Music: character dancing

[Guest costumier]

Hello all,

 

Can you recommend good audio CDs for character dancing please? DD needs some for Hungarian, Polish and Russian styles, as well as some character class CDs for practicing character barre work at home. Also any recommendations of folk troupes that would be inspiring to watch on video would be good, we have one of the Moiseyev dancers that she loves, anything similar would be good. Thanks!

[vrsfanatic]

Try clicking on Amazon above and run a search on Russin Folk Music. There are quite a few CDs and DVDs. Also, have you Googled Russian folk music?

[Guest costumier]

Thanks vrs, I've had a good google and it seems there are a lot more in the UK sites, I guess character must be more popular there? I found a few in the Royal Opera House shop, the irritating thing being they have no sound clips to listen to. I've googled like mad but have only been able to find sound clips for one of the CDs, and that was OK but didn't exactly make me want to leap up and dance. The blurbs look good but I'm very wary of ordering a pianist I haven't heard before, the quality and style vary so much! So many class CDs are competent but pedestrian, and I think it's important if you want the kids to MOVE musically, to give them music that is PLAYED musically. Plus DD is very sensitive to music and she WILL care! (Wonder where she gets that from?) Plus if I'm going to have to listen to a CD over and over in my house, I want it to be something I'll enjoy listening to.

 

Can you tell me if Whit Kellogg, Duncan Stearns, Ruth Greene, Anna Reznik or Dina Simanovich is likely to light my fire? (Josu Gallastegui was the one I heard, that was OK but not quite there for my taste.) DD's favourite pianists that she knows so far are Elena Balyakhova, Regina Shestakova and Laurent Choukroun. Thanks!

[Guest costumier]

STOP PRESS! I just found out it looks like the Choukroun CD "Danse de Caractere" is back in print. Just a few days ago they were saying "due in fall 2005." It's a lovely CD so I'll start with that, but any feedback from members with experience of any of the others would still be very much appreciated.

[Guest costumier]

Uh, no, when I tried to order it, in fact it ISN'T back in yet.

 

This is a funny thread, I'm talking to myself!

 

Do you not do much character work in America?

[Poppy]

I don't know if this is exactly what you are looking for:

 

Homepage: http://www.guydearden.co.uk/index.shtml

Then click on National Variations

 

 

I have ordered from this site before. You can listen to samples of the music. I use his baby ballet, primary poppets and ballet variations cd's for my classes. Some of them are purely piano, others have additional instruments. I haven't heard the national variations yet so I can't comment!

 

He is based in Spain but ships worldwide. I usually receive my cd's in about a week.

 

Hope this helps.

[Guest costumier]

Yes thank you! I hadn't seen that before. The "national variations" CD was done with synthed folk instruments. The synth thing wasn't to my taste, if I can't have real instruments I'd rather have a piano, but it did show something - I hadn't googled under "national", I'd forgotten that kind of dancing is called national in some places. (Over here "national" usually refers to highland dancing.) So I'll have another google. Thanks!