The Ballet Pre-Theatre Guide

Curtain up in twenty minutes - and you’ve no idea what’s about to happen on stage.Eighty ballets. One entry each. Everything you need before the lights go down.Ballet tells its stories without words. That is the glory of it, and also the reason so many people spend the whole of Act I quietly wondering who the man in the feathered hat is supposed to be, or why everyone has suddenly gone mad. The programme tells you the cast. This tells you the story.The Ballet Pre-Theatre Guide covers eighty of the world’s most performed ballets - from Swan Lake, Giselle and The Nutcracker to Mayerling, Manon, La Bayadère and Le Corsaire - with one self-contained entry for each. Read it in ten minutes on the train, in the interval, or in the last few seconds before the house lights dim.What’s inside80 world-famous ballets, arranged alphabetically, one entry eachThe story told act by act - so you always know where you are and what just happenedComposer, choreographer, premiere date and venue, and running time at a glanceWhy It Matters - a short note on each work’s place in the repertoire, and what to watch forWritten to be read before the performance, not studied afterwardsWho it’s forTheatregoers who want to follow the story instead of guessing at itNewcomers to ballet - no technical vocabulary, no assumed knowledge, nothing to look upDancers and drama students preparing or learning a roleDance students and teachers needing a quick, reliable reference across the standard repertoireAnyone buying tickets as a gift who wants the recipient to enjoy the evening properlyEighty ballets, eighty entries, and never again that sinking feeling in the second intervalCompanion to the Ballet Stories series on YouTube. Part of The Arts Edge Pre-Theatre Series.Time is knowledge.