Lisa Macuja says farewell to Nikiya and Masha

MANILA, Philippines - One of the most poignant moments at the recent concert “The Legends and the Classics” came when Lea Salonga was telling the audience that she, like her fellow headliners Lisa Macuja-Elizalde and Cecile Licad, will have to bow out from the stage eventually.

“Some sooner than others,” the Broadway star added candidly, prompting the prima ballerina who was right beside her to suddenly cover her face and cry her eyes out. They hugged, to the resounding applause of an audience already moved by the three artists’ remarkable performance for the past two hours.

For Lisa, this is indeed a particularly emotional time as the reality of retirement looms ever so near. “Retirement for dancers is not an ‘if’ — it’s a ‘when’. And retirement for all dancers comes way too soon. Just when you finally understand the many layers behind portraying the tragic heroines of Giselle, Juliet or Nikiya; just when you develop the wisdom to pace yourself in a stamina-demanding role such as Kitri in Don Quixote; just when you feel capable enough with experience, artistic maturity and technique to be able to give those spot-on performances of Odette/Odile, Medora, Cinderella or Swanilda — your body becomes, in a word, uncooperative.”

Still, Lisa considers herself blessed as her farewell to the full-length ballets has been spread out through a three-year retirement project dubbed the Swan Song Series. After saying goodbye to Swan Lake and Romeo and Juliet in 2011, and Giselle, Don Quixote and Carmen in 2012, she is poised to take on her final La Bayadere and The Nutcracker this year, the last of the classics that she will dance in their full versions.

“To be able to dance Nikiya in La Bayadere one last time with Mikhail Martynyuk of the Kremlin Ballet to kick off Year 3 of my Swan Song Series is going to be a rigorous journey back to the time and place when men and women were separated by castes,” says Lisa.

Love and sacrifice are the themes that run through this lyrical and dramatic ballet set in India. The bayadere or temple dancer Nikiya is committed to a lifetime of service in the temple of the High Brahmin who desires her. She falls in love with the warrior Solor and he with her, but he has been pledged to marry Gamzatti, daughter of the Majarajah. In the end, however, Nikiya and Solor are bound to each other in their vow of eternal love.

In a happier turn, Lisa appears in the most beloved Christmas ballet that is The Nutcracker. “The music of Tchaikovsky alone is enough to transport you to a world of dancing dolls, giant rats and magical transformations from Nutcracker to Prince, and from an awkward child who doesn’t fit in on Christmas Eve, to a glamorous Sugar Plum Fairy,” Lisa sums up.

The prima ballerina first danced as Masha at age 19 in the Marinsky Theater in the student performances of the ballet as given by the Russian Ballet Academy in what was then Leningrad. Masha is Lisa’s most performed role in its excerpt form. Her dad Cesar Macuja’s records indicate she has danced the adagio from Act 2 an astounding 234 times and the full-length ballet a total of 37 times.

While there are countless versions of The Nutcracker choreography, the first version that she learned in her Leningrad school, of Vassily Vainonen, under the tutelage of Tatiana Udalenkova, is still the closest to her heart.

“The fiendishly difficult hopping variation was the dance that got me the silver medal in the Asian Pacific International Ballet competition in Tokyo, Japan in 1987; the big adagio from Act 2 always a wonderful opening to Ballet Manila’s Ballet & Ballads concerts while the small adagio from Act 1 remains one of my most favorite adagios to perform.”

Dancing Masha in Russia in 1984 catapulted Lisa into ballerina status. “Dancing Masha as the last ballet of 2013 will bring me full circle and to the end of my Swan Song Series. Thankfully, I continue to look at Masha as that wide-eyed child on Christmas Eve, about to open a present that will change the rest of her life.”

Lisa Macuja-Elizalde will have four performances of La Bayadere — on Nov. 14 and 16, 7:30 p.m., with Mikhail Martynyuk of the Kremlin Ballet, and on Nov. 15 and 17, 7:30 p.m. with Ballet Manila principal dancer Rudy De Dios, all at Aliw Theater, CCP Complex, Pasay City. The Manila Symphony Orchestra, under the baton of guest Russian conductor Alexander Vikulov, is featured in the shows on Nov. 14, 15 and 16. The Nutcracker gala is scheduled on Nov. 29, 7:30 p.m., followed by shows on Dec. 1 and 7, 3 p.m. The Dec. 7 performance is a benefit for Smokey Mountain through the Philippine Christian Foundation.

Presented by Ballet Manila, Manila Broadcasting Company and Aliw Theater, Swan Song Series 3 has BPI Credit Cards and Multimedia Exponents (MME) as major sponsors. Special thanks go to Star City, Island Rose, Center Table Catering.

For tickets, contact Ticketworld at 891-9999 or ticketworld.com.ph.

For information, call Ballet Manila at telephone numbers 525-5967 or 400-0292 or visit www. balletmanila.com.ph and www.lisamacuja.com.