this program of contrasting works. Soloist Sasha De Sola joins Ballet Master Betsy Erickson who offers her perspective of this ballet, and brings her long experience with the Company to the discussion of Wheeldon’s Within the Golden Hour and Balanchine’s Scotch Symphony.

The centerpiece of the program is the world premiere of Yuri Possokhov’s The Rite of Spring, set to Igor Stravinsky’s revolutionary 1913 score—music that has inspired and challenged a wealth of prominent choreographers and dancers. Musicologist Susan Key, San Francisco Ballet School Administrative Manager and music educator, Andrea Yannone, and Dance Educator Mary Wood will be joined by SF Ballet Music Director Martin West to explore Stravinsky’s complex musical tour de force, the challenges it offers to dancers, and how the work maintains its edgy modernism, even after a century.

SF Ballet is proud to present Hamburg Ballet in Nijinsky, created by Artistic Director and Chief Choreographer of The Hamburg Ballet John Neumeier. Mr. Neumeier will join us for a discussion of this provocative retrospective of the great dancer's life and career. Following the discussion with Mr. Neumeier, Company Manager Lauren Chadwick will share the duties and responsibilities of the Company Manager while on tour and at home.

The 80th Season’s opening program includes the San Francisco Ballet premiere of Serge Lifar’s groundbreaking Suite en Blanc. English dancer and former director of the Australian Ballet, Maina Gielgud has staged the work for SF Ballet. Gielgud brings her extensive experience to the discussion of this work which has been described as “clever, intriguing and intricately patterned.” A world premiere by innovative choreographer Wayne McGregor and Jerome Robbins’ lovely In the Night round out the program.

Don Quixote is well-known as a rollicking comedy packed with virtuoso dance. We will hear from Artistic Director and Principal Choreographer Helgi Tomasson and Technical Director Christopher Dennis about the process of bringing San Francisco Ballet new scenery

In this program, San Francisco Ballet performs three works by 20th century choreographic giant George Balanchine and focuses on the variety of his output, from the classic and traditional Divertimento #15, through a revival of the romantic Scotch Symphony. Ballet Scholar Carrie Gaiser Casey, Ph.D. with San Francisco Ballet’s Visiting Scholar Dr. Beth Genné, a historian of dance and of art at the University of Michigan and Dr. Stephen Hinton, Avalon Foundation Professor in the Humanities and Professor of Music at Stanford University, will explore and comment in depth on the role of modernism in art and music in the 1940s, focusing on the cutting-edge ballet The Four Temperaments, choreographed by Balanchine in 1946 and set to the music of Paul Hindemith.

This program features Symphonic Dances a world premier by emerging choreographer Edwaard Liang. Ballet Master Katita Waldo shares how a choreographer takes a work from conception to production. Also on the program is Helgi Tomasson’s The Fifth Season and Jerome Robbins’ Glass Pieces.

The company shows off its versatility performing the lush classicism of Rudolph Nureyev’s Raymonda Act III, the wrenching drama of Yuri Possokhov’s RAkU, and the contemporary creation of Ashley Page’s world premiere Guide to Strange Places. Assistant to the Artistic Director and Ballet Master Ricardo Bustamante and Soloist Elana Altman expand on the training and the discipline that allow San Francisco Ballet dancers to master this span of styles.

The wealth of varied music in our repertoire contributes significantly to its impact. We will explore this through the eyes of Music Director and Principal Conductor Martin West as we discuss Choreographer in Residence Yuri Possokhov’s newest ballet Francesca da Rimini and the return of Alexei Ratmansky’s Le Carnaval des Animaux, along with an encore of Helgi Tomasson’s Trio.

As we wrap up the season, we revisit John Neumeier’s The Little Mermaid, a heart-wrenching story of sacrifice and unrequited love told through dance and drama and hear from Executive Director Glenn McCoy and Media Consultant and Producer Judy Flannery about SF Ballet’s past, present, and future media projects.