Ballet festival at Aspendos

ISTANBUL

The 24th International Aspendos Opera and Ballet Festival, organized by the State Opera and Ballet Directorate, will be held between Aug. 23 and Sept. 4 at the Aspendos Ancient Theater in the southern province of Antalya. 

The event will commence with Verdi’s opera “Aida,” to be performed by the Antalya State Opera and Ballet.

Foreign and local soloists will take the stage under the directorship of Kuzman Popov. 

Borislav Ivanov will be the conductor of the opera, in which Vienna State Opera artist Kamen Chanev, Varna Opera’s Dimitrinka Raycheva, Bolshoi Theater’s Agunda Kulaeva, soloists Murat Güney, Engin Suna, Şafak Güç, M. Burak Pektaş and Arzu Aydoğdumu will share the stage. 

The Antalya State Opera and Ballet will be accompanied by the Mersin State Opera and Ballet in the second performance of “Aida” on Aug. 25. Koray Damcıoğlu, Nurdan Küçükekmekçi, Stare Çelebi, Alaaddin Ataseven, Şafak Güç, Engin Suna, Burak Pektaş and Zişan Damcıoğlu will be on stage in the performance. The orchestra’s conductor will be Alexandru Samuil.

Within the scope of the festival, the Istanbul State Opera and Ballet will perform Tchaikovsky’s “Sleeping Beauty” on Aug. 28. The closing performance of the festival will be conducted by the Moscow State Ballet on Sept. 4. 

“Scheherazade,” “Les sylphides [Chopiniana]” and “Polovtsian Dances” will be staged in the performance. 
All performances will take place at the Aspendos Ancient Theater.