Mikhailovsky Theatre’s 180th Season Opened on 13 September

This season is dedicated to the build-up to a landmark date: the 180 year anniversary of the founding of the Mikhailovsky Theatre. This date will be celebrated in a year’s time, in autumn 2013. Vladimir Kekhman, the Mikhailovsky Theatre’s General Director, has been talking about the Theatre’s plans.

The 180th season opened on 13 September with the ballet Giselle, ou Les Wilis. The leading roles were performed by Polina Semionova and Marcelo Gomes. These world-famous dancers will regularly appear throughout the season on the stage of the Mikhailovsky Theatre, both in the classical and contemporary repertoires.
 

“The Mikhailovsky Theatre’s new season is a commemorative one: in 2013 we are marking our 180th anniversary. This milestone coincides with a number of other significant dates for the world of theatre: 200 years since the birth of Wagner and Verdi, and Benjamin Britten’s centenary. All these events will be widely celebrated to honour these true titans of music, who in many ways defined musical tonality in the 19th and 20th centuries. In planning our operatic repertoire, we have paid particular attention to this: the company is well prepared for an encounter with music of such complexity and depth. And, no less importantly, our audience is too. Britten will appear for the first time in the Theatre’s repertoire; his opera, Billy Budd, staged by Willy Decker, will be a joint project with the Weiner Staatsoper. Vasily Petrenko, working with the Frankfurt-based stage and artistic director Vera Nemirova, will present Wagner’s Der fliegende Holländer. This opera was last performed in the Theatre back in the 1950s, under the baton of the celebrated Kurt Sanderling. In September 2013, to mark the 180th anniversary of the opening of the Mikhailovsky Theatre, the legendary Daniel Barenboim will appear, with the Staatskapelle Berlin orchestra”.
In the coming months there will be two premières, the first of which will be an opera: on 26 October, theatregoers will be able to see a new staging of Pyotr Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin. Andriy Zholdak will offer his interpretation of this classic. This will be the operatic debut for the renowned director who is firmly integrated in European theatre. The first ballet première of the season will take place on 13 December: Nacho Duato, Artistic Director of the ballet company, is working on new choreography for Sergey Prokofiev’s Romeo and Juliet. The conductor and director for both performances is Musical Director and Principal Conductor Mikhail Tatarnikov.

In addition to the premières, the theatre will offer a number of other special events before the end of 2012. On 6, 7, and 9 November, during the Diaghilev P.S. festival, in which the Mikhailovsky Theatre is a partner, the stage will be given over to touring productions from the Hamburg Ballet, a world famous collective under the direction of John Neumeier. The programme includes the ballet La Dame aux Camellias and a gala concert. The opening ceremony for the St. Petersburg International Cultural Forum will take place on 10 November. Preparations are also well underway for the Mikhailovsky Theatre Grand Prix, which will showcase some of the most promising pupils studying in ballet schools, and will take place on 21–22 November. In accordance with tradition, this will be topped off by a gala concert featuring stars of the world ballet stage. Finally, the Italian opera star Barbara Frittoli, one of the best-known sopranos of our time, will appear on 31 December at the theatre in a festive New Year programme under the baton of Principal Guest Conductor Vasily Petrenko.

The 180th season opened on 13 September with the ballet Giselle, ou Les Wilis. The leading roles were performed by Polina Semionova and Marcelo Gomes. These world-famous dancers will regularly appear throughout the season on the stage of the Mikhailovsky Theatre, both in the classical and contemporary repertoires.

The operatic season will open on 20 September with the opera Un ballo in maschera by Guiseppe Verdi. On the podium will be Musical Director and Principal Conductor of the theatre, Mikhail Tatarnikov. On 26 September, La Bohème by Giacomo Puccini will be performed under the baton of Vasily Petrenko, who took up the post of Principal Guest Conductor at the end of the last season.

The touring programme for the forthcoming season will begin with performances in Riga, Latvia, at the Golden Mask festival of performing arts at the beginning of October. In March and April 2013 the touring ballet company will put on a two week run at the London Coliseum, performing Don Quixote, Swan Lake, and Multiplicity. Forms of Silence and Emptiness, as well as putting on an evening of one-act ballets for the British audience. In April 2013, on the invitation of Ivan Liška, Artistic Director of the Bavarian State Opera, the ballet company is going to Munich, where it will present Nacho Duato’s staging of The Sleeping Beauty. In the summer of 2013, the Theatre’s opera company will take part in the Savonlinna Opera Festival in Finland. Mikhailovsky Theatre

Polina Semionova ©Mikhailovsky Theatre’s

  ©2012 Danza Ballet

00020