Dance Performances Welcome Spring

The nation's top dance companies from ballet to contemporary dance are offering their best and new repertoires to welcome the new season. Here is a list of must-see dance performances from various genres ready to delight dance fans.

Ballet

The nation's two top ballet companies open the new season with major works.

First is the Universal Ballet Company (UBC), which stages "Swan Lake" at the Universal Arts Center in eastern Seoul until April 3. The ballet composed by Tchaikovsky is a favorite in Korea.

The UBC's "Swan Lake" is based on the 1895 Marius Petipa-Lev Ivanov edition, which maintains the classical beauty of the piece. A ballerina dances dual roles in "Swan Lake" the pure ingenue Odette and the evil but enchanting Odile making the lead role more challenging. Still, it is a dream role for many ballet dancers and Swan Lake has become a gateway for budding talents.

For this run, the UBC invited the Bolshoi Ballet's principal dancers Ekaterina Krysanova and Semyon Chudin, who will dance on March 25 and 27.

The UBC's principal dancer Hwang Hye-min will dance with her longtime partner and husband Ohm Jae-yong as well as Lee Dong-tak, while Kang Mi-sun will dance with Konstantin Novoselov.

Among the young dancers, Hong Hyang-gi will debut as Odette/Odile and Kang Min-woo as her counterpart Prince Siegfried. Feifei Ye, the UBC's solist from China, will dance with Maxim Chashchegorov, first soloist of the Bavarian State Ballet in Munich, Germany.

For more information, visit www.universalballet.com or call 070-7124-1737.

The Korea National Ballet (KNB) opens the season with "La Bayadere" at Opera Theater of Seoul Arts Center in southern Seoul from March 30 to April 3.

The piece is based on the 1977 Petipa edition later revised by Yuri Grigorovich for the Bolshoi Ballet in 1991 and for the KNB in 2013. The ballet, known for its grand scale featuring over 120 dancers and 200 costumes, revolves around temple dancer Nikiya, her lover the warrior Solor and Princess Gamzatti.

The KNB said "La Bayadere" will offer characteristic dances as well as a heightened quality of the corps de ballet.

Principal dancers for the KNB, including Lee Eun-won, Kim Li-hoe, Park Seul-ki, Lee Dong-hoon, Lee Young-cheol and Friedemann Vogel from the Stuttgart Ballet, will dance the three lead roles.

For more information, visit www.kballet.org or call 02-587-6181.

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