Dance of a lifetime

By CARRIE KIRSCHNER - The Independent

ASHLAND December 23, 2007 05:45 pm

— “The Great Russian Nutcracker” enchanted audience members and local ballet dancers alike at the Paramount Arts Center on Sunday.
The holiday classic was performed twice Sunday and featured the internationally acclaimed Moscow Ballet along with more than 50 local dancers.
The beloved ballet has been a Christmas tradition for the Ashland Youth Ballet for more than 18 years, but this year’s performance marked only the second time local dancers mixed with professionals on stage.
Maria Whaley, founder of the Ashland Youth Ballet and dance coordinator for the local dancers, said her dancers were star-struck by the Russian dancers. As soon as the first Russian dancers took the stage all their eyes grew wide with awe, she said.
Last summer, the local dancers got an opportunity to learn their roles in “The Nutcracker” from the world-renowned troupe in a workshop at the June Conn School of Dance in Ashland. Choreographer and soloist Boris Baskakov taught all the local dancers their parts, Whaley said, adding her students have been practicing their parts for three to four hours every Saturday since August to prepare for Sunday’s shows.
Having her students get the opportunity to dance with and watch the Russian troupe was a dance instructor’s dream come true, Whaley said. “(‘The Nutcracker’) was founded in France but it grew up in Russia,” she said.
“To see the finesse, the technique... Everything we harp and harp on our dancers to do, they see that perfected in these particular artists,” she added.
Whaley said she hopes the performances will not only inspire her students to continue their studies in the classical arts but move others in the audience to become patrons of the fine arts.
“The Great Russian Nutcracker” brings families back year after year because embodies the best characteristics of fine arts, she added.
“They know it and yet there is still mystery involved in it,” Whaley said. “I think with the busyness of society in general it’s nice to be able to come into this magical moment and lose themselves for just a few minutes,” she said.
“It’s timeless. It’s just a holiday tradition that keeps you coming back and waiting to see it again,” said Russ Pomfrey, 45. Pomfrey said he remembers watching “The Nutcracker” as a child and brought his 6-year-old daughter, Hallie, to see it.
“It’s a lovely production,” he said. “I just wanted her to have a chance to enjoy this. It’s the children that make the production along with the beautiful sets and colors that makes you keep wanting to come back.”
“I grew up watching it,” Ruth Tompkins, 41, of Ashland, said. “It’s just something that goes from generation to generation.”
It’s clear her daughter Ried Tompkins, 12, who has danced in two productions of “The Nutcracker” but spent this year in the audience admiring her peers has already taken the tradition to heart.
“The little ballerinas are so cute,” she said. “They were just so adorable in those costumes.”

Copyright © 1999-2008 cnhi, inc.