Sound of hoofs

Cavalia is a multimedia spectacle which combines equestrian arts, dramatic visual effects, live music, dance and acrobatics.[Photo by Jiang Dong/China Daily]

With 46 years of experience in creating and staging such live spectacles, Montreal-based Latourelle was inspired to produce Cavalia by the audiences' focus on animals during a performance. He wanted to do something different from a circus show that usually has the trainers controlling animals.

Gauthier has been the show's chief choreographer since its inception. He says when Latourelle told him about the idea, he thought it was pure "genius".

Audiences in Beijing can expect a show that is full of beautiful, romantic and poetic surprises, he says.

"Normand (Latourelle) is spontaneous and he is good at making impossible things happen," says Gauthier. "Some people doubted our idea but we were patient."

Audience response is rewarding, he adds.

When they first started, they just wanted to get people's reaction about a new show and they didn't expect it would grow into such a big event, according to Gauthier, who joined Cirque du Soleil in 1986 as a stage artist and has since worked on some 2,000 live performances with the troupe.

"What defines Cavalia is the trust between horses and human beings. We don't force the animals to do anything. We spent lots of time building trust," he says.

It took a long time to train a horse to stand still when actors were "flying" over its head, he cites as an example.

Horses were used in the military in the past and in the modern world they are largely used in competitions, he says.

With Cavalia, they wanted to show the world how respect and trust works between animals and human beings.

Copyright for the show in China has been bought by an investment company Sinocap. The show will have its first round of performances in Beijing through May.