Classical ballet as we know it today arose within the Paris Opera as the Paris Opera Ballet and has remained an integral and important part of the company.

It was founded in 1669 by Louis XIV as the Académie d'Opéra and shortly thereafter was placed under the leadership of Jean-Baptiste Lully and renamed the Académie Royale de Musique. The Paris Opera (French: Opéra de Paris, or simply the Opéra) is the primary opera company of Paris. Alongside this production, a series of demonstrations, presented in the form of classes, afford an appreciation of the breadth, richness and excellence of this ancestral tradition of dance training. Maurice Béjart offsets these two masculine pieces with a refined and sensual choreography for the female dancers on Chopin’s Don Giovanni Variations. D’Ores et déjà by Béatrice Massin and Nicolas Paul, created for the school’s Tricentenary, combines the vocabulary of Baroque and contemporary dance with music by Jean-Philippe Rameau whilst Jacques Garnier’s Aunis evokes the influence of folklore on classical dance. Using extracts from the music of Léo Délibes, the ballet demands musicality, lightness in the port de bras, precise leg and foot work and some virtuoso sequences of steps. Soir de fête by Léo Staats is a veritable demonstration of French choreographic style. As an echo of the tricentenary celebrations of the French school, the Ballet School's performance this year allies tradition and modernity, giving pupils the opportunity to master works from the standard repertoire and to reach out to new worlds.

Danse opera garnier