La Scala announces its opening gala programme

La Scala has announced the programme, though not with full casting, of its Ballet Gala which marks the return of the company to the stage after the cancellation of the theatre's programming in March due to the coronavirus.

The four-evening run begins on 23 September and stars the company's étoiles Svetlana Zakharova and Roberto Bolle, guests Alessandra Ferri and Federico Bonelli, as well as the company's principal dancers.

Mauro Bigonzetti is creating a new work for the programme for two women called Do a duet on music from Mozart's Symphony No. 25 in G minor; Ferri and Bonelli will perform a duet from Angelin Preljocaj's Le Parc; Zakharova will dance The Dying Swan; and Bolle will return to Maurice Béjart's red table for Boléro.

The (quite short) evening will also see the pas de trois from the pirate's cave scene of Anna-Marie Holmes' production of Le Corsaire and will feature company members as Medora, Conrad and the slave Alì; the idiosyncratic Prince's solo from Rudolf Nureyev's The Sleeping Beauty; and as a tribute to Zizi Jeanmaire, an extract from Roland Petit's Carmen with Carmen and Don José.

Tickets are still available from the online ticket office: 23, 24, 26 September (with Zakharova) and 2 October at 8pm.

Gramilano( Editor )

Graham Spicer is a writer, director and photographer in Milan, blogging (under the name ‘Gramilano') about dance, opera, music and photography for people “who are a bit like me and like some of the things I like”. He was a regular columnist for Opera Now magazine and wrote for the BBC until transferring to Italy.

His scribblings have appeared in various publications from Woman's Weekly to Gay Times, and he wrote the ‘Danza in Italia' column for Dancing Times magazine.