With less than a month to prepare for Ballet Manila’s 15th anniversary celebration, in between the familiarly difficult technique classes of Tatiana Udalenkova who is here for six weeks for our annual intensive training and the choreography rehearsals of Russia’s People’s Artist Sergey Vikulov, Augustus Damian III and Ballet Manila’s resident choreographer Gerardo Francisco plus the various corporate shows, Ballet & Ballads concerts and Pistang Pinoy weekend performances in Star Theater, okay, okay I’ll stop now.
To say that the last few weeks have been busy is an understatement – but not very different from any other period right before a season opening – it’s just that it’s our 15th season we are opening and we have added on the pressure of topping our overtly successful Today’s Stars of the Russian Ballet Gala last July 10.
I owe these jaw-dropping statistics to our President of the Ballet Manila Foundation – who happens to be my Dad – ’s meticulous records and close to obsessive-compulsive personality…
• 4,008 Ballet Manila performances that include 38 in Russia, 23 in South Korea and 31 in the United States of America.
• 3,879 Philippine performances in a total of 48 cities and towns in Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao.
• 537 full-length ballet performances with 74 Nutcrackers, 55 Don Quixotes, 34 Tatlong Kuwento Ni Lola Basyangs and 49 Pinocchios!
• 2007 Circus D’Ballet performances with a tough-to-beat record of 543 performances of the pioneer production Belen.
• 112 ballets in our repertoire
15 years of delivering classical, neo-classical, contemporary and Filipino ballets in both traditional and non-traditional venues. 15 years of consistently working towards the vision of having a ballet institution that was created by dancers for dancers with the well-being of the dancing professionals in heart and mind. 15 years of family, friendship and a singular passion to dance…
We began with a makeshift studio floor and mirrors on wheels in our home porch – we now have three spacious rehearsal studios occupied from noon till nine pm. We began without a home theatre – we now have two. We began with three scholars, we now have 127 students in the Ballet Manila School. We began with 12 dancers united in a leap of faith – we now have 52 strong dedicated to dancing every performance even better than the last one.
The mission continues – the vision a lot closer – the legacy remains. Our direction is as crystal clear as the GALA we are celebrating: Preserve the classics, create new works, develop several generations of audience and dancers and always, always tell a good story – preferably on pointe – without having to say a single word.