The Mariinsky Ballet is the resident classical ballet company of the Mariinsky Theatre in Saint Petersburg, Russia.
The Mariinsky Theatre is a historic opera house in Saint Petersburg, Russia. Opened in 1860, it became the preeminent music theatre of late 19th-century Russia, where many of the stage masterpieces of Tchaikovsky, Mussorgsky, and Rimsky-Korsakov received their premieres. Through most of the Soviet era, it was known as the Kirov Theatre. Today, the Mariinsky Theatre is home to the Mariinsky Ballet, Mariinsky Opera and Mariinsky Orchestra. Since Yuri Temirkanov's retirement in 1988, the conductor Valery Gergiev has served as the theatre's general director.
Russian ballet is a form of ballet characteristic of or originating from Russia.
Agrippina Yakovlevna Vaganova was a Soviet and Russian ballet teacher who developed the Vaganova method – the technique which derived from the teaching methods of the old Imperial Ballet School under the Premier Maître de Ballet Marius Petipa throughout the mid to late 19th century, though mostly throughout the 1880s and 1890s. It was Vaganova who perfected and cultivated this form of teaching the art of classical ballet into a workable syllabus. Her Fundamentals of the Classical Dance (1934) remains a standard textbook for the instruction of ballet technique. Her technique is one of the most popular techniques today.
A ballet master is an employee of a ballet company who is responsible for the level of competence of the dancers in their company. In modern times, ballet masters are generally charged with teaching the daily company ballet class and rehearsing the dancers for both new and established ballets in the company's repertoire. The artistic director of a ballet company, whether a male or female, may also be called its ballet master. Historic use of gender marking in job titles in ballet is being supplanted by gender-neutral language job titles regardless of an employee's gender.
Altynai Abduakhimkyzy Asylmuratova is a Kazakh-born former ballerina who is artistic director of the ballet company at Astana Opera. She is a former prima ballerina with the Kirov Ballet and a guest artist all over the world.
Le Réveil de Flore, is a ballet anacréontique in one act, with choreography by Marius Petipa and music by Riccardo Drigo, to a libretto written by Petipa and Lev Ivanov. First presented by the Imperial Ballet at Peterhof Palace on 6 August [O.S. 25 July] 1894.
Rostislav Vladimirovich Zakharov was a Soviet and Russian choreographer, ballet dancer and opera director. He was a professor at the Russian Institute of Theatre Arts (GITIS) in Moscow (1946–1983). Zakharov was awarded the Stalin Prize twice and designated the People's Artist of the USSR (1969).
Saint Petersburg has always been known for its high-quality cultural life, and its best known museum is the Hermitage.
Pyotr Andreyevich Gusev was a Russian ballet dancer, teacher and choreographer. He was born on 29 December, 1904 in St. Petersburg. He studied at the St. Petersburg School of Choreography under Alexandr Shiryayev. He was a friend of George Balanchine and joined his Young Ballet group. He graduated in 1924 and joined the Kirov Ballet. He married Olga Mungalova, a ballet dancer at Kriov. In 1935 he left the Kirov and joined the Bolshoy in Moscow as a soloist. He was dancing with such ballerinas as Galina Ulanova and Maya Plisetskaya.
Varvara Pavlovna Mey was a prima ballerina, ballet instructor and author.
Alla Yevgenyevna Osipenko is a retired Soviet ballerina. She studied at the Leningrad Choreographic School in the class of Agrippina Vaganova.
Anna Pavlova, also known as A Woman for All Time, is a 1983 biographical drama film depicting the life of the Russian ballet dancer Anna Pavlova, written and directed by Emil Loteanu and starring Galina Belyayeva, James Fox and Sergey Shakurov. It depicts Pavlova's passion for art and her collaboration with the reformers of ballet including Michel Fokine, Vaslav Nijinsky and Sergei Diaghilev.
Leonid Veniaminovich Yakobson, whose last name is sometimes spelled Jacobson, was a Jewish ballet choreographer from Russia. He was the founder of the Yacobson Ballet.
Yulia Victorovna Makhalina, also Yulia, is a Russian ballet dancer. Since 1986, she has been with the Kirov/Mariinsky Ballet where she is a principal dancer. Along with Ulyana Lopatkina, Makhalina is a member of 'the basketball team', a group of Kirov dancers who are characterized for being especially tall and slender.
Viktoria Valerievna Tereshkina is a Russian ballet dancer, who performs as a principal dancer with the Mariinsky Ballet in Saint Petersburg. People's Artist of Russia (2018). Laureate of the highest theater award of St. Petersburg "Golden Soffit", and Laureate of the IX International Ballet Competition "Arabesque".
Renata Shakirova is a ballet dancer, currently a principal with the Mariinsky Ballet.
The class of perfection is an advanced ballet class for the highest ranking ballerinas in a ballet company. In Russia, the traditional class of perfection has been replaced by the unified company class, but the term may still be used informally for the special classes taken by only the highest ranking dancers in a company.
Vera Mikhailovna Krasovskaya was a Russian ballet historian, critic and dancer. She began her dancing career at the Leningrad Ballet School and graduated from it in 1933. Krasovskaya performed with the Kirov Ballet at the Mariinsky Theatre from 1933 to 1941 before stepping down to become a critic and studied at the Leningrad Ostrovsky Institute of Theatre. She published two volumes of four books on Russian ballet and went on to author a larger second volume focus on the history of ballet in Western Europe. Krasovskaya also wrote biographies on Anna Pavlova, Vaslav Nijinsky, Natalia Dudinskaya, Irina Kolpakova, Nikita Dolgushin and Agrippina Vaganova. She was awarded the Triumph Prize in December 1998 for her contribution to Russian culture.
