This have gone fairly smoothly for Wang Tzer-shing (王澤馨) and her husband/partner Chat Tzongue (謝宗益) in preparations for their 10th International Ballet Star Gala (國際芭蕾舞星在台北), comparatively speaking.
There have been no major cast adjustments because of injuries, which have plagued the past two galas at the National Theater.
And smoothly that is if you do not count that they have been simultaneously planning two gala productions in two countries and they have moved the Taiwan show to the National Taichung Theater, which means working with a new crew and extra-long airport runs to pick-up the dancers, who will be coming in from around the world.
Photo Courtesy of Art Wave Inc
Wang just laughed when I told her that she and Chat obviously thrive on challenges. She said that things have, for the most part, just fallen into place.
The story of this year’s gala in Taichung begins with the Indonesia Dance Society, which thanks to the gala programs the couple have produced in Singapore, contacted them about putting together one for Jakarta.
They agreed, and assembled a line-up of 10 dancers, including such perennial Taipei favorites as American Ballet Theatre principal dancer Daniil Simkin and Mariinsky Ballet premier danseur Igor Kolb, for a show this Saturday at the Theater Besar Jakarta.
Photo Courtesy of Art Wave Inc
Wang and Chat had not really been thinking about doing another gala in Taipei early this year because the National Theater is closed for renovations through the end of this month and then its weekend slots are largely booked through May with the International Festival of the Arts, which is extra big and extra long this year to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the National Theater and Concert Hall.
However, Wang said at the end of October she started thinking about doing a local show, and she asked the 10 dancers headed for Jakarta if they would be able to spend an extra few days in Asia after that show.
Five said yes —Simikin, Kolb, Sofia Gumerova from the Mariinsky, Lorena Feijoo of the San Francisco Ballet and Ulrik Birkkjaer from the Royal Danish Ballet, and so Wang and Chat got to work trying to find a theater, and finding more dancers and dances to fill the bill.
Photo Courtesy of Wilfried Hosl
As fate would have it, the National Taichung Theater did have an open date for the Saturday after the Jakarta show. The only problem was that outside productions at the theater have to be vetted by a team of “professionals,” Wang said, and the theater initially said that it would not be able to release the Feb. 11 date until the end of last month.
Wang said she tried to explain to the theater’s management that no promoter would be able to produce a show with such a short lead time, given all the paperwork needed for travel arrangements and work visas.
“I really appreciated that they speeded up their processing and we got the OK by the beginning of December,” Wang said.
Photo Courtesy of Daniel Jackson
“It’s a test,” she said of the Taichung show, not only in trying to fill a hall that is 400 seats bigger than the National Theater, but in terms of attracting audiences from outside of Taipei.
However, instead of the usual two performances for the annual gala, there will be only one, and the top ticket price is only NT$4,500, compared to the NT$6,000 for most orchestra seats at previous galas in Taipei.
“A lot of audience members are coming from Taipei, as well as our regulars from Hong Kong and Japan,” Wang said.
With just over a week to go, “we have sold about 70 percent of the tickets and my friends in Taichung say people in Taichung like to buy their tickets at the last minute,” she said.
There is certainly enough on the program to attract ballet fans: in addition to the 11 dancers, there will be eight pieces making a Taiwan premiere— including an excerpt from Kenneth MacMillan’s ballet Elite Syncopationst, a pas de deux from Gerald Arpino’s ballet Light Rain, and Krzysztof Pastor’s In Light and Shadow — as well as one world premiere — Eve, choreographed by Danielle Rowe.
While most of the premieres are modern pieces, there are a few excerpts from ballet’s classic canon to keep the purists happy, including the White Swan Pas de Deux, the Giselle Pas de Deux and the pas de deux from Le Corsaire.
The other dancers on the program are: Hye Min-hwang from the Universal Ballet in Seoul, Sophie Martin from the Scottish Ballet, Dragos Mihalcea from the Royal Swedish Ballet and Laurretta Summerscales from the English National Ballet, as well as Marlon Dino and Lucia Lacarra, who used to dance with the Bayerisches Staatsballett and are now freelance dancers. While Dino and Lacarra both appeared in the 2014 gala, the rest will be new faces to local audiences.
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