DVD/Videos: La Esmeralda

[Guest 1dancerella]

Hey all!

I didn't know exactly which forum to put this question in. I'm looking for the full length ballet of La Esmeralda (preferably a Bolshoi performance) on either dvd or video. I'm having so much trouble finding it! If anybody knows any way I can get my hands on it i would be so grateful!

 

Thanks!

[Mel Johnson]

No such recording has ever been made.

[sgmca]

Dd danced the variation at YAGP this year. We found a video on Best Buy online that included the variation ( I think it was the Kirov) and ordered it but the video never came in. They finally cancelled our order after 30 days. Good luck finding one and if you do, please post where you got it. I'd love to know!

[Mel Johnson]

There are various bits and pieces of this old ballet which have made it to video, but no complete recording. "Diana and Acteon" pas de deux is one, and the variation with the tambourine shows up in various places.

[mohnurka]

Diana and Acteon is available, performed by Larissa Lezhnina and Farukh Ruzimatov on "Essential Ballet: Stars of Russian Ballet" (here), as well as by Tatiana Terekhova and Sergei Berezhnoi on "Kirov Ballet: Classical Ballet Night: Mixed Program" (here).

 

The variation with the tambourine (name??) is performed by Gabriella Komleva and Vitali Afanaskov on "Kirov Ballet: A Classic Ballet Night: Mixed Program (here), by Altynai Asylmuratova and Kirill Melnikov on "Classic Kirov Performances" (here -- 5th one down the list -- under number 1341), and by Elena Evteeva and Eldar Aliev on "the Kirov Ballet in London" (here).

 

Hope that helped!

[onyx]

Well, I don't know if you could get a copy of it, but the New Jersey Ballet did a full legnth production of Esmerelda last year and I would think that have have some kind of video recording of it( isn't that an established practice for professional companies, now?). I don't know whether or not they would release a copy to you if they had one but you could ask - they are located on Microlab road in Livingston NJ. Their phone no. is 973-597-9600. HOpe this helps.

[onyx]

Oh, and a choroegrapher from Russia set the production.

[Mel Johnson]

That's not to say that nobody has done the ballet! It was revived, revised and otherwise tinkered with during the Vaganova period of the Soviet Ballet. It fit in rather well with the spirit of the times, and "the masses" demanding social justice. That and a lustful priest, an aristocrat who croaks, and all sorts of other goodies dear to the hearts of the Bolsheviks.