PNB Company dancers in Carmina Burana. Photo © Angela Sterling

"Carmina Burana [fills] the stage with color and movement. Between the dancers, the chorus, and Ming Cho Lee's set, our eyes are overwhelmed..."  (Seattle Weekly)

Apollo

Music: Igor Stravinsky
Choreography: George Balanchine © The George Balanchine Trust
Staging: Peter Boal

Carmina Burana

Music: Carl Orff
Choreography: Kent Stowell
Staging: Kent Stowell

From Greek gods to 13th century monks, this blockbuster double-bill reaches through centuries to resonate with powerful impact. Apollo, George Balanchine's oldest surviving ballet, was his first international success as well as the start of his remarkable collaboration with Igor Stravinsky. The depiction of "a wild, half-human youth who acquires nobility through art" (Balanchine), Apollo is instructed by three Muses: Terpsichore, muse of dance and song; Polyhymnia, muse of mime; and Calliope, muse of poetry. Considered "worth every accolade ever bestowed upon it" (DanceView Times), Apollo "has acquired a mythical aura of its own" (New York Times).

Kent Stowell’s magnificent Carmina Burana, which has played to sold-out audiences since its 1993 premiere, realizes Carl Orff's vision of a theatrical masterpiece that would surmount all artistic boundaries. The famous cantata's poems about the fickleness of fortune, the joy of renewal, and the perils of sin come vividly to life in the shadow of Ming Cho Lee's colossal twenty-six-foot golden wheel as Stowell's evocative choreography, a 72-voice chorale, and live orchestra draw the audience into an exhilarating communal experience that is "unashamedly expressive" (Seattle Weekly).

Apollo & Carmina Details