ROYAL BALLET PRINCIPAL ALINA COJOCARU BACK ON STAGE TONIGHT

Today in the Evening Standard, Ismene Brown reports on the return to the Covent Garden stage of Alina Cojocaru.

Cojocaru suffered a major injury while rehearsing a ballet and has been off the stage for a year. She is much loved by audiences at the Royal Ballet, and some say that Giselle, the ballet she will dance tonight, is her signature role. It's certainly the ballet which she and her partner Johan Kobborg have performed the most all over the world.

She talks movingly about the pain and loneliness of her lengthy injury, of the worry of trying to find the right treatment, and of being left behind when the ballet company went on tour. I think most of us can empathise with her in this situation - long-term injuries can batter your self belief and the battle to stay mentally as well as physically strong, when it takes longer that you'd like to recover, can be utterly draining without the right support.

Excerpt from the interview entitled " First Lady of ballet is back on stage after her hardest performance" :

What about the ballet that gave her the injury? Cojocaru won't name it, but it was an accident, and she will face it again if she needs to.
"I am different now - suddenly you see the end of one journey and the beginning of the next more beautiful journey. There is nothing I could wish for myself right now. I'm only 27 and still have half my career ahead of me. And I am so glad to be back. Today we were working on Giselle and I heard that music and thought, I'll cry from the first step I take on stage. But I'll probably laugh like crazy too."

The article doesn't mention that Alina did dance a Family performance of Giselle last week.

Nevertheless, tonight's lucky audience are in for a treat. I bet it's a sell-out.

Good Luck Alina.