World Premiere

Ashley Page was born in Rochester, Kent, and began his dance training locally before continuing his studies at the Royal Ballet Lower and Upper Schools. He joined The Royal Ballet in 1976, and during his formative years with the Company he collaborated closely with Sir Frederick Ashton and Kenneth MacMillan, creating numerous roles in their new ballets. These experiences helped shape the deep classical pedigree he brings to all his work. He also worked with esteemed visiting choreographers, including Glen Tetley and, most notably, Richard Alston, who would play a pivotal role as a mentor in Page’s development as a choreographer.

In 1984, he was promoted to Principal Dancer and choreographed his first professional work, A Broken Set of Rules. While continuing to dance, he developed his choreographic style, creating 17 works for the Company and receiving commissions from Rambert Dance Company, the Dutch National Ballet, and others. His choreography has since been sought after by leading companies worldwide—including San Francisco Ballet, Joffrey Ballet, Royal Ballet of Flanders, and Vienna State Ballet—reflecting his global appeal and stylistic versatility. Known for bold collaborations and exploring new contexts for dance, his 1994 Fearful Symmetries at Covent Garden, starring Irek Mukhamedov, became a defining work.

In 2002, after 27 years with The Royal Ballet, he became Artistic Director of Scottish Ballet. Over the next decade, he transformed it into a leading modern ballet company, creating acclaimed full-length ballets such as The Nutcracker, Cinderella, The Sleeping Beauty, and Alice, alongside contemporary pieces and new commissions that revitalized the company’s profile. He premiered Guide to Strange Places with San Francisco Ballet during his final year there.

Now a freelance choreographer and opera director, he continues to work with major companies internationally. His current collaboration with The Sarasota Ballet marks a significant moment in his career: his first-ever World Premiere with the Company, offering audiences a rare opportunity to witness a new creation by one of the UK’s most influential choreographers.

Page’s achievements have been recognized with numerous prestigious awards, including a Time Out Award for Fearful Symmetries (1994), the Olivier Award for Best New Dance Production (1995), the TMA Award for Outstanding Achievement in Dance (2004), and the Herald Angel Award (2005). In 2006, he was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) for services to dance. Further honors include the Critics’ Circle Award, Herald Archangel Award, the De Valois Award for Outstanding Achievement from the National Dance Awards (2012), and an Honorary Degree from the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland.

One of the most important and influential 20^th century composers, Stravinsky was born 17 June 1882 and brought up in the Russian capital St Petersburg, where his father was a bass singer at the Imperial Maryinsky Theatre. A lonely schoolboy, he studied piano, music theory and composition from an early age, but was sent to study law at St Petersburg University in 1901, leaving in 1906, after his father’s death, to study music privately with Rimsky-Korsakov who became a second father to him. In 1906 he married his cousin Katya Nosenko, who bore him four children.

Stravinsky shot to international fame with his brilliant score for Fokine’s The Firebird (1910), followed by further commissions for Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes: Petrushka (1911), The Rite of Spring (1913) and Le Rossignol (1914). The Stravinskys had been dividing their time between their estate in the Ukraine and home in Switzerland, when World War One and the Russian Revolution prevented their return to Russia, and they settled in Brittany and then Paris, becoming French citizens in 1934. In the interwar years, until the 1939 death from tuberculosis of his wife Katya, Stravinsky lived a double life, between his family in Biarritz and Nice, and his lover and later second wife, Vera de Bosset, whom he met in 1921. These years also saw Stravinsky develop a neo-classical style in Pulcinella (1920), Apollo and Oedipus Rex (1927), Symphony of Psalms (1930), Dumbarton Oaks Concerto (1937) and two symphonies.

In 1939, at the age of 57, Stravinsky emigrated to the United States, where he married Vera in 1940 and settled happily in West Hollywood, becoming a US citizen in 1945. After his 1951 opera The Rake’s Progress, Stravinsky became influenced by the twelve-tone serial experiments initiated by Schoenberg. Stravinsky’s fruitful collaboration with Balanchine produced such major ballets as Agon (1957). He continued travelling, composing and conducting, returning to Russia in 1962 for the first time since 1914, to give concerts in Leningrad and Moscow. In 1969 he moved to New York, where he died of heart failure, aged 88, on 6 April 1971, and is buried, near Diaghilev, in Venice’s San Michele cemetery.

Emma Kingsbury has designed extensively for film, ballet and opera. Emma has designed for a number of US ballet companies including San Francisco Ballet, Joffrey Ballet, Pacific Northwest Ballet, Atlanta Ballet, BalletX, Pennsylvania Ballet, Oregon Ballet Theatre, Richmond Ballet, Tulsa Ballet, Smuin Ballet, Texas Ballet Theater. International designs for dance include for København Danser in Copenhagen, The Crucible for Scottish Ballet winning the UK Award for Dance, Cinderella Royal New Zealand Ballet and for Hessisches Staatsballett, Germany. Emma is currently costume designing Der Ring des Nibelungen with La Scala, Milan and a new Sleeping Beauty.

Ethan Vail is originally from Indiana and has been the lighting designer for various art forms. His passion for lighting dance truly began in his college, Purdue University, and since then he has lit numerous ballets ranging from full length works like Johan Kobborg’s La Sylphide to one-act ballets including masterpieces by Ashton, George Balanchine, and Sir Kenneth MacMillan. He has also created original designs for choreographers Gemma Bond and Ricardo Graziano. Ethan’s work has also been seen in various theatres around the country including Westcoast Black Theatre Troupe, Urbanite Theatre, and Asolo Repertory Theatre. Highlights of his career thus far include winning the 2013 U.S. Institute for Theatre Technology’s Young Designers, Managers & Technicians Award; and lighting The Sarasota Ballet’s 2024 performances at The Royal Opera House in London.