Swan Lake - Ballet by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky

Ballet
Duration: 130 minutes including intermission

PRODUCTION TEAM
Puppet construction: Bernhard Leismüller / Bernhard Morgenstern
Puppet heads: Sebastian Demmel
Costume workshop: Bernhard Leismüller / Amand Pérez
Set design: Bettina Hummitzsch
Choreography and staging: Jutta Mähr

CHOREOGRAPHY
Building on Petipa's choreography, the ensemble of the Puppet Opera under the direction of Munich choreographer Jutta Mähr developed its own interpretation of this ballet classic. Yet even though a puppet can seemingly master any physical challenge with ease, the goal was to make the effort visible. The illusion that muscles strain to the point of pain, that dancers truly sweat, that they must constantly struggle for balance - this was the central aim of the production.

STAGE HISTORY
"Swan Lake" is arguably the most famous ballet of all time - every classical company has it in its repertoire. Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky spent half a year (August 1875 to April 1876) completing his first ballet, which premiered on February 20, 1877 at the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow. The first Russian guest performance in the West took place in 1969 with the Kirov Ballet. Among more recent interpretations, the choreography of star Rudolf Nureyev became popular, as did the works of George Balanchine (New York 1951), Vladimir Bourmeister (Moscow 1956), John Cranko (Stuttgart 1963), John Neumeier (Hamburg 2002), and the all-male version "Matthew Bourne's Swan Lake" (London 1995).