Season Opener

The season in Sarasota opens on October 28, 2011 with a very different collaboration between the professional company and its affiliated Sarasota Ballet School in the American premiere of Tchaikovsky’s Ballet Fantasy, in which choreographer Matthew Hart (Royal Ballet, Rambert Dance Company) imagines the composer interrupting his best-loved ballets (Sleeping Beauty, Swan Lake and Nutcracker), unwittingly causing comic chaos!

This light-hearted ballet is matched with Peter Darrell’s highly dramatic Othello and a world premiere choreographed by one of The Sarasota Ballet’s talented dancers, Ricardo Graziano. “When I saw the workshop of this ballet, I was immediately impressed by the clarity, musicality and energetic quality of Ricardo’s choreography,” shares Webb. “The richness of the classical technique, paired with the chic costume designs by Bill Fenner, makes this a grand opening for the season.”

Othello, choreographed to the haunting music of Franz Liszt’s A Faust Symphony, takes a fresh look at Shakespeare’s tragedy through the eyes of the villain Iago. In this fast moving and terse drama, the jealous Iago’s evil machinations bring the ballet to a tragic conclusion with the destruction of the once powerful hero, Othello.