NIKOLAY TSISKARIDZE is current most famous and decorated ballet artist and a superstar in Russia. He was a premier dancer of the Bolshoi Ballet for 21 years (1992-2013). Ethnically Georgian, he was born in Tbilisi on 31 December 1973. He has never met his father, who was a violin player and died in the 90s. Nikolay`s mother was a French actress, but after she got married, she did not continue her career. Nikolay began his studies at the Tbilisi ballet School in 1984 and joined the Moscow Ballet School in 1987, where he studied under the guidance of Pyotr Pestov, one of the most experienced classical dance teachers. Pestov was known for his strict rules and perfectionism. If he was displeased with a student during class, the pupil can find himself out the door in no time. That often happened to Nikolay. But oddly enough, he was told that this was a good sign and that he was going to be a star. Nikolay worked very hard but his mother did not feel pity of him - she thought that being of blue blood he couldn´t complain. She also trained him to refuse to discuss three things - nationality and faith, earnings and privat life. A unique combination of natural abilities such as flexibility, musicality, charisma and superlative lyrical expressiveness distinguished the young dancer as a rare talent, and in 1992 he graduated at the top of his class and he directly joined the ballet company of the Bolshoi Theater. At the theater he had the good fortune to enter the class of prominent ballerina Marina Semyonova. After a brief period in the corps de ballet, he became a Principal in 1995. Since 1997 Tsiskaridze has regularly performed with the Mariinsky Ballet. In December 2001 he made his dibut at the Paris Opera - as Solor in La Bayadère (by Rudolf Nureyev), having repeated his appearance with the Paris Opera Ballet as Drosselmeyer/Prince in The Nutcracker (by Rudolf Nureyev) in 2009. In October 2003 Tsiskaridze had to face his first major injury which threatened to end his career - the devastating knee injury sustained during his rehearsal at Opera de Paris. After the very first operation when doctors changed the ligament in his knee he got staphylococci infection into his body and for some period he was in a critical state. With further 9 operations doctors succeeded to save not only his life, but his leg as well. Finally, he started learning to walk. He entered the stage after 9-month intermission. As a dancer, Tsiskaridze possessed the purity of Russian dance training and the regality and mystery of royalty. His extremely long legs moved with masculine power, yet also with feminine grace. His arms could at one moment be strong and forceful, and at the next soft and elegant. His feet were well arched for a man and his beats were pristine. As a product of the Russian ballet school, which emphasizes dramatic expression hand in hand with technique from a very early stage in training, Tsiskaridze was an effortless actor with the ability to mesmerize the audience.
Posted on: Mon, 19 Jan 2015 10:07:58 +0000
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