Every dancer and apprentice dreams about taking part in a big production, and Cuballet offers that opportunity this summer without looking at hierarchies or origins.
British, US, Dutch, Mexican, Salvadorian and Cuban artists will share the stage with the piece “Swans Lake” and lessons from July 7 through August 3. “Swans Lake”, the most popular classic ballet pieceever was chosen in response to requests made by most the participants in previous editions of this event.
“Dancing like a swan is dancer’s greatest dream”, said professor and choreographer Hector Figueredo, founder of Cuballetin the mid 80’s.
Figueredo explained Oncuba this is a very attractive piece among dancers and the public in general given the bipolar nature of the main female dancer. In one evening she plays a good and an evil swan, which are differentiated in the use of opposite colorsin their clothes –black and white.
In the opinion of this member of the Prodanza Artistic Council, these events show students and professionals how to stage a classic piece, which demands strict discipline and constant rehearsals till mastering different dancing styles and performance techniques.
The participants in this years’ edition will get ballet, repertoires, physical efficiency, and folklore lessons, among others. Hector is still capable of recalling details of each piece he has staged for the closing ceremonies of these events from the first piece, “Coppelia”, to the casts of dancers that emerged in those occasions. Cuballet is certainly a learning space and at the same time an opportunity to prove talents by great classics.
In successive events, Prodanza has premiered its own pieces such as “The three musketeers”, and versions of “The corsair”, “Paquita”, “La bayadera” and others not entirely included in the repertoire by the Cuban National Ballet (BNC by its acronym in Spanish).
Students from different Cuban vocational schools will share the classrooms at Prodanza with apprentices and professionals from several nations. They will all dance at the National Theater, from August 1 through 3. Their performances are dedicated to the 100th anniversary of the father of the Cuban ballet school, Fernando Alonso.
“This great professor deserves all kinds of homage because without him we wouldn’t have the methodology of our school, the basis for the Cuban professional ballet movement and for many renowned dancers worldwide”, Figueredo pointed out. According to this choreographer, Prodanza will pay tribute to Alonso at Colon Cemetery in Havana, next July 28th, on the occasion of one anniversary of the passing of the founder of the National Ballet and the school that nourishes our many dance companies.
The undisputable main character of the first Cuballet was Joven Guardia, a dancing company created by maître Laura Alonso in order to boost the development of the most talented dancers from the BNC. From the mid 80’s to the early 90’s, that artistic movement contributed with the emergence of choreographers such as Armando Yuvero and Hector himself, and made it easier for stars like José Manuel Carreño, Xiomara Reyes, Lorena and Lorna Feijóo, Amilcar Moré, Svetlana Ballester, Víctor Gilí, Lienz and Yan Tse Chang, among others, who were not above the age of 20 at the time.
“By that time there was no linoleum or any other current technical resources, we danced on wood because we were young and we had a common dream: dancing, dancing anywhere”, noted Figueredo. He recalled as one of the most exciting experiences the day they went to Buey Arriba in carts to perform in that municipality in the mountains in the eastern Cuban province of Granma.
Hector extolled the technical development of ballet in time but expressed his disconformity in the fact that several dancers do the same step in every variation, not taking into account each period´sdifferent techniques and styles.
This is Cuballet 68th edition. Prodanza has not only held the event in Cuba, but also in Mexico, Argentina, Switzerland, the United States and Brazil.
Soon Figueredo will depart to France along with eight dancers from Prodanza. There, they will perform in different theaters in the south of that nation, in response to another invitation to display the Cuban dancers’ skills in classics as for instance “Don Quixote”, “The Nutcracker”, “Swans’ lake” and “La fille mal gardée”. These artists will also interpret neoclassic pieces and will then return to Havana to join Cuballet with the hope of making their dreams come true
