The New York City Ballet Launches 2015 Spring Season Tonight

New York City Ballet will open its 2015 Spring Season tonight, April 28 with three programs of 12 landmark Black & White ballets by George Balanchine: Monumentum pro Gesualdo, Movements for Piano and Orchestra, Concerto Barocco, Episodes, The Four Temperaments, Apollo, Agon, Duo Concertant, Symphony in Three Movements, Square Dance, Le Tombeau de Couperin, and Stravinsky Violin Concerto. The ballets will be performed in 11 performances during the first two weeks.

Following the Balanchine Black and White performances, the Company will present the New York City Ballet premiere of Peter Martins' La Sylphide at the annual Spring Gala performance on Thursday, May 7. Originally staged for the Pennsylvania Ballet in 1985, Martins' production is after August Bournonville's 1836 production for the Royal Danish Ballet, where Martins trained and danced before joining New York City Ballet as a Principal Dancer in 1970.

Set to the score by the Norwegian composer Herman Severin Løvenskjold, La Sylphide is one of the world's oldest surviving Romantic ballets and tells the story of a Scottish farmer who deserts his bride-to-be when he is enticed into the woods by a sylph. The sets and costumes for Martins' La Sylphide are by Susan Tammany who designed the original production for the Pennsylvania Ballet, with lighting designs by Mark Stanley.

At each performance of La Sylphide, New York City Ballet will also present Bournonville Divertissements, a series of the Danish choreographer's most popular dances, which were originally staged for New York City Ballet by the great ballet teacher Stanley Williams in 1977. La Sylphide and Bournonville Divertissements will be given eight performances during the course of the 2015 spring season.

Other season highlights include an additional all-Balanchine program of ballets- Walpurgisnacht Ballet, Sonatine, La Valse, and Symphony in C-all of which are set to the music of French composers. An all-Robbins program, comprised of The Goldberg Variations and West Side Story Suite, will be performed beginning on May 13. An additional ballet by Robbins, N.Y. Export: Opus Jazz, will be performed with Balanchine's Raymonda Variations and Martins' Morgen. Justin Peck's 'Ro?de?,o?: Four Dance Episodes, which premiered during the 2015 Winter Season, will share a program with Peter Martins' Symphonic Dances and Christopher Wheeldon's Mercurial Manoeuvres. Returning for one performance only are Liam Scarlett's Fune?railles and Troy Schumacher's Clearing Dawn, both of which premiered at the Fall 2014 Gala and feature costumes by Sarah Burton for Alexander McQueen and Thom Browne, respectively. These ballets will be joined by Jean-Pierre Frohlich's Varied Trio (in four), Christopher Wheeldon's This Bitter Earth, and Robbins' The Goldberg Variations on May 29.

New York City Ballet will close the 2015 spring season with George Balanchine's full-length staging of A Midsummer Night's Dream for one week of performances from June 2 through 7.

Create-Your-Own subscriptions for the 2014-2015 Season, which provide savings over single ticket prices, are available by phone at 212-496-0600, and online at www.nycballet.com. Single tickets for the spring repertory performances start at $29. Tickets for all performances can be obtained at the theater's box office, at www.nycballet.com and by phone at 212-496-0600.

All performances will take place at the David H. Koch Theater, which is located on the Lincoln Center Plaza at Columbus Avenue and 63rd Street. For general information on tickets for any New York City Ballet performances, call 212-496-0600, or visit www.nycballet.com. See the Spring 2015 calendar for a complete schedule of programs.

Photo Courtesy of the NYC Ballet