Dance
The Ballets Russes was noted for the high standard of its dancers, which contributed a great deal to its success in Paris, where dance technique had declined markedly since the 1830s. Most of the company's dancers were resident performers at the Russian Imperial Theatres in the early years. Diaghilev took them on loan to Paris during the theatres' long summer holidays.
Principal women dancers included many who earned international renown: Anna Pavlova, Tamara Karsavina, Olga Spessivtseva, Mathilde Kschessinska, Ida Rubinstein, Bronislava Nijinska, Lydia Lopokova, Diana Gould and Alicia Markova, among others.
The company was more remarkable for raising the status of the male dancer, who had been largely ignored by choreographers and ballet audiences since the early 19th century. Among the male dancers were Michel Fokine, Serge Lifar, Léonide Massine, Anton Dolin, George Balanchine, Valentin Zeglovsky, Theodore Kosloff, Adolph Bolm, and the legendary Vaslav Nijinsky, who was the most popular and talented dancer in the company's history.
The three most significant choreographers of the company were (in chronological order) Fokine, Nijinsky, and Massine.
Read more about this topic: Ballets Russes Composers
Famous quotes containing the word dance:
“When my old wife lived, upon
This day she was both pantler, butler, cook,
Both dame and servant, welcomed all, served all,
Would sing her song and dance her turn, now here
At upper end o’the table, now i’the middle,
On his shoulder, and his, her face afire
With labor, and the thing she took to quench it
She would to each one sip.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“We look at the dance to impart the sensation of living in an affirmation of life, to energize the spectator into keener awareness of the vigor, the mystery, the humor, the variety, and the wonder of life. This is the function of the American dance.”
—Martha Graham (1894–1991)
“Who will go drive with Fergus now,
And pierce the deep wood’s woven shade,
And dance upon the level shore?”
—William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)