The contemporary triple bill Prism starts its Sydney season on November 7, after which, just for something completely different, The Australian Ballet will dive back into David McAllister’s blingy, ultra-traditional The Sleeping Beauty. It started its national run in Adelaide in July and had a Brisbane season in August. It goes without saying the company is versatile. That’s…
Tag: Robyn Hendricks
The Sleeping Beauty. The Australian Ballet, Adelaide, July 22-23, 2025.
Tchaikovsky was “charmed and captivated” when asked to write the music for The Sleeping Beauty by the director of the Imperial Theatres, Ivan Vsevolozhsky. Audiences have felt the same since the work’s premiere in 1890. The composer and choreographer Marius Petipa worked closely and harmoniously together and created one of the ballet canon’s enduring masterpieces. The Sleeping Beauty has been…
The Australian Ballet ends 2023 with Swan Lake and 16 promotions
The Australian Ballet’s 60th anniversary celebrations came to a close in Sydney with Swan Lake and with promotions for 16 dancers – about 20 per cent of the company. TAB ended 2023 with 67 dancers although that number will increase to 77 when three new soloists and seven new corps de ballet members join next year. Swan Lake was…
Swan Lake. The Australian Ballet, State Theatre, Melbourne, September 19-20, 2023
Tradition reigns in The Australian Ballet’s new Swan Lake, based on a fondly remembered 1977 production by former artistic director Anne Woolliams. Nearly 50 years on it’s still recognisable as her work, albeit with lashings of 21st-century glamour. Swan Lake is the main event in artistic director David Hallberg’s celebration of the company’s 60th anniversary and in what…
Sylvia, The Australian Ballet
Sydney Opera House, November 8 The dash for bathrooms and bars was substantially less frantic than usual after the close of Act I of Stanton Welch’s Sylvia. Heads everywhere bowed over their synopsis sheets. What in the name of all the gods in Ancient Greece was going on? How does one show via ballet that Artemis…
Verve, The Australian Ballet
Sydney Opera House, April 5 The Australian Ballet’s contemporary triple bill Verve, having a Sydney season this year after its premiere in Melbourne last year, presents works from the company’s three resident choreographers, each with a distinctive style that serves the program well. Veteran Stephen Baynes, who has held his post since 1995, is a…
Robyn Hendricks promoted to principal artist at The Australian Ballet
In what has become a tradition at The Australian Ballet, Robyn Hendricks was promoted on stage on Friday in Melbourne to the highest rank of principal artist. She was elevated by artistic director David McAllister after dancing Odette-Odile in Stephen Baynes’s production of Swan Lake. Hendricks joined the AB in 2005, became a soloist in…
Symphony in C: The Australian Ballet
Sydney Opera House, April 29. Symphony in C is one of George Balanchine’s grandest and most cherished pronouncements on the classical tradition. It features a strict hierarchy that cascades down from principals and soloists to an all-female corps and ends in exhilarating fashion with more than 40 dancers onstage – a number at the lower…
Swan Lake: Sydney summing up
The Australian Ballet, Sydney, March 31, April 2, April 5, April 16. The Australian Ballet will undoubtedly stick with Stephen Baynes’s 2012 production of Swan Lake – now being revived for the first time – for many a year to come. It has sold out 21 performances at the Sydney Opera House and a check…
Thrills and spills: the year in dance
We’ll get to the year’s most interesting work and dancers shortly but 2015 was also notable for offstage developments, particularly at Australia’s three leading classical companies, The Australian Ballet, Queensland Ballet and West Australian Ballet. So let’s begin there. OFFSTAGE The national company At The Australian Ballet, David McAllister became the company’s longest-serving artistic director, surpassing…
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