History of Ballet Dance

History of Ballet

1924:



The Dancing Times was still being edited by JS Richardson. The content is Very much about dance rather than ballet and many of the covers feature pictures from musical reviews or exotic dancers from overseas.


The dance was not an invidually recognised and popular style at this time, so they had to hype the coverd of music reviews by using exotic dancers from overseas to hope the attraction would be for the beautiful dancers and not the dance alone.

1928:

Queen Mary agreed to become the patroness of the Association of Operatic Dancing of Great Britain, which was founded by and had as its President Mme Adeline Geneée. This was seen as a significant move towards the establishment of a State ballet school.

Without the recognishion of Queen Mary operatic/ballet dancing may not have been such a popular style of performance.


1934:
An amazing year for British ballet with a home-grown company performing the first full length versions of Giselle, Nutcracker and Swan Lake.

20 years later the critic Richard Buckle wrote "No one can dance Giselle like Markova, and no one should try to. Hers is a personal and extraordinary interpretation which defies analysis and which it would be fatal to copy. She breaks every rule and gives one of the great performances of our day".

This says to me that this was a turning point to future ballet dancers, that times were changing and so should the standard of their dance.

The Vic-Wells unveiled their Giselle on 1st January 1934. 30th January, Casse-Noisette (Nutcracker), their largest production to date, was also led out by Markova and Stanley Judson, a former member of the Pavlova company.

1942:
Nearly all the male dancers were conscripted and off to war. Later it dawned on the government that ballet and dance could actually help the war effort best by properly entertaining troops and civilians and some more 'manpower' was found. Rapidly all the Sadler's Wells Ballet males went and only Robert Helpmann, of the originals, was left. Luckily he was exempted. Robert Helpmann produced 3 ballets for Sadler's Wells Ballet. Admirable considering he had never choreographed a thing for them previously-alongside dancing too.

Robert Helpmann's Hamlet was premiered on the 19th with designs by Leslie Hurry (and whose later designs for the Royal Ballet Swan Lake will be remembered by many)

1946:
On the 20th February there was a gala reopening of the Opera House with the King, Queen, both Princesses, Prime Minister (Attlee) and many other VIPs.

It was a new production of Sleeping Beauty with Fonteyn dancing Aurora. According to the Dancing Times “It was a great occasion and it marked the first appearance of a British company in ballet on a grand scale”.

1 Jul - 3 Aug: Ballet Rambert's first season at Sadler's Wells. Includes the first performance of a full length Giselle - based on Sergeyev/Maryinsky version but including Romantic Ballet details courtesy of Cyril Beaumont (president)
Richard Buckle claimed in the Observer (August 1953) that the production “proves Madame Rambert to have a deeper understanding of this masterpiece of Romantic Ballet than anyone else alive.”

1949:
The post-war ballet boom had reached its peak and was about to start declining - but at the start of the year ballet was still sufficiently popular for programmes to be presented in huge arenas and temporary theatres.

The event of this year was the Sadler's Wells Ballet's first visit to the USA. They opened in New York on October 9th with Sleeping Beauty and had a success which has passed into history.

Margot Fonteynhad a personal triumph in the States and moved from being the UK's favourite ballerina to being a world star.

"To watch the coordination of her head, arms and torso is to learn a lesson about the nature of art. The inclination of her neck and the exact curving of her arms from shoulder to finger-tips are Raphaelesque, (I am reminded that Leonardo wrote in his Notebooks 'it is the extremities that lend grace to the body')".{Richard Buckle}

The art of ballet was really get recognised and becoming bigger and bigger each year even with threats from war.