GIVEAWAY Royal Winnipeg Ballet Double Feature in Vancouver

Exploding with athletically-charged movement and sensual virtuosity, RWB’s trademark presentation of Carmina Burana will open the evening’s double bill, featuring German composer Carl Orff’s pounding, evocative score and Argentine choreographer Mauricio Wainrot’s bold, corporeal choreography. Performed in a series of five vignettes, the “highly visceral ballet…highlights the vitality of the company” (Winnipeg Free Press), moving from gravity-defying leaps and spins to primal urgency to romantic tenderness, aligned with the cantata’s texts celebrating all of life’s sensual pleasures. Originally commissioned by Belgium’s Royal Ballet of Flanders in 1998, RWB presented the work’s Canadian premiere in 2002, which has since become a popular audience favourite over the past two decades.

Choreographer Cameron sinkʷə Fraser-Monroe is a member of the Tla’amin Nation in qathet (Powell River) and an alumnus of the Royal Winnipeg Ballet School. Hailed as “a powerful fusion of Indigenous storytelling, contemporary ballet, and classical music—rooted in tradition and elevated for the stage” (The Globe and Mail), T’əl: The Wild Man of the Woods is a powerful retelling of the traditional oral tale of a young woman who ventures into the unknown to save her sister from the sinister T’əl, a dark figure who steals children under the cover of night. A gripping, heroic tale, the evening-length ballet is based on the oral history of Tla’amin Elder Elsie Paul, who narrates in both her native Ayajuthem and English. The fully Indigenous-led creative team also features an original score by JUNO-nominated, two-spirit composer Cris Derksen, and stunning costumes by New York-based Navajo designer Asa Benally.