Mikhail Leonidovich Lavrovsky
Artistic director of the choreographic school "Lavrovsky Laboratories".
People's Artist of the USSR, winner of the Lenin and State Prizes of the USSR, Holder of the Order of Honor of the Russian Federation, winner of the Moscow Prize in Literature and Art, and other Soviet, Russian and international awards.
"He strung out one variation after another like a man possessed, but performed them with incredible refinement and elegance. With a controlled smile and a reckless desperation, he gave the impression of a man who was not afraid of anything in the world. Of course, in reality, this is not the case. For every skidding, every round and mind-blowing pirouette, the heart should have been beating uneasily. It couldn't have been any other way. But he left an indelible impression.
His dance is perfect. Lavrovsky does the most risky things and-just think! - almost absolutely everything is as it should be, accurately and correctly".
«Нью-Йорк таймс», 1967г
"He strung out one variation after another like a man possessed, but performed them with incredible refinement and elegance. With a controlled smile and a reckless desperation, he gave the impression of a man who was not afraid of anything in the world. Of course, in reality, this is not the case. For every skidding, every round and mind-blowing pirouette, the heart should have been beating uneasily. It couldn't have been any other way. But he left an indelible impression.
His dance is perfect. Lavrovsky does the most risky things and-just think! - almost absolutely everything is as it should be, accurately and correctly".
«Нью-Йорк таймс», 1967г
Mikhail Lavrovsky, the son of the famous Soviet choreographer Leonid Lavrovsky, was born at the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, on October 29, 1941, in an evacuation, in the city of Tbilisi.
His mother, a famous Leningrad ballerina, soloist of the Kirov (now Mariinsky) Theater, Elena Georgievna Chikvaidze, on the eve of the terrible blockade, already deeply pregnant, by chance, left the northern capital. His father, Leonid Lavrovsky, who was the head of the Kirov Ballet before the war, was then appointed to direct the Yerevan Opera and Ballet Theater. Spendiarov and immediately after Mikhail's birth, the family moved to live in Yerevan for several years.
In 1944, the Lavrovskys came to Moscow, where Leonid Mikhailovich was appointed chief choreographer of the main theater of the country-the Bolshoi Theater of the USSR.
The fate of ballet dancer Mikhail Lavrovsky was destined. In 1961, he graduated from the Moscow Choreographic School (now the Moscow State Academy of Choreography) and was accepted into the Bolshoi Ballet Company. Being the son of the theater's chief choreographer, Mikhail Lavrovsky, nevertheless, achieved everything himself. None of the main parties rained down on him; on the contrary, fearing to be biased against his son, Leonid Lavrovsky, sometimes deliberately, bypassed him in appointing him to one or another role. Mikhail Lavrovsky made his own way to the "star" premieres of the Bolshoi Ballet.
The first teacher, under whose guidance he improved his skills, was an outstanding dancer and a very strict mentor Alexey Ermolaev. Seeing the young man as a talented artist, he forced him to work to the limit of his abilities. Mikhail Lavrovsky's success is the result of incredible hard work and self-control. And to this day, on the threshold of his eightieth birthday, the recognized master works daily with students, and before that he trains himself, without allowing himself any indulgences.
In 2021, it will be 60 years since Mikhail Lavrovsky faithfully served the Bolshoi Theater.
In 1987, while still an active ballet dancer, Mikhail Lavrovsky began teaching at his native theater and continues this activity to this day. Over the years, he has managed to raise more than one generation of bright and talented world ballet stars.
Having danced almost the entire contemporary repertoire of the Bolshoi Theater, from the romantic Albert in the ballet "Giselle" (for the performance of this role he was awarded the Vaclav Nijinsky Prize, the Paris Academy of Dance), to the heroic "Spartacus", in the masterpiece of the same name by Yuri Grigorovich (for the performance of the role he was awarded the Lenin Prize, the highest state award of the USSR), Mikhail Lavrovsky continued his career as a choreographer.
After graduating in 1979 from the Ballet Master's Department of the Lunacharsky State Institute of Theater Arts (now the Russian Institute of Theater Arts — GITIS), Mikhail Lavrovsky, with his usual passion, began a new activity.
On his home stage at the Bolshoi, he staged several ballets, including "Fantasia on a theme of Casanova", to the music of Mozart, " Nijinsky "(muz. Rachmaninoff), in memory of our outstanding ballet dancer of the early twentieth century, "Matador", based on the work of De Falla"Love is a sorceress".
In 1983, after assuming the position of artistic director of the Tbilisi State Academic Opera and Ballet Theater named after Zachary Paliashvili, Lavrovsky staged the first jazz ballet in the USSR, Porgy and Bess, based on the musical work of the same name by George Gershwin. The world premiere of the production took place on the stage of the Bolshoi Theater, which received a grateful response from the audience. On the wave of success, Mikhail Lavrovsky first decided to stage his father's legendary ballet Romeo and Juliet (music by Sergei Prokofiev).
The transfer of an epochal, multi-act performance that thundered on the two main stages of the country (the Kirov Theater, where the premiere took place, and the Bolshoi Theater, where the ballet gained world fame), to the Tbilisi Theater company required considerable work on the editorial board and became a kind of exam for a novice choreographer. In addition, by 1985, the age of the production had already passed the mark of forty-five years and needed a new edition. Dedicating this complex work to the memory of his illustrious father (Leonid Lavrovsky died in Paris in 1967, while on tour at the Moscow Choreographic School), Mikhail Lavrovsky, with the unconditional support of the entire Tbilisi Theater team, managed to revive "Romeo and Juliet". The production, without losing its original design or grand scale, has acquired the dynamics of a new, rapidly changing world. It was a year when the whole vast country was waiting for changes: the era was changing. However, the choreographer managed to make the audience fall in love with the classic drama ballet, keeping it as it was conceived by the first directors. The undoubted success of that editorial board is evidenced by the fact that over the next thirty years Mikhail Lavrovsky was repeatedly invited to stage "Romeo and Juliet" on foreign stages.
During his long and successful career, Mikhail Lavrovsky managed not to exhaust himself. And all because he was never satisfied with what he had achieved, and when setting new goals, he tried himself in all sorts of creative guises and experiments. He directed ballet companies of famous theaters, including the Stanislavsky and Nemirovich-Danchenko Moscow Musical Theater; worked not only as a choreographer, but also as an actor and director of dramatic performances; wrote scripts and librettos; directed several film ballets, one of which is " Mtsyri "(muz. Toradze) was awarded the Grand Prix of the International Dance Film Festival in New York!
Mikhail Lavrovsky inherited this "gene" of incessant creative search from his famous father: "Laboratories" Leonid Lavrovsky was also written by the outstanding Soviet and Russian opera director Boris Pokrovsky. Trying to find new forms of performance, a new aesthetic of choreography, a new language of acting, both Lavrovskys created their own performances, experimenting with students and students. It is in the rehearsal halls and ballet classes of schools and theaters that you can and should try and search. Therefore, taking over the experience of searching for his father, Mikhail Lavrovsky, today, already in his "Laboratories", continues his "creative research" of theatrical choreographic art.
In the early 90s of the last century, together with Zhanna Borisova, he opened one of the first private choreographic schools, which today has already acquired the status of a State Choreographic School and is named after Leonid Lavrovsky.
In 2010, Mikhail Lavrovsky was invited to take the position of artistic director of the Moscow State Academy of Choreography.
In the summer of 2021, after a short break, he again took a course at the Russian Institute of Theater Arts-GITIS.
In September 2021, on the eve of his eightieth birthday, Mikhail Leonidovich Lavrovsky opens a new choreographic school "Lavrovsky Laboratories", where he will train future artists of classical and modern ballet, involving young students in the performances of the Lavrovsky dynasty.
