On November 7 the Hvorostovsky Krasnoyarsk Opera and Ballet Theatre will introduce the Alexander Glazunov’s ballet Raymonda choreographed by Marius Petipa as edited by Yuri Grigorovich.

One of the most spectacular and challenging performances was the first ballet composing experience for the young composer Alexander Glazunov and the main triumph of Marius Petipa, who created choreography for about a hundred ballets. For the Krasnoyarsk Opera and Ballet Theatre, Raymonda is the third performance staged by People's Artist of the USSR Yuri Grigorovich. The ballet master staged the performance several times for different theatres including the Bolshoi. He edited it into a two-act ballet and added new duets to it. In his version the main protagonists appeared in the crowd dance scenes, giving the wholeness to the original suite construction of the ballet. As the assistant ща the ballet master Yuri Grigorovich, Honoured Artist of Russia Ruslan Pronin said: “Yury Nikolaevich Grigorovich created a new version of the ballet especially for Krasnoyarsk spectators. In our Raymonda there are stylistically very interesting dances: Spanish and Saracenic ones. But the main language is the language of classical dance, the language of Petipa. I am sure that the new version of the production of Yuri Nikolaevich Grigorovich has become more mobile, understandable and modern.  The famous grand pas of the third act is transferred to the first one. According to Grigorovich, the divertissement of the last act did not play a role in the development of the plot.

Raymonda is a great performance, with many images, dances, big scenes. The team of the Krasnoyarsk Theatre works with full dedication, and we hope that the result will be worthy of any stage of the world.”

The performance designer artist Dmitri Cherbadzhi commented on the set design of the show: “Raymonda will be performed in the scenery of blue colours. This is both a legend and a fantasy world, and on stage, it looks like an obsession. The costumes of the heroes are classic in accordance with the era - from tutus to trousers. But it is worth mentioning that a convincing suit is not always an authentic reproduction, as they say, “as like as two peas”. I want to dress not a soloist, but a dance; and the costume should help reveal the image.”

The ballet characters are performed by Honoured Artist of Russia Maria Kuimova-Litvinenko, Yekaterina Bulgutova, Elena Svinko, Natalia Bobrova, Anna Fedosova, Nadezhda Panfilova, Yuri Kudryavtsev, Daniil Kostylev, Georgiy Bolsunovsky, Kirill Litvinenko, Egor Osokin.