We made it to Jackson. Today was the Opening Gala Performance of the USA International Ballet Competition. This was a half/half deal. The first half was a lot of speeches thanking everyone in Jackson who makes this possible. This competition comes to Jackson every 4 years. The moving force that made this happen was Thalia Mara - a famous ballet professional and teacher who was lured to Jackson from New York. She was the determined person who made this competition a United States presence in the ballet competition world. She made this competition happen in Jackson beginning in 1979 - and it's happened every 4 years since then. Most dancers consider the Jackson venue to be the premier dance competition in the world - similar to what Cliburn is for piano. Tonight was spent doing atta boys, and kowtowing to the sponsors who give bucks, plus they had a nice little quasi olympic type opening complete with flag procession of dancers and a torch being lit.
For anyone reading who doesn't know. Drake and I were in Jackson 20 years ago. Drake came up on a Saturday night to pick me up after I had spent a week with my brother at his first rehabilitation attempt. Looking for something to do, we discovered this 'ballet thing'. We just walked over to the theater, and scored a pair of 'will call' tickets that hadn't been picked up. We were blown away by the quality of the dance, and we promised ourselves that when we retired, we would return for the entire competition. I was beginning to have some doubts that we had done the right thing, until after the intermission tonight.........
The second half of tonight's "Gala" was actual dancing by an invited dance company called "The Bad Boys of Dance". They were an amazing company of 6 men and one woman. The artistic director (lead dancer) and his wife (the one woman), who is the choreographer/assistant artistic director both won gold medals in Jackson. (FYI - She's doing all this while also having had a baby - she brought out their 3 year old daughter during the final curtain call.)
The electrifing performance and innovative choreography was set to rock and roll/early hip hop music (think Queen). The men danced with power, grace, and athleticism, and the entire performance was an overwhelming assault to the eyes and the ears. Let's just say, I would pay really good money to see the "Bad Boys" perform again. I kept thinking that this is the performance I would choose to take someone to see who "doesn't like ballet".
After tonight, we get SERIOUS. Young dancers have sent audition tapes to a committee of selectors. The selectors cull the field down to 100 dancers from all over the world - well, 31 countries, and the 100 compete through 3 elimination rounds. Tomorrow, Round 1 begins. At 2 pm there will be 10 performances, an intermission, and 10 more performances. Same deal repeats at 7:30 pm tomorrow night. WOW. It's going to be amazing. Any kind of a medal here makes a dancer's career. Just being a competitor gets you exposure to artistic directors from ballet companies all over the world. They arrive in Jackson with blank dance contracts, and most of the competitors leave with their names on those contracts. That means for a young dancer that they get to make a living at what they love to do, and what they've trained many hours for from about age 5 on.
Other fun today - Martha Priska met us in McComb, Mississippi and we had lunch (really dinner) at The Dinner Bell - a boarding house style restaurant, complete with the giant table seating 15 people (as if this was a boarding house) with a turntable that revolves around the center area of the table. On the turntable is: fried chicken, ribs, sausage, fried eggplant, dumplings, corn, lima beans, green beans, mashed potatoes, squash casserole.......and MORE. Fun and FILLING. The food was excellent like good southern home cooking can be. We talked non-stop with Martha for 3 hours. We ended up at McDonald's - less crowded and more conducive to visiting where we tried McDonald's version of the Starbucks Frappucino - and FYI - they taste exactly the same for 1/2 the price. Thanks, Martha, for doing the heavy driving. She came almost 2 times farther than we had to drive.
We are settled in. The extended stay hotel is new. Beds are great, towels and shower are good. We've even made the run to the grocery store.
Stay tuned. We're still having fun. AND WE ARE PUMPED ABOUT THE BALLET!!
