★★★★✰ Osipova inhabits the role of Anna Anderson with gruelling sincerity. She appears deranged from the beginning with close-up camera angles revealing a depth of despair that is tremendously affecting.
Tag - Valeri Hristov
★★★★✰ The choice of works emphasised ensembles more than individuals. It was interesting to see large numbers of young men dancing together, as well as a more usual female corps de ballet.
Hightlight - Yasmine Naghdi promoted to Principal dancer. Full press release with all Promotions, Joiners and Leavers
★★★★✰ The first Emeralds ballerina, Beatriz Stix-Brunell, could be a water nymph, touching the hands of her suitor, Valeri Hristov, in the opening pas de deux before drifting out of reach.
Gallery by Foteini Christofilopoulou...
Monotones II: Audiences are now accustomed to the manic acrobatic contortions of modern choreography, so it is rewarding to see the rigour with which the three performers (Marianela Nunez, Valeri Hristov and Edward Watson) control their elasticity.
It’s a truism that any startlingly new dance-maker without an early elite training will have based his (or her) choreography on their own physique...
The best of the videos and best piece of the night was Kim Brandstrup's Leda and the Swan using the much-loved Zenaida Yanowsky and Tommy Franzen
This triple bill, with two world premieres, shows how ably choreographers 85 years apart can refresh the language of classical ballet without distorting it beyond recognition.
But it was Rojo who really surprised me, with the most emotionally open performance I've ever seen from her. ...a swansong, indeed: what a way to go!