Oakland Ballet to Perform The Secret Garden

The Oakland Ballet will be performing The Secret Garden based on Frances Burnett’s 1909 children’s classic on Tuesday, March 10, in Laxson Auditorium. Ronn Guidi, who founded the Oakland Ballet in 1965, has helped make the company nationally recognized for its unique, innovative, and often historically significant, dance productions. Guidi says in his choreographer’s notes for The Secret Garden, “My challenge to myself was to create an innovative and daring interpretation of a favorite ballet, to transform classical roles into roles that the dancers could make their own, to take a modern audience through a timeless story of love and loss, and, along the way, to interpret hope as a credible contemporary value.” The production features Edwardian costumes, imaginative sets, and the music of England’s leading turn-of-the-century composer, Sir Edward Elgar.