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| | Arts Calendar / April 26 / Ballet |
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 Ballet by George Balanchine in three parts on music by Gabriel Faure, Igor Stravinsky and Pyotr Tchaikovsky. 150 min. Choreography by George Balanchine. Set Designer: Alyona Pikalova. Costume Designer: Elena Zaitseva. Music Director: Pavel Sorokin. Jewels is a three-act ballet created for the New York City Ballet by co-founder and founding choreographer George Balanchine. It premiered on Thursday, 13 April 1967 at the New York State Theater, with sets designed by Peter Harvey and lighting by Ronald Bates. Jewels has been called the first full-length abstract ballet. It has three related movements: Emeralds, Rubies, and Diamonds (usually separated by intermissions). It can also be seen as three separate ballets, linked by their jewel-colored costumes. Balanchine commented: "The ballet had nothing to do with jewels. The dancers are just dressed like jewels." Each of the three acts features the music of a different composer: Emeralds is set to the music of Gabriel Faure, Rubies to the music of Igor Stravinsky and Diamonds to music by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky.
Bolshoi Theater  |
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 The ballet with singing. Texts by Bertolt Brecht. Russian texts by Svyatoslav Gorodetsky. Music supervisor and conductor: Valery Kirianov. Designer: Rostislav Protasov. Light designer: Denis Enyukov. Every opera is no saint... But if the seven deadly sins are combined in a collaborative creation of the composer Kurt Weill and the dramatist and poet Bertolt Brecht, an extraordinary result is to be expected. And that is exactly what happened. It is difficult to determine the genre of their work at once. Is it an opera in which they dance or a ballet in which they sing? Retelling the plot makes no sense: the performance is definitely worth seeing. Besides, the opera-ballet “Seven Deadly Sins” is rarely staged in Russia, so try not to miss such an opportunity. The most famous production of the opera was staged by Boris Pokrovsky in The Moscow State Academic Chamber Musical Theatre in 1981. Nowadays, in the time of "quick perception" Kurt Weill's music is more relevant than ever. The performance is full of the special psychology which is known to be the Helikon’s actors’ strong point. "During the work on the performance our team thought about the meaning of the word "sin" more often than we usually do. Its interpretation is extremely personal, and that is why each of the two actresses who play the role of Anna I completely differs from each other," - says the director Ilya Ilyin. "When I discovered "The Seven Deadly Sins", I felt that special energy of it. It affects as a contrast shower which brings the purification of the soul, - admits the musical director of the staging, conductor Valery Kiryanov. - And the eternal biblical canons become closer to us. This is a necessary thing of current interest in modern times. It feels like a confession..."
Helikon Opera |
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