Pacific Northwest Ballet Artistic Director, Peter Boal examines the works on the current repertoire.

Artistic Director’s Notebook: Square Dance, Prodigal Son, Stravinsky Violin Concerto

To capture Balanchine’s contribution to ballet in America in a few paragraphs is impossible, but I’ll attempt to scratch the surface. Balanchine, often in partnership with benefactor and arts impresario Lincoln Kirstein, founded the School of American Ballet and New York City Ballet. These institutions served as his dance laboratories. In these humble studios, with the help of dancers, musicians, and fellow artists, revelatory discoveries in ballet technique and dance-making came to life. Dancers hold Balanchine’s ballets in a place of reverence. That is especially true of PNB dancers, who enjoy a wealth of Balanchine repertoire and possess an innate technique and musicality acquired at schools like ours...

2024-10-24T12:01:27-07:00October 24th, 2024|Categories: Director's Notebook, Performances|Tags: , , , , , , |Comments Off on Artistic Director’s Notebook: Square Dance, Prodigal Son, Stravinsky Violin Concerto

Executive Director’s Notes: The Veil Between Worlds, The Times Are Racing, Black Wave

Welcome to the fall arts season in Seattle and PNB’s first repertory program of our performing year. We hope that with this program, and the rest of our 2024/25 season, you encounter the warmest welcome from PNB and experience the universal connection and sense of well-being that ballet can so often provide. We deeply appreciate your support and presence in our community – from all of us at PNB, thank you for joining us.

2024-10-24T12:08:32-07:00September 13th, 2024|Categories: Director's Notebook, Performances, PNB on Tour|Tags: , , , |Comments Off on Executive Director’s Notes: The Veil Between Worlds, The Times Are Racing, Black Wave

Artistic Director’s Notebook: The Veil Between Worlds, The Times Are Racing, Black Wave

Welcome to the first program of the new season. What a season it promises to be with the unveiling of our much-anticipated new production of The Sleeping Beauty, the return of Roméo et Juliette, and three world premieres. There are also plenty of fan favorites like Crystal Pite’s Emergence, Jerome Robbins’ Afternoon of a Faun, Marco Goecke’s Mopey, and Twyla Tharp’s Nine Sinatra Songs. The excitement starts right here – right now, with Rep I!

2024-10-24T12:06:06-07:00September 13th, 2024|Categories: Director's Notebook, Performances|Tags: , , , , , , , , |Comments Off on Artistic Director’s Notebook: The Veil Between Worlds, The Times Are Racing, Black Wave

Executive Director’s Notes: Coppélia

Welcome to Coppélia, PNB’s final repertory program of the 2023/24 season. It’s been several years since we last presented the luminous, lighthearted world of Coppélia, and it’s a joy to bring this beautiful production back to life. If you joined us for our most recent two programs, you may find it hard to believe that the company of classical dancers onstage before you could possibly be the same group of artists who so totally committed to the contemporary choreography of Crystal Pite, Alejandro Cerrudo, Matthew Neenan, Twyla Tharp, and Jessica Lang in March and April.

2024-05-24T16:43:03-07:00May 24th, 2024|Categories: Director's Notebook, Performances|Tags: , , |Comments Off on Executive Director’s Notes: Coppélia

Artistic Director’s Notebook: Coppélia

Almost fifty years ago, I attended a New York City Ballet performance of George Balanchine’s Coppélia. Somewhere in the middle of the first act, I decided I wanted to dance. You know the rest of this story. Coppélia is all about the dancing, and the music, and the laughter, colors, costumes, and scenery. It may have the same effect on you as it did on me all those years ago.

2024-05-24T16:40:52-07:00May 24th, 2024|Categories: Director's Notebook, Performances|Tags: , , , , , , |Comments Off on Artistic Director’s Notebook: Coppélia

Artistic Director’s Notebook: Sweet Fields, The Calling, The Seasons’ Canon

"What goes into planning a season? There are more factors to list than my word count allows."

2024-04-04T14:37:21-07:00April 8th, 2024|Categories: Director's Notebook, Performances|Tags: , , , , , , , |Comments Off on Artistic Director’s Notebook: Sweet Fields, The Calling, The Seasons’ Canon

Artistic Director’s Notebook: Bacchus, One Thousand Pieces

"We all have our harrowing stories from mid-March of 2020. Naturally, mine involves PNB. On the morning of March 12th Executive Director Ellen Walker informed me all theaters on Seattle Center campus had been asked to suspend any further activity. I told her I needed twelve more hours. That night we were scheduled to take the stage for the dress rehearsal of David Dawson’s Empire Noir and Alejandro Cerrudo’s One Thousand Pieces. Though we were able to run and film the dress rehearsal before retreating to our homes, PNB has never performed the complete One Thousand Pieces for a live audience. How grateful we are to finally bring this piece to the stage with you in the audience.

2024-03-18T12:30:34-07:00March 7th, 2024|Categories: Director's Notebook, Performances|Tags: , , , , , |Comments Off on Artistic Director’s Notebook: Bacchus, One Thousand Pieces

Executive Director’s Notes: Kent Stowell’s Swan Lake

Welcome to Swan Lake, one of Kent Stowell’s most stunning contributions to PNB’s repertoire. This production of Swan Lake and I arrived at PNB at the same time, in the summer of 2003. I was struck by the magnitude of the physical production, and still find new details in Ming Cho Lee’s magnificent sets and Paul Tazewell’s opulent costumes. For a new-to-PNB arts administrator, I could not have encountered a more beautiful ballet beginning.

2024-01-29T09:13:23-08:00January 29th, 2024|Categories: Director's Notebook, Performances|Tags: , , , , |Comments Off on Executive Director’s Notes: Kent Stowell’s Swan Lake

Artistic Director’s Notebook: Kent Stowell’s Swan Lake

Just over twenty years ago, in September 2003, a theater called Marion Oliver McCaw Hall opened in Seattle. Built on the site of the Seattle Opera House, which dated back to the 1962 World’s Fair, the new hall was the realization of years of dreaming, planning, fundraising, and building. With Seattle Symphony’s recent relocation to Benaroya Hall, McCaw Hall was tailored to the needs of its two primary tenants, Seattle Opera and Pacific Northwest Ballet. After a joint gala celebrating the new digs and the dawn of a new era for each arts organization, PNB offered another unveiling – a completely redesigned version of Kent Stowell’s Swan Lake.

2024-01-29T09:07:04-08:00January 29th, 2024|Categories: Director's Notebook, Performances|Tags: , , , , , , , |Comments Off on Artistic Director’s Notebook: Kent Stowell’s Swan Lake

Executive Director’s Notes: George Balanchine’s The Nutcracker® 2023

On behalf of everyone at PNB, thank you for choosing to celebrate the season with us. Over the years we’ve heard from many in our audience about what this production means to you. It may mark the official start of your holidays, be the destination for a much anticipated annual outing with visiting family, or offer a nostalgic antidote to a too-busy time of year...

2023-11-20T15:22:37-08:00November 20th, 2023|Categories: Director's Notebook, Performances, The Nutcracker|Tags: , , , |Comments Off on Executive Director’s Notes: George Balanchine’s The Nutcracker® 2023
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