2015年11月アーカイブ

Photo：Kiyonori Hasegawa

The second show under the Tokyo Ballet's new artistic director, Yukari Saito, is the masterpiece of Romantic ballet, La Sylphide (The Sylph), a piece that is one of her specialties, as she has performed in it many times.

Saito danced the original in venues such as the Bolshoi Theatre and the Mariinsky Theatre, where she was highly praised and even called the "Marie Taglioni of Japan." Saito gained the trust of choreographer Pierre Lacotte while working as his assistant with the Moscow Musical Theatre Ballet, and she was entrusted with the direction of the Tokyo Ballet for the first time in 2013.

Now that Saito is the artistic director, she has been working with the dancers to guide and direct them, based on her own onstage experience.

The dancers that Saito has cast for the first night are Rie Watanabe, who has previously garnered good reviews for her superior flexibility, dexterity, and graceful charm, and the fresh Arata Miyagawa, who has attracted attention with his high level of physical ability and perfectly practiced movements. On the second night, the highly successful pair from the previous production, Kanako Oki and Daichi Matsuno, take to the stage again. The perfectly proportioned Oki's greatest gifts include her grace and the well-defined clarity of her technique, honed in Russia. Matsuno, with his sweet and gentle classical look, shows his dynamism and lightheartedness, putting his height to good use.

La Sylphide is the story of a young man named James who backs out of his wedding, having fallen in love with a sylph, a mysterious woodland spirit. Every detail of the Romantic ballet aesthetic is reproduced in this production, giving it the unique style and beauty of the classical ballet blanc. The piece also features group dances, a particular point of pride for the Tokyo Ballet.

This production of La Sylphide from the Tokyo Ballet offers the new artistic director, Yukari Saito, a chance to exercise her remarkable skills, and ballet-goers have plenty to look forward to.

The Brilliant New Artistic Director, Yukari Saito, Spreads Her Wings
Don't Miss the First Performance of the Vladimir Bourmeister Staging of Swan Lake!

Having served for many years as the prima ballerina of the Tokyo Ballet, Yukari Saito assumed the position of the troupe's artistic director this past August. This performance will be the first major project under her charge. In addition to her abundant experience as a dancer, her profound understanding of the culture of ballet, and her training as a ballet master in Russia, Saito has already received high praise for her backstage involvement in productions at the Moscow Musical Theater Ballet and in productions of La Sylphide and Don Quixote at the Tokyo Ballet. With this production, Saito will display the full potential of her celebrated genius.

What makes Vladimir Bourmeister's staging of Swan Lake so enchanting is encapsulated in the choreographer's own words: "The dancer must live the life of the character he is playing onstage." Bourmeister had studied theater before becoming acquainted with ballet. In contrast to the 19th-century Petipa-Ivanov revival staging--which emphasized formal beauty--Bourmeister faithfully reproduced Tchaikovsky's original intent by adhering to the dramaturgy of the composer's original score, thereby restoring a dramatic narrativity to the ballet. This staging was a major success worldwide, and it has earned the distinction of being a masterpiece production.

The Tokyo Ballet has received acclaim for its stagings of numerous classical ballets and, in more recent years, dramatic ballets, including Onegin and Romeo and Juliet. Now that the Tokyo Ballet has gained Yukari Saito as its new artistic director--shortly after the troupe's 50th anniversary--this truly presents the peak opportunity to perform the Bourmeister version of Swan Lake, which combines the classical with the dramatic.

This performance will have three pairs of lead performers: Mizuka Ueno and Dan Tsukamoto, who continue their glamorous presence as the Tokyo Ballet's top duo; Rie Watanabe, acclaimed for her graceful dancing in La Sylphide and Giselle, paired with the notable Yasuomi Akimoto, who joined the troupe after receiving overwhelming praise for his ability in the August auditions; and Mamiko Kawashima plus Hideo Kishimoto, who were celebrated for their elegant performances in the February production of The Sleeping Beauty.

Expect a new era for the Tokyo Ballet in 2016, ushered in with the Bourmeister-staged version of Swan Lake.

What Is the Bourmeister Version of Swan Lake?

This dramatic staging of Swan Lake (first performed in 1953) by Russian choreographer Vladimir Bourmeister was a worldwide success. Bourmeister went back to Tchaikovsky's original score, heightening the drama and changing the greatest highlight of the ballet--the third act--into a dramatic development in which folk dancers become the devil's minions and bewitch the prince. In 1960, the Paris Opera adopted this version for its first production of Swan Lake. The staging also became part of the repertoire of La Scala Theatre Ballet in Milan.

Yukari Saito, Artistic director of the Tokyo Ballet

Saito joined the Tokyo Ballet in 1987 and went on to perform as a prima ballerina for many years. With her poetic and graceful dancing and dramatic expressiveness, she immediately blossomed into a star performer. She has played the lead role in all the major classical full-length ballets. In 2010, Saito won the 27th Chieko Hattori Ballet Prize, the Tokyo Shimbun Dancing Arts Award, and the Yokohama Cultural Award for her performance as Tatiana in Onegin. She has also performed works by Béjart, Kylián, and Neumeier, and she has given numerous guest performances overseas. In 2005, she graduated top of her class from the Moscow State Academy of Choreography (the Bolshoi Ballet Academy) and went on to gain experience as a ballet instructor at the Moscow Musical Theater Ballet. In 2012, Saito won the Medal with Purple Ribbon awarded by the Japanese government. She became the artistic director of the Tokyo Ballet in August 2015.

The source for the musical masterpiece Carousel, now turned into a ballet with music by film score maestro Michel Legrand!
The moving story of the Ruffian Liliom bringing his ill-fated love from the "Next World"

Photo：Holger Badekow

One of John Neumeier's more recent works, Liliom turns Ferenc Molnár's drama--the basis for Rodgers and Hammerstein's Broadway musical masterpiece Carousel--into a movingly staged ballet. Neumeier--whose passions were stirred watching Carousel as a boy in the land of his birth, the USA--said that he was moved even further upon reading the play on which the musical was based and that he aspired to someday take it on himself.

During the Great Depression of the 1930s, the high-spirited ruffian Liliom lives a humble life with his lover Julie. But when he loses his job and becomes a thief to provide for the child whom Julie will bear, his failure and subsequent despair drive him to suicide. Allowed to return temporarily from "the next world" to the world of the living, Liliom is shaken to learn that his son, who resembles him, is now in the same situation. When it appears as though Liliom and Julie's tragic love and way of living may be passed down to the next generation, a "star" that Liliom brings from the next world gives rise to a ray of hope, bringing forth much excitement.

Much attention was given at the premiere to the fact that Neumeier commissioned the master film composer Michel Legrand--known for such tours de force as the soundtrack to The Umbrellas of Cherbourg--to write all the music for the show. Legrand's jazz-tinged score richly conveys the ambiance of the period as it rises to its crescendo. The Hamburg-based Norddeutscher Rundfunk (NDR) Bigband, which has performed this set on stage since the first performance, will also bring its stylings to the Japanese production.

Alina Cojocaru--the talented star who was once the top principal at the Royal Ballet in the UK and now dances for the English National Ballet, in between the numerous guest performances entrusted to her by Neumeier--played Liliom's wife, Julie, at the premiere of the ballet. Cojocaru is slated to play the part in every performance in Japan. Liliom promises tears and emotion. Do not miss out!

Nobles, fairies, and amusing mechanicals...
The dreamlike, festive ballet that expresses the Three Worlds created by the magic of the Bard's words in three dance styles and with three genres of music

Photo：Holger Badekow

A Midsummer Night's Dream, staged by John Neumeier when he was just 35, is a dazzlingly festive ballet that gives form to the worlds of Shakespeare's famous comedy through a young choreographer's exuberant creativity and raw emotion.

The likes of Ashton and Balanchine had already produced great pieces within the ballet world based on the same play. What is notable about Neumeier's version is that the choreographer devised a way of more faithfully expressing the view of the world that Shakespeare painted with his words.

The inhabitants of the three worlds--the down-to-earth people, the comical Mechanicals, and the mystical fairies--each express themselves through entirely different music and dancing. The betrothed Athenian nobles Theseus and Hippolyta, as well as the two other couples, perform a stately classical dance to Mendelssohn's bright score. Bottom and the other merry Mechanicals, attempting to stage a play at Theseus and Hippolyta's wedding, play primitive barrel organs and perform comical sketches. Finally, the forest-dwelling fairy king and queen, as well as their servants, dance, with a great deal of jumping and dynamic lifting, to Ligeti's mysterious electronic tones.

In the climactic wedding scene, following the courtiers' dance and the Mechanicals' farce, the occasion concludes with a bright pas de deux by Theseus and Hippolyta, appearing entirely as the grand finale of a classical ballet. However, the subsequent epilogue, featuring Oberon and Titania, vividly illustrates that this bright reality is underpinned by the power of "The Dream." This masterpiece weaves Shakespeare's worlds into a single dreamlike tapestry of different styles of performance in a spectacular work of ballet. It is not to be missed!