SUMMER PERFORMANCE
June 3, 2023
Edmonds Center for the Arts
Olympic Ballet Theatre closes its performance season with an eclectic display celebrating the diversity of ballet. This annual production honors tradition and spotlights innovation, featuring excerpts from classical ballets by famed choreographers of the past and new contemporary ballet works by talented choreographers of today. The 2023 production of Summer Performance includes:
Paquita Grand Pas Classique
This classical ballet excerpt with original choreography by Marius Petipa and music by Ludwig Minkus was added to Act III of Paquita in 1881. While most of the original ballet has been lost to time, Paquita Grand Pas Classique is a treasured part of many ballet companies’ repertoire to this day. This passage is considered a masterpiece of classical ballet, featuring a parade of variations, solos, and corps de ballet.
Capriccio del Cuore
Alberto Gaspar’s newest piece draws inspiration from Sergei Rachmaninoff’s Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini, based on the famous violinist Niccolò Paganini’s 24 Caprices, Caprice No. 24. Rachmaninoff’s piece takes the listener on a glorious journey of emotion, seeming to also take a fanciful look at the controversial violinist himself, and the rumored deal with the devil that Paganini made for his extraordinary musical abilities.
Gaspar’s newest work leans into the technical skill and grand passions of Rachmaninoff’s musical variations, taking the audience through the darkest realms of desperation and death but also soaring into the softer realms of love and hope and celebrating the ineffable transformative power that a single person or moment can have over us—that someone can come into our lives and gift us with a ray of hope and inspiration that allows us to ascend from the darkest places within ourselves with new perspective and purpose.
TICKETS
Edmonds Center for the Arts
Saturday, June 3, 2023
7:00 PM
Ticket Price: $27–$40
(varies by age and seating location)
Paquita Grand Pas Classique
The story of an almost-lost ballet
Paquita is a romantic ballet in three acts. Marius Petipa first staged it for the Imperial Ballet in St. Petersburg in 1847. In 1881, Petipa created a revival of this ballet, adding new pieces composed by Ludwig Minkus. This production included the Paquita pas de trois for the first act and the Paquita grand pas classique and the Mazurka des enfants for the last act.
These additions survived long after the full-length ballet left the stage (although the full version was just recently revived by several ballet companies). Today, these pieces, particularly the Grand pas classique, are major cornerstones of the traditional classical ballet repertory and have been staged by ballet companies throughout the world. Read more in the blog post
Photo: Rowan Catel
Into Dust Photography
Meet Alberto Gaspar
Choreographer of the new work in Summer Performance
Alberto Gaspar is an OBT’s company dancer and choreographer. He holds an engineering degree in International Business and different diplomas from Tecnológico de Monterrey and Harvard University. His experience as a choreographer began at Saint Louis Ballet, where he created a piece for the Pulitzer Museum that included a live cello piece and several designs from upcoming fashion designers.
He has been involved with two collaborative groups that performed neoclassical and contemporary pieces set to live music in galleries and museums. His show titled Mexicanismo, featuring Yancy Calvo’s art successfully toured two states in the United States. He also created a music video for Lisa Mac and Dreamers, a dance video spotlighting socio-political issues in our country. Alberto has created choreography for Ballet Memphis, including a full-length ballet for the school and three different neoclassical ballets for the company.
Alberto’s two contemporary ballet pieces previously premiered at OBT are Transfigurations in 2019 and 1 in 10^2,685,000 in 2022.
Summer Performance is made possible by:
Funded in part by the City of Edmonds Arts Commission Tourism Promotion Fund through City of Edmonds Lodging Tax funds.
Made possible in part by assistance from the Snohomish County Hotel-Motel Tax Fund.