Ballet appreciation course in OTTAWA this fall

This fall I am taking my popular ballet appreciation courses on tour to Carleton University's Learning Retirement program in Ottawa. If you want to get more out of the Bolshoi and Royal Ballet cinema broadcasts, learn more about ballet in general, and have fun, this course is for you! If you don't live in the Ottawa-Gatineau area but know someone who does, please forward this information to them.

 

 

Best of Ballet

Lecturer: Katherine Barber
Lecturer biography: Katherine Barber is known to legions of fans as “Canada’s Word Lady” for her knack for making word histories lively and entertaining, but ballet is her real passion. She has taken ballet classes for almost forty years, and has seen thousands of performances all over the world. A popular teacher of ballet appreciation courses and “Ballet Talk” presenter for The National Ballet of Canada, she is a highly knowledgeable balletomane who vivaciously communicates her love and knowledge of the art form while demystifying its sometimes intimidating aspects.

• Fridays, September 12th – October 17th
• 10:30 a.m. – 12:30 p.m.
• Location: Room 124, Leeds House Building

Lecture series description: Ballet, one of the world’s greatest life-enhancing high art forms, beautifully combines visual arts, music, drama, and movement in one package. Those whose experience of ballet begins and ends with The Nutcracker will be surprised to discover how varied, exciting, and downright enjoyable ballet is. Current ballet fans will enrich their experience with insights into its history and all its aspects, focusing on six great choreographers whose repertoires will be part of this year’s live cinema broadcasts. By the end of this lecture series, participants will be able to identify distinctive choreographic styles and understand the physical challenges inherent in ballet.
Lectures, discussions, films and hands-on learning (ballet mime) Fee: $110.00 + HST Enrollment capacity: 60 participants

Week 1 - Women in White: French Romantic Ballet (Giselle, La Sylphide)
19th-century Romanticism and its obsessions – emotion, the supernatural, the individual, an idealized view of women – have left their mark on ballet to this day.

Week 2 - Impressing the Tsar: The Grand Imperial Russian Style (La Bayadere, Paquita, The Pharaoh's Daughter)
When you think "ballet", you see a regal-looking ballerina in a short tutu performing feats of virtuosity, and you owe that vision to Marius Petipa and his late-19th-century ballets.

Week 3 - Swans and Sugarplums (Swan Lake, Nutcracker)
The collaboration between Tchaikovsky and the choreographers of the Russian Imperial Court takes ballet to new heights as a serious art form.
Week 4 - Seeing the Music and Hearing the Dance (Jewels, Symphony in C/Palais de Cristal)
The great 20th-century Russian-American choreographer George Balanchine creates a new, plotless style of "neo-classical" ballet in which the dance serves great music, and reinvents ballet as a vigorous, athletic North American art form.
Week 5 - The Dark Night of the Soul (Manon)
The 20th-century British choreographer Kenneth MacMillan pushes ballet in new directions, exploring its ability, like all great art forms, to portray the darker side of the human condition, in ballets renowned for their heart-wrenching duets.
Week 6 - English Charm (La Fille mal gardée, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland)
Frederick Ashton puts an indelibly English stamp on a French-Italian-Russian art form in ballets that celebrate love and warm the cockles of the viewer's heart. Christopher Wheeldon continues the tradition.

Registration begins Tuesday, July 29th at 9:00 a.m.

By mail:

Print and complete the registration form and mail it to Carleton. Mailed registration forms will be processed in the order they are received.
Carleton University
Learning in Retirement
1516 Dunton Tower
1125 Colonel By Drive
Ottawa, ON
K1S 5B6

On-line:

Beginning July 29th at 9:00 a.m. please fill out and submit the on-line registration form to indicate the lecture series you’d like to register in. Following your submission of this form, the Learning in Retirement office will send you an e-mail with a secure link to the payment page.

By phone:

Beginning July 29th at 9:00 a.m. please call Carleton directly to register at 613-520-2600 ext. 1756. If the phone line is busy, please leave a message! All phone messages are responded to in chronological order. Please note that the Learning in Retirement office is no longer permitted to take credit card payment over the telephone. Those who wish to register by phone may provide payment by one of the following:

• by mailing a CHEQUE to the address listed above
• by paying with a CREDIT CARD online (using a link to the secure online payment system, which will be provided to you following your phone registration)
• by coming to the Learning in Retirement office IN PERSON and paying with a cheque, credit card, or debit card

By e-mail:

Beginning July 29th at 9:00 a.m. you can register by providing the details of your registration in the body of an e-mail message. Please e-mail: Learning.in.Retirement@carleton.ca

If you love ballet, please check out my season of outstanding ballet trips by clicking here.

GET MORE BALLET OUT OF LIFE WITH TOURS EN L'AIR

Use the buttons below to share this post on facebook, twitter, by email, or other social media.

Follow me on twitter: @thewordlady

You can sign up to have my ballet updates delivered directly to your inbox (and be entered in this month's prize draw) here.