The latest issue of Dancing Times is out tomorrow. In September’s issue, I cover Wayne McGregor’s “amazing” Woolf Works at La Scala with Alessandra Ferri giving a “frighteningly intense” performance alongside an excellent cast from La Scala Ballet including “powerful and touching” performances from Timofej Andrijashenko as Septimus and Claudio Coviello as Evans, and Gioacchino […]
Benjamin Millepied
Photo album: Gala Les Étoiles at Ravenna Festival with international ballet stars
Dorothée Gilbert and Hugo Marchand (Paris Opera Ballet), Jacopo Tissi and Alena Kovaleva (Bolshoi Ballet), Bakhtiyar Adamzhan (Astana Opera, Kazakhstan), Tatiana Melnik (Hungarian National Ballet), Constantine Allen, Anna Tsygankova, Young Gyu Choi and Rebecca Storani (Dutch National Ballet), Sergio Bernal (Spanish National Ballet) Daniele Cipriani’s galas, Les Étoiles, have become staples of the ballet stars’ calendar with top names participating from Russia, […]
Les Étoiles dance gala closes the 2019 Ravenna Festival
The Ravenna Festival was founded in 1990 by Cristina Mazzavillani Muti, with a rich programme which includes symphonic and chamber music, opera, drama, dance, ballet, musical theatre, jazz, and ethnic music. It’s the perfect location for a summer festival as Ravenna is a stunningly beautiful city, with eight UNESCO World Heritage sites including its stunning […]
Rome Opera Ballet’s Philip Glass triple bill thrills
The Philip Glass triple bill at Rome Opera Ballet showed off three very different choreographic styles to one composer’s music. Glass has a way of seducing the listener into his world —his music is guileful and hypnotising. The mainly minimalist component to his music results in there being a stronger connection with Vivaldi or Bach […]
Rome Opera Ballet presents a Philip Glass Evening featuring a new work with Eleonora Abbagnato and Friedemann Vogel
Rome Opera Ballet presents a Philip Glass Evening, which opens 29 March 2019, and features a new work with the company’s director, Eleonora Abbagnato, and guest artist Friedemann Vogel. The programme offers Benjamin Millepied’s Hearts and Arrows, Jerome Robbins’s Glass Pieces, and Nuit Blanche, a new piece by Sébastien Bertaud with designs by Christian Dior […]
BALLET2000 Prix presents Maya Plisetskaya Awards in Cannes
The first edition of the Awards handed out by the dance magazine BALLET2000 were in 2004 when Maya Plisetskaya was presented with the main Prix for her career and during which she danced Ave Maya created for her by Maurice Béjart. Fittingly, the Awards Gala this year was dedicated to the memory of the great […]
BALLET2000 Prix dedicates Cannes gala to Maya Plisetskaya
In a week’s time, the BALLET2000 Prix will host its annual event in Cannes, this year dedicated to the memory of Maya Plisetskaya. When the prize was launched, in 2004, then known as Les Étoiles de BALLET2000, the first Lifetime Achievement Award went to Plisetskaya. The 79-year-old not only collected her prize, but danced too: […]
Benjamin Millepied to leave Paris Opera Ballet… Is La Scala the new POB?
According to a report online in Paris Match, Benjamin Millepied is on the verge of leaving the Paris Opera Ballet. He took up the position as head of one of the world’s most celebrated ballet companies just over a year ago, saying that he would shake it up a little, bringing also a little Hollywood […]
Eleonora Abbagnato on being both an Étoile in Paris and a company director in Rome
I’m happy that the Mayor of Rome, Ignazio Marino, and Sovrintendente Fuortes, have had faith in my passion. My heart has always remained in Italy and this theatre needs people who believe passionately in dance. Eleonora Abbagnato was speaking at a press conference in Rome, her first appearance after her nomination as the Rome Opera Ballet’s […]
Paris Étoile Abbagnato welcomes Millepied and is glad to see Lefèvre go
He impressed us with his simple yet incisive approach during the rehearsals. He is a man who has a life outside dance; this is his true strength. Paris Opera Ballet Étoile Eleonora Abbagnato was talking about the new company director Benjamin Millepied. She was interviewed by the Italian Vanity Fair after Millepied’s new ballet for the POB, […]