Olympic Ballet Theatre to stage romantic ballet ‘Giselle’
Published 1:30 am Friday, April 7, 2017
Snohomish County’s premiere ballet company, Olympic Ballet Theatre of Edmonds, will perform its version of “Giselle” Saturday evening at the Everett Performing Arts Center.
The company operates under the artistic direction of Mara Vinson and Oleg Gorboulev, the former Pacific Northwest Ballet dancers who have owned OBT since 2011.
Vinson will be dancing Giselle opposite Le Yin as Albrecht. A former Houston Ballet and PNB principal dancer, Yin also was Vinson’s partner in December’s production of “The Nutcracker” in Everett, flawlessly dancing the roles of Clara and the Nutcracker Prince.
OBT company dancers will take on the other leading roles, including Charles Gordon, Riho Shimada, Kyohei Masaoka and Mana Sasaki. Olympic Ballet School students also will dance in the production.
“Giselle” had its debut in 1841 in Paris, but the choreography in use today is primarily derived from revivals of the ballet staged in Russia in the 1890s and early 1900s by Marius Petipa.
The ballet tells a bittersweet story of love, betrayal and forgiveness.
After falling in love, a peasant girl named Giselle dies of a broken heart after discovering that her mysterious suitor is actually Albrecht, a young man from a nearby royal family who is engaged to a young woman who is also from royalty.
A group of supernatural and vengeful women — the Wilis — who all have died from broken hearts, then summon Giselle from her grave with a plan to kill Albrecht. But Giselle’s great love and ability to forgive ultimately frees Albrecht from death.
The ballet also will be performed later this month in Edmonds.
If you go
Olympic Ballet Theatre’s “Giselle” will be performed at 7 p.m. April 8 at the Everett Performing Arts Center, 2710 Wetmore Ave., and at 7 p.m. April 29 at Edmonds Center for the Arts, 410 Fourth Ave. N.
Tickets available online at olympicballet.com or by calling 425-774-7570.
