[I_Love_My_Husband]

Classical ballet in America does NOT have nudity. I've seen CLASSICAL ballet from the UK/Russia/etc and I've NEVER seen nudity.

I've also taken ballet for years, and I will tell you as a ballet dancer that ONE of the reasons a girl will be in ballet is BECAUSE of the costumes.

Balanchine (and post-) and others do NOT do Classical Ballet unclothed.

Ballet is STILL a CLASSICAL CONSERVATIVE art.

There are however those that call their MODERN crap "ballet", and it's not.

[Mamzelle]

I'm such a conservative ballet fan, I think Balanchine is/was crap...didn't quite understand PSon's description of ballet in England, which I took to be where he's posting from.

[Prodigal Son]

There are however those that call their MODERN crap "ballet", and it's not.

That is a matter of opinion though, isn't it?
We've all got our opinions and they all stink- yours included ;-)
It's all about perspective.

Some modern dance is really nice. I wouldn't want to live in a world where all dance had to be in the classical form. I like classical as well but I certainly wouldn't want my choices limited to it. I like a few options myself. A little room for interpretation.

I don't know how far I'd go in describing all forms of modern dance as 'ballet' per se, but clearly, much of it is. Last night's ballet opened with a bit called 'Hurricane'. Set to Bob Dylan's song of the same title. Overtly political. The perfomance could just as well have been done in a city square by a street performer- it carried the same effect. The dancer's interpretation was interesting but it wouldn't have ever occurred to me to label it ballet and it wasn't what I paid to see (which was Ghost Dances- which was ballet).