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Home » Open thread 9/4/21

Open thread 9/4/21

The New Neo Posted on by

This Moiseyev number in rehearsal starts slow, but it certainly picks up speed. The attention to detail and style is phenomenal – in particular the ever-changing lean of the head and upper body, and the interplay between the men and women. Even when the men and women are doing the same steps, they do them so differently: the women with sedate yet subtly flirtatious charm, and the men with a bit of swagger.

Enjoy.

Comments

Open thread 9/4/21 — 43 Comments

  1. Thank you Neo. A very nice and welcomed break from everything.
    I will say one thing though. The men’s knees will be hurting when they get to my age (75).

  3. Shirehome. Must be my age–76–and my first thought was the knees.

    Used to be a sports calisthenic called the duck walk. Ruined ACL pretty regularly I don’t think it’s done any more. Thought of that here.

    But as to the dance….I liked it and it would likely be more attractive from a conventional camera point.

    Didn’t see the swagger. Read an advice column years ago which said standing still and letting the swagger swirl around you is HAWT. Lots of things I never understood.

  6. Dwaz;

    Actually, it’s not ballet. It’s folk dance on steroids, performed by dancers with training in many genres, including ballet. It’s a rehearsal, so they’re not wearing their folk dance costumes.

  7. An awful lot of white people in this video. Where is the diversity? How are they able to function without some people of color in that dance routine. Isn’t diversity a strength in Mother Russia, as well? We could send them a few million to help make Russia a healthier, happier, more prosperous place.

  8. Leroy Anderson’s contribution to dance: “The Waltzing Cat,” written in 1950. The Fayetteville (NC) Symphony Orchestra posted a pandemic-related Zoom version in May 2020– which allowed the musicians to add photos of their cats in the center of the screen:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p6exEYPTeD4&ab_channel=OperationsAccount

    Anderson himself was recorded singing the lyrics that Mitchell Parish wrote for “The Waltzing Cat” in 1951:

    There once was a tomcat— a wonderful tomcat, who had all the usual faults,
    But this cat was different—and what made him different was his inclination to waltz;
    Each night this feline Sir
    To his lady love would purr:

    CHORUS

    I love to waltz (Meow!)
    On a night like this with stars in the skies,
    I love to waltz (Meow!)
    As I look into your lovely green eyes.
    I never knew what a little waltz would do,
    Till the night I danced with you,
    Lightly as a feather—we’ll pussy-foot together,
    I’d love to spend (Meow!) all my nine lives just waltzing with you.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BpsTjq7j0dU&ab_channel=LeroyAndersonMusic

    Moiseyev it’s not, but at least it’s good-humored and shouldn’t make anyone’s knees hurt!

  10. Skilly–

    Apropos of diversity, the Fayetteville Symphony not only has some musicians of color (plus a female drummer!), but there are also numerous felines of color (FOCs) in the central photos in the video, and even a few dogs at the end. No speciesism in Fayetteville!

  11. Looks like the dancers were enjoying themselves. Folk dancing, even on steroids, must be easier, less nerve-wracking than ballet.

    FWIW, Google translate tells me the title is: “‘Monogram’ at the rehearsal.” I wonder if “monogram” doesn’t need more context for proper translation.

  13. Probably a lot of hard work goes into making it look like they’re thoroughly enjoying themselves.

  14. Probably a lot of hard work goes into making it look like they’re thoroughly enjoying themselves.

    tcrosse:

    Except for the knee-dancing, that looked like duck soup for professional ballet dancers.

  15. Huxley,

    In Russian, “venzelia pisat'”–literally, “to write monograms”–is slang for swaying or weaving drunkenly. Suspect it’s meant here to suggest more-elegant evolutions, but with a bit of sway/swagger.

    Nice vid. Them rooskies sure can do-si-do.

  17. huxley:

    For the women, somewhat duck-soupish – except for the speed, which is difficult. Also, the style is very difficult and takes a long time to get just right. And they have it just right – the little details of head and upper body and emphasis.

    For the men, not duck soup at all, of course.

  18. I was walking along the Charles River recently and bumped into a local Japanese women’s ballet club. They were all dressed in matching green tutus out for a photo session with the river in the background and a video recording with music to dance to. They had fun, everyone applauded, and a good time was had by all. Right across Soldier Field road where they were dancing is the Boston Skating club, a venue for ballet on ice. It was very appropriate.

  20. Here is an interesting open question…

    When and why did fighting in the movies become more like dance?
    [Most ridiculous in Chinese movies]

  22. Wonderful dance, Moiseyev Ballet is always on theTop!

    Zara A:

    Perhaps you could say more about the Moiseyev Ballet.

    I’m old enough to remember when the Bolshoi was It, at least to Americans. But this is the first I’ve run across the Moiseyev Ballet.

    Lovely dance by your Azerbaijani friends.

    Google Translate says: “An expression of the spirit and character of the people.”

  23. The Moiseyev Dancers (as they were then) appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show in June, 1958. They filled the entire hour, and were a big hit.

  25. Moiseyev was widely acclaimed as the greatest 20th-century choreographer of character dance, a dance style similar to folk dance but with more professionalism and theatrics.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Igor_Moiseyev

    Zara:

    Hmm. That’s a dance troupe of a different color! Intriguing. I was off the mark thinking of them as professional ballet dancers.

    In my college days I did Israeli folk dancing and Balkan line dancing. I could imagine those being taken to a higher level.

  27. @Huxley:

    Peak Kibbutz and Peak Hava Nagila … now those were the days! Copped the end of them ca. 4th grade curriculum and extra-curricular activities in second half of the seventies. And then, Children, the Left Moved On. As it always does.

    Never saw much of Balkan Line dancing… but when the Serbian and Croatian soccer clubs played against each other there were often other cultural expressions on display.

    Moiseyev himself was a survivor. Seems to have led a charmed life unless English Wikipedia is missing stuff. I wonder if there are any good films about his life.

  28. Kipling started one of his shorts ,”Daughter of The Regiment”, with the English doing the Circassian Circle at some anonymous garrison in the middle of India. It was a party and his Uninvolved Narrattor had missed a step, “puttin’ everybody out”
    How much more exotic can you get, how far into a different world, when the English are doing a line dance from some place in–Asia? the Balkans?, Far Samarkand?–as if it’s the most natural thing in the world? Not only are they doing it, they’re expected to know it and the Uninvolved Narrator’s failure is remarked upon. Then he goes off and talks to his friend Mulvaney, sitting on one of the artillery bridges. The tone is set when Mulvaney says, of Mrs Mulvaney’s output, “the season bein’ onwholesim, only little Jhansi was left on hand” Kipling could draw his readers into a world they could not imagine they could not imagine.
    For some reason, this has caused me to youtube up some of the dances from the east and I see a concept not in American dance. There is usually some kind of reference, if only a short positioning, of the men being warriors.
    Got to mean something, as a friend of mine used to say, because it can’t mean nothing.
    Turns out the Circassian Circle is still a Thing among folk dance folk.

  29. My niece just deleted her Facebook account. She had passed on a mourning comment for those Americans just killed in Afghanistan and Facebook flagged it:
    ______________________________

    13 door bells rang today
    13 flags will be folded
    13 families will never be the same [flag emoji]

    God bless our brave men and women and their families [prayer hands emoji]
    ______________________________

    Innocent. Well-meaning. Understandable. But no…Facebook knows better.
    ______________________________

    False Information

    The same information was checked in another post by independent fact-checkers.

    See Why [button]
    ______________________________

    Damn these motherless SOBS and their flying-monkey algorithms. My niece is only 21 but she can see the hand of Big Brother.

  30. huxley. Was the “why” detailed? Could have been the Marines didn’t get to everybody “today” and so there are two left over or something.
    Figures

  31. Richard Aubrey:

    If my niece clicked the Why button, she didn’t tell me the lame-o Facebook explanation.

    She did enclose a screenshot, which is what I quoted in ascii.

  35. Those Slavic not quite so Untermenschen developed a mighty good way to demonstrate reproductive fitness. You just can’t fake being able to get down and boogie like that.

  36. Peak Kibbutz and Peak Hava Nagila … now those were the days! Copped the end of them ca. 4th grade curriculum and extra-curricular activities in second half of the seventies. And then, Children, the Left Moved On. As it always does.

    Zaphod:

    Yes, I caught the earlier part of the wave. Some of those I danced with had already done their stint on an Israeli kibbutz.

    Back then a young American could volunteer at a kibbutz. In exchange for work, one would be given room, board and trips around Israel.

    Sorry to hear Israeli folk dancing is no longer a thing beyond Jewish community centers.

  37. I notice in the still neo posted that some of the women have quite long necks.
    Is this sought, or is it more common in the body type which can make the top end of the enterprise?

  38. @Huxley:

    Moving right along from nuclear-armed folk dancing Levantine Oneida Communities, I give you Koreans taking a break from Domestic Violence in order to engage in some Peaceful Cultural Appropriation:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=seV1NBVYQPM

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KYj7ipc7XQI

    Is there nothing this garlic-fueled People cannot do?

    If I do have a soft spot for the ROK, it’s that they have some very well-planned cycling routes and make some of the best bling and accessories for Brompton and Moulton bikes.

  40. Here’s something different in STOL aircraft:

    https://youtu.be/sI32NIvjvic

    It’s an AN-2 biplane with a pretty standard modern turboprop upgrade. AN-2s were designed to be a kind of Soviet Aerial Tractor and to have very short take off and landing capabilities from the get go.

    But then they’ve gone and added 4 electrically powered propellers to each lower wing in order to increase lift for takeoff and reverse thrust when landing. Presumably the 8 auxiliary props can be disengaged and collapsed during cruise — see configuration at start of video when plane is being pushed out on the ramp.

    There’s been lots of blah recently about battery powered aircraft, but it hadn’t occurred to me that there might be advantages to having a bunch of small and light electrically powered props or fans powered by the same turbine which drives the plane’s main propellor.

  41. Z.
    Some time back, took my kids to the Toronto Children’s Museum. One of the exhibits was a foot-pedal-powered generator.
    The kid peddled away and the tech hooked in a light bulb. Peddling was marginally harder. Another bulb, tougher yet. A dozen, could hardly move the wheel.
    So, is there enough power to use all those extra blades?

  42. @Richard Aubrey:

    I’d say yes. The AN-2 was designed for and fitted with piston engine to operate as a very robust STOL aircraft. It really was pretty much a tractor that flew with nasty old 1940s tech Soviet piston engines. With a modern turboprop configuration there’s going to be a lot more power available to play with for less engine weight. I believe that turboprops usually have variable pitch propellers so that can be run at constant speed, so diverting available power from main prop to auxiliary electric props would be trivial.

    I don’t know anything about aeronautical engineering, but am guessing that the idea is to increase airflow around the bottom wing and force more of it to be laminar thereby lowering the stall speed so that the thing can get off the ground in less distance and at lower takeoff speed. If the thing can be made to react to dynamic situations might also help prevent some wind shear accidents? Anyone who *does* have a more educated clue please feel free to chime in!

    There are some really quite heavy lift capable drones with multiple props powered entirely by batteries…. Problem is flight time given relatively low energy density of even the best batteries cf. hydrocarbon fuels <— what we have here.

    Re the cycling at the museum… we humans are pretty puny. 150W pedaling effort is no joke for a child and that’s two big old lightbulbs in series and worse because of all the mechanical inefficiencies in a kid-proof one-size-fits-all demo rig. The best Tour de France riders can manage ~600W sustained for several hours. Interestingly the current distance record for human-powered flight dates back to 1988:

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_human-powered_aircraft#Kremer_speed_prize_and_later_flights_by_MIT_team

  43. Z.
    Point of the museum issue is to demonstrate to kids what power really is and how it is, in effect, relative to the work it’s doing. You can’t just turn on another machine without…something happening. Which is why I inquired.
    Stayed, this was thirty years ago, more or less, at the Yorkville Venture Inn. Rooms had a few books. Closest I’ve come to larceny was when I started on Gibbs’ “Now It Can Be Told”.

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