Gala Dance Open, traditionally closing the program of the Festival, will for the first time be held on the famous imperial stage — at the Alexandrinsky Theatre.
As always, all the participants of the Gala are International Ballet Stars, being on the peak of their career. However, this time Dance Open Festival is going to present a nuber of new names, included in the world's ballet top lists. Misty Copeland, Melissa Hamilton, Igone de Jongh, Sara Michelle Murawski are among them.
Furthermore, Gala is included in the Russia and Great Britain cross-year calendar. Essential part of the evening is not only Royal Ballet's and Covent Garden's soloists performances but also works of British choreographers, in particular — Wayne McGregor and David Dawson. Both of them are not only representing British culture but also will present the idea of Gala, being the most popular figures of the "radical choreography".
Classics of the XX centurywill be represented in works of John Neumeier, Kenneth MacMillan and Kasyan Goleizovsky. Jose Martinez succeeded in finding his own recognizable intonation in reframing of academicism.
Dance Open Festival continues an established tradition of choreographic work reconstruction. The Bluebeard ballet, staged by Marius Petipa in 1896 by music of Pyotr Schenk haven't been performed in post revolutionary Russia. Gala audience will see the bright and goreous Grand Pas Electrique from this ballet, performed by soloists of the Bolshoi Theatre. At the moment the scrupulous work on reconstruction of the choreographic text and recreation of the costumes based on scetches of Ivan Vsevolozhsky — gifted artist and one of the directors of the Imperial Theatre — is going. Therefore, despite the general contemporary focus of the XIII season, Dance Open Festival does not retract from promoting the great history of Russian ballet.
Russian Ballet Stars will also participate in Gala: on the one hand it's Viktoria Tereshkina, Kristina Kretova and Semyon Chudin, working in Russia, and on the other hand it's Natalia Osipova, at the moment dancing abroad, but still being a Russian ballerina.
As always, all the participants of the Gala are nominated for Dance Open Award. Secret vote of the international jury will define the award-winners in six categories. However, every audience member will have an opportunity to participate in choosing the winner in People's Choice Award by dropping their tickets into special boxes after the concert ends or by voting in groups facebook.com/DanceOpen and vk.com/dance_open. People's Choice Award is always the most intriguing nomination.
