April 2013
Sergei Polunin no longer to appear in Midnight Express
The Ukranian ballet star, who left the Royal Ballet suddenly last year, has left Peter Schaufuss' production, due to open at the London Coliseum next week Continue Reading
Leanne Benjamin retires from the Royal Ballet
After 21 years, with the Royal Ballet, Principal Dancer Leanne Benjamin has announced she will retire from the stage in July this year at the age of 49. Her last performance in London will be be as Mary Vetsera … Continue Reading
Mikhailovsky Ballet - Laurencia - London Coliseum
Once again, this opening night showcased the prodigious talents of the Mikhailovsky’s leading dancers Natalia Osipova and Ivan Vasiliev... Continue Reading
balletLORENT - Rapunzel - Sadler's Wells
Phillipa White’s Rapunzel, whipping around a headful of something that looked like tangled bright red dreadlocks was, refreshingly, no Disney princess.. Continue Reading
English National Ballet 2 - My First Cinderella - Peacock Theatre
In a theatre filled with enthusiastic youngsters (not to mention the numerous fluffy light-up wands), it is impossible not to feel at least some of the excitement that comes with a childhood trip to the ballet.. Continue Reading
Mikhailovsky Ballet - Laurencia - London Coliseum
Osipova can express every feeling with a vivid honesty and win our hearts, while our eyes dazzle at the clarity and radiant assurance of each step. Vasiliev, quaintly undervalued by some local commentators, has both astonishing and soaring brilliancy of technique
Mikhailovsky Ballet - Don Quixote - London Coliseum
But it is Vasiliev who makes the hero human as well as superhuman, endowing the hero with warmth and wit; Osipova’s Kitri is a shimmering creature, but never a real girl.
Mikhailovsky Ballet - Laurencia - London Coliseum
Choreographed with plodding precision by Vakhtang Chabukiani, with over-emphatic music by Alexander Krein, the ballet most closely resembles a silent film, full of grandiloquent gestures and stirring crowd scenes
Mikhailovsky Ballet - Laurencia - London Coliseum
Laurencia, which continues the Mikhailovsky Ballet’s London season, is a curious hybrid. The Spanish dances, castanets and local colour suggest the exotic ballets of the 19th century, with the addition of a Soviet-friendly tale of a peasant uprising. Natalia Osipova …
Mikhailovsky Ballet - Don Quixote - London Coliseum
Such is the fame of Ivan Vasiliev and Natalia Osipova's on and off stage partnership that like Brangelina they are becoming known around the globe by a single celebrity name...Vasipova. Continue Reading
Mikhailovsky Ballet - Don Quixote - London Coliseum
So charged was the atmosphere that the two of them looked tempted, at first, to sacrifice choreographic detail for pyrotechnic thrill; instead, they settled into performances that were as exciting for their wit and colour as for any record-breaking effects.
Mikhailovsky Ballet - Don Quixote - London Coliseum
His jump has the same gravity-defying lift. As he goes up, and up, and up, an awed gasp goes round the theatre. For all the raw power, Vasiliev can be delicately precise: he starts one turn at whizzing speed, then slows right down, coming to a superbly controlled stop.