Carla Fracci

American Ballet Theatre: Together Tonight – an 80th Anniversary YouTube celebration

11 May 2020 by gramilano Leave a Comment

May 2020 was to have been a special month for the American Ballet Theatre – the time to celebrate its 80th anniversary.

American Ballet Theatre – known as Ballet Theatre from 1939 until 1957 – was founded in 1939 by Lucia Chase and Richard Pleasant and its first performance was on 11 January 1940.

Chase was its director, together with Oliver Smith, from 1945 to 1980. Mikhail Baryshnikov took over until 1989. Smith returned with Jane Hermann from 1990 to 1992, when Kevin McKenzie took over as artistic director, a position her still holds.

ABT will present American Ballet Theatre: Together Tonight, a virtual celebration in support of the ABT Crisis Relief Fund on its YouTube Channel…

Google Arts & Culture puts thousands of images and documents from La Scala’s archive online

8 May 2020 by gramilano Leave a Comment

Google Arts & Culture is a non-profit initiative with the tech giant working alongside cultural institutions and artists around the world to bring some of the world’s art and culture online so that it can be accessible to anyone, anywhere.

La Scala Opera House has teamed up with Google Arts & Culture to bring online the largest opera house archive, with images from operas, ballets and concerts, with designs, and scores. Thanks to Google’s Street View – which usually helps you to spy on the new house your friend has bought or find your way around a city centre to find a particular pub – you can wander around La Scala’s auditorium, foyers, stage and corridors.

[VIDEO] Massenet’s La Cigale with Carla Fracci and Paul Chalmer

29 April 2020 by gramilano Leave a Comment

A short compilation of clips from the first act of the little known ballet by Jules Massenet: La Cigale. The video was recorded in the Teatro Comunale in Treviso in 1988 and features Carla Fracci and Paul Chalmer.

[VIDEO] Pas de Quatre with Carla Fracci, Margrethe Schanne, Josette Amiel, and Kirsten Bundgaard 1968

21 April 2020 by gramilano 1 Comment

The ballet divertissement Pas de Quatre was choreographed by Jules Perrot in 1845 to music composed by Cesare Pugni, commissioned by Her Majesty’s Theatre in London. It was first seen on 12 July 1845 and was an immediate hit, mainly because it brought together some of the most famous ballerinas of the time: Carlotta Grisi, Fanny Cerrito, and Marie Taglioni. The great Romantic ballerina, Fanny Elssler didn’t wish to take part, so the young Lucile Grahn was the fourth dancer.

Erik Bruhn and Carla Fracci – Romeo and Juliet, 1966

26 March 2020 by gramilano 3 Comments

Erik Bruhn choreographed a version of Romeo and Juliet which he and Carla Fracci danced with the Rome Opera Ballet in 1966. The balcony scene is now on YouTube.

Marianela Nuñez and Roberto Bolle lead a top-notch cast in Onegin at La Scala

24 November 2019 by gramilano 2 Comments

John Cranko’s ballet Onegin was brought to La Scala in 1993 as a vehicle for Carla Fracci with Rex Harrington in the title role. It wasn’t, however, Fracci’s first contact with the ballet. Her close ties with Cranko began before he became the director of the Stuttgart Ballet when she created Juliet in his production […]

Alberto Testa – Italian dancer, choreographer, teacher and writer – has died at 96

11 October 2019 by gramilano Leave a Comment

Alberto Testa was a walking encyclopedia of dance, always elegantly dressed with never a hair out of place, and was very much of another time recalling Frederick Ashton with his old-school ways. Although he could be childlike and impish in his humour, he commanded great deference from those who collaborated with him and those who […]

In with the old – La Scala returns to Nureyev’s Sleeping Beauty

7 July 2019 by gramilano 1 Comment

If there is a ballet that belongs to La Scala, it’s Rudolf Nureyev’s production of The Sleeping Beauty, created for the ballet company in 1966 with Carla Fracci and Nureyev in the main roles. It was performed 152 times until 2007, when Tchaikovsky’s score fell silent for eight years until awoken by Alexei Ratmansky when […]

Video: Carla Fracci and Roberto Bolle dance Le Spectre de la rose, 1998

31 May 2019 by gramilano 1 Comment

Shortly before Carla Fracci’s 62nd birthday, she and 23-year-old Roberto Bolle went to Toyko for the 14th Toyko Summer Music Festival dedicated to Diaghilev and 20th Century Ballet. The young star had been promoted to principal dancer at La Scala in 1996 and had already embarked on an international freelance career. On 9 and 10 […]

Interview with Alessandra Ferri: Maturing I find myself smiling more

6 April 2019 by gramilano Leave a Comment

I’m enjoying a new chapter in my life having the fortune to play women of my age and not romantic roles like the Giselles, Carmens, Juliets, Manons… all wonderful, but enough, they’re part of another Alessandra. Now I’m a 55-year-old with the knowledge of how extraordinary that is. Alessandra Ferri, now in Milan for a […]