21/05/2019

Eurasian Dance Festival: art that knows no bounds

In the coming summer, the III International Ballet Festival “Eurasian Dance Festival” will present a kaleidoscope of ballet evenings in which world classical masterpieces, folk art and the latest premieres of the most actual choreographers of modernity will meet. The performances will be held on the stage of the Astana Ballet Theater from 4 to 16 June with the support of the Ministry of Culture and Sports of Kazakhstan.

Among the invited guests are renowned theaters and dance groups of Berlin, Prague, Tokyo, St. Petersburg, Kiev and Nur-Sultan. Such a mix cannot be measured, assessed or repeated, all ballets are original and will be shown to the Kazakhstan public for the first time. Conservatives and avant-garde supporters will be able to satisfy their exacting tastes and will again find grounds for discussion. Only one end is impossible - to remain indifferent to this festival of dance.

The festival will open on June 4, the loudest premiere of last season of the “Astana Ballet” Theater - the ballet “Salome” staged by the national choreographer Mukaram Avakhri. Her choreography and artistic concept are based on the play of the same name by Oscar Wilde, who, in turn, rethought the biblical legend of the young princess Salome and the prophet John and turned it into a work on the nature of human passions. Theater artists, owning various dance styles, were able to embody bold choreographic ideas of the choreographer surprisingly accurately and organically. In addition to "Salome", the theater will show its latest acquisition from the German choreographer Raimondo Rebeck "A Journey of a Memory".

The next, the festival scene will be entered by the National Dance Ensemble of Ukraine on June 6 named after Pavel Virsky. The team, founded in 1937, has managed to conquer both the public and critics around the world. The program, named in the poster “Dance as fate”, collected the best numbers of the founder of the ensemble Pavel Virsky and his successor Miroslav Vantukh: “Povzunets”, “Gopak”, “Zaporozhtsy”, “Matrosy”, “Under the cherry tree”, “Sisters” and others, each of which is permeated with subtle humor, gentle lyricism, or broad prowess, so characteristic of the Ukrainian people.

The Japanese International Ballet Company (JIBC) will show its ballets “Peri” and “Zero Body” on 10 June. The creative face of the theater develops in an effort to enrich the classical and modern ballet with the energy and philosophy of the Japanese national tradition. In this aspect, this art is an experiment. An interesting fact is that the artistic director of the theater is Vladimir Malakhov - one of the brightest dancers of our time.

The project of the Mariinsky Theater premieres “Dance. Dance. Dance.” will continue the program on June 12. Igor Kolb, Danila Korsuntsev and Evgeny Ivanchenko, symbolically referred to in the ballet world as “knights of dance”, reveal the facets of their acting and dancing talent in three author's one-act performances. Danila Korsuntsev will perform as a performer, the author of the idea and the libretto in Oleksii Busko’s “Interrupted Flight” ballet to the music of P.I. Tchaikovsky along with Mariinsky Theater soloists Andrei Ermakov, Alexei Turko and ballerina of the Boris Eifman Ballet Theater Nina Zmievez. Evgeny Ivanchenko and the soloist of the Mariinsky Theater ballerina Renata Shakirova will tell a touching story in which He and She happen to meet in a stuck elevator and, of course, fall in love with each other. The ballet to the music of Bach, Khachaturian and jazz improvisations of the 60s is called “Lift”. The initiator and inspirer of the project, Igor Kolb, a dancer who seems to have reached all imaginable heights of professional maturity, chose co-authors Alexandre Chelidze. The ballet “No name” created by them, or “From a clean slate” is a ballet monologue in which, unable to withstand silence, the artist’s soul speaks with the public not only with its body, but also with its words.

June 14 - Czech National Ballet with the program “Slavic Temper”, the main theme of which is Slavic culture and historical heritage interpreted by young choreographer artists with unique vision and emotional artistic freedom: K. Kozielska, A. Kaidanovskiy and Ondřej Vinklat. ASPECTS of K. Kozielska, to the music of Western composers, uses the female dance on pointe, but has nothing in common with the typical style of classical music. Pointe shoes for her rather a balance metaphor on the verge between harmony and chaos. Ondřej Vinklat - a talented rising star, a brilliant dancer and musician, in the ballet «DUMKA», although using the academic music of A. Dvorak, reflects in it the dynamism of the unpredictable and instinctive flow of movement as such. And the third ballet “PERFECT EXAMPLE is from the spectrum of modern choreography. As a world-famous choreographer, Andrei Kaidanovskiy successfully works in the genre of conceptual experiment.

Theater "Astana Opera" on June 15 will show on its stage the premiere of the ballet "Giselle". The plot is based on the legend of the wilis, merciless ghosts of girls deceived by their lovers. Those who died before the wedding, now they take revenge on every man, circling him in a deadly dance, until the victim falls dead. For three weeks, Adolph Adan wrote the musical score, and the venerable Jean Coralli and the young Jules Perrot acted as choreographers. The premiere performance of "Giselle" was held in 1841 in the Paris Grand Opera. The unique consonance of the touching story and its choreographic incarnation determined the successful fate of the ballet.

On June 16, the closing ceremony of the festival and the Gala concert of world ballet stars will take place on the stage of the Astana Ballet Theater. This is a real firework dance, a lively “master class” from the premieres and prima ballerinas of the best theaters in the world. The program of the evening is both traditional and unexpected at the same time: classical excerpts from famous ballets and innovative trials will be shown. Among the invited guests: Leonid Sarafanov (Mikhailovsky Theater, St. Petersburg), Bakhtiyar Adamzhan and Aigerim Beketaeva (Astana Opera Theater), Aliya Tanykpaeva (National Ballet of Hungary), Marian Walter, Evelina Godunova and Yolanda Correa Frias (Berlin State Ballet) as well as leading soloists of the Astana Ballet Theater.