Launched in Moscow, the Golden Mask Festival has begun to show its ballet program. One after another, the jury and the public were immediately presented with a whole block of nominated performance.
Tchaikovsky’s Opera and Ballet Theater (Perm) is one of the best ballet companies in the country and the world, and their new version of The Nutcracker ballet is quite capable of competing even with such an obvious “masked” favorite, like the Bolshoi’s Nureyev ballet. In addition to the performance itself, in private nominations for the Mask, choreographer Alexei Miroshnichenko (chief choreographer of the Perm troupe), conductor Artyom Abashev, performer of the party Marie Polina Buldakova, Schelkunchik-Prince Pavel Savin, Alon Pikalova for the work of the artist and Tatiana Noginova – as the author is nominated here for the work of the artist and Tatyana Noginova as the author costumes.
Another participant in the “masked” race – the Samara Academic Opera and Ballet Theater – came to the festival for the first time. The reason for this is the ballet of this theater “Esmeralda” with an exclusive renewal in the true choreography of Petipa, the scene of the Grand pas des Corbeilles (“Basket Dance”). He was nominated for “Mask” in only two nominations: the main one is for the performance and the other one is “The Best Choreographer’s Work”, which will be won by the main choreographer of this theater, Yuri Burlaka, one of the world-renowned experts in ancient choreography.
The ballet Esmeralda was created by Giselle Jules Perrot-to Carlotta Grisi in London in 1844, and after 4 years the author himself, invited to work in Russia at that time, transferred his work based on Victor’s famous novel Hugo “Notre Dame de Paris”, in St. Petersburg. The premiere on the stage of the Bolshoi Kamenny theater was performed by another European celebrity – Fanny Elsler. Since then, this ballet, up to the Soviet time, has been preserved in the playbill of many Russian ballet theaters and remained one of the most beloved by the audience.
