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[dirac]

A story on the ceremony honoring Carlos Acosta in Cuba yesterday.

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Cuban danseur and choreographer Carlos Acosta was bestowed with the 2011 National Performing Arts Award, which he devoted to Fernando, Alberto and Alicia Alonso, founders of the National Ballet of Cuba that trained him as a ballet dancer.

"I owe them what I am," said the artist at Havana's Garcia Lorca Grand Theater to a standing ovation. He also devoted the award to his family, especially to his father, who introduced him to Ballet and thought him the value of humbleness, and to all the teachers along his career.

[dirac]

Reviews of Scottish Ballet.

The Independent

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Scottish Ballet's appearances at the Edinburgh International Festival are big occasions: they are both at home and on an international stage. This year, they unveiled a world premiere and their first performances of one of Kenneth MacMillan's best-loved works. The dancers rose triumphantly to these challenges.

The new Kings 2 Ends is Jorma Elo's first work for a British company. Born in Finland, Elo danced with Netherlands Dans Theater before building a career as a choreographer. Kings 2 Ends has hints of Jiri Kylian and William Forsythe.....

The Telegraph

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Artistic director Ashley Page leaves Scottish Ballet next year after a decade in charge. Over that period, he has transformed them into a dynamic, forward-looking company. And his cleverness in programming is revealed by this smart double bill, premiered as part of the Edinburgh International Festival, which sets a new commission by Jorma Elo alongside Kenneth MacMillan’s masterful Song of the Earth.

Elo, Boston Ballet’s resident choreographer, is little known in Britain. On the basis of Kings 2 Ends, he has a sleek, attractive and quite distinctive style, which noodles around the edges of both classical and contemporary techniques.

[dirac]

The Australian Ballet celebrates its fiftieth anniversary.

The West Australian

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The Australian Ballet will celebrate its 50th birthday next year with a Perth season of the full-length ballet Romeo and Juliet created by Graeme Murphy.

After presenting Murphy's internationally acclaimed Swan Lake in Perth in 2009, the company is bringing the chorographer's take on Shakespeare's love story for seven performances at the Burswood Theatre from October 10.

The Herald Sun

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Dancers from the world's most prestigious ballet companies will perform their "greatest hits" in Melbourne next year during a celebration of the Australian Ballet's 50th birthday.

The international gala, at the Arts Centre in October, is part of an ambitious program the ballet unveiled today to mark the milestone.

[dirac]

A preview of the Suzanne Farrell Ballet's Kennedy Center engagement by Kim Kocich in Playbill.

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Reaching deep into her memories and personal archives, and working closely with the Balanchine Trust, she recalled, “I began to uncover other ‘lost’ ballets recorded on film, which was quite uncommon back then. The quality of this footage really ranges—from a polished BBC video of Divertimento Brillante, to a dark, shaky version of Ragtime, shot by my sister with an 8-mm camera. Filmed from the audience, Arthur Mitchell and I are practically dots; dancers jump in and out of the frame, and there’s no music! Despite what I’ve had to start with, the process of reviving these works has been fascinating. As I aspire to remain as true as possible to Balanchine’s original vision, I know that some of these puzzles have missing pieces. But that’s no reason to let these ballets completely disappear.”