Dance, Abbagnato patroness of the international gala ‘L’Aquila dresses in stars’

2023-08-10 20:31:14

The great stars of the Terpsichorean firmament shine again under the sky of L’Aquila for the 3rd edition of the International Dance Gala L’Aquila dresses in Stars, a show included in the artistic program of the 729th edition of the Celestinian Pardon. Stars of the first magnitude will perform on the stage set up at the foot of the San Berardino staircase on 24 August, starting with the godmother of the event, Eleonora Abbagnato, the first Italian to be named étoile of the Opéra national de Paris, director of the corps de ballet since 2015 of the Teatro dell’Opera in Rome and for a year also director of the school of the Capitoline foundation.

Eleonora Abbagnato this year will give the public her interpretation of two choreographic cameos. Paired with Michele Satriano, principal dancer of the Teatro dell’Opera di Roma, she will open the Gala performing ‘Rouge et Noir’, a poignant pas de deux on pointe that the brilliant choreographer Uwe Scholz composed in 1988 for his masterpiece ballet ‘The Red and Black’. The ballet, inspired by Stendhal’s novel, recounts the passion, tinged with a thousand contrasting shades, between the young and ambitious seminarian Julien Sorel and his lover Madame de Rênal. Again Eleonora Abbagnato will close the evening paired with Alessio Rezza, étoile of the Teatro dell’Opera di Roma, dancing ‘Cheek to Cheek’, a famous duo with a Hollywood flavor created in 1977 by Roland Petit for his wife Zizi Jeanmaire, to the brilliant music of Irving Berlin.

Alongside Eleonora Abbagnato and her partners, ten first-rate stars, étoiles sought after and applauded all over the world for the first time in L’Aquila. Mayara Magri and Matthew Ball, both étoile of the Royal Ballet of London, Tatyjana Melnyik, étoile of the Hungarian National Ballet of Budapest, paired with Michal Krcmar, absolute étoile of the Finnish National Ballet of Helsinki, the Italians Alessandra Tognoloni and Francesco Mariottini, both étoile of the Compagnie des Ballets de Monte-Carlo of the Principality of Monaco, the Italian Elisabetta Formento and the Cuban Yanier Gómez Noda, stars of the Compañía Nacional de Danza de España in Madrid, and the brothers Elvis and Martin Nudo both in force at the Finnish National Ballet.

On the program virtuosic solos and pas de deux taken from the masterpieces of the 19th and 20th century ballet repertoire

Rich, very rich the program of the Gala that tells the human feelings and the various nuances of love through classical dance, alternating solos and virtuosic pas de deux taken from the masterpieces of the nineteenth and twentieth century ballet repertoire (‘Don Quixote’, ‘ Diana and Atteone’, ‘Coppelia’, ‘Spring Waters’), with choreographic cameos signed by some of the most brilliant contemporary choreographers. From Jean-Christophe Maillot (‘The Taming of the Shrew’), to Fabrizio Monteverde (‘Bluebeard’), to Kristian Cellini from Abruzzo (‘Empathy’), to Valentino Zucchetti, the first Italian choreographer to sign new works for the corps de ballet by the Royal Ballet of London (‘Where you are, I feel’).

Also scheduled is an exceptional choreography, ‘Tschaikovsky Pas de Deux’ by George Balanchine, a choreographic masterpiece which will be featured in the Gala program thanks to an agreement signed with the George Balanchine Trust in New York.

The Gala, with the artistic direction of Ornella Cerroni of the Art Nouveau Dance Center of L’Aquila and the consultancy of the journalist and dance critic Francesca Bernabini, is presented by Alessandra Casale, model, model, theater actress but also author and TV presenter and web broadcasters, a true lover and connoisseur of dance, who will introduce artists and choreographies by telling curiosities and anecdotes. The lighting design of the show is signed once again this year by the well-known lighting designer Carlo Cerri.