Square Dance - George Balanchine ballet
This video documents the marriage of square dance with ballet. According to the George Balachine Trust's website: "In Square Dance, Balanchine joined the traditions of American folk dance with classical ballet. He felt the two types of dance, though widely different in style, had common roots and a similar regard for order."
Elsewhere, Balanchine is quoted as waying, “I have always liked watching American folk dances, especially in my trips to the West, and it occurred to me that it would be possible to combine these two different types of dance, the folk and the classic, in one work… The invention, its superb preparation for risks, and its high spirits are some of the things I was trying to show in this ballet.”
When Balanchine's Square Dance premiered in 1957, during the surge in popularity for that dance form, caller Elisha Keeler was onstage chanting his rhymes while the dancers moved to music by Vivaldi. Keeler had been profiled in The New Yorker (1957), where he came to the choreographer's attention.
Later productions of the ballet dropped the caller. Fortunately, we have this video that shows the original version.
Tags: ballet, Elisha Keeler, George Balanchine
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| This Item | is related to | Item: Square Dance Tonight - with Elisha Keeler |
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This video documents the marriage of square dance with ballet. According to the George Balachine Trust's website: "In Square Dance, Balanchine joined the traditions of American folk dance with classical ballet. He felt the two types of dance, though widely different in style, had common roots and a similar regard for order."
Elsewhere, Balanchine is quoted as waying, “I have always liked watching American folk dances, especially in my trips to the West, and it occurred to me that it would be possible to combine these two different types of dance, the folk and the classic, in one work… The invention, its superb preparation for risks, and its high spirits are some of the things I was trying to show in this ballet.”
When Balanchine's Square Dance premiered in 1957, during the surge in popularity for that dance form, caller Elisha Keeler was onstage chanting his rhymes while the dancers moved to music by Vivaldi. Keeler had been profiled in The New Yorker (1957), where he came to the choreographer's attention.
Later productions of the ballet dropped the caller. Fortunately, we have this video that shows the original version.