Debuts in Giselle

A lyrical dancer “with elongated lines” and “an inimitable flexibility vital to embody the ideal image onstage,” Maria Shirinkina joined the Mariinsky Ballet Company in 2006. Over six years, the dancer has performed many coryphée roles as well as lead roles in Apollo, Jewels, Chopiniana, In the Night, Shurale, The Nutcracker and La Sylphide. Last season saw the dancer make her eagerly awaited debut in the role of Gulnare in Le Corsaire. Following that, the role of Juliet in Leonid Lavrovsky’s Romeo and Juliet marked an important step in the young dancer’s artistic career, being her first serious experience of onstage sincerity. Shirinkina created “the image of an ideal Juliet: a tall, slim and well-formed brunette with large Mediterranean dark eyes” demonstrating brilliant “professional indicators: her leaps, turns and the extent of how high she can lift her legs.” Her most significant role this season has been that of Aurora in the ballet The Sleeping Beauty.

The technically refined and elegant Konstantin Zverev, who has firmly established himself in classical ballet, has begun to make a name for himself in modern dance in recent years. He performed as the “dazzling officer” Vronsky in the premier of Alexei Ratmansky’s ballet Anna Karenina at the X International Ballet Festival MARIINSKY in 2010. According to the newspaper Kommersant, his Vronsky was notable for his “particular classical style.” For this role Zverev received a nomination for St Petersburg’s most prestigious theatre award, the Golden Sofit. The premiere of Angelin Preljocaj’s ballet Le Parc in the spring of 2011 featuring Zverev brought the dancer another Golden Sofit nomination. His duet with Diana Vishneva, “refined and, at the same time, imbued with eroticism,” captivated audiences “with the beauty of the poses, high supports and gracious weaving of their bodies.”