garybruce

California writes: I'm looking at some of the entries at the nypl.org on-line catalog. It does appear some things which includes LeClercq are available for public viewing at the library. Symphony in C: http://nypl.biblioco...2_symphony_in_c Serenade: http://nypl.biblioco...136052_serenade Thanks for that research effort, California.I'ts wonderful seeing that at least two major ballets with her are viewable at the library - all that's necessary is a trip to NYC from Florida :-) BTW, the problem with the Balanchine DVD - which I've seen and own - is that it only offers tiny flashes of her dancing. Of course, Le Clercq herself never saw fit to produce a DVD of her dancing while she was alive, when the Trust would have been hard put to deny her request. I suspect the public may never see more than what's out there now. It took more than 50 years for the two clips to surface, so I guess we will have to be satisfied with what we've got in our lifetime.

It's terribly sad to see all this battling over a literary investigation into LeClercq's life when the reason for her greatness is almost entirely inivisible - two video clips totaling less than 10 minutes are accessible publicly. One 8-minute clip of her dancing with Jacques D'Amboise in Robbins' Afternoon of a Faun and another 1:22 minute clip of her dancing La Valse with Nicholas Magallanes. Whatever viideo clips exist in the NYC Library at Lincoln Center continue to be denied public viewing, and my question is why? Doesn't NYC Ballet, which clearly owns copyright, wish to promote their great ballerina and enhance their prestige? It's more than frustrating to see this lack of initiative - the one thing people want to experience is ballet in the only medium that resonates. Yet ballet organizations continue to act in their worst self-interest by denying the public access to this visual record.

bart, you're spot on: she is quite amazing as an "actor" of dancing - she inhabits the character of the piece she's performing through the steps, the gestures and the overall spirit of the choreography. The only dance videos we seem to have of her are these two yet they demonstrate the extent to which she was an artist. I hear there are others in the NYC public library at Lincoln Center. Has no one thought of assembling them into a DVD?

I posted this separately but now that I've found this thread, I think others would like to know that Jacob's Pillow has a 1:22 minute video of Tanaquil dancing La Valse in August 1951 with Nicholas Magalianis. It's on the Jacob's Pillow website. http://danceinteractive.jacobspillow.org/dance/tanaquil-leclercq-nicholas-magallanes

Christian, You are a scholar and a gentleman and a first rate balletomane. Gary

The Giselle danced by Baryshnikov and Makarova back in 1977 for ABT in Lincoln Center has been on video for quite some time, but I still haven't located it on DVD. Does anyone have any info as to whether it will be transferred to DVD format in the near future? It's one of the few great ballets in the recent past that has yet to be digitized. Crossing fingers for a positive response.

I'm sorry I wasn't clear. Farrell thought TV, specifically the idea of having the company one is AD of on TV, was a great marketing tool. Although, she had complimentary things to say about MCB as well. I just found Villella in Nutcracker from 1965 in a DVD, on Amazon.com. It says the release date was 2008.

You Tube also has a three minute clip of her dancing the dying swan--and it looks like it comes from La Mort du Cygne because her technique is very good and her bow at the end replicates the photo of her that appeared in Life magazine from 1937. That would make her 20 at the time. As for her style, I haven't seen enough of her to make a statement of any kind.

Can you point me toward any other video of her dancing not contained in the DVD Yvette Chauvire: France's Prima Ballerina Assoluta? It's amazing to me that given her career the French never thought of filming her--even for instructional purposes. And despite the fact that the 1937 La Mort du Cygne print is extant--it was shown several years ago at a film festival in California--they haven't come out with it on DVD.

I searched through Ballet Talk for insight into Yvette Chauvire's dancing career given its length. I wasn't able to find much, so I wondered if anyone can recommend any studies or books about her that might give one some perspective on how she danced, her major roles, etc. I purchased the one DVD for sale on Amazon that shows clips of her dancing but mostly teaching. However, it appears there is nothing else out there that shows her in her prime. Even the 1937 La Mort du Cygne in which she starred is not available on DVD, unless I'm mistaken (hopefully).

I happened upon entirely new clips of Pavlova and Spessitzeva dancing, the latter from the 1932 Giselle production in London with Anton Dolin (not the rehearsal but the real thing), while there are clips from Fairy Doll and two other ballets with Pavlova. All seem to have been put up in the past three months. Simply type in their names in the search field.

I received my copy weeks ago and also find it a treasure trove of ballet writing, almost entirely from English and American writers. But I'm starting to find some oddities, like seeing only two reviews by Arlene Croce on Balanchine, both on relatively minor ballets (Mozartiana and Who Cares). Equally surprising were finding just ten pages on Nureyev and twenty pages on Fonteyn. But overall, this is a spectacular compendium of writing on ballet choreographers and their ballets, as well as ballet dancers over the past 100 years.

Has anyone on BT seen the new DVD?

I must be inhabiting another universe, because I found the RB's Sleeping Beauty to be second rate. The choreography was danced by the entire company so poorly, so lackadaiscally (other than Carabousse) as to make it look like another ballet when compared with the productions of the Paris Opera Ballet (2006 DVD) or the Kirov Ballet (2001 DVD), which I consider the top versions currently available. Some of the soloists in this Royal Ballet's Sleeping Beauty were downright embarrassing (eg, the Bluebird duet).

Many thanks for these. I've never seen these before, but I remember someone on BT saying The Fairy Doll sequence was included in Margot Fonteyn's dance documentaries, made after she retired from the stage, and never released commercially after their initial telecast. Unlike her famous Dying Swan, these clips truly show what her style was like.