November 20, 2024—Michael Smuin's first Christmas Ballet was performed the year after he founded Smuin Contemporary Ballet, making this the 30th anniversary of what has become a treasured Bay Area annual tradition. Each year's performance includes beloved, familiar standards, such as the boa-wielding vamp in Santa Baby, as well as some new works to...
October 28, 2024—For most professional dancers, working full-time while raising a family is more than enough to keep them busy around the clock. Diablo Ballet's Amanda Farris does all that and more, as one of the Company's two costumers. Typically an overlooked and underappreciated art in and of itself, constructing and maintaining costumes...
July 17, 2024—San Francisco Ballet has introduced Principal Dancer Sasha De Sola and Soloist Julia Rowe as the first recipients, or inaugural fellows, of its new artist development program Raising Leaders. The program offers a curriculum tailored to support the career growth of dancers as "future leaders of ballet beyond the stage."
May 10, 2024—The coming of spring marks the end of the ballet season for many companies and the beginning of their summer tour season. The upcoming 2024-2025 season beckons with several premieres, works that are new to the Bay Area, North America, or, lucky us, the world. Here are some of the premieres we can look forward to in the coming months....
Dos Mujeres is San Francisco Ballet's tribute to Latina women, featuring the choreography of Colombian-Belgian Annabelle Lopez Ochoa with the San Francisco Ballet premiere of Broken Wings and the world premiere of Carmen by Cuban-born Arielle Smith. For the occasion, the lobby of the War Memorial Opera House is decorated in big, brightly colored...
April 9, 2024—As well as showcasing foreign artists, the annual San Francisco International Arts Festival is an opportunity to see some of the smaller local dance companies that typically perform in less well-known venues. Often limited by shoe-string budgets, they don't get as much advertising exposure as the bigger dance companies. Yet, some have...
March 26, 2024—One of Annabelle Lopez Ochoa's signature choreographic accomplishments is her narrative ballets about famous women in recent history: Frida Kahlo, Eva Peron, Coco Chanel, Maria Callas, Delmira Augustini, etc. It may seem surprising, then, that her upcoming world premiere, Tupelo Tornado for Smuin's Dance Series 2 tells the story of...
No sooner had San Francisco Ballet concluded their last performance of Swan Lake this season when they announced its return with Swan Lake Encore from April 30–May 5. SF Ballet's Swan Lake is worth seeing again in and of itself, but the spring performances will have the bonus of international guest stars Natalia Osipova, Daniel Carmago, and Jacobo...
March 1, 2024—The New York Post dance critic Clive Barnes once said of Michael Smuin that, "he dares with an imagination that runs happily from Maryinsky to Las Vegas." Last night Michael Smuin's imagination ran very happily from Zorro to Frank Sinatra on the opening night of Smuin Contemporary Ballet's 30th anniversary production "Celebrating...
February 28, 2024—The Memorial Opera House had a nearly full house last night, which might seem surprising on a weeknight four days after opening night. Judging from the thunderous applause and cheers when Sasha De Sola took the stage, the crowd came to see her. So had I. She didn't disappoint us.