Biography
Leipzig Ballet, with its origins dating back to the late seventeenth century, is now widely recognised as one of the great international ballet companies. In the 1940s, Mary Wigman set a milestone with her choreography of Carl Orff’s Carmina Burana – with features of expressionist dance. Since the opening of the Neues Opernhaus (New Opera House) in 1960, virtually all the great narrative ballets have been performed, as well as new works.
1991 saw the start of a new era with the appointment of Uwe Scholz as Director of Ballet and Principal Choreographer. His first première in Leipzig, The Creation, which remains the flagship of the company in the neoclassical tradition, was followed by symphonic ballets such as The Great Mass, Symphony No. 7 in A major and Bruckner 8, which were staged as guest performances throughout Europe and in Hong Kong. Following Uwe Scholz’s death in 2004, the new Director of Ballet, Paul Chalmer, made his mark, inter alia, with a three-year Stravinsky cycle.
Since the 2010/11 season, Mario Schröder has taken over the company as Director of Ballet and Principal Choreographer. He previously held the same posts in Würzburg and Kiel, and has created well over 60 choreographies, including in Japan, the US, Russia, Mongolia and France as well as for great German venues such as the Deutsche Oper (German Opera) and Komische Oper Berlin (Berlin Comic Opera) and for the Aalto Ballett Theater Essen (Aalto Ballet Theatre in Essen). He worked with Ruth Berghaus, Maxim Dessau, Nikolaus Lehnhoff and Uwe Scholz and has won numerous choreography competitions.
New curatorial-artistic direction coming up 2024/25
Rémy Fichet is the designated new Director of the Leipzig Ballet and will take over its artistic direction at Oper Leipzig from the 2024/25 season. In succession to the meritorious previous Ballet Director and Chief Choreographer Mario Schröder, Rémy Fichet will continue the tradition of the Leipzig Ballet as established by Uwe Scholz. For the upcoming seasons, collaborations with innovative choreographers from the international dance scene are being planned. Tobias Wolff, Director of Oper Leipzig: "We are deliberately making the change to a curatorial-artistic direction at the Leipzig Ballet, and I am truly grateful that our preferred candidate Rémy Fichet has chosen our institution. I look forward to new creative formats and choreographies with the company."
Rémy Fichet, born in Amiens (France), completed his dance training at the Paris Opera Ballet School. After two years as a dancer at the Ballet de l'Opéra national de Paris, he joined the Leipzig Ballet in 2000, performing in the ensemble until 2008, most recently as a soloist. Following his career as a dancer, he remained loyal to both dance and the Leipzig Ballet. As scheduler and project coordinator, and since 2012 as Artistic Production Manager, Rémy Fichet provided the structural framework for the successful work of the Leipzig Ballet, with additional qualifications from two years of part-time management studies and a Master of Arts degree, which he completed with distinction at the Palucca University of Dance Dresden in 2023. Rémy Fichet established first-time specialised dance medicine services for the ballet ensemble at Oper Leipzig and values long-term, individually tailored support for the dancers and the next generation of choreographic creatives.