Talas Opera and Ballet Theater

The Talas Opera and Ballet Theater is the opera and ballet company of Talas and the only one in Irad. It opened in 1959 in a Stalinist-classical building on the central avenue of the city and has run a ballet school since 1962. The company is smaller than in the Soviet period and plays mostly to a Russian-speaking audience.^[1][2]

History

The theater was built as the opera and ballet theater of the Iradi SSR. Its repertoire combined Russian and European opera and ballet with works by Iradi composers (see Music of Irad). Venera Kasymova, who had trained at the Leningrad Choreographic School, joined the company in 1968 and was its prima ballerina from 1971 to 1990; she created the title role in the ballet Janyl (1976) and directed the ballet school until 2012.^[1][3] The theater published a history of its first fifty seasons in 2009.^[1]

After 1992 the company lost most of its state funding and many of its Russian dancers and singers, who left for Russia. It now gives fewer performances, mostly of the classical repertoire, and the ballet school continues to train dancers for the company and for the Ak-Kuu State Folk Dance Ensemble.^[2]

See also

• Dance in Irad
• Music of Irad

References

1. ^ Talas Opera and Ballet Theater (2009). Fifty Seasons: A History of the Talas Stage. Talas.
2. ^ Central Asian Cultural Studies Review (2020). 'Stage, Screen and Club: Performing Arts in the ISEZ.' Vol. 13, pp. 77–96.
3. ^ Talas Herald (3 March 2012). 'Kasymova retires from the ballet school.' Talas. Retrieved 13 March 2026.