Alberta Ballet: fairy tales and happy endings
Through sheer creativity and business acumen, Alberta Ballet has achieved the rare pas de deux of mastering both its art and its finances.
Since its formation in 1966, Canada's fourth-largest ballet company has been praised for its eclectic, bold and youthful programming that has wowed audiences and critics alike around the world. During a 1997 week-long engagement at New York's Joyce Theater, the influential New York Post theatre critic Clive Barnes referred to Alberta Ballet as "a strong and elegant ensemble."
In addition to performing at the opening ceremonies of the Winter Olympics in Calgary in 1988, the company has twice travelled to China: in 1998, for a five-week tour, and again in early 2004, to participate in Beijing's first International Dance Festival.
Building on a rich repertoire that includes the ballets of such masters as George Balanchine, Rudi van Dantzig and Canada's Brian Macdonald, Alberta Ballet's internationally renowned artistic director Jean Grand-Maître has skilfully placed his own dramatic and visual stamp on the company's productions. The Montreal native's inaugural season in 2002-03 featured the world premiere of Carmen, a full-length classical ballet he choreographed and set to Georges Bizet's opera.
In 2003-04 - Alberta Ballet's 37th season - Grand-Maître celebrated the "wonder and wisdom" of fairy tales by devoting five of the company's six shows to colourful and enchanting story ballets. Among them, a world-premiere production of Cinderella; A Midsummer Night's Dream, choreographed by Christopher Wheeldon of New York City Ballet; and the timeless Christmas classic, The Nutcracker, produced in collaboration with Ballet British Columbia.
The season also featured a National Ballet of Canada program that paired artistic director James Kudelka's The Firebird with The Four Seasons, featuring soon-to-be-retired principal dancer Rex Harrington in one of his most celebrated roles, as well as the world-famous Royal Winnipeg Ballet's new production of The Magic Flute.
Rounding out the 2003-04 season was Festival of New Works: Arias, which saluted the creativity of four gifted female choreographers, including the Montreal-born, modern-dance legend Margie Gillis.
In addition to performing its regular season in both Calgary and Edmonton and running a ballet school, Alberta Ballet's Discover Dance program presents full ballets and excerpts of its shows to school students in both cities. That program was augmented in 2003 when the company launched an annual interactive Discover Dance Tour in which elementary students throughout the province are taught dance steps, learn about the daily life of a dancer and watch performances.
Adults also have a chance to be active in the company: as volunteers; as patrons through initiatives such as the Adopt-a-Dancer program, in which a sponsor's generosity can help nurture the career of one of the company’s 24 dancers; and through special events like Great Chefs in Great Homes 2004, where gourmands pay $250 to join Grand-Maître and his dancers for a lavish six-course meal.
Alberta Ballet's whirlwind pace of activity has literally paid off. During its 2003-04 season, in a turn more reality than fairy tale, the company announced that it had eliminated its $475,000 debt and achieved a surplus of more than $350,000.
- Christopher Guly