Tag Archive: Gergő Ármin Balázsi

Effervescent

13. February 2025

“The Merry Widow”
Hungarian National Ballet
Hungarian State Opera
Budapest, Hungary
February 8-9, 2025

by Ilona Landgraf
Copyright © 2025 by Ilona Landgraf

The brisk beats that opened last Saturday’s revival of The Merry Widow at Budapest’s opera house promised a peppy performance, and the following two and a half hours delivered brio indeed. Franz Lehár composed the music in 1905 for his popular eponymous operetta, and John Launchbery and Allen Abbot were the first to edit it for the dance stage in 1974. Both worked on behalf of the British choreographer Ronald Hynd who in 1975 adapted the comic operetta into a three-act ballet for the Australian Ballet. Since then, many ballet companies have added it to their repertory. The Hungarian National Ballet premiered The Merry Widow in 2014 with new sets and costumes by the Brit Peter Docherty.

Docherty designed a long workbench stuffed with books and champagne (shadowed by a wall-sized replica of the national coat of arms) where the staff of the Pontevedrian embassy in Paris shuffled papers, boozed, and stood at attention as soon as the anthem sounded. The small Balkan state of Pontevedrian was bankrupt, but its geriatric ambassador, Baron Zeta, had a bailout plan. If his first secretary, Count Danilo Danilovitch, married the Pontevedrian millionaire’s widow, Hanna Glawari, her money would refill the state coffers. (more…)

Prix Benois Laureates 2024

27. June 2024

Prix Benois de la Danse
Bolshoi Theatre (Historic Stage)
Moscow, Russia
June 25, 2024

by Ilona Landgraf
Copyright © 2024 by Ilona Landgraf

On Tuesday evening, this year’s Prix Benois laureates were announced on the Historic Stage of the Bolshoi Theatre.
The Mariinsky Ballet’s Olesya Novikova won the prize for best female dancer for her performance as Aspiccia in La Fille du Pharaon (Marius Petipa’s version as reconstructed by Toni Candeloro). Gergő Ármin Balázsi (Hungarian National Ballet) and Artemy Belyakov (Bolshoi Ballet) shared the prize for best male dancer. Balázsi was nominated for his performance as Leon in Boris Eifman’s The Pygmalion Effect and Belyakov for his performance as Ivan IV in Yuri Grigorovich’s Ivan the Terrible. Marco Goecke was awarded the prize for best choreography in absentia for In the Dutch Mountains, a creation for the Nederlands Dans Theater. (more…)

Dancer Nominees for the Prix Benois 2024

21. June 2024 0 Comments

Prix Benois de la Danse
Bolshoi Theatre (Historic Stage)
Moscow, Russia
June 2024

by Ilona Landgraf
Copyright © 2024 by Ilona Landgraf

Thirteen dancers from eight companies are nominated for this year’s Prix Benois. Of the seven women and six men, two dance in China, Hungary, and Italy; one dances in Japan, and six in Russia. Next week, the laureates will be announced in an award ceremony at the Bolshoi Theatre, Moscow.

Here’s a short overview of the nominees in alphabetical order by company names:
(more…)

Enchanting

16. December 2022

“The Nutcracker”
Hungarian National Ballet / Hungarian National Ballet Institute
Hungarian State Opera
Budapest, Hungary
December 10, 2022 (matinee + evening performance)

by Ilona Landgraf
Copyright © 2022 by Ilona Landgraf

The Dutch National Ballet has in its repertoire a gorgeous “Nutcracker and the Mouse King” by Wayne Eagling (featuring no less beautiful designs by Toer van Schayk), which premiered in 1996. It seems that from that moment on, Eagling has been spellbound by the “Nutcracker”. The version he created in 2015 – tailored to the Hungarian National Ballet – is his fifth take on the fairy-tale. For Budapest’s “Nutcracker” he collaborated with the company’s artistic director, Tamás Solymosi. I saw a matinee and an evening performance.

From the moment I noticed the cupcakes and Gugelhupf on the Stahlbaum family’s Christmas buffet, I knew that Eagling and Solymosi’s production would be just so: a treat based on a traditional recipe but refined with local additions and updated techniques. The original recipe by Vasili Vainonen is from 1934 – and his “Nutcracker” premiered in Budapest in 1950 to great acclaim. (more…)

Homage to Iván Nagy

30. April 2022

“6th Iván Nagy International Ballet Gala”
Ballet of the Hungarian State Opera
Hungarian State Opera
Budapest, Hungary
April 23, 2022

Iván Nagy (1943 – 2014), a ballet dancer born and trained in Hungary, rose to stardom as a principal for the American Ballet Theatre in the 1970s. He later embarked on a second career as an artistic director – first at the Ballet de Santiago, and subsequently at the Cincinnati/New Orleans Ballet and the English National Ballet. In his final years, he returned to his homeland to support the ballet of the Hungarian State Opera as an artistic advisor. Since 2015, the company has paid tribute to him at a yearly international gala, which was canceled due to the pandemic in 2020 and 2021. (more…)

A Hushed-Up Scandal

23. March 2022

“Mayerling”
Ballet of the Hungarian State Opera
Hungarian State Opera
Budapest, Hungary
March 19, 2022

Eighteen years after its Hungarian premiere, Kenneth MacMillan’s “Mayerling” returned to the stage of Budapest’s newly renovated State Opera this March. According to a local dance critic, audience members cried while watching the 2004 performance, as the tragic 1889 death of Crown Prince Rudolf (heir to the throne of Austria-Hungary) is a chapter of Hungarian history that stirs up many emotions. Though he led a life of debauchery and primarily performed insignificant tasks in his role, the liberal-leaning Crown Prince was popular among the people. They pinned great hope on him, (more…)