The Perm opera and ballet theatre will present the first premiere in the 147th season on the 1st of November. We will see a common project of the theatre and the Perm ballet school — the ballet «La fille mal gardée» staged by Kirill Shmorgoner. This performance is special because all parts will be danced by the ballet school’s students.
A light and joyful story about — a rare case — happy love. The plot of «La fille mal gardée» is simple and clear: the mother wants to marry her daughter a fortune which is somehow in breach of the girl’s plans who is in love with the lowborn peasant. He loves her back. An hour and a half of scenic action, some tricks, a little craft, combination of good luck — and a couple celebrates a wedding. Practically all students of the ballet school will take part in the performance. Children — pupils of the second and the third years — will perform figure dances and the graduates will dance the main parts.
Kirill Shmorgoner, a directing ballet-master:
— Material ideally suits for a students’ performance. It is not the most difficult ballet text, a simple, clear, at the same time facetious and exciting story and what is the most important — it is an opportunity to involve dancers of different age. «La fille» is a ballet with plenty of comic situations and grotesque characters. All this should be not only well danced but also well played. So for students it is also a great lesson of acting skills.
Collaboration between the opera and ballet theatre and the ballet school began at the moment when the school was founded. Its students are involved in 11 performances of the theatre, almost 60 years a «students’» ballet «Coppelia» is being performed on the theatre’s stage. This year the theatre and the school signed a collaboration agreement than not just formalizes already consisting relationships but also stipulates new forms of cooperation. The first big project at the new phase is the production of «La fille mal gardée».
Vladimir Tolstukhin, artistic director of the Perm ballet school:
— It is very important for us that students get stage practice. When children come to the school they don’t fully realize where they are and why. But after the first performance on stage their thinking absolutely changes. They experience this stress, understand what it means to perform to a packed house, hear applauses that energize them and motivate for further work and development.
«La fille mal gardée» is also one of the oldest ballet texts. It means that spectators have a chance to see an example of old-time choreography of preromanticist epoch. The directing ballet-master Kirill Shmorgoner who had been dancing this ballet on the Perm stage saved many elements of Aleksander Gorsky’s choreography, following the first version of the ballet, added his own dance fragments and a little simplified dances taking into account the performers’ abilities.
Kirill Shmorgoner, a directing ballet-master:
— It’s obvious that when working with children one should consider their technical abilities and physical training, that’s why we have simplified some dances. Of course we can’t deny that a students’ performance can be not so perfect from the technical point of view but emotionally, sincerely, expressively, charming and energetically — no adult performance can be equal to it.
The premier of the ballet will take place on the 1st of November. The performance will be shown this month four times: November 2, 3, 28 and 29. After that the performance will be added to the repertoire.