Bolshoi: Don Quixote

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Captured live on 6 March 2011
Ballet in three acts with a prologue. Libretto by Marius Petipa, after the novel of the same name by Miguel de Cervantes.

Originally choreographed by Marius Petipa to the music of Ludwig Minkus, Don Quixote was first presented by the Ballet of the Imperial Bolshoi Theatre of Moscow in 1869. Over the years Don Quixote has been modified and restaged, and has become a staple of the Bolshoi repertoire. All modern productions of the Petipa/Minkus ballet are derived from the version staged by Alexander Gorsky for the Bolshoi Theatre of Moscow in 1900. Later embellishments also included the challenging assignment to one ballerina of the roles of both Kitri and Dulcinea. This new choreographic version by Alexei Fadeyechev dates from June 1999, and has been danced by the Bolshoi worldwide. Here, Don Quixote and Sancho Panza are not the central characters, although they connect all the scenes. The real heroes are Kitri and Basilio, and the ballet is more fun, more open and more exuberant than in its previous versions.

Synopsis
Don Quixote, a nobleman obsessed with chivalry and romance, decides to go on a quest to accomplish great feats which will bring glory to his name.
In Barcelona, Lorenzo, the innkeeper, chases away the penniless Basilio, who is flirting with his daughter Kitri. He has already promised her hand to the rich Gamache. When Don Quixote appears, he mistakes the inn for a castle, Lorenzo for its lord, and Kitri for Dulcinea, a princess.

Music: Ludwig Minkus
Choreography: Marius Petipa, Alexander Gorsky
Revival and new choreography: Alexei Fadeyechev
Sets: Sergei Barkhin
Costumes based on sketches by Vasily Diyachkov (1903), revived by: Tatiana Artamonova, Yelena Merkurova
Music director: Pavel Klinichev

Kitri/Dulcinea: Natalia Osipova
Basilio: Ivan Vasiliev
Gamache: Denis Savin
Don Quixote: Alexei Loparevich
Sancho Panza: Alexander Petukhov
Lorenzo: Yegor Simachev

With the Orchestra of the State Academic Bolshoi Theatre
With the Bolshoi soloists and the Bolshoi Corps de Ballet