Margarita Shrayner – Landgraf on Dance

14. September 2026

Legendary

“Swan Lake”
Bolshoi Ballet
Bolshoi Theatre
Moscow, Russia
September 7 and 8, 2026 (Historic Stage)

by Ilona Landgraf
Copyright © 2026 by Ilona Landgraf

The Bolshoi Ballet is legendary for its Swan Lake. The first performance took place in 1877, almost one hundred and fifty years ago. This September, the swans danced for the 1,868th time, which translates to roughly thirteen Swan Lakes per year. Since 2001, the company has performed Yuri Grigorovich’s version, which includes scenes by Marius Petipa, Lev Ivanov, and Alexander Gorsky.

Grigorovich’s Swan Lake is grand. Its concepts and ideals represent the highest achievements of humanity and culture—dignity, decorum, grace, love, and unmatched beauty—and it shows how easily human nature can be led awry. Compared to Vladimir Bourmeister’s Swan Lake at the Stanislavsky Theatre, a ballet that reveals the protagonists’ inner life like none I’ve seen so far, Grigorovich portrays them as emblematic figures in an allegory, the sad ending of which Tchaikovsky’s prologue forebodes.

For the first act, Simon Virsaladze designed a Gothic castle of majestic height. Its trombone players are positioned in mirror image and wear partly red livery that conveys the court’s harmonious order. The entrance of twelve couples, along the line of which Prince Siegfried jetés in, infuses the stage with dynamism. Soaring high, he combines prowess with elegance. The lakeside to which Rothbart (“The Evil Genius”) directs him like a puppeteer is lit by gray moonlight and streaked with wisps of cloud. From a rock at he rear, the Evil Genius oversees his spell. Like a yin-yang symbol, his emblem, a curtain in the shape of a coat of arms, shows white and black swans opposite one another. It has a vicious look and, when lowered, hides the Evil Genius’s machinations or serves as a screen for the Prince’s visions. For Act II’s ball, the retinue swapped their red garments for turquoise. The non-dancing court society wore medieval-ish robes, including pageboy wigs for the men (costumes also by Virsaladze). My favorite part of the outfit was the Russian delegation’s pearl hair accessories.

On September 7th, Darina Moseyeva’s Odette was a fragile swan woman who seemed to live on the air she breathed. A highly sensitive creature, Dmitry Vyskubenko’s Prince treated her with utmost care. Moseyeva immersed herself so deeply into the role that she really seemed to transform into a bird-human chimera. Unfortunately, for undisclosed reasons, she didn’t dance in the second act, and Yaroslava Kuprina replaced her after a prolonged break and an announcement. Kuprina’s Odile was a perfect masquerade of wickedness—sharp and calculating, yet alluring. Presumably having rehearsed all day for her actual Swan Lake on the evening after next, Kuprina ran out of steam during the fouetées but regained her energy in the final scene at the lakeside. She was met with intense applause at the curtain calls, and the Vietnamese delegation that attended the performance in the Imperial Box expressed its appreciation with an announcement and a flower basket for the company.
Vysubenko was an impeccable partner throughout. His entrechats were stunningly filigree, and in the vision scene, his port de bras turned the air velvety.

September 8th’s Odette (Arina Denisova) and her Prince (Makhar Mikhalkin) were mesmerizing in their adagio pas de deux. It touched the soul in a way that cannot be grasped intellectually. Denisova’s Odette was calmer than Moseyeva’s and most aflutter when the Prince swore his love. Her sparkling Odile’s arms undulated like a snake; her gaze was compelling and her smile sure of victory. Of Mikhalkin’s solos, I especially admired his picture-book manège of tours en l’air.
Egor Gerashchenko’s Evil Genius darted along the line of his black swans like Spartacus; on the following evening, Igor Tsvirko danced the role, spreading menacing vibes far into the auditorium.

Akib Anvar’s jester jumped and capered fabulously, his tours, split jumps, and daredevil combinations propelling the energy at the right moments like an engine. Of the Prince’s two friends, Kristina Petrova and Margarita Shrayner danced more polished than Antonina Chapkina and Elizaveta Kruteleva. However, the latter had to deal with the quick tempo that Alexey Bogorad set at the conductor’s podium (Pavel Sorokin’s tempo on the previous evening was more moderate). At times, he also hastened the swans.

Of the brides-to-be, Ana Turazashvili’s was a self-assured, top-notch Hungarian bride who paid remarkable attention to every detail of her variation. Elizaveta Gaponenko, by comparison, made me think of Raymonda. Both Russian brides (Antonina Chapkina and Maria Konkova) were warm and giving, their arms as soft as the most gentle breeze. The Spanish brides (Anastasia Smirnova and Kristina Petrova) glided across the stage with space consuming steps, which showed off their full, flowing skirts. The Neapolitan dance led by Valeria Bespalova was vivacious, whereas on the following evening, Sofia Maimula and her Neapolitan companions hurried to keep up with Bogorad’s brisk pace. Taisia Konovalova’s Polish bride’s male entourage faced the same challenge. On the previous evening, Olga Marchenkova and her men were unremarkable.

Nelli Kobakhidze and Anastasia Meskova portrayed the Princess-Mother; Alexey Loparevich and Alexander Fadeyechev played the Prince’s tutor; Nikita Elikarov was the Master of Ceremonies at both performances.
The swan corps moved with impeccable precision and grace. Watching its beautiful patterns felt like a gift.

Link:		Website of the Bolshoi Theatre
Photos:	1.	Ensemble, “Swan Lake” by Yuri Grigorovich, Bolshoi Ballet 2026 © Bolshoi Theatre/Natalia Voronova
	2.	Darina Moseyeva (Odette), “Swan Lake” by Yuri Grigorovich, Bolshoi Ballet 2026 © Bolshoi Theatre/Damir Yusupov
	3.	Arina Denisova (Odile), “Swan Lake” by Yuri Grigorovich, Bolshoi Ballet 2026 © Bolshoi Theatre/Mikhail Logvinov
	4.	Dmitry Vyskubenko (Prince Siegfried) and ensemble, “Swan Lake” by Yuri Grigorovich, Bolshoi Ballet 2026 © Bolshoi Theatre/Elena Fetisova
	5.	Makhar Mikhalkin (Prince Siegfried), “Swan Lake” by Yuri Grigorovich, Bolshoi Ballet 2026 © Bolshoi Theatre/Pavel Rychkov
	6.	Ensemble, “Swan Lake” by Yuri Grigorovich, Bolshoi Ballet 2026 © Bolshoi Theatre/Mikhail Logvinov
	7.	Ensemble, “Swan Lake” by Yuri Grigorovich, Bolshoi Ballet 2026 © Bolshoi Theatre/Natalia Voronova
Editing:		Kayla Kauffman

29. April 202523. January 2026

Full of Spirits

“The Tempest”
Bolshoi Ballet
Bolshoi Theatre (New Stage)
Moscow, Russia
April 22, 2025

by Ilona Landgraf
Copyright © 2025 by Ilona Landgraf

For his latest choreography for the Bolshoi Ballet in 2024—The Tempest (after Shakespeare’s play)—Vyacheslav Samodurov again teamed up with composer Yuri Krasavin. Both had already collaborated on the one-act ballet Dancemania in 2022. This time, their cooperation must have been tempestuous. “Vyacheslav Samodurov and I did not get along right away…I still see this play completely different,” Krasavin stated in an interview. While Krasavin believed that he accompanied rather than led the artistic process, for Samodurov, “Music comes always first and the composer is the boss in many ways.” But whoever was the boss, the score (played by the Bolshoi Orchestra under the baton of Pavel Klinichev) was mesmerizing. Continue reading “Full of Spirits”

10. September 202424. January 2026

An Opening Salute

“The Sleeping Beauty”
Bolshoi Ballet
Bolshoi Theatre
Moscow, Russia
September 07, 2024 (live stream)

by Ilona Landgraf
Copyright © 2024 by Ilona Landgraf

The Bolshoi Ballet opened its 249th season with a revival of Yuri Grigorovich’s The Sleeping Beauty, which has been absent from the stage for four years. Because of the thorough change of décor, the production was announced as a premiere. It swapped the opulent (and often criticized) sets and costumes that Ezio Frigerio and Franca Squarciapino designed for the 2011 revival (celebrating the reopening of the theater’s Historic Stage after six years of refurbishment) for the restrained décor that Simon Virsaladze (1909–1989) created for Grigorovich’s second version of the ballet in 1973. The subdued hues and aquarelle-ish style of its courtly surroundings direct the gaze toward the colorful costumes (recalling French court fashion from King Louis XIII’s to the Sun King, Louis XIV’s, reign), beautiful flower garlands and bouquets at Aurora’s birthday party, and, most importantly, the dancers and their performances. Raising the curtain didn’t elicit oohs and aahs from the audience as, for example, Jürgen Rose’s décor for Marcia Haydée’s Sleeping Beauty regularly has done on Western stages. Continue reading “An Opening Salute”

5. March 202424. April 2024

In Commemoration of Ekaterina Maximova

“Fragments of One Biography”
Bolshoi Ballet and Guests
Bolshoi Theatre
Moscow, Russia
February 01, 2024 (video)

by Ilona Landgraf
Copyright © 2024 by Ilona Landgraf

On February 1st, the Bolshoi Ballet’s prima ballerina, Ekaterina Maximova (1939-2009), would have celebrated her 85th birthday. A phenomenally successful (and multi-decorated) artist, Maximova’s fame reached far beyond Russia’s borders. After retiring from the stage of the Bolshoi in 1988, she continued to dance with other Russian and international companies—and sometimes even returned home to the Bolshoi. From 1990 on, Maximova worked as a coach, teacher, and member of several arts councils and committees. Every five years, Maximova’s husband, Vladimir Vasiliev, stages a gala at the Bolshoi in honor of his late wife. I was able to watch this year’s event on video. Continue reading “In Commemoration of Ekaterina Maximova”

17. February 20242. March 2024

Reassuring

“Chopiniana”/“Grand Pas from the Ballet Paquita”
Bolshoi Ballet
Bolshoi Theatre (Historic Stage)
Moscow, Russia
February 14, 2024

by Ilona Landgraf
Copyright © 2024 by Ilona Landgraf

The musicians of the Bolshoi Orchestra are on their toes. After acknowledging the welcoming applause, conductor, Pavel Klinichev, raised his baton in the same instant that he turned around to face them. The vigorous bars that he prompted belonged to a Polonaise by Chopin. It opened Mikhail Fokine’s romantic Chopiniana (1908), which the Bolshoi Ballet revived in November 2022. It’s the first part of a double bill the second piece of which – the Grand Pas from Petipa’s Paquita – has been a landmark of classical dance since its creation in 1881.

There’s no need to discuss how Fokine’s choreography was performed. The Bolshoi is a guarantor of sublime performances. Indeed, the unity of the corps was nothing less than staggering; every step was measured yet effortless like an outpouring of natural decency. Perfect proportions soothed the eye. As the leading sylphs, Anastasia Stashkevich, Elizaveta Kruteleva, and Anastasia Denisova paid great attention to detail, adding the right tinge of buoyancy, melancholy, or playfulness to their solos. Vyacheslav Lopatin’s poet combined sensitivity and decisiveness. His clean and – at times mighty – jumps earned applause. Alyona Pikalova’s set design – an arch of gnarled treetops opening onto a sunny water meadow – invited the mind to dream.
I’ve watched several companies dance Chopiniana, but no performance was as complete as the Bolshoi’s. Perhaps due to experiencing messy times in my home country of Germany (and in the West in general), the refined order and serenity of Chopiniana felt especially comforting. It seemed like the epitome of civilization. Continue reading “Reassuring”

3. January 202324. August 2026

Transcendent

“The Nutcracker”
Bolshoi Ballet
Bolshoi Theatre
Moscow, Russia
December 29, 2022 (matinee and evening performance)

After meeting him at a guest performance with Les Ballets de Monte Carlo six years ago, the Bolshoi’s Semyon Chudin suggested that I see their “Nutcracker” in Moscow. Year after year, one thing or another has prevented me from getting to the Bolshoi at Christmastime. Finally, this year, it happened: on the edge of New Year’s Eve, I watched a matinee and an evening performance.

The Bolshoi’s “Nutcracker” dates back to 1966 – qualifying it neither as trendy nor hip by today’s standards. Perhaps Makhar Vaziev, the company’s artistic director, has kept it in the repertoire for a number of reasons: out of respect for tradition; out of respect for the ballet’s choreographer – Yuri Grigorovich – one of the company’s formative figures; and out of respect for the crowd-pleasing nature of the piece that leads to sold out performances now as ever. Continue reading “Transcendent”

17. March 201920. April 2020

Pipe Dreams

“La Fille du Pharaon”
Bolshoi Ballet
Bolshoi Theatre
Moscow, Russia
March 08, 2019 (matinee and evening performance)

Aspicia, the heroine in Petipa’s “La Fille du Pharaon”, was a highly coveted role among ballerinas. Carolina Rosati, an Italian ballerina whose insistence propelled the ballet to creation, danced Aspicia at the world premiere in St. Petersburg in 1862. Mathilde Kschessinska, the unofficial queen of St. Petersburg’s Imperial Theatres, claimed the role as hers at the 1898 revival – meaning that it was like a revolution when the role was given to Anna Pavlova in 1906. “La Fille du Pharaon” was Petipa’s first significant choreographic success. Pierre Lacotte’s take on the ballet for the Bolshoi Ballet in 2000 was a tribute to Petipa and to the famous ballerinas who had shared their knowledge about Aspicia with Lacotte: Lyubov Egorova, Mathilde Kschessinska, and Olga Spesivtseva.

The ballet’s rambling narrative is loosely based on Théophile Gautier’s 1857 novel “The Romance of a Mummy”. Fueled by opium, an English explorer imagines a slew of adventures with Aspicia, the daughter of an Egyptian pharaoh. Aspicia, a mummy, resurrected from her sarcophagus, goes hunting and is saved from a lion’s wrath by the heroic Egyptian Taor (the Englishman), with whom she naturally falls in love. The duo, contending with Aspicia’s forced marriage to the King of Nubia, elopes to an idyllic fishing village. There, they are met by further hazards: suicide attempts, a detour to the underwater realm of the God of the river Nile, and more. Finally, Aspicia and Taor are reunited and happily married – until at the height of the rejoicing, the Englishman awakes from his dream. Continue reading “Pipe Dreams”

24. February 201722. April 2020

Grigorovich’s “Giselle”

“Giselle”
Bolshoi Ballet
Bolshoi Theatre
Moscow, Russia
February 18 / 19, 2017

“Giselle” is in the core repertory of almost every ballet company, whether in a modern interpretation or a traditional one. The Bolshoi even holds two traditional versions, one by Yuri Grigorovich, the other by Vladimir Vasiliev. Vasiliev’s 1997 “Giselle” follows the earlier versions of Leonid Lavrovsky and Alexander Gorsky. Earlier in 1987 Grigorovich had instead traced the choreographic lineage directly via Marius Petipa to Jules Perrot and Jean Coralli’s 1841 original. In honor of the 90th anniversary of Grigorovich’s birth, the Bolshoi presented three performances of his “Giselle” as part of the Grigorovich ballet festival, of which I saw two matinées with different casts. Continue reading “Grigorovich’s “Giselle””