Ballet Looks Forward

Ballet Looks Forward! (Fanfare) The concluding program of 1938.

Announcer Rex Benware makes introductory remarks. Irving Deakin speaks about ballet in general terms with an actor reciting verses written by England's poet laureate John Masefield.

Deakin describes the path ballet has taken since the late nineteenth century in Russia to the present by playing excerpts of music from the following ballets: Tchaikovsky's La Bella Durmiente (The Sleeping Beauty), Swan Lake, and The Nutcracker, Coppélia, Michel Fokine's ballets Prince Igor, Les Sylphides, Le Spectre de la Rose, and Scheherazade.

Deakin also discusses Leonide Massine's ballets The Hood Humored Ladies, La Boutique Fantasque, The Three-Cornered Hat, Le beau Danube, and Présages, Nijinska's Bolero, Adolph Bolm's Ballet Mécanique, and Massine's Gaîté Parisienne. Deakin adds commentary which sometimes takes the form of reciting poetry.

Closing remarks and announcements.

(ca. 46 min.)

Audio courtesy of the NYPL Dance Division.

WNYC archives id: 152558