Word: diaghilev
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1950-1959
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Stravinsky: Les Noces (Vienna Chamber Choir, four soloists, four pianos and percussion, conducted by Mario Rossi; Vanguard). The subject is a rustic wedding, and the pagan, mechanistic music (written for the Diaghilev ballet of 1923) is built around folk sources. Memorable qualities: the jabbing momentum in the accompaniment and the jerky rhythms of the chorus, which nevertheless convey the feeling of high good spirits. Fine performance...
Parisians, recalling the magic of the name "Ballets Russes" from the Diaghilev days, were excitedly preparing to look at the first performance in Western Europe by a sizable (50 members) Soviet ballet troupe. But the day before the opening, news came that Dienbienphu had fallen to Moscow's Communist allies in Indo-China. While defeated on the military front and retreating on Geneva's diplomatic front, the French stiffened on the ballet front...
...everything from bullfighting to being the husband of a stripteaser. The son of a Madrid jeweler, Julio (pronounced "Hoolio'' even in Manhattan) left home at the age of 15, when his father objected to his artistic bent. He painted scenery for the Madrid opera, danced in Serge Diaghilev's ballet, went into the Spanish army to fight the Rifs in Africa. In 1923 De Diego set out to see the world. After his defiant gesture atop the Woolworth Building he got a job doing fashion illustrations, painted murals for kitchens and bathrooms, designed menus...
Kirstein was a huge (6 ft. 4 in.), bullet-headed young man, who, though just out of Harvard, was already showing signs of becoming the U.S. version of Diaghilev himself (TIME, Jan. 26, 1953). An heir to a Filene department-store fortune in Boston, he was an editor of the arts magazine Hound & Horn, author of a rash first novel and a book of poetry, and teetering on the edge of balletomania. His dream: to found a truly American ballet company. There was nothing for it but to get the world's foremost Russian choreographer to spark it. Balanchine...
...Whose imperial ballerinas traditionally became the companions of grand dukes. * And a political success. After service in Geneva, he was appointed Ambassador to Spain (1933), died (in bed) just before he was scheduled to leave Moscow for Madrid. * Except for a rash of "Ballets Russes," all of which claimed Diaghilev's magical mantle. * Among them: Tanaquil LeClercq, Patricia Wilde. Herbert Bliss. Todd Bolender, Nicholas Magallanes, Francisco Moncion...