Daniil Simkin and Tatiana Melnik in Don Quixote

Daniil Simkin as Basilio and Tatiana Melnik as Kitri in Don Quixote, music Ludwig Minkus, new version Johan Kobborg. Shot at Dance Open 2019 Gala on 29.4.2019 in Alexandrinsky Theatre, St. Petersburg.

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Tatiana Melnik is a Principal with Hungarian State Opera ballet. She was trained at Academy of Choreography, Perm (2006). Danced with Russian State Ballet, V. M. Gordeev (2006-2013), Stanislavsky and Nemirovich-Danchenko Moscow Academic Music Theatre – soloist (2013-2015), starting from 2015 with Hungarian State Opera ballet.

Daniil Simkin (born 1987 in Novosibirsk) is a Russian ballet dancer and principal dancer with American Ballet Theatre. The family left the Soviet Union in 1990. His parents were engaged to dance in Graz, then took engagements in various cities in Germany before settling in Wiesbaden in 1993, where he spent the rest of his childhood. Unlike most professional ballet dancers Simkin did not attend a vocational ballet school. He was coached privately by his mother, who became a ballet teacher after retiring from dancing in 1999. Simkin’s first professional position was with the Vienna State Opera Ballet, where he was a demi-soloist from 2006 to 2008. During this time he made his debut in a principal role as a guest with the Lithuanian National Opera and Ballet Theatre. In 2008 he became a soloist at the American Ballet Theatre in New York, and in 2012 he was promoted to principal dancer.

Photos by Jack Devant Ballet Photography with kind permission of the Dance Open ballet festival and Ekaterina Galanova, special thanks to Kristina Proku.