SWAN LAKE

A Swan Lake catapulted into our times, where we glimpse conflicting relationships between tyrannical parents and children, immersed in a world affected by environmental issues. In 2020, at the height of the pandemic, French-Albanian maestro Angelin Preljocaj, among the leading choreographers on the European stage, rewrites this masterpiece of classical ballet born in 1895 in the days of imperial Russia at the hands of Marius Petipa and Lev Ivanov. Its original and innovative contemporary version welcomes the musical universe of Pyotr Il’ič Tchaikovsky across a wide spectrum, ranging from the scores of the ballet in question to other excerpts from symphonies, overtures and concertos by the same composer. Classical melodies, however, are here brought into dialogue with the rather magnetic sounds of the 79Ds. Interpreting the tormented and poignant love story between Siegfried and Odette are twenty-six dancers from Ballet Preljocaj, the prestigious French company based in Aix-en-Provence that just this year celebrates the fortieth anniversary of its founding in 1985 at the hands of the choreographer himself, its expert helmsman. A grand spectacle, then, that ferries the ballet’s narrative progression into the third millennium, enhanced by Éric Soyer’s lighting, Boris Labbé’s video projections and costumes designed by renowned Russian designer Igor Chapurin, a former author in several Moscow Bolshoi Theater productions and a longtime collaborator of Angelin Preljocaj.