BALLET MINNESOTA: "LA BAYADERE"

Saturday May 19, 2001
13th Minnesota Dance Festival

see also:
Rehearsal Photos


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Ballet Minnesota Premiere:
May 18-19, 2001
13th Minnesota Dance Festival
Fitzgerald Theater, St Paul, Minnesota

choreography: after Marius Petipa
composer: Ludwig Minkus
score: La Bayadere
restaged by: Cheryl Rist
costumes: Cheryl Rist
lighting: Tom Campbell
sets: Jim Arnold

Nikiya: Oksana Konobeyeva     Solor: Kirill Bak
Soloists: Svetlana Gavrilova, Melanie Hughes, Brianna VandeVelde

La Bayadere History

World Premiere: February 4, 1877 by the Imperial Ballet,
Maryinski Theater, St Petersbury, Russia

Choreography: Marius Petipa
Music: Ludwig Minkus
Plot: Sergey Khudekov & Marius Petipa
Sets: K. Ivanov, P. Lambin, O. Allegi & A Kwapp
Nikiya: Ekaterina Vazem
Solor: Lev Ivanov

La Bayadere story
(notes compiled by Gerard Charles, www.balletmet.org)

The ballet is set in legendary India. Nikiya, a bayadere (or temple dancer), is in love with Solor, a noble warrior. However, the Rajah decides to marry his daughter Gamzatti to Solor. Overwhelmed by her beauty, Solor forgets his vows of love to Nikiya. When the Rajah learns of Nikiya and Solor's love from the High Brahmin (who is also in love with Nikiya), he decides to have the bayadere killed. Gamzatti tries to persuade Nikiya to give up Solor, but she refuses and attacks the princess who then also decided to have the bayadere killed.

Nikiya dances at the betrothal celebrations of Gamzatti and Solor. She is fatefully bitten by a poisonous snake hidden in a basket of flowers sent by the Rajah and Gamzatti.

Solor has an hallucinatory vision of Nikiya (act 4) "Kingdom of the Shades". He tries to grasp her but she disappears. Later, at his wedding ceremony he is again haunted by the vision of Nikiya which he alone can see. The gods, infuriated by the killing of Nikiya, destroy the temple, killing everyone in it. The spirits of Nikiya and Solor are reunited in eternal love.