This spring will be the eleventh time that All-Russia Golden Mask Festival is held. It has become a tradition that the very best productions in all performing arts (drama, puppetry, opera, ballet, modern dance, operetta and musical as one category) as well as their best creators – directors, choreographers, conductors, artists and actors – are awarded with the title prize.

In the opera nomination the current festival program counts seven productions coming from six opera companies who will bring them before the panel of experts and the public, with the gloomy Macbeth on March 31, and the conceptual Flying Dutch on April 10 being the nominees from the Bolshoi Opera. As to ballet productions there will be five of them from three companies nominated to compete for the main prize – here the Bolshoi will show Declan Donnellan and Radu Poklitaru’s joint work Romeo and Juliet on March 30 and the one-act ballet Magrittomania on April 3.

The performances coming from Russian provinces are expected to be the highlight of the festival. Though more often than not they make a context for metropolitan and St. Pete’s monsters, still sometimes it’s them who make a breakthrough. The grand production of "Aida" from Novosibirsk created by a most talented duet of Dmitry Chernyakov and Teodor Kurentzis fits only the Kremlin Palace stage where it will be shown on April 7. Chernyakov, the famous fighter against opera routine, interpreted "Àida" as an anti-war social fresco, suppressing its Egyptian colour. As soon as the premier curtain fell the critics praised to the sky both Kurentzis and the singers: Irina Makarova well known to Muscovites (Amneris) and Oleg Videman (Radames). The New Stage of the Bolshoi will host two guest companies. On April 4 the Rostov-on-Don Musical theatre will be representing its Lady Macbeth of the District of Mtsensk, and next day the Saratov Opera and Ballet Theatre Company will show its version of Tosca. Rostov’s Lady is a tough performance mounted by Susanna Tsiruck and is rightly considered to be one of the best interpretations of the Shostakovich score. Saratov’s Tosca is a traditional production. It will come to the liking of the elderly theatregoers. Unfortunately Mariinsky’s Nose, the brainchild of Yury Alexandrov and Zinovy Margolin, won’t see Moscow. The invariable Golden Mask winner, "Helicon–Opera" company, will be representing its version of Dialogues des Carmelites on the 25, 26 and 27 of March. Dmitry Bertman’s production is surprisingly austere and laconic. Two of the Helicon’s primas Natalia Zagorinskaya (Blanche) and Larisa Kostyuk (Madame de Kruassie) will struggle for the prize.

The Bolshoi Opera again seems to be willing to appear among the winners. Two of its projects the Flying Dutch and Macbeth will be brought before the Jury. The Jury will carefully consider the individual job of Petr Convichny, Alexandr Vedernikov, Yokhannes Layaker, Anna-Katarina Benke and Pobert Hale (the Flying Dutch), Nyakroshuse, both senior and junior, Elena Zelenskaya and Vladimir Redkin (Macbeth).

George Balanchine’s Serenade from the city of Perm was the first on the Festival schedule. It was shown in February on the Bolshoi’s New Stage within the framework of the Crescendo Music Festival. The corps-de-ballet was dazzlingly synchronised and beautiful while the performance of the soloists left much to be desired.

The Bolshoi ballets fall into the following nominations: Magrittomania has been selected for the Best Production nomination. As to Romeo, besides the Festival Main Nomination it is chosen for an individual one thanks to Maria Alexandrova and Denis Savin.

Yet the main happening of the ballet program this time is going to be a three-day tour of the Ìàriinsky Ballet at the Bolshoi. On 7 and 8 of April in Moscow theatregoers will enjoy An Offering to Balanchine and on April 9 – Forsythe in Mariinsky. The former is the program prepared by St. Pete’s troupe for the 100-anniversary of the American choreographer, which comprises three ballets: Four Temperaments by Paul Hindemith, Maurice Ravel’s Waltz and The Piano Concert (" Ballet Imperial "). The program is geometrically accurate, mystical and neo-classic in nature. Muscovites are looking forward to seeing the great prima of the Mariinsky Ballet Uliana Lopatkina in the Waltz, who is among the nominees for the best female role. The latter is a program completely devoted to Forsythe’s choreography and includes the triad of Steptext to the music of I.S.Bach’s Chakona in D-minor, Where Golden Cherries Hang to the music of the Finale of Franz Schubert’s Ninth Symphony and the third one called Breathtaking Ecstasy about Being Precise to music composed by the vanguard Tom Villems and Lesley Stuck. The ballet that bounds in sophisticated rhythmic twists and unheard of density of the choreographic text will be performed by the classic trio of the troupe – the nominees Andrey Merkuriev, Leonid Sarafanov and Natalia Sologub. This year choreographers are not on the Festival list of nominees.