Seven Days: Vermont's Independent Voice

Hoofing It

Can you imagine dancing with a thousand-pound-plus partner? Riders in White Stallion Productions’ stage show featuring highly trained male horses do just that. Lipizzaner stallions have hooves in two worlds: Now equine equivalents of Fred Astaire, the snow-white dressage champs were originally bred as battle steeds back in 16th-century Austria, when war horses needed complex moves to carry their riders through combat. For the record, WSP’s Florida-based “World Famous Lipizzaner” group isn’t related to the “Herrmann’s Own Lipizzan” troupe that used to train and perform annually in North Hero’s Knight Point State Park — those horses left for greener pastures at the end of 2007, after a 15-year run. Vermonters who’ve missed their summer gigs can see WSP’s stallions pirouette and perform other feats of coordination and strength to classical music at one of two weeknight shows.