Plans for San Francisco Ballet’s 90th Season

This coming January will mark the launch of the 90th Season of San Francisco Ballet (SFB). As usual, the season itself will be preceded by the annual performances of The Nutcracker. There will be 33 of them beginning on December 8. However, the focus of this article will be on the seven programs that will celebrate not only a landmark season but also the arrival of the new Artistic Director, Tamara Rojo.

Three of those programs will present full-length performances of a single narrative ballet, all of which have attained “classical” status. The first of these will also be the earliest in ballet history. Giselle was first performed in Paris in 1841, danced to music composed by Adolphe Adam. Helgi Tomasson created the choreography in 1999 for the SFB production, drawing upon both the original choreography by Jean Coralli and Jules Perrot, as well as the revival staging by Marius Petipa. That version was last performed in 2015.

Cinderella was first created as a co-production shared with the Dutch National Ballet. The choreography was created by Christopher Wheeldon, who worked with master puppeteer Basil Twist to achieve many of the “special effects.” In addition projections were created by Daniel Brodie. This production was first performed in 2013, and it was last performed in January of 2020.

The season will conclude with Tomasson’s choreography of Romeo and Juliet. This was given its premiere during the 1994 season. It was most recently presented last year as part of the SFB Digital Season.

The season will begin with the next@90 festival. Between January 20 and February 11, there will be three programs, each presenting world premiere performances of three ballets. Five of the nine choreographers will be making SFB debuts. These will be:

1. Bridget Breiner, Artistic Director of the ballet company at the Badisches Staatstheater Karlsruhe
2. Robert Garland, Resident Choreographer of the Dance Theatre of Harlem
3. Yuka Oishi, the first Japanese soloist in the Hamburg Ballet and currently a freelance choreographer
4. Jamar Roberts, Resident Choreographer of the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater
5. Claudia Schreier, Resident Choreographer of the Atlanta Ballet and Artistic Director of Claudia Schreier & Company

The other four contributing choreographers will be:

1. Nicolas Blanc, former SFB Principal Dancer, currently choreographer for the Joffrey Ballet
2. Benjamin Millepied, Artistic Director and initiator of the LA Dance Project
3. Yuri Possokhov, SFB Resident Choreographer, who will be creating his sixteenth work for the company
4. Danielle Rowe, San Francisco choreographer, who created the film “Wooden Dimes” for the Digital Season

Cavan Conley and Esteban Hernández in the “COLORFORMS” video created for the SFB Digital Season (photograph by Ezra Hurwitz, courtesy of SFB)

The one remaining program in the season will also present three ballets. One of these, “COLORFORMS,” was created for the Digital Season and will be given its first performance on the stage of the War Memorial Opera House. This will be followed by William Forsythe’s “Blake Works,” which was given its SFB premiere this past February. The program will begin with Tomasson’s “7 for Eight,” created for eight dancers performing the seven movements harvested from the keyboard concertos of Johann Sebastian Bach.

Season tickets will go on sale on August 10. In addition to full subscriptions for all seven of the performances, there is also a discounted “3-Series” subscription option. Single tickets will go on sale the fall on a date yet to be announced.