Pirates, kidnappings, a shipwreck and a record of 120 dancers on stage; suspense will be at its highest in this magnificent and exotic tale. In the marketplace of Adrianople, the beautiful Medora is sold to Pasha by a slave dealer. But a pirate, hidden among the crowd with his companions, decides to ravish her.
Inspired by Lord Byron’s poem, Marius Petipa’s version of the ballet was part of the Bolshoi’s repertoire until the beginning of the 20th century.
Le Corsaire
is a ballet typically presented in three acts, with a libretto originally created by Jules-Henri Vernoy de Saint-Georges loosely based on the poem
The Corsair
by Lord Byron. The ballet has many celebrated passages which are often extracted from the full-length work and performed independently: the scene Le jardin animé, the Pas d’esclave, the Pas de trois des odalisques, and the so-called Le Corsaire pas de deux, which is among classical ballet’s most famous and performed excerpts.
Recorded at the Bolshoi Ballet, Moscow, Russia
Conducted:
Pavel Klinichev
Choreographed:
Alexei Ratmansky and Yuri Burlaka after Marius Petipa
Starring:
Svetlana Lunkina, Ruslan Skvortsov, Nina Kaptsova and Andrei Merkuriev