Seventeen-year-old Julian Mackay is one of the six winners of this year’s Prix de Lausanne. He is part of the extraordinary Khan-MacKay family which boasts four ballet dancers; something this blog has covered before.
Julian however is flying high during his last year at the Bolshoi Academy before his graduation in June, having already won medals last summer at the Sochi and Istanbul, he was awarded the Kelvin Coe Scholarship from the En Avant Foundation, and around Christmas was dancing Albrecht for the Russian State Ballet on tour. However winning at Lausanne is special.
He took the Giselle variation as his classical piece and Richard Wherlock’s Solo for Diego to show off his contemporary flair.
Leading up to the Prix de Lausanne I prepared my Giselle variation with Nicolai Tikhomirov. Along with the technical aspects, he helped me to understand why Albrecht is in anguish and to send all of my gestures, either to Giselle or Myrtha. I chose this variation because I love the role, and would like to dance the full-length ballet.
I prepared my contemporary solo with Alisher Hazanov. He showed me the right way to put humour in Solo for Diego. I had to work very late at night as was rehearsing many pieces for the Bolshoi Academy as I had spent my Christmas vacation dancing Siegfried on tour in Germany and Switzerland. I am very grateful to Vyacheslav Gordeev, former Bolshoi Principal and director of the Russian State Ballet, for the opportunity.
Grishko helped to make all my costumes in a very short time, and they were great. When a few days before leaving I rehearsed with my costumes on, I finally felt ready to go to Switzerland!
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