Alina-2023 festival: 8 choreographers, 5 foreign countries and 25 Russian cities
On April 8, 2023 The Sky Grace Rhythmic Gymnastics Academy held the Alina-2023 festival. While it was the 12th festival, it was held in Sochi for the first time.
The festival was attended by 356 young gymnasts from 25 Russian cities and five foreign countries. Members of the Russian national team also took part in the performances.
All the festival numbers were choreographed by eight professional choreographers - Ekaterina Sirotina, Irina Zenovka, Elena Afanasyeva, Natalya Belugina, Saniya Glyzina, Ekaterina Baiborodina, Eldar Sayfutdinov and Andrey Brykanov.
Especially for the show, the choreographers staged 13 original numbers.
Elena Afanasyeva directed the Jewels of Russia performance, which all of the festival participants were a part of; Polovtsian Dances for gymnasts from Kazan and Ulyanovsk, as well as Swan Lake for gymnasts from St. Petersburg.
The Ninth Wave is a creative work by Ekaterina Sirotina and performed by gymnasts from St. Petersburg, Krasnodar and Sochi. The choreographer also staged the Poetry performance for gymnasts from Volgograd, Saransk, Gelendzhik, Rostov-on-Don and the DPR. They performed to poems read by famous Russian artists Sergei Bezrukov, Vladimir Mashkov, Ksenia Alferova and Ekaterina Guseva.
Irina Zenovka choreographed four of the festival performances - Russian Avant-garde, Saber Dance, Faith, Golden Cockerel. Gymnasts from Nizhny Novgorod took part in the first, Omsk in the second, Moscow in the third, Moscow and the Moscow region and Karolina Tarasova from the DPR in the fourth. Arina and Dina Averina, Anna Popova and Anastasia Guzenkova took part in the numbers she choreorpahed.
Moreover, Faith was performed to the accompaniment of the Sretensky Monastery choir.
Young gymnasts from Russia and China presented their Baikal performance to a song sung by Ragda Khanieva. The performance itself was choreographed by Natalia Belugina.
She also staged Lezginka and the international number My Good Land, which brought together gymnasts from Minsk (Belarus), Tashkent (Uzbekistan), Shymkent (Kazakhstan), Penza and Ulyanovsk.
Sania Glyzina, Ekaterina Baiborodina and TODES school-studio choreographer Andrey Brykanov, together staged the Flowers performance. Gymnasts from Astrakhan, Ryazan, Penza, Volgograd, Voronezh, Orel, Kaliningrad, Perm, Saransk, Ulyanovsk, Krasnodar, the DPR, Schelkovo, Moscow Region and the Vladimir region took part in it. Cuban gymnasts Gretel Mendoza and Isabella Rojas took on the role of red poppies, as soloists.
The director of the show for the 3rd time was Vyacheslav Kulaev, a choreographer, dancer involved in the preparation of television shows, musical and theater projects.