Announcing the 2025 Workshop Performances
The School of American Ballet’s 2025 Workshop Performances will take place at Lincoln Center’s Peter Jay Sharp Theater on Saturday, June 7 (2:00 p.m. and 8:00 p.m.) and Monday, June 9 (7:00 p.m. benefit performance) with a program featuring George Balanchine’s Raymonda Variations, an excerpt from Balanchine’s Cortège Hongrois, a new work by New York City Ballet’s Laine Habony (Saturday performances only), and the third movement of Jerome Robbins’s Glass Pieces. The selection from Glass Pieces marks the first time the piece will be performed by SAB students in Workshop’s sixty year history.
Both performances on June 7 will feature a pre-curtain celebration of the “Capstone Class” of senior students, and the June 9 benefit performance will begin with the annual presentation of the Mae L. Wien Awards for Outstanding Promise.
Program Highlights:
Balanchine had performed in the three-act ballet Raymonda at the Maryinsky Theatre, originally choreographed by Petipa, and admired Glazounov’s score, calling it “some of the finest ballet music we have.” He chose to use the music to create his Raymonda Variations, a thirty-minute plotless ballet consisting of virtuosic solos, and Cortège Hongrois, which blends character dance and classical ballet. Balanchine’s Raymonda Variations premiered at Workshop in 1980 and has since appeared only one other time in 1991, each staged by SAB Faculty Member Suki Schorer. Ms. Schorer has staged works by Balanchine for the annual Workshop Performances every year since 1973 (except for 2003, when no Balanchine ballet was included on the program). The students will also be performing an excerpt from the classical section of Cortège Hongrois, staged by Aesha Ash, Head of Artistic Health and Wellness. The ballet was first presented at Workshop in 1986, again in 1993, and most recently in 2012.
The performances on Saturday, June 7, will feature a new work commissioned by the School from SAB alumna and NYCB dancer Laine Habony. This marks her fourth and most significant collaboration with SAB in recent years, having choreographed for students in the 2023 and 2024 NYCB Virginia B. Toulmin Choreography Workshops and for SAB’s 2024 Summer Choreography Workshop. Ms. Habony attended SAB from 2010-2013, joining the Company as a member of the corps de ballet in November 2014.
The program will conclude with the Workshop premiere of Jerome Robbins’s iconic Glass Pieces. When Jenifer Ringer joined SAB’s artistic leadership team in August 2024 as the Director of Intermediate/Advanced Divisions and Artistic Programming, she brought with her a wealth of expertise as a répétiteur for the Jerome Robbins Foundation. This spring, she will assist in the staging of the energetic third movement of Robbins’s beloved work.
Tickets for the 2025 Workshop Performances may be purchased here. All tickets for June 7 (2:00 p.m. and 8:00 p.m) are priced at $70. Tickets for the June 9 benefit performance are $125 (performance only) and $1,500, $2,500 and $5,000 (performance and dinner). The Peter Jay Sharp Theater is located at 155 W. 65th Street (between Amsterdam and Broadway) in Manhattan.