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Ballet. September Top Ten

Ballet. September Top Ten

In September the Bolshoi Theatre of Belarus gives a royal present to all admirers of ballet.

If you, dear spectators, failed to attend the ballet fest in June or did not get a ticket to our traditional project “Ballet Summer at the Bolshoi”, you have a unique opportunity to enjoy those wonderful productions in the first month of the fall. If you have never seen the national ballet Vitaut, which has recently won the hearts of the Moscow audience, you have a chance to attend the performance in September. If you miss a fairy tale about a prince turned into a wooden nutcracker, or you simply feel like listening to Pyotr Tchaikovsky’s magic music, hasten to buy tickets to the Belarusian Bolshoi without delay!

But let it be consistent. Here is a list of 10 must-see ballet performances:

1. The honour to open the 84^th season of the Belarusian Bolshoi was given to Love and Death by Polad Bülbüloğlu choreographed by Olga Kostel. The musical director and conductor Andrey Ivanov, supervised by his Azerbaijani colleague and friend Ayyub Guliyev, was perfect at dealing with vivid colourful music of the east with the percussion in the main role, creating an exquisite philosophical fairy tale about the eternal struggle of good and evil. The performances of Love and Death will be shown on 6 and 7 September.

2. On 11 September the company will present Boris Asafiev’s The Fountain of Bakhchisarai based on the poem by Alexander Pushkin.

… The savage Khan Girey runs riot in Poland. During one of the attacks he and his army manage to seize the castle where Princess Maria’s birthday is being celebrated. The Tatars kill everyone apart from Maria who the khan madly falls in love with… On that night the tragic love story will be told by the brilliant ballet dancers. The performance will be conducted by Ivan Kostiakhin.

3. ‘Vyacheslav Kuznetsov’s score is … really theatrical. The music effectively sets off dramatic collisions, impresses with the expression of its culmination scenes and, as a contrast, by the subtle lyric of love scenes,’ this is about the national ballet Vitaut which recently won the audience of the Russian capital: in June it was presented at the Bolshoi Theatre of Moscow. On our stage Vitaut can be seen on 13 and 14 September. The performances will be conducted by Vyacheslav Volich.

4. On 16 and 19 September the theatre will present Tchaikovsky’s The Nutcracker, or Another Christmas Story choreographed by Aleksandra Tikhomirova.

The story takes place at Christmas, the time of miracle and expectations of new happiness. As soon as the magic night falls on the streets of the town, everything becomes extraordinary: dolls come to life, grey mice turn into kings, little girls become princesses, and the everyday life sees… a miracle. The performance will be conducted by maestro Nikolai Koliadko.

      5-6-7.       Please make a note in your diary: “21 September: we’re going to the Bolshoi Theatre!” This event should not be missed: Paquita (the short for grand pas to the music by Ludwig Minkus from the eponymous ballet) is back on our stage. And this is not all: the evening will also present one-act ballets by Jiří Kylián, namely Petite Mort and Sechs Tänze to the music by the genius Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. The performance will be conducted by Nikolai Koliadko and Ivan Kostiakhin.

8. Le Petit Prince will be shown on 23 and 25 September. No doubt it will be interesting not only for children, but also for adults to come to the performances. Little spectators will see the realization of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry fairy tale, so loved by children, on our stage. Older audience will also learn a lot of new things. Did the Little Prince remain in each of us? You will probably find an answer to this question during the performances which will take place under the baton of Oleg Lesun.

9. On 27 and 28 September the theatre will present a real hit in the world of dance, Swan Lake by Pyotr Tchaikovsky (the version by the People’s Artist of Belarus Yury Troyan and Aleksandra Tikhomirova). Why is this fairy tale so popular worldwide? Let’s try to find out. The performance will be conducted by Andrey Galanov.

10. The Sleeping Beauty, a world ballet masterpiece to the music by Pyotr Tchaikovsky, will be performed on 30 September.

Princess Aurora falls into eternal sleep, having pricked her finger on a spindle on the day of her maturity celebration. This is the revenge of the wicked Fairy Carabosse who has not been invited to the Princess’s christening. A hundred years later with the Lilac Fairy’s help Prince Desiré gets to the enchanted forest where he sees Aurora and awakens her with a kiss. Their happy love breaks the wicked spell of Fairy Carabosse… We know this fairy tale since childhood, but Pyotr Tchaikovsky’s music made it even more magic.