Back in the days when Merle Park was a CBE — she became Dame Merle in 1986 — she left this interview with a British women’s magazine. It makes interesting, and amusing, reading almost 40 years later.Dame Merle Park will celebrate her 80th birthday on 8 October this year. At times my energy has been at a very low ebb I always have more energy in a hot climate than in a … [Read more...]
World Ballet Day 2017: 5 October Live with Australian, Bolshoi, Royal, Canadian and San Francisco Ballet Companies
Five of the world's leading ballet companies will come together for World Ballet Day on Thursday 5 October to broadcast 20 hours of live, behind-the-scenes footage via Facebook Live, following a successful partnership with Facebook in 2016.The Australian Ballet, Bolshoi Ballet, The Royal Ballet, The National Ballet of Canada and San Francisco Ballet will partner for the … [Read more...]
Tamara Karsavina compares Rudolf Nureyev and Vaslav Nijinsky
Rudolf Nureyev defected to the West in 1961 and later that same year he danced with Margot Fonteyn for the first time, and the following year he joined The Royal Ballet. In 1963, the BBC asked the great Tamara Karsavina to comment on the new Russian dancer and compare him with her Ballets Russes partner Vaslav Nijinsky.Karsavina and Nijinsky had joined Diaghilev's troupe … [Read more...]
Xander Parish becomes a Principal Dancer with the Mariinsky Ballet
Last night, on the stage of The Royal Opera House which he left eight years ago, Xander Parish was promoted to Principal Dancer of the Mariinsky Theatre.The Mariinsky are in London for a three week run of five different programmes until 12 August. Last night saw Parish as Siegfried in Swan Lake. The 31-year-old dancer from Hull joins Kimin Kim of South Korea as the … [Read more...]
Bolshoi Ballet’s Italian dancer, Jacopo Tissi, on his first year in Moscow and dancing Diamonds at the Lincoln Center
Last August, young ballet dancer Jacopo Tissi, resigned from the La Scala Ballet to accept the offer a contract with the Bolshoi Company. As I wrote last September, it’s not something that happens every day. Like all Russian companies, the Bolshoi has few dancers from outside the ex-Soviet borders in its ranks.However, Makhar Vaziev, the Company’s current director, who was … [Read more...]