«АРЛЕЗИАНКА» «БОЗБАЛА және ӨЛІМ» «КАРМЕН»

L'ARLÉSIENNE

One-act ballet

To music by Georges Bizet (Suites No. 1 and No. 2)

Libretto based on the play of the same name by Alphonse Daudet

Ballet by Roland Petit

Staged by Luigi Bonino

Running time: 2 hours 20 minutes (including one interval)

Please note that the age limit is 10+

Management reserves the right to substitute performers

The iconic French ballet L'Arlésienne is a drama that tells the story of a young, dreamy farmer’s son, Frédéri, and his destructive passion for a woman “with a questionable past” from the town of Arles. The action takes place in Provence, in the south of France. The love of a simple peasant girl, Vivette, cannot cure him of this fatal obsession.

The Arlésienne herself never appears on stage; she remains a mysterious, unseen, yet irresistibly compelling figure around whom the drama revolves. The play is enriched with scenes of rural life, while the set design recreates Van Gogh’s landscapes of Arles. The choreography is imbued with the spirit of folk dance. A passionate male monologue, demanding both technical endurance and powerful temperament, leaves just as strong an impression as the large ensemble scenes.

The score, originally composed for an orchestra of 26 instruments, is remarkable for its conciseness and expressiveness. It is suffused with light and optimism, brimming with an intense life force that prevails despite personal tragedies.

L'Arlésienne is recognized as one of the most successful contemporary ballet productions and continues to be performed with great acclaim on the world’s leading stages.

PRODUCTION TEAM

Conductor: Elmar Buribayev

Ballet Teacher: Gillian Whittingham

Lighting Designer and Technical Coordinator: Jean-Michel Désiré
Set Designer: René Allio

Costume Designer: Christine Laurent

Costume Production Coordinator: Aurelia Lyon
Assistant Conductors: Arman Urazgaliyev, Ruslan Baimurzin
Assistant Set Designer: Gulmira Issemgaziyeva
Assistant Costume Designer: Dariga Taishikova
Assistant Lighting Designer: Mikhail Yepanchin
Stage Managers: Altynganym Akhmetova, Ainur Khalelova
Technical Project Manager: Victor Carare

Artistic Director of the Ballet Company:

Altynai Asylmuratova, People’s Artist of Russia

LE JEUNE HOMME ET LA MORT

(one-act ballet in two scenes )

Set to the music of J.S. Bach (Passacaglia and Fugue in C Minor BWV 582)

Idea and Libretto by Jean Cocteau

Ballet by Roland Petit

Arrangement and Orchestration by Ottorino Respighi

Staged by Luigi Bonino

Premiered on 25 June 1946, at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées

The initial impetus for the creation of the ballet came from Boris Kochno, the director of Roland Petit’s newly founded Ballets des Champs-Élysées. He suggested staging a one-act ballet featuring the talented dancer Jean Babilée and advised Petit to turn to Jean Cocteau for the libretto. The renowned poet, playwright, novelist, artist, screenwriter and film director Cocteau quickly improvised the plot and even demonstrated sketches for the future plastic characterisation of the characters. He also conceived the musical and scenic design of the ballet.

The plot is simple: A poor young artist, tormented by love, anxiously awaits the arrival of his beloved, nervously glancing at the clock but the girl never comes. When she finally appears, the Young Man does not realise that Death has come for him in her guise.

The existential nature of the theme was characteristic of post-war Paris. The protagonist desperately tries to break free from his suffocating loneliness, yet it is only Death that ultimately leads him beyond his dreary reality into another dimension.

PRODUCTION TEAM

Conductor: Elmar Buribayev
Ballet Teacher: Gillian Whittingham
Set Designer: Georges Wakhévitch
Costume Designer: Varvara Karinska
Lighting Designer and Technical Coordinator: Jean-Michel Désiré
Costume Production Coordinator: Aurelia Lyon
Assistant Conductors: Arman Urazgaliyev, Ruslan Baimurzin
Assistant Set Designer: Gulmira Issemgaziyeva
Assistant Costume Designer: Dariga Taishikova
Assistant Lighting Designer: Mikhail Yepanchin
Stage Managers: Altynganym Akhmetova, Ainur Khalelova
Technical Project Manager: Victor Carare

Artistic Director of the Ballet Company:

Altynai Asylmuratova, People’s Artist of Russia

CARMEN

One-act ballet in 5 scenes

Music by Georges Bizet, orchestrated by Tommy Desserre

Choreography and libretto by Roland Petit

(based on the novella of the same name by Prosper Mérimée)

Staged by Luigi Bonino

Premiere: 21 February 1949, at the Prince’s Theatre (Shaftesbury Theatre), London,

during the UK tour of ‘Les Ballets de Paris’

Despite its title, Roland Petit’s ballet is centered around José. The choreographer explores the theme of the destructive power of female beauty and the inextricable link between passion and death. The ballet unfolds through five short scenes (a street outside the tobacco factory, a tavern, Carmen’s bedroom, smugglers and the backstage of the bull-ring), telling the story of the last romantic, crushed by a cruel, cynical, mocking and immoral world. Carmen embodies this world she is vulgar and seductive, bold and demanding, erotic and frivolous. José is neither a soldier nor a smuggler. Blinded by passion, he fights for his dishonoured love and punishes vice by killing Carmen.

The genre of the ballet is a tragedy, emphasised by the striking set designs of Antoni Clavé. The choreography is a remarkable fusion of classical ballet, Spanish-style movements, pantomime, and, as always in Petit’s works, everyday gestures.

The premiere of Carmen was a phenomenal success. The production ran uninterrupted for four months in London, two months in Paris and three months in the United States. Petit staged the ballet in Copenhagen (1960), Hamburg (1967), Gothenburg (1969), Marseille (where it remained in the repertoire from 1974), New York (1981) and London (1986). In June 1998, the Mariinsky Theatre premiere featured Altynai Asylmuratova, who had previously danced the role of Carmen in Marseille, alongside Islam Baimuradov.

Over its first 50 years, Carmen by Roland Petit was performed more than 5,000 times worldwide and remains the most frequently staged ballet based on Bizet’s opera.

PRODUCTION TEAM

Conductor: Elmar Buribayev

Ballet Teacher: Gillian Whittingham

Set and Costume Designer: Antoni Clavé
Lighting Designer and Technical Coordinator: Jean-Michel Désiré
Costume Production Coordinator: Aurelia Lyon
Assistant Conductors: Arman Urazgaliyev, Ruslan Baimurzin
Assistant Set Designer: Gulmira Issemgaziyeva
Assistant Costume Designer: Dariga Taishikova
Assistant Lighting Designer: Mikhail Yepanchin
Stage Managers: Altynganym Akhmetova, Ainur Khalelova
Technical Project Manager: Victor Carare

Artistic Director of the Ballet Company:

Altynai Asylmuratova, People’s Artist of Russia

BALLET COMPANY AND ORCHESTRA OF THE ASTANA OPERA HOUSE

Tickets purchased at the Astana Opera are exchangeable and refundable only in cases of cancelled or postponed performances. In all other cases, no refunds and exchanges are possible.