SINCE Ballet Manila has its resident dancers who are featured in its productions, it is rare that the company invites artists from abroad to dance in its presentations.

However, for ‘Giselle,’ one of the most cherished works in classical ballet, world-renowned principal dancer Renata Shakirova and soloist Aleksei Timofeyev of the famous Mariinsky Ballet Russia, were flown in to perform for Ballet Manila.

Ballet Manila artistic director Lisa Macuja did not think twice about importing principal dancers from Russia and bringing them to Manila.

“As you know, Giselle is a tragedy,” informed Lisa. “It’s sad, but it’s beautiful, but one of the most romantic ballets of all time. It’s a two-act ballet.

“It’s always a beautiful learning experience for a company to welcome these artists and experience a ballet with guest artists who are new, special and will give a different dynamic to the performance.

“As artistic director of Ballet Manila, I feel that my company needs to be able to also experience this kind of performance with really special guest artists all the way from Russia.

“I feel like a big sister to Renata. I considered (Kirov ballerina) Tatiana Udalenkova even a second mother. I graduated in 1984 and she (Renata) graduated in 2015.”

Four years of studying in Russia – when Lisa entered the Vaganova Choreographic Institute, now known as the Academy of Russian Ballet at St. Petersburg – made the prima ballerina fluent in conversing in Russian.

Renate and Aleksei met Lisa online in March this year. “I wrote an e-mail to Renata’s Instagram account,” Lisa said. “I knew of Renata from my teacher, Tatiana, but we never met before. I introduced myself online and invited her to dance Giselle for us.”

First thing that Renata did was to look at their performance calendar because they are very busy and see if they are free to come to the Philippines.

“Thank God, they are free to do Giselle,” Lisa granted.

“As dancers, we are very excited to be able to dance this ballet together,” Renata declared. “Personally, it’s a very interesting part of our history together as dancers.”

Convincing the couple to come to the Philippines for the first time and perform onstage together, was not a tall order for them.

“We heard so many beautiful things about the Philippines,” Aleksei said. “When the possibility came for us and we learned we were free to come, that was fate.”

“It was very hard to say no to Lisa,” Renata added. “She was full of energy and loving life, so it was very hard to say no to her. We treasure the fact that we’re working with Lisa and Ballet Manila.

“To be able to experience your culture, traditions, your kindness, this a country that’s very far from Russia. Philippines is very exotic. For us to experience the Philippines, we had to say yes.”

For the male lead of Albrecht in Giselle, Aleksei admitted it is one of the hardest roles for a male dancer to perform.

“I’ll be dancing the role of Albrecht with my wife for the first time,” he said. “So it will be true love. Act II will be difficult, but I definitely will not die.”

The standard of any classical ballet, you don’t look at the principal dancers or the soloists, but the corps de ballet. Giselle is hanging on its corps de ballet who all have to dance in one style.

For Lisa’s Ballet Manila, that is more challenging. This pandemic, she lost a lot of dancers who transferred to other groups and even went abroad.

“Dancing as a group, it becomes better the more you dance as a cohesive unit,” she said. “It is really difficult to be able to create this illusion of 18 girls dancing with all the same style, with all the same line of deck in their Arabesque, with all the same line of arm.

“That needs a lot of rehearsals, a lot of work and especially challenging because we kind of had to stretch these two levels. We meet in the middle and they become one unit when they perform.”

Audiences will be enthralled by the visiting ballet superstars and incredible talent. “It’s the first time they will be dancing Giselle as husband and wife,” Lisa said. “They are usually paired with other dancers, so it’s not the first time they are dancing Giselle.”

Ballet Manila presents ‘Giselle’ on August 31 at 8 p.m. and a Sunday matinee (September 1) at 5 p.m. Ballet Manila dancer Abigail Oliveiro will also stage a special performance on at 1 p.m. on August 31.

AUTHOR PROFILE

Leah C. Salterio