April 30, 1983
Died George Balanchine, he is also - Georgy BalanchivadzeA choreographer of Georgian-Russian descent who created American ballet and laid the foundation for world neoclassical ballet.
See the music, hear the dance
Born in 1904 in St. Petersburg. In 1913, he entered the Imperial Theatre School as a ballet student. He graduated in 1921, under Soviet rule. He danced in the corps de ballet of what is now the Mariinsky Theatre. He also studied at the conservatory.
What are you waiting for? What are you saving for? Now is all there is.
He founded the experimental group "Young Ballet." In 1924, he went on tour abroad and stayed. In Paris, the impresario Sergei Diaghilev offered him a position as choreographer in his Ballets Russes. On Diaghilev's advice, Georgi Balanchivadze became George Balanchine.
I don't want people who want to dance, I want people who have to dance
In 1933, Balanchine moved to America. He opened a ballet school. A year later, he founded a professional company, the American Ballet. He also performed in musicals on Broadway. Another Balanchine company, the Ballet Society, would later become the New York City Ballet, now one of the most renowned ballet companies in the world.
Most ballet teachers in the United States are terrible.
If they were in medicine, everyone would be poisoned.
Balanchine wasn't interested in ballet with a plot. His ballet created images born of music and conveyed emotions.
We need to discard the plot, do without sets and lavish costumes. The dancer's body is their main instrument; it must be visible. Instead of sets, there must be changing lighting... In other words, the dance expresses everything through music alone.
Balanchine's production of Tchaikovsky's "The Nutcracker" became a Christmas tradition in the United States. He died at the age of 79 in New York.
