Archive for the 'Balanchine' Category

In Balanchine Classroom

Sunday, September 19th, 2021

  • May 19, 1965: George Balanchine examines Suzanne Farrell’s hand in rehearsals for a NYCB production of Don Quixote at New York State Theater. (Gjon Mili/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images)

    In Balanchine Classroom is streaming at Kanopy.

    Filled with never before seen archival footage of Balanchine at work during rehearsals, classes, and in preparation for his most seminal works, along with interviews with many of his adored and adoring dancers and those who try to carry on his legacy today, this is Balanchine as you have never seen him, and a film for anyone who loves ballet and the creative process.

  • Balanchine, 1941
    (Above photo by George Platt Lynes)

  • Balanchine Teaching – the New Yorker

  • Shakespeare of Dance and Our Contemporary

  • Balanchine danced with John Maynard Keynes‘s wife who was
    a ballerina.

  • Ledgendary Dancer, Jacques d’Amboise died at 86

    Tuesday, May 4th, 2021

  • (Photo via)

    NY Times obit

    Jacques d’Amboise, Charismatic Star of City Ballet, Is Dead at 86
    He helped popularize ballet with an all-American style, combining the nonchalance of Fred Astaire with the nobility of a classic male dancer. Hollywood came calling, too.

  • <> <>
    (Suzanne Farrell, Jacques d’Amboise and George Balanchine)

    Rehearsing ‘Move ments for Piano and Orchestra’ with Suzanne Farrell, who was replacing the pregnant Diana Adams, and Balanchine in 1963.

    Photo Essay Jaqcues d’Amboise early days National Dance Institute (See many photos here)

    I think I did my solo before I was seventeen and I was doing principal roles while I was still quarter ballet. And Freddie Ashton came to the U.S. and did a ballet for me, and then I did my first movie. I turned eighteen on the set. I just did what I wanted and had everything given to me. And in a way that was why I started National Dance Institute: I never had to audition for anything; I never had to pay for a dance class.

  • Jacques d’Amboise Legacy (See 3 dance videos, two from films)

  • Edward Gorey’s Love of Goerge Balanchine + Photos of Balanchine Dancers

    Tuesday, January 22nd, 2019

  • Corradp Cagli, Vittorio Rieti,Tanaquil LeClercq George Balanchine -the Ballet Society; Photo by Irving Penn

  • Edward Gorey

    What did Gorey appreciate about Balanchine’s work?

    He had a real artistic genius’ ability to zero in on genius in other artists, and he appreciated Balanchine at that level. As he famously said in one interview, “What makes Balanchine so extraordinary is that when you see his dances, you feel ever after as if the steps were absolutely perfect for the music, and there can be no other choreography.” It was literally as if the music was becoming flesh before his very eyes. And it was that absolute clarity and concision and complete mastery of the medium that I think struck such a responsive chord with him. In the same way that Balanchine famously said, “Ballet is woman,” I daresay Gorey would say ballet is Balanchine.

  • Balanchine and Arthur Mitchell


  • (Balanchine with Farrell, McBride, Mimi, Paul, Verdy in promo for Jewels)
    Photo by Martha Swope

  • George Rouault Designed The Prodigal Son for Balanchine, Baryshnikov as The Son

    Tuesday, May 27th, 2014

  • (image via)

    B & B
    (Martha Swope/George Balanchine Trust, via New York Public Library)
    George Balanchine demonstrating a movement to a young Mikhail Baryshnikov at New York City Ballet.

    Jerome Robbins, Edward Villella and Baryshnikov danced The Prodigal Son.

    “Balanchine’s choreography upset Prokofiev, who conducted the premiere. The composer had envisioned a production that was ‘real’; his concept of the Siren, whom he saw as demure, differed radically from Balanchine’s. Prokofiev refused to pay Balanchine royalties for his choreography.”

    Rouault and Prokofiev
    Monte-Carlo, 1929

    George Rouault – May 27, 1881

    Fauvist and Expressionist
    n 1907, Rouault commenced a series of paintings dedicated to courts, clowns and prostitutes. These paintings are interpreted as moral and social criticism. He became attracted to Spiritualism and the dramatic existentialism of the philosopher Jacques Maritain, who remained a close friend for the rest of his life. After that, he dedicated himself to religious subjects. Human nature was always the focus of his interest.

    George Balanchine & Arthur Mitchell (An African American Dancer)

    Wednesday, January 22nd, 2014

  • George Balanchine and Arhtur Mitchell

    Mitchell shares interesting stories about Balanchine. (youtube) or whyPad de deux was so controversial (youtube)

    Arthur Mitchell is an African-American dancer and choreographer who created a training school and the first African-American classical ballet company, Dance Theatre of Harlem.
    In 1955 Mitchell made his debut as the first African American with the New York City Ballet
    Mitchell was the only African-American dancer with the NY City Ballet until 1970. Choreographer and director of the NYCB George Balanchine created the pas de deux in Agon especially for Mitchell and the white ballerina Diana Adams. Although Mitchell danced this role with white partners throughout the world, he could not perform it on commercial television in the United States before 1965, because states in the South refused to carry it.

    Arthur Mitchell

    Slim dragon-fly
    too rapid for the eye
    to cage,

    contagious gem of virtuosity
    make visible, mentality.
    Your jewels of mobility

    reveal
    and veil
    a peacock-tail.

    — by Marianne Moore

  • Other related links..
    4 temperaments – Portraits of Paul Hindemith

  • THe Unknown Balanchine.. (Balanchine’s early years)

    George Balanchine was born on January 22 [O.S. January 9] 1904.

    Igor Stravinsky and Balanchine – An Inspired Partnership

    Monday, June 17th, 2013

    Birthday of Igor Igor StravinskyGoogle Igor
    Igor by Pablo Picasso (via)
    See previous post.

    Maria Tallchief, Life with Balanchine, Her Fling with Nureyev

    Friday, April 12th, 2013

    R.I.P Maria Tallchief (Chicago Tribune) she was 88.

  • Maria with Mr. B.

    On Balanchine.

    Passion and romance didn’t play a big role…. We saved our emotion for the classroom. And despite his reputation as a much married man obsessed with ballerinas, George was no Don Juan.”

    Under Balanchine, Tallchief changed physically. Her neck grew longer. She dropped 10 pounds. She took on the deportment of the Russian stylist. Her chest was high, her back straight, her instep arched. “What did I learn? I learned to turn out. How to point my toes properly. Where I belonged. Where to place my body. What muscles had to be developed — every one. Otherwise there was no way I was going to dance his ballets.”

  • See Nureyev and Maria Tallchief dance here (Youtube)

  • Nureyve chose Maria to dance with him for his debut in America..
    Nureyev had affairs with the ballerina Maria Tallchief and with Erik Bruhn, long his idol as a dancer and the complicated, often unhappy, love of his life.

    Beaming Balanchine

    Monday, May 25th, 2009


    George B and Igor (Early career of G.B on Yourtube)

  • Mr B and Stravinksy Balanchine and Stravinsky

    More on youtube.
    Pacific Northwesat performs George Balanchine’s JEWELS

    What is the Curse of Balanchine?

    Magic spells, poisons, potions and enchantments may be frequent plot devices at the ballet, but the art form itself is under a bewitchment of its own making. It’s the Curse of Balanchine. (Read more here at Washington Post Ballet Must Make Room Onstage for More Than One Genius)