On the 31st March I went to the Coliseum in London to see Swan Lake performed by Ballet Nacional De Cuba. Swan Lake was the first ballet Alicia Alonso staged for her new company back in 1948. The company now has a brilliant reputation worldwide for their outstandingly talented male performers. Tickets sold out for this performance which was called ‘the hottest tickets in town’ by ‘Visit London’.

From the beginning I thought it was wonderful because everybody on stage was an amazing and talented dancer especially the Jester (Yonah Acosta) whose leaps and turns were amazing, full of spring and straight.

The premier dancer was Anette Delgado. She was my favourite. She played Odette and Odile, the white and the evil black swan. She was brilliant in both roles, but especially in Odile as she whipped through all of her 32 fouettes with ease. She was light on her feet and danced around the stage easily and quickly making her performance with the Prince outstanding.

The Cygnets were also very good and my favourite part of their dance was when the four swans were dancing together.

I thought the scenery was creatively effective although it was traditionally done, it clearly showed where and when we were in the storyline. For example the woods at night were illuminated with green lights, making shadows cast over the stage as if it was night and the moon was shining. This helped me to understand what was going on. I loved the costumes, and the intricate designs they had on them, especially Odile’s black tutu with red stones and sequins glittering whenever the light hit them in the bright ballroom scene. I didn’t like the costumes in the final scene where the swans returned back into women and they just placed a baggy over-dress on top of their tutus. I thought this looked weird. This was a shame because Odette’s dress could have been amazing because she could have had a beautiful princess dress on, but the over-dress just didn’t fit and wasn’t magnificent.

I would highly recommend this to my friends because the dancers were spectacular and the way they performed the story line was incredible.

Abi Leach, age 12

Ballet Nacional de Cuba in Swan Lake. Photo Alastair Muir