Hamilton City Ballet

This weekend, on Saturday, October 4 at 7:30 pm and Sunday, October 5 at 2 pm at the Great Hall at Hamilton Place, the Canadian Ballet Youth Ensemble presents Giselle, performed by the Ballet Nacional de Cuba. While the Cuban Ballet company is not well known in Canada, the dancers are amazing to watch. Their strength and skill is unmatched and watching their passion for dance is sheer joy.

Giselle was the prized role that Ballet Nacional de Cuba founder, Alicia Alonso, made almost untouchable. Alicia Alonso has once again graced Hamilton with her presence. Going to see Giselle is worth it even for a brief glimpse of this fabulous lady.

As a young woman Alicia practiced dancing in her mind when she was on bed rest for her eye problems. Later as her eyesight failed her she continued to dance in spite of her challenges. Today she remains the head of the ballet company and guides the final product for the ballet productions. While her sight is very limited, her vision is very clear and her productions are a sight to behold and enjoy. Now THAT is a prima ballerina.

We highly recommend taking the time to go see the Cuban ballet perform Giselle this weekend. While Alicia will not be in the starring role, her presence will still be felt in this ballet that has meant so much to her.

Welcome to the Hamilton City Ballet Blog. Visit us here regularly for school updates, photos, up and coming local dance events and auditions, Mr. Max stories (not to be missed), and Vaganova Pointers.

The Hamilton City Ballet has started up its exciting 2008/2009 dance season. After a summer of hard work for many of the dancers, most are back at the HCB studio to work even harder!

During the summer, Ulana went to study for a month with the Royal Winnipeg Ballet. We look forward to hearing more about her time in Winnipeg, and hope to share it with you here.

Caleigh went to Cuba for two weeks to study at the Ballet Nacional de Cuba. She loved working with the Cuban dancers and hopes to return there soon to work with them again. They have a fabulous company and great school to study at.

Emile, Cassandra, and Ailish went to the Quinte Ballet School in Belleville for the summer program.

Sadly, Ricky was not to be seen much in the HCB studio this summer. His pas-de-deux support was sadly missed but we think we’ll see more of him this season. Where have you been Ricky?

Mr. Max was away for a while also but his location was no secret- Mr. Max did guest teaching in London, England and in the U.S. He was in high demand this summer, but even with his super human driving skills, he could not be everywhere at once!

This is a year of change for HCB as many of the senior students have moved on to University. Stacey, Maria, Andrea, Olesya, and Madeleine will be sadly missed. We wish them well in their endeavours and hope to see them sometime in the future at the studio again.

Classes have now started and even with the missing dancers the classes seem to have expanded, meaning lots of new students to share their talents with us at the year-end recital. Welcome to all the new students! On the topic of the recital, there is already speculation about what Mr. Max’s year- end show will be. The studio rumour mill is running although we know it will be quite a while until Mr. Max will reveal the great annual secret….

We hope everyone has picked up his or her copy of last year’s recital- Pinocchio and Don Quixote. The DVDs are all ready and waiting. A huge thanks to Peter Armstrong for doing the filming last year.

For anyone interested in photos of the recital, please check out the website with lots of lovely photos from the recital. Andrei Chelekhov did a fabulous job of capturing the dancers at the shows. Go to www.picasaweb.google.com/ashel58 to see the photos.

Check back with us often for the latest news and community dance events.

Happy Dancing everyone!