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Anna Karenina leads Mariinsky Ballet's Covent Garden tour

Friday, 03 December 2010 17:00 Written by Ismene Brown

The Mariinsky's Firebird: on a Fokine triple bill with Sheherazade and Chopiniana.
Photo by N Razina/Mariinsky

The Mariinsky Ballet are next year’s summer Covent Garden visitors, the promoter Victor Hochhauser announced today. It will be the 50th anniversary of the London impresario’s first presentation of the then Kirov Ballet - the June 1961 tour on which Rudolf Nureyev defected to the West just days before.

Between 25 July and 13 August 2011 the hallowed St Petersburg company’s repertoire features only one novelty, the British premiere of the gifted Alexei Ratmansky’s Anna Karenina, to the Tolstoy novel, which will be a double bill with Carmen, the Alberto Alonso version created originally for Maya Plisetskaya and his sister Alicia Alonso simultaneously, in Moscow and Havana. The music for both is by Rodion Shchedrin, the modern Russian composer currently being specially championed by Valery Gergiev, the Mariinsky’s director and conductor.

However almost as intriguing is the all-American bill of Balanchine and Jerome Robbins: Balanchine's Scotch Symphony (to Mendelssohn’s music) and Ballet Imperial (to Tchaikovsky), and Robbins’s dark-mooded In the Night (a dance to Chopin Nocturnes). Other programmes will be:

a "Homage to Fokine": with the Russian version of Les Sylphides, called Chopiniana, The Firebird and Sheherazade, deploying the Mariinsky orchestra in two major scores by Stravinsky and Rimsky-Korsakov.

Leonid Lavrovsky’s Romeo and Juliet, the landmark staging in 1940 to Prokofiev’s music, and the progenitor of most subsequent stagings (though now looking distinctly its age by comparison).

two time-honoured classics of Mariinsky style: Swan Lake and La Bayadère.

Among the top artists heading the tour are the usually jetsetting Diana Vishnëva (pictured right with Igor Kolb in Swan Lake) and Igor Zelensky, and the scheduled presence of the peerless classicist Ulyana Lopatkina and rising maverick Alina Somova ensure a lively debate about the way Mariinsky classical style is going. US guest artist David Hallberg should also offer a contrasting view onto American classical style, while the young British dancer Xander Parish who left the Royal Ballet last year to join the Mariinsky is also promised.

Other dancers listed include familiar young stars from the last tour, the tall redhead Ekaterina Kondaurova, the lyrical Viktoria Terëshkina, the outstanding new man Vladimir Shklyarov and petite dazzler Olesia Novikova.

Public booking opens on 5 April 2011.

http://www.kennedy-center.org/calendar/index.cfm?fuseaction=showEvent&event=BLBSF
Mariinsky Ballet: Giselle

Boasting an artistic legacy that spans more than 200 years, St. Petersburg's Mariinsky Ballet returns with the classic evening-length ballet Giselle, choreographed by Jean Coralli, Jules Perrot, and Marius Petipa.
Mariinsky Ballet
Valery Gergiev, Artistic Director
Yuri Fateev, Deputy Director of the Ballet Company

Giselle
Choreography by Marius Petipa
Music by Adolphe Adam
--with the Opera House Orchestra

"This is an Imperial Russian feast to slowly savor."
--San Francisco Chronicle

"It is the combination of athleticism with lyricism and artistry that makes the company unique."
--Time Magazine

For their ninth visit in a ten-year partnership with the Kennedy Center, the great Russian company Mariinsky Ballet performs Giselle, one of their signature productions and among the most romantic and visually striking works in the classical canon. The story of a simple peasant girl who falls deeply and completely for a dashing prince disguised as a commoner, Giselle twists into a tale of betrayal and heartbreak. In the ballet blanc second act, Giselle haunts the stage with her host of vengeful Wilis, ultimately transcending death with forgiveness.

Like the character Giselle, Mariinsky Ballet exists today as beacon of strength, a recognizable symbol of classical dance. One of the most influential ballet companies in the world for the past 200 years, Mariinsky Ballet continues to set the standard for stage productions.

PRINCIPAL CASTING
Tue., Feb. 8 at 7:30 p.m.
Giselle: Diana Vishneva
Alberth: Andrian Fadeyev
Hanz: Yuri Smekalov
Mirtha: Ekaterina Kondaurova

Wed., Feb. 9 at 7:30 p.m.
Giselle: Viktoria Tereshkina
Alberth: Vladimir Shklyarov
Hanz: Konstantin Zverev
Mirtha: Alexandra Iosifidi

Thu., Feb. 10 at 7:30 p.m.
Giselle: Alina Somova
Alberth: Evgeny Ivanchenko
Hanz: Yuri Smekalov
Mirtha: Ekaterina Kondaurova

Fri., Feb. 11 at 7:30 p.m.
Giselle: Viktoria Tereshkina
Alberth: Vladimir Shklyarov
Hanz: Konstantin Zverev
Mirtha: Alexandra Iosifidi

Sat., Feb. 12 at 1:30 p.m.
Giselle: Alina Somova
Alberth: Evgeny Ivanchenko
Hanz: Yuri Smekalov
Mirtha: Anastasia Petushkova

Sat., Feb. 12 at 7:30 p.m.
Giselle: Uliana Lopatkina
Alberth: Daniil Korsuntsev
Hanz: Konstantin Zverev
Mirtha: Ekaterina Kondaurova

Sun., Feb. 13 at 1:30 p.m.
Giselle: Diana Vishneva
Alberth: Andrian Fadeyev
Hanz: Yuri Smekalov
Mirtha: Alexandra Iosifidi

2-part reportage from 2003 about Ekaterina Kondaurova:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_-Nl8ddKgJc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lgPV7AoE-jM
...and Ekaterina in 2010:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=utdTq5H8L3U

I wonder who would've guessed that the shy girl from the first videos will turn into that glamorous stage personality she's today.

...


P.S.She's married now,right?They make such a beautiful couple!

Странно. Нет составов на Баядерку на 20, 22 и 23 февраля. И совсем не понятно: гастроли в США заканчиваются 13 февраля, а в Канаде начинаются 20 февраля. Из США в Канаду через Россию? Так Гергиев, только на одних билетах, театр в финансовую трубу загонит...
Subject to chаnge - кто знает, это как переводится?

В данном контексте: составы могут претерпеть изменения.

Спасибочки!!!!!!!!

I've just discovered how truly magnificient Tatyana Terekhova(now coach of Mariinsky Prima Alina Somova) was!
Don Quixotte videos:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2GU5Tx0f ... re=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BWF40T26lyU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s4w3OapB ... re=related
This is certainly one of the best Kitris ever created...too bad they couldn't film her with a better Basil!