12 June 2022 (Sun), 18:00 Mikhailovsky Classical Ballet and Opera Theatre (established 1833) - Modern Ballet Evening of one-act ballets: Na Floresta. Prelude. White Darkness
Running time: 2 hours 20 minutes (till 20:20)
The performance has 2 intermissions
Schedule for Evening of one-act ballets: Na Floresta. Prelude. White Darkness 2022
Composer: Benjamin Britten Composer: George Frideric Handel Composer: Ludwig Van Beethoven Choreography: Nacho Duato Composer: Karl Jenkins Composer: Heitor Villa-Lobos Composer: Wagner Tisso
Orchestra: Mikhailovsky Symphony Orchestra Ballet company: Mikhailovsky Ballet
Triple bill by Nacho Duato
NA FLORESTA
Credits:
Music by Heitor Villa-Lobos, Wagner Tisso
Choreography, Staging, and Costumes: Nacho Duato
Stage Design: Walter Nobbe
Lighting Designer: Nicolás Fischtel
Costume Technology: Alla Marusina
Choreographer’s Assistants: Tony Fabre, Gentian Doda
Répétiteurs: Elvira Khabibullina, Kirill Myasnikov
World première: The Hague, NDT-2, 15 February 1990
Russian première: Moscow Stanislavsky and Nemirovich-Danchenko State Academic Music Theatre, 24 July 2009
Première at the Mikhailovsky Theatre: 23 May 2013
One of his best early works, Na Floresta made Nacho Duato world famous. In this one-act ballet, the Spanish choreographer penetrates the savage mystery of the Amazonian Selva. By analogy, the bustling variety of nature represents the ocean of human feelings. Its metaphysical currents again and again give rise to a new and unrestrained tide of life, circumscribing its flow in an eternal cycle.
PRELUDE
Credits:
Music by George Frideric Handel, Ludwig van Beethoven, Benjamin Britten
Choreographer, Stage and Costume Designer: Nacho Duato
Lighting Designer: Brad Fields
Costume Technology: Alla Marusina
Musical Director of the production: Valery Ovsyanikov
Choreographer’s Assistants: Zhanna Ayupova, Kirill Myasnikov
Répétiteurs: Zhanna Ayupova, Elvira Khabibullina, Kirill Myasnikov
In the production, the elements of scenery and the curtains executed by artist Vyacheslav Okunev are used
Benjamin Britten’s music is performed by permission of Boosey & Hawkes Music Publishers Ltd
World première: Mikhailovsky Theatre, 14 June 2011
The choreography of this one-act ballet brings together and celebrates three styles of dance: romantic, classical, and modern. For this very reason, critics have called the production a ‘choreographic map of the world of dance’. This performance, rooted in academic theatre and staying true to traditional customs of staging and stage effects, can sometimes forget in which era it belongs: sylphs rejoice on the ballroom floor while mysterious dancers in black are zealots of academic ballet tradition. Sequences of more reserved choreography are abruptly imposed upon by a set that seeks to transform its allotted immobility into movement or at least a semblance of it. The ballet is not based upon one central storyline, but rather upon the polyphony of playfulness and rivalry between sculptural forms.
WHITE DARKNESS
Credits:
Music by Karl Jenkins
Choreography and Staging: Nacho Duato
Stage Design: Jaffar Chalabi
Costume Designer: Lourdes Frías
Lighting Designer: Joop Caboort
Musical Director of the production: Marius Stravinsky
Costume Technology: Alla Marusina
Choreographer’s Assistant: Thomas Klein
Assistant to Musical Director: Igor Tomashevsky
Répétiteurs: Elvira Khabibullina, Kirill Myasnikov
Karl Jenkins’ music is performed by permission of Boosey & Hawkes Music Publishers Ltd
World première: 2001, Madrid
Premiere of the production at the Mikhailovsky Theatre: 2 May 2014
Nacho Duato composed the one-act ballet, White Darkness, as a requiem for the untimely loss of a sister. The result is a masterpiece which, according to critics, has “reached impossible heights” in the landscape of modern art.
The ballet’s heroine, having lost faith in love, seeks oblivion; but the path she has chosen brings her not joy but feverish agitation, followed by disappointment, alienation and self-imposed isolation.
Nacho Duato does not consider dance to be a form of social commentary, but he nevertheless uses it to convey the most complex of themes. “I am deeply struck by how sad it is when young people allow drugs to ruin their lives and slip into a dark world, a world so dark, in fact, that there is no escape from it,” the choreographer explains, on the subject of the emotional background to this production.
Schedule for Evening of one-act ballets: Na Floresta. Prelude. White Darkness 2022
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