But is it art?

[Mark Thomas]

I don't know if we have any balletomanes amongst us. If we do, I suspect that you'll be horrified by this and I'm not sure what to make of it myself... 

[Gareth Vaughan]

That's amazing! And, yes, it is Art - really top notch virtuoso performance art. A wonderful marriage of circus skills and dance skills. I LOVE ballet - and I loved this.

[Alan Howe]

I don't much like it, but I recognise the technical skill involved in this apparent marriage of acrobatics and dance. China's Got Talent, perhaps?

[JimL]

I'd be more impressed if HE was dancing on HER shoulders.  And that had about as much to do with Swan Lake as anything you'll find in my underwear. 

[giles.enders]

I enjoyed it for what it is, an event to music  These days things are what people want them to be, opera lovers will recall some of the bizare productions that have been done and as for much modern poetry it is hard to know what it is, other than a stream of conciousness using as many adjectives in one line as they can think of.

[Hovite]

It's better than the current Bolshoi version.

[Gareth Vaughan]

Yes - "an event to music" is an accurate description. This must not be construed as a version of the ballet of Swan Lake. It is a performance event using music from Swan Lake. In a similar way Bejart's ballet "The Firebird" is not the story of the Firebird; it uses only the suite from the ballet and is, more or less, pure dance with no particular story to tell. That's fine by me. In fact, as a great admirer and devotee of Bejart I feel he pointed the way to this sort of amalgam of performance arts based on movement because some of his choreography was close to acrobatics, almost all his dancers had circus skills, many could sing (and did). He deliberately mixed opera, jazz and theatre to huge effect.
Really, we shouldn't compare it with Swan Lake, the full length ballet, because it is not comparing like with like and needs to be judged by slightly different criteria.

[Alan Howe]

I'd be more impressed if HE was dancing on HER shoulders.  And that had about as much to do with Swan Lake as anything you'll find in my underwear. 

Very tastefully put, Jim. I don't think.

[Mark Thomas]

I'm pretty much with Gareth on this one. There's no denying that as an acrobatic performance it is absolutely stunning. When it comes to Swan Lake, perhaps we should remember that this is the Great Chinese State Circus.