We had a great delivery of over 500 shoes to the Maeen Tent People children last Saturday, January 23rd. The children were ecstatic over their new “used” shoes and socks and a great thanks goes to Carrie Cole our organizer, Mary Elizabeth Diab and Rana Elfar for helping measure the little “toes” and handing out shoes. Also a huge thanks to all of our local schools and children who decorated boxes and filled them up with the precious shoes. Also we would like to thank the AWA for contributing more shoes and helping assist in the distribution.

If any of you would like to have an amazing experience, away from the “fluff” of everyday life, and like to join us on our next mission in Jeresh, January 30th, please contact Carrie Cole at 079-635-9618 or carrie@ammanballet.com. We really could use a few extra pair of hands to hand out shoes.

Lastly, if any of you were not able to drop off shoes at one of our locations, and you still have some shoes to donate, please bring them to Haya Center Ballet studio in Shumesani or to the Energy 97.7 Radio Station in the Haddad Plaza on Wadi Sugra by the end of the day tomorrow (Thursday). If you go to Energy 97.7 you can go up to the studio and meet the D.J.’s—fun trip for the kids .

Sincerely,
Melissa Sweiss, Director
The School of Amman Ballet
www.AmmanBallet.com
079-587-1575

“We are happy to be a part of the Haya Cultural Center.  Our mission at the School of Amman Ballet is to incorporate good ballet training with community outreach.  We thought we would find that by teaming up with other dance schools, but it seems those schools are primarily focused on the commercial aspect of dance training—not really congruous to our purpose. Our brief move to Tempo Dance Studios in the fall was a total disappointment.  The professional training environment we were promised simply did not exist”, shares Melissa Sweiss, Director of SAB

We have had some great highlights in 2009 and we are looking for even greater moments in 2010.  We are starting the year with the delivery of over 500 pairs of shoes to the Maen Tent People and the Gaza Camp in Jeresh.  On the cultural side we are looking forward to some more performances with the Amman Symphony Orchestra, a spring recital and of course the Nutcracker again in December.  This year we will focus on some underserved members of the community with classes for the Al Hussein Society for the Habilitation and Rehabilitation of the Handicap and the children of the At Risk Program of the River Jordan Foundation.

The Haya Cultural Center is located on Abdel Hameed Sharaf street at the center between the Arab Bank and the traffic light in front of the Almuthana pharmacy.

THE NUTCRACKER

JANUARY 06, 2010

SUGAR PLUM FAIRIES, MOUSE kings, dancing snowflakes and candy canes—it can only be The Nutcracker. The Dumas stage adaptation of E.T.A. Hoffmann’s story, set to Tchaikovsky’s famous suite, is a staple Christmas performance.

Words and photography by John Lillywhite.

(John Lillywhite)

SUGAR PLUM FAIRIES, MOUSE kings, dancing snowflakes and candy canes—it can only be The Nutcracker. The Dumas stage adaptation of E.T.A. Hoffmann’s story, set to Tchaikovsky’s famous suite, is a staple Christmas performance. But was an undertaking of this scale really feasible for the Amman School of Ballet, a company that’s only been around since May?

Ballet schools typically do a year-end revue to show off their students’ progress, but this one certainly went a bit beyond.

On December 10 and 11, just under 3,000 people attended the school’s production of The Nutcracker, which involved around 110 dancers, a children’s choir of 50 and, of course, the Amman Symphony Orchestra.

Images

The duo behind performance are Melissa Sweiss, the founder and director of the Amman School of Ballet, and Rachel LaBonte, a former student of the Kirov Academy of Dance in Washington, DC who, after a 10-year hiatus, had decided to return to training, and perhaps one day to the stage. The two met for the first time in July, at Cups & Kilos, when Sweiss was still “putting feelers out” in regard to a major Christmas performance.

“At first, when Melissa suggested a performance of The Nutcracker, I was like: Are you mad?” LaBonte recalls.
“We agreed to do little vignettes instead,” chuckles Sweiss. “That’s how I sucked her in.”

The ballet quickly took on a life of its own. “Rachel’s favorite part was the land of sweets, but I really enjoyed the Christmas party,” explains Sweiss. “After that we thought, what about the battle scene? And so on and so on.” Over the next four and a half months, the project grew and grew.

“Almost everything was achieved through cold calling and a bit of luck. There were some real low points,” Sweiss says. “Many sponsors found it hard to imagine how tutus and ballet would help sell washing machines, or whatever. And there was the fact we were an unknown entity, and new to Amman.”

She and LaBonte list a dizzying array of setbacks, from having nowhere to rehearse to the costs of renting space at the Hyatt (tickets to the event had to be priced at JD25).

The Nutcracker would not have been possible without a huge amount of encouragement and support from local businesses and families. At one point there was no available space large enough to accommodate rehearsals for the hundreds of dancers and their amilies (and cars)—until the National Music Conservatory stepped up to offer its halls.

Sweiss and LaBonte originally wanted the matinee performance to be entirely charitable, until they ran into fundraising difficulties. So George and Sami Khoury paid for 100 girls from the Madrasati program to attend the performance, and gave everyone in the audience a goodie bag.

The costumes for the play were designed by local Jordanian businesswomen Hana Barkawi and the ladies at Kenz, a company that employs graduates from the Al Hussein Society for the Rehabilitation of the Physically Handicapped. Zalatimo sweets donated more than 6,000 pastries, while the owner of the Ramada Hotel and Suites arranged an after-party for the 120-member dance troupe.

As both Sweiss and LaBonte point out, The Nutcracker was not about foreigners coming in and putting on a show; at a certain point it seemed like half of Amman was involved in getting this show off the ground.

“Slowly but surely, whole families would come to watch rehearsals, and children as young as five or six would feel a sense of accomplishment and pride,” LaBonte concludes.

For more information or to register, call 079-587-1575

غيداء حمودة

عمّان- تحتفل عمان هذا العام بعيد الميلاد بطريقة مغايرة عن الأعوام السابقة، حيث ستحتضن عرضا لباليه كسارة البندق في الساعة السابعة مساء من يومي الخميس والجمعة في فندق حياة عمان.

ويشترك في تقديم العرض، الذي يقام في الأردن للمرة الأولى، 120 راقصا وراقصة من مدرسة عمان للباليه، إلى جانب راقصين من الخارج وأوركسترا المعهد الوطني للموسيقى.

ويعتبر عرض باليه كسارة البندق أحد الطقوس المتبعة في كثير من مدن العالم ضمن احتفالاتها بأعياد الميلاد. وتنسب كسارة البندق في أصلها الأدبي إلى خرافة من خرافات هوفمان، وهو كاتب روائي ألماني وموسيقي ورسام (1776- 1822)، كان طلب من تشايكوفسكي أن يؤلف متتابعة راقصة واستوحاها من قصة كسارة البندق وجعلها موضوع متتابعة من فصلين يضمان خمس عشرة مقطوعة تحكي في مجموعها قصة حلم جرت لفتاة صغيرة -كلارا- في ليلة عيد الميلاد.

وتسبق عرض كسارة البندق مجموعة من أغاني عيد الميلاد، التي ستقدمها جوقتا المدرسة الأهلية للبنات ومدرسة المطران، وتشتمل على 50 مؤديا مع مرافقة الأوركسترا لهما. وسيتم تقديم عرض خيري مساء يوم السبت لمجموعة من أطفال المناطق النائية.

وتعتبر مليسا صويص مؤسسة مدرسة عمان للباليه، التي تأسست في نيسان (إبريل) من هذا العام، هذا الحدث تتويجا للجهود التي بذلت لنشر هذا الفن في الأردن، مشيرة الى انه تم تخريج 140 طالبا للمدرسة حتى الآن.

وتؤمن صويص بأن فن الباليه له جمهوره في الأردن وتطمح إلى أن يصبح عرض كسارة البندق طقسا سنويا يشترك في تقديمه الكثير من المبدعين في المملكة.

Ghaida.h@alghad.jo ]]> http://ammanballet.com/347/amman/jordan/feed 0 http://ammanballet.com/nutcracker-comes-to-jordan/amman/jordan http://ammanballet.com/nutcracker-comes-to-jordan/amman/jordan#comments Sat, 02 Jan 2010 07:19:56 +0000 admin http://ammanballet.com/?p=340 The stage was set for Jordan’s premier ballet show of Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker after nearly two months of rehearsals for young children at the Amman School of Ballet school.
Nearly 120 children were accompanied on Friday (December 11) by 55 musicians from Amman’s Symphony Orchestra and 50 choir singers.
The fairy-tale ballet, usually played during the Christmas season, is based on the story ”The Nutcracker and the King of Mice” by E.T. A. Hoffman.
Organizers said training the children for the ballet was a daunting task.
“There is lots of local talent, but the problem was that the orchestra, which represents 80 percent of the show, was not ready for a show at this level, and training the children also took a long time,” said Murad Sweiss, an organizer of the show who founded the Amman School of Ballet with his wife Melissa in the spring of 2009.
Some of the participating children said Jordan needed a ballet school to give opportunities to local talent.
“I always wanted to be a ballet dancer since I was a little, but there were no places teaching ballet in Jordan when I was four years old but now I can do it – at the age of 11 – with Miss Melissa.” said Eman, one of the dancers.
Participating children admitted ballet dancing needs hard work.
“It’s a difficult hobby. You need to work hard to become a famous dancer,” said dancer Majd.
During a two-hour show, dancers performed the four main parts of the ballet: the party Scene, the Battle Scene, the Land of Snow and the Land of Sweets.
The story centres on a 12-year-old girl, her brother and sister, who receive gifts from their clockmaker-inventor godfather on Christmas Eve, one of which is a Nutcracker doll.
That night, the girl embarks on an adventure that includes a war with a seven-headed Mouse King and his army of mice.
“This is a great idea particularly because I was one of the supporters of ballet dancing in my school. Ballet is a great art. It is becoming more popular in Jordan,” said Farah Saad, a mother and former ballet dancer.
The story of the Nutcracker has captivated many artists over the decades. It has been adapted into various forms of animated films while the ballet version has reached film screens many times

The second is a Christmas spirited story-time movie featuring a unique adaptation of the Nutcracker story written by Lena Tuffaha. A sneak preview is available at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9VHEnN1Myxk. DVDs are available for sale at 4 J.D. during all Nutcracker rehearsals and activities.

As for the show itself we are producing a high quality production. DVDs are available for only (9 J.D). Place an order for your Nutcracker DVD by sending an email to documedia@jldproductions.com including the following info:

Name:

Mobile:

Email:

Quantity requested:

As soon as the DVD is released we will contact you and arrange for delivery!

Happy holiday season to all, and keep checking all our latest updates at:

http://www.ammanballet.com

http://www.youtube.com/user/DocuMediaJo

http://jld-documedia.blogspot.com/

Violet Bawab Al Nashash

Senior Producer

DocuMedia Director

Tel:    +962 6 4646215

Fax:   +962 6 4646431

Mobile: +962 79 5077722

Visit our youtube channels: vbnashash, JLDProd, MashrekJo.

Email: violet@jldproductions.com

facebook.com/violetbn.

As a part of SAB’s initiative to support the local community, KENZ has been selected to design and sew costumes for The Nutcracker Christmas Spectacular.  These costumes are being created and constructed by KENZ women who are graduates of the Al Hussein Society for the Habilitation/Rehabilitation of the Physically Challenged.  “It would have been very easy to order costumes for the show from various dancewear companies, but giving work to a section of society that is so often is overlooked gives me great happiness.  The quality of the work and the workmanship of these women, on the other hand made the decision to go with Kenz for the costumes an easy one.  We started working with the Kenz seamstresses in the fall to provide ballet dresses for our pre-ballet students, so I knew they could deliver.  This year’s show is requiring over 100 costumes to be designed and delivered on a very tight timeline”, adds Melissa Sweiss, Director of The School of Amman Ballet.

Since 1979 the Al-Hussein Society (AHS) has focused on the rehabilitation and education of the physically challenged in Jordan.

The Al-Hussein Society is a nonprofit organization supported by private donations, grants and income generating projects such as the Kenz Gift Shop.

There is a treasure trove of gifts to be found in Kenz. It is a joint venture between AHS, the Holy Land Institute for the Deaf and other NGOs. The KENZ Gift Shop is a pioneer in the employment of adults with physical disabilities in Jordan. The employees are creative, productive, enthusiastic and skillful.

KENZ specializes in making party costumes (for school plays, Halloween…etc), and items for nurseries, including toy boxes, sets of tables and chairs for young children. KENZ also produces made-to-order tablecloths, cushions and a host of other items.

You could also pick or purchase your tickets @

1. La Mirabelle in Abdoun
2. La Mirabelle in Shemasani
3. Sweiss Liquors on Abdoun Circle

   Sweiss Jewelery jeweler row Sweifieh

To encourage arts

My daughter is performing in this show and, ironically, I see dancers from several dance schools participating in the production. If the writer of the letter is in support of the arts in Amman and truly encourages her students to pursue ballet as a career, she should encourage her students to audition and participate in such productions.In response to the letter “Easy dancing” (The Jordan Times, November 18, 2009), expressing disappointment with the article “School of Amman Ballet to bring the Nutcracker to Jordan”, I would like to applaud the article’s writer and The Jordan Times for covering the story.

22 November 2009

I was very disappointed to read the article “School of Amman Ballet to bring the Nutcracker to Jordan” (The Jordan Times, October 9, 2009).

18 November 2009