Bryant Park Tree lighting and Skating Show in NYC

[apgold]

The annual Tree Lighting at Bank of America Winter Village returns Tuesday, November 28 at 6pm and features:

• Broadway stars and co-hosts Jessica Vosk and Mauricio Martínez
• Performances by world-class skaters Mariah Bell, Karen Chen, Ryan Bradley, skating pair Alexa Knierim and Brandon Fraizer, and The Skyliners
• World premiere of Ice Theatre of New York's Jazz Nutcracker, choreographed by Kolton Krouse for Bryant Park
• Figure Skating in Harlem, skating to live music by vocalist Alicia Hall Moran

Ryan Bradley was there last year, and he's always entertaining. Mariah and Karen should be lovely as well as Alexa and Brandon. It's nice that we have 4 members of the 2022 Olympic team at this event as well as the synchro team from NY - the Skyliners.

I'm also curious to see the Jazz Nutcracker from ITNY, they always have interesting performances. If you are not in NY or can't make it, there will be a Live Stream on the day of the event. I hope to be there in person and take some videos, as I did in 2022.

 

[apgold]

I attended the show tonight at Bryant Park - it was cold, but not too bad and started right on time, which I appreciated.

The LiveStream video has the performances which were recorded by Jordan Cowan of OIP. They start at about 9:50 into the stream with the ITNY Jazz Nutracker, which was fun. I noticed that Joe Johnson and Karina Manta are skating together again and had their time in the spotlight along ITNY players like Sarah France and Liz Schmidt. The Skyliners and FSIH also did nice programs.

I really enjoyed Karen's skate to Josh Groban's "Believe"- her spirals and spins are still gorgeous. Alexa and Brandon did a lot of fancy lifts, a death spiral and a double twist, but no jumps. I think Ryan Bradley skated the same program as last year to "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" (ETA, no it was "White Christmas" last year) but he's still jumping at 40 and did a backflip which shocked the people standing near me, lol.

I enjoyed Mariah as well, she skated last to "White Christmas" with a few single axels and one double. If I have one complaint, the music was very generic and not very memorable (then again, I'm Jewish and a lot of Xmas songs sound the same to me, lol). Last year, The Browns skated to a "Last Christmas" cover which was not the best, but at least something more pop oriented.

The tree lighting itself was fun and the crowd was appreciative. I'd rather attend this than the Rockefeller Tree Lighting, which is also this week.

 

[apgold]

I uploaded some videos to Youtube, obviously not as close or same quality as Jordan's ice cam, but it's fun to watch him record the skaters.

• ITNY Jazz Nutcracker
• Karen Chen - Believe
• Mariah Bell - White Christmas
• Alexa Knierim/Brandon Frazier - Christmas Eve/Sarajevo 1984 (interestingly I have Ashley and Timothy's skate to this same music on my channel from 2019, compare and contrast, lol)
• Ryan Bradley - Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas

 

[Fireplace7890]

Thank you for sharing your videos. Karen and Mariah are such beautiful skaters and I miss seeing them. I'm glad there was a good turnout in spite of the cold weather.

 

[Mathman]

Does the cameraman on the ice bother the performers at all? Or are they used to it.

Beautiful skating.

 

[Ic3Rabbit]

Does the cameraman on the ice bother the performers at all? Or are they used to it.

Beautiful skating.

Used to it.

 

[Weathergal]

I uploaded some videos to Youtube, obviously not as close or same quality as Jordan's ice cam, but it's fun to watch him record the skaters.

• ITNY Jazz Nutcracker
• Karen Chen - Believe
• Mariah Bell - White Christmas
• Alexa Knierim/Brandon Frazier - Christmas Eve/Sarajevo 1984 (interestingly I have Ashley and Timothy's skate to this same music on my channel from 2019, compare and contrast, lol)
• Ryan Bradley - Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas

It was nice seeing Ryan Bradley again! And I love the crowd "ooohed" almost as much for his scratch spin as they did for his backflip.