Sydney Opera House, April 2, 4 and 7 TWO and bit years ago, when Paris Opera Ballet came to Sydney with its production of Giselle, I was able to see three excitingly different readings of the title role, two of them from debutantes. We seem to get our fair share of important firsts in Australia….
Tag: Paris Opera Ballet
In which I fail to stop my list at 10
THIS year I saw more than 200 performances and, over the past week or so, have written about the people, plays, operas, dance works and musicals that spoke to me most strongly. Now I cull the list to 14 – just because that’s how it turned out – and a supplementary, the last being something…
Dance in 2013
THE Australian dance-lover had plenty to enjoy in 2013, as long as there was a decent travel budget to hand. Paris Opera Ballet returned to Sydney, the Bolshoi had a season in Brisbane, The Australian Ballet premiered a new version of Cinderella by Alexei Ratmansky (Melbourne and Sydney only, although Adelaide sees it in 2014),…
2013: a retrospective
Here’s my take on the year’s high points. As many have noted before me, “best” is a useless word when applied to the cornucopia available in the arts. Here are the people and productions that most inspired me. “A SHORT show is a good show,” we all carol (me and my fellow critics) as we…
The Bolshoi in Brisbane
Le Corsaire, May 30; The Bright Stream, June 7. Queensland Performing Arts Centre, Brisbane. THERE is no more interesting, influential or thoughtful choreographer working in classical ballet than Alexei Ratmansky and Brisbane was fortunate to see two distinctly different examples of his art in its sell-out Bolshoi Ballet season. And what a pleasure it was…
Dorothee Gilbert, Ludmila Pagliero, Myriam Ould-Braham: three Giselles
Paris Opera Ballet, Capitol Theatre, Sydney: January 29, February 4, February 5 IT’S always something of an occasion when a dancer takes on a big role for the first time, particularly in one of the small handful of works in which ballerinas cement their reputation. I remember being thrilled to discover that Alina Cojocaru, then…
Giselle, Paris Opera Ballet
Capitol Theatre, Sydney, January 29 GISELLE may be seen as a ballet of two contrasting halves, the world of the living giving way to the realm of the spirit. It is usually played in that manner, with Giselle’s death at the end of Act I the bridge from reality to the fantastical world of the…
deborah jones: FollowSpot 