Petipa's

Nikiya, the temple dancer heroine of Petipa's La Bayadère Thu to 13 Aug, pits her passion for the warrior Solor against the implacable powers of religion and royalty.

This week's new dance 2011

While adhering to the original template, Duato had altered the steps to the point where only a ghostly echo of Petipa's choreography remained.

Who's pulling the strings in Russia's ballet revolution? 2012

Set to Tchaikovsky, the work elaborates on the original Perrault tale and Petipa's choreography with additional danger, darkness and wit.

This week's new theatre and dance 2011

The story is 19th-century Russian ballet at its most spectacularly kitsch but the classicism of Petipa's choreography remains its unsullied, exquisite heart.

This week's new dance 2011

The 2011-12 season at La Scala doesn't officially open until Dec. 7, with a production of Mozart's "Don Giovanni," yet the legendary Milan opera house will hardly be empty in the meantime, hosting a Robert Wilson-directed production of Monteverdi's "Il ritorno di Ulisse in patria" (Sept. 19-30), and a revival of Marius Petipa's 1898 ballet "Raymonda" (Oct. 11-Nov. 4).

Packing in the Performances 2011

Petipa's Don Quixote Tue, Wed, first choreographed back in 1869 for the Bolshoi Ballet and subsequently revised by Gorsky, is the quintessence of old-fashioned, Imperial Russian spectacle – leisurely, lavishly staged and cheerfully sacrificing authenticity to virtuosity.

This week's new dance 2011

Alexei Ratmansky and Yuri Burlaka's recreation of Le Corsaire restores the opulent architecture of Petipa's choreography but still manages to keep up the pace of its hokey narrative, which is loosely based on Byron in its story of pirates, harem girls and general derring-do on the high seas.

This week's new dance 2010

Petipa's rollicking comedy, which was created for the Bolshoi in 1869, has almost as little to do with Cervantes as Corsaire has with Byron and the Bolshoi are one of the few companies who manage to play its nonsense in pitch-perfect style.

This week's new dance 2010

This opens with Cavalry Halt, Petipa's 1896 setting of Ivan Armsheimer's score that portrays the comic and romantic shenanigans resulting from a regiment being billeted in a small village.

This week's new dance 2010

Despite notable stagings, such as the first productions of Petipa's Don Quixote (1869), and of Julius Reisinger's Swan Lake in 1877 (a flop – the now-classic version of Tchaikovsky's ballet was produced later in St Petersburg) – the Bolshoi went into decline.

The Bolshoi ballet: a step-by-step guide to dance 2010