San Francisco Ballet and Artistic Director & Principal Choreographer Helgi Tomasson will launch the 2020 Repertory Season with “Spellbound,” the company’s Opening Night Gala, on Thursday, January 16, 2020.
One of the Bay Area’s most anticipated annual events, the Gala begins with a cocktail reception and black-tie fundraising dinner at San Francisco City Hall at 5 pm.
The evening’s performance begins at 8 pm and will feature twelve pieces, including three world premieres by current and former members of SF Ballet’s Company: Val Caniparoli, Choreographer in Residence Yuri Possokhov, and Myles Thatcher. “For the first time in 30 years, I decided to ask three choreographers to create new pas de deux or pas de trois for opening night,” says Tomasson, who celebrates his record-breaking 35th season with the Company in 2020.
“What connects these choreographers is that they are all close members of the San Francisco Ballet family, and they each represent a different generation of dancemaking.”
Caniparoli, choreographer of the internationally-sensational Lambarena, joined the Company in 1972 before being appointed Principal Character Dancer in 1985. Yuri Possokhov, SF Ballet’s current Choreographer in Residence, danced with SF Ballet for 12 years before transitioning to choreographing full time, and now creates works for companies around the globe from the Joffrey to Bolshoi Ballet. In 2015, Myles Thatcher, a current member of the corps de ballet, became one of the first corps members in at least three decades to choreograph a new work for SF Ballet’s subscription season. He’s since created a handful of works for the Company, including Ghost in the Machine and Otherness for 2018 Unbound: A Festival of New Works.