of five male dancers romping around the stage.

[20:41] The curtain drops to applause and raises as cast bows to audience.

[23:20] Following flowers and a number of bows, the curtain closes.

                                          ***

“Diamonds”--

Cast: Ulyana Lopatkina and Igor Zelensky, supporting dancers.

Music by Pyotr Tchaikovsky

[00:00] It is back to basic classical costumes as the stage is glittering in white with the troupe introducing the principals. The females are decked out with tiaras loaded with diamonds. Wind and string instruments replace the piano from the last section.

[06:32] Lopatkina appears upstage left, Zelensky enters downstage right; both in white. Impressed by Lopatkina's legs which seem to bend in physiologically impossible angles.

[16:28] Lopatkina's performance is stunning, certainly befitting the title of diamonds it portrays. Flawless, the en pointe impossible, the pirouettes will make you dizzy watching them. Zelensky, on the other hand, served more as the dancer's bar throughout the sequence.

[17:00] the dancers return to the floor. followed by a Zelensky solo, upstaging his own previous performance with Lapotkina. He exits downstage right and the floor fills with male dancers. The orchestral accompaniment leans toward a military type horn salute. The ladies return and join the troupe.

[20:37] Lapotkina enters upstage left for a solo. The two principals dash in and out from each side of the stage, matching pirouette spin for spin.

[23:19] dancers, in pairs, enter, upstage right performing a sort of grand march. For a minute I thought I was watching a Paris ballet, the influence is somewhat evident, with a bit of a waltz tossed in.

[26:06] the dancers disappear and are replaced by the principals.

There are at least three cameras, as many as five,  covering the ballet, the main one is directly in the center.

 

[33:49] presentation of the conductor and the flowers

finis.

    Initially, Bolshevism and ballet did not mix. Balanchine, originally Balanchivadze, (1) became an expatriate and left Russia when it became the Soviet Union. He was hired by Sergei Diaghilev, another expatriate and eventually migrated to the United States. As for ballet behind the Iron Curtain, Joseph Stalin, following a great deal of convincing, allowed it to continue as a cultural heritage program to influence and persuade the lowbrow capitalists of the superiority of the socialist movement. (2)

    A Footnote: I would highly recommend watching this on Photoshop, as the clarity is unsurpassed, there is a time counter and the file in the program does not suffer many of the glitches encountered watching it online at the rather crude, and ever so proletarian, “YouTube” site.

References:

1. George Balanchine, by Brian Seibert, Rosen Publishing (2006)
2. Dancing Up a Storm, the 1917 Revolution and Russian Ballet, by Carolyn Pouncy, published in Culture Matters, 19 March 2017
3. Links for downloading the entire three parts of the ballet can be found at: http://hdvidzpro.pro/video/Mariinsky-Orchestra-and-Ballet

ENG 102-- "The Power Principle", Segment 3: "Apocalypse"--RAW TEXT OUTLINE & TIMESTAMP

ENG 102-1105
Prof M Judd
University of Nevada, Reno
Spring 2018 07/18
JC Langelle




Following text transcription to serve as rudimentary reverse outline within the range indicated by the included timestamps--

[0:36:59-0:37:58]

In 1989. Berlin Wall fell Soviet Union collapsed and anybody who believed the propaganda of the list fifty years was a NATO will be disbanded. And in fact there was a promise to Gorbachev it was George Bush number one the first president who was president on made sure that the promise was never in writing it was a verbal agreement this one will study is a verbal agreement which Gorbachev naively took seriously and not realizing who is dealing with it was a verbal agreement that if the rich off permitted Germany to be reunified and incorporated within NATO which is quite a concession then NATO would guarantee that they wouldn't extend one inch to the east

as the phrase that was used that wouldn't go to East Germany and certainly not beyond

but Bush was careful not to put it in writing so that promise went out the window very quickly and effectively Clinton quickly expanded it to the east and so on but why wasn't NATO disbanded. Well there's no Russia to defend against. But still reason you've got to make sure that Europe doesn't go off in an independent course. And may do prevents that keeps it under U.S. command and if I made it was expanded after the Russian Russians disappeared and I was expected in the east is extended the world and NATO has been turned into a U.S. run global intervention force in the Balkans in Afghanistan and effect beyond the current NATO mission officially is to protect the oil resources energy resources pipelines and sea lanesso as to protect the global energy system protect means make sure we run it.

March 1999 the U.S. and its NATO allies bomb Yugoslavia armed forces joined our NATO allies and air strikes against Serbian forces responsible for the brutality in Kosovo.

March 2011 America's next president and a new coalition of the willing attack Libya

"the U.N. Security Council passed a strong resolution that demands and to the violence against citizens. It authorizes the use of force"

[0:39:26-0:40:19]

to me it was sanctioned by the one Security Council in contrast to the bombings of the Slavia there was no such greenlights in 1999 in the bombings were led by need of the first time the military alliance atop the sovereign nation a non NATO member posing no threat to the group similarly Libya poses no external threat and there are other striking parallels between the conduct of these wars.

the enemy then Slobodan Milosevic dubbed the new Hitler the enemy of today the eccentric one mark and power for over forty years now similarly villainize to by the US

*************************************

The Photoshop analysis of the film with a text box included to add transcription of the narration-dialogue.

ANTHROPOLOGY 281--The Phonetics of Deceit--WAVEFORM & TRANSCRIPTION ANALYSIS

ANTH 281-1001
Dr. J Ferguson
University of Nevada, Reno
Spring 2018 06M18
JC Langelle

     A recent essay assignment in English 102 references the video "The Power Principle, Part 3, "Apocalypse". (2010), released by Metanoia Films and directed by Scott Noble. The essay required analysis of part 3, with a focus on two minutes of the video.

     Background: The film represents an effort to trace the proliferation of atomic weapons from the post-World War Two era, through various events such as the Cuban missile crisis, the fall of the Soviet Union, and at least two other non-relevant conflicts, Kosovo and Libya. Various speakers are either edited into the video or have some direct relation to its development. This essay is not interested in the cast of characters, but will focus on the technique used to purvey the message.

     Narration: the soft-spoken woman's voice with the intense and varied music attempts to lull the viewer-listener into a state of semi-comatose hypnosis. One would think that presentation of the catastrophic events surrounding a nuclear detonation in a major metropolitan center would cause the narrator to be screaming in the ears of the audience. Instead, she continues throughout the video in the monotonous monotone, possibly intended by some speech expert to be the style necessary to convey the message. Here's what the overall pattern of the speech analysis looks like on the SIL Technology Speech Analyzer. (NOTE: The MP4 video was downloaded from Vimeo and  converted to an MP3 file for use on the analyzer.)

The film is about 70 minutes long and jumps from speaker to news clip to what-if scenarios to direct interviews of persons, some well known, others insignificant.

     Another method for analysis which allows for viewing the MP4 along with the sound file utilizes Sony's Acid Music Studio program:

In the above image we can see several functions at once including the location of the sound file at the video in time at the upper left corner along with a numerical frame reference. The image on the bottom has a notepad transcription placed in front of the program so that the text file can be analyzed as the film is running.

     The transcription itself was unavailable at all of the locations where the film was located, both at Vimeo and at YouTube. A third party online source was used to decode, transcribe the text and of the two, neither provided one-hundred percent accuracy. Editing was possible on both and a timestamp on the other. Below is one done at Vocalmatic with a timestamp:

The inaccuracy in the transcription requires following along the video in the Acid MS file and making corrections, this is due to the raw transcription done by a machine. For more money, the transcription can be done by "humans"

     Certainly, if there was an attempt to deceive the viewer, it may be uncovered in technical analysis such as the above, which could act as a lie-detector test for the content. Further investigation into the above process is necessary before any hard conclusions can be drawn.