Trips for Ballet Lovers 2017-18

[toursenlair]

I have announced my season of trips for ballet lovers for 2017-18. I arrange hotels, premium, ballet tickets, sightseeing, some meals, backstage tours of opera houses, watching class or rehearsal if possible, meeting dancers if possible. You can always add on extra days if you wish. For more information, please email me at toursenlair@gmail.com and visit my website at toursenlair.blogspot.com

 

September 28 - October 7, 2017

(10 days, 4 performances)
Paris and Amsterdam
Nederlands Dans Theater
New works by Clug, Walerski, and León & Lightfoot

Dutch National Ballet
all van Manen: On the Move, Sarcasmen, Five Tangos, Symphonieën der Nederlanden 
National Ballet of Canada
Nijinsky (Neumeier)
Paris Opera Ballet:

Jewels (Balanchine)

draft itinerary here:

http://toursenlair.blogspot.ca/2017/03/amsterdam-and-paris-ballet-trip-fall.html

 

2018

March 2 - 4, 2018

(3 days, 2 performances)

Sarasota and West Palm Beach (Florida)

Sarasota Ballet

"Still Life" at the Penguin Café (Bintley), The Dream (Ashton)

Miami City Ballet

Theme and Variations (Balanchine), The Concert (Robbins), new Brooks 

 

March 12 - 21, 2018

(10 days, 4 performances)

Vienna and Budapest

(day trip to Bratislava)

Vienna State Ballet

Raymonda (Nureyev)

Stravinsky Violin Concerto, Theme and Variations (both Balanchine), Bach Suite III (Neumeier), The Concert (Robbins)

Hungarian National Ballet

The Fountain of Bakhchisarai (Rostislav)

Slovak National Theatre Ballet  

Esmeralda (Medvedev after Petipa)

 draft itinerary here:

http://toursenlair.blogspot.ca/2017/05/vienna-budapest-ballet-trip-march-2018.html

 

April 14 - 23, 2018

(10 days, 9 performances)

Munich

Bavarian State Ballet

Onegin (Cranko)

A Midsummer Night's Dream (Neumeier)

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (Wheeldon)

Spartacus (Grigorovich)

Bavarian State Ballet Junior Company and School Performance

Anna Karenina (Spuck)

Borderlands, Kairos, New work (McGregor)

The Taming of the Shrew (Cranko)

Romeo and Juliet (Cranko)

 

April 26 – 30, 2018

(5 days, 4 performances)

San Francisco
San Francisco Ballet

Festival of New Works

12 new works by: David Dawson, Alonzo King, Edwaard Liang, Annabelle Lopez Ochoa, Cathy Marston, Trey McIntyre, Justin Peck, Arthur Pita, Yuri Possokhov, Dwight Rhoden, Stanton Welch, and Christopher Wheeldon.

 

May 17 - 20

New York

(4 days, 5 performances)

New York City Ballet: All Jerome Robbins 

Interplay, In the Night, The Cage, Other Dances, Fanfare 

Opus 19/The Dreamer, Glass Pieces,  Dances at a Gathering

In G Major, Afternoon of a Faun, Antique Epigraphs, The Concert

Dybbuk, Fancy Free, West Side Story Suite

American Ballet Theatre

TBA

 

May 31 – June 10, 2018

(11 days, 7 performances)

Copenhagen

Royal Danish Ballet
Napoli (Bournonville, restaged by Nikolaj Hubbe and Sorella Englund)
"Bournonvilleana" details TBA
Swan Lake (staged by Silja Schandorff and Nikolaj Hübbe)
Shaken Mirror (Brandstrup)
"Nikolaj Hübbe presents..."
Artists, commentators, scientists comment on a theme, with performances by members of the Royal Danish Ballet
"An evening of modern dance" details TBA
Closing Gala

 

June 29 - July 8. 2018

(10 days, 6 performances)

Berlin and Hamburg (day trip to Dresden)

Berlin State Ballet: Don Quixote

Dresden Semperoper Ballet

Gods and Dogs (Kylian), Heatscape (Peck), Political Mother (Schechter)

National Ballet of Canada

Dreamers Ever Leave You (Binet), Emergence (Pite), The Man in Black (Kudelka)

Hamburg Ballet

Illusions...like Swan Lake (Neumeier)

Beethoven Project (Neumeier)

The Concert, Dances at a Gathering  (Robbins)

 

 

 

[capybara]

Do you ever include UK Companies in your itineraries Toursenlair? Looking at al the treats above, it still feels like a big omission if people are joining you from 'all over'.

[Jan McNulty]

RB, BRB, NB were three Companies that Katherine's group saw on a recent visit to the UK.  The visit also included a trip to AiP.

 

I wasn't on the trip but I did bump into Katherine at Casanova and Midscale North.  I met Katherine quite a few years ago now on a trip that included a visit to see BRB in their home theatre.

[toursenlair]

5 hours ago, Jan McNulty said:

RB, BRB, NB were three Companies that Katherine's group saw on a recent visit to the UK.  The visit also included a trip to AiP.

 

 

plus Rambert! And I tried to get Matthew Bourne in there too but the logistics of getting to Leicester didn't work. And if Ballet Black had announced their program earlier I would have added a day to the trip to see them too.

 

capybara, in addition to the trip I took last month, I have done two other trips to the UK in the last 7 years. I have also proposed others that I didn't get enough uptake for. Then the pound soared against the Canadian dollar and UK trips became prohibitively expensive until the drop in the value of the pound last year (clouds and silver linings...)

The absence of a destination on my list of trips is no reflection on the destination or the companies.

I look at EVERY major company's offerings and then decide on my trips based on the repertoire and time of year and the aim of squeezing as many performances into as little time as possible. From experience I have learned that there is next to no interest in travelling in January and February, and March is iffy. I can't do autumn trips usually because of other commitments (and usually by the time all the companies have announced their seasons people have already made other travel plans for September-December, or really it would be September-October because people don't want to travel in November and December, and besides December is endless Nutcrackers almost everywhere!). In July there aren't a lot of companies performing, so this leaves me essentially April-June.  Also if I had 20 people sign up for London this year, it's not so likely they will be wanting to go to London next year (I have a lot of repeat customers) but will be looking for a different destination, for both sightseeing reasons and the wish to see a different company/repertoire.

Also I do have to spend SOME time at home or my cats will divorce me! (plus I need time for planning and preparing - organizing these trips is a huge logistical undertaking).

So.... no slight intended to the UK's wonderful ballet companies. I hope I will be able to include them again in my 2018-19 season.