1.
Frederick Ashton
–
Sir Frederick William Mallandaine Ashton OM CH CBE was a British ballet dancer and choreographer. He also worked as a director and choreographer in opera, film, determined to be a dancer, despite the opposition of his conventional middle-class family, Ashton was accepted as a pupil by Léonide Massine and then by Marie Rambert. In 1926 Rambert encouraged him to try his hand at choreography, Ashton was chief choreographer to Ninette de Valois, from 1935 until her retirement in 1963, in the company known successively as the Vic-Wells Ballet, the Sadlers Wells Ballet and the Royal Ballet. He succeeded de Valois as director of the company, serving until his own retirement in 1970, Ashton is widely credited with the creation of a specifically English genre of ballet. Among his best-known works are Façade, Symphonic Variations, Cinderella, La fille mal gardée, Monotones I and II, Enigma Variations, Ashton was born in Guayaquil, Ecuador, the fourth of the five children of George Ashton and his second wife, Georgiana, née Fulcher. George Ashton was manager of the Central and South American Cable Company, in 1907 the family moved to Lima, Peru, where Ashton attended a Dominican school. When they returned to Guayaquil in 1914, he attended a school for children of the English colony, one of his formative influences was serving as altar boy to the Roman Catholic Archbishop, which inspired in him a love of ritual. Another, still more potent, influence was being taken to see Anna Pavlova dance in 1917 and he was immediately determined that he would become a dancer. Dancing was not a career acceptable to a conventional English family at that time, Ashton later recalled, My father was horrified. You can imagine the middle-class attitude and my mother would say, He wants to go on the stage. She could not bring herself to say into the ballet, Ashtons father sent him to England in 1919 to Dover College, where he was miserable. Homosexual, and with a distinctly Spanish accent that his classmates laughed at and he was not academically inclined, and his father decided that on leaving the school in 1921 Ashton should join a commercial company. He worked for a firm in the City of London. In January 1924 George Ashton committed suicide and his widow was left financially dependent on her elder sons, who ran a successful business in Guayaquil. She moved to London to be with Ashton and his younger sister, despite family disapproval Ashton pursued his ambition to dance professionally. He auditioned for Léonide Massine, at the late age of twenty he was accepted as a pupil. After Massine left London, Ashton was taken on as a student by Marie Rambert and she encouraged him to try choreographing. His first attempt was in 1926 for a revue staged by Nigel Playfair, the Observer commented on an engaging little ballet called A Tragedy of Fashion, or The Scarlet Scissors which Mr. Eugene Goossens has set most suitably to music
2.
Sergei Prokofiev
–
Sergei Sergeyevich Prokofiev was a Russian and Soviet composer, pianist and conductor. As the creator of acknowledged masterpieces across numerous genres, he is regarded as one of the major composers of the 20th century. Prokofievs greatest interest, however, was opera, and he composed works in that genre, including The Gambler. Prokofievs one operatic success during his lifetime was The Love for Three Oranges, composed for the Chicago Opera and subsequently performed over the decade in Europe. During that time he married a Spanish singer, Carolina Codina, in the early 1930s, the Great Depression diminished opportunities for Prokofievs ballets and operas to be staged in America and western Europe. He enjoyed some success there – notably with Lieutenant Kijé, Peter and the Wolf, Romeo and Juliet, the Nazi invasion of the USSR spurred him to compose his most ambitious work, an operatic version of Leo Tolstoys War and Peace. Prokofiev was born in 1891 in Sontsovka, a rural estate in the Yekaterinoslav Governorate of the Russian Empire. His father, Sergei Alexeyevich Prokofiev, was an agronomist, Prokofievs mother, Maria, came from a family of former serfs who had been owned by the Sheremetev family, under whose patronage serf-children were taught theatre and arts from an early age. She was described by Reinhold Glière as a woman with beautiful. Who knew how to create an atmosphere of warmth and simplicity about her, after their wedding in the summer of 1877, the Prokofievs had moved to a small estate in the Smolensk governorate. Eventually Sergei Alexeyevich found employment as a engineer, employed by one of his former fellow-students, Dmitri Sontsov. By seven, he had learned to play chess. At the age of nine, he was composing his first opera, The Giant, as well as an overture, unable to arrange that, Tanayev instead arranged for composer and pianist Reinhold Glière to spend the summer of 1902 in Sontsovka teaching Prokofiev. The first series of lessons culminated, at the 11-year-old Prokofievs insistence, the following summer, Glière revisited Sontsovka to give further tuition. By 1904, his mother had decided instead on Saint Petersburg, glazunov was so impressed that he urged Prokofievs mother to have her son apply for admission to the Conservatory. He passed the tests and enrolled that year. Several years younger than most of his class, Prokofiev was viewed as eccentric and arrogant and he also shared classes with the composers Boris Asafyev and Nikolai Myaskovsky, the latter becoming a relatively close and lifelong friend. As a member of the Saint Petersburg music scene, Prokofiev developed a reputation as a rebel, while getting praise for his original compositions
3.
Royal Opera House
–
The Royal Opera House is an opera house and major performing arts venue in Covent Garden, central London. The large building is referred to as simply Covent Garden. It is the home of The Royal Opera, The Royal Ballet, originally called the Theatre Royal, it served primarily as a playhouse for the first hundred years of its history. In 1734, the first ballet was presented, a year later, Handels first season of operas began. Many of his operas and oratorios were written for Covent Garden and had their premieres there. The current building is the theatre on the site following disastrous fires in 1808 and 1856. The façade, foyer, and auditorium date from 1858, the main auditorium seats 2,256 people, making it the third largest in London, and consists of four tiers of boxes and balconies and the amphitheatre gallery. The proscenium is 12.20 m wide and 14.80 m high, the main auditorium is a Grade I listed building. The letters patent remained in the possession of the patentees heirs until the 19th century, in 1728, John Rich, actor-manager of the Dukes Company at Lincolns Inn Fields Theatre, commissioned The Beggars Opera from John Gay. In addition, a Royal Charter had created a fruit and vegetable market in the area, at its opening on 7 December 1732, Rich was carried by his actors in processional triumph into the theatre for its opening production of William Congreves The Way of the World. Despite the frequent interchangeability between the Covent Garden and Drury Lane companies, competition was intense, often presenting the plays at the same time. Rich introduced pantomime to the repertoire, himself performing and a tradition of seasonal pantomime continued at the modern theatre, in 1734, Covent Garden presented its first ballet, Pygmalion. Marie Sallé discarded tradition and her corset and danced in diaphanous robes, george Frideric Handel was named musical director of the company, at Lincolns Inn Fields, in 1719, but his first season of opera, at Covent Garden, was not presented until 1734. His first opera was Il pastor fido followed by Ariodante, the première of Alcina, there was a royal performance of Messiah in 1743, which was a success and began a tradition of Lenten oratorio performances. From 1735 until his death in 1759 he gave regular seasons there and he bequeathed his organ to John Rich, and it was placed in a prominent position on the stage, but was among many valuable items lost in a fire that destroyed the theatre on 20 September 1808. In 1792 the architect Henry Holland rebuilt the auditorium, within the shell of the building but deeper and wider than the old auditorium. Rebuilding began in December 1808, and the second Theatre Royal, the Old Price Riots lasted over two months, and the management was finally forced to accede to the audiences demands. During this time, entertainments were varied, opera and ballet were presented, kemble engaged a variety of acts, including the child performer Master Betty, the great clown Joseph Grimaldi made his name at Covent Garden
4.
Margot Fonteyn
–
Dame Margot Fonteyn de Arias, DBE, was an English ballerina. She spent her career as a dancer with the Royal Ballet. Fonteyn was born Margaret Evelyn Hookham on 18 May 1919 in Reigate and her father was a British engineer, among his family were people in literature and music. Her mother was half Irish and half Brazilian, the daughter of Brazilian industrialist Antonio Fontes and her later formal married name was Margot Fonteyn de Arias, in the Spanish-language tradition. At four years of age her mother signed her and her brother up for ballet classes. At age eight, Margot travelled to China with her mother and father, for six years Margot lived in TianJin, then in Shanghai, where she studied ballet with Russian émigré teacher George Goncharov. Her mother brought her back to London when she was 14, continuing to work in Shanghai, her father was interned during World War II by the invading Japanese. After starting with the Vic-Wells Ballet, she rose quickly through the ranks of the company, by 1939 Fonteyn had performed principal roles in Giselle, Swan Lake and The Sleeping Beauty and was appointed Prima Ballerina. She was most noted in the ballets of Frederick Ashton, including Ondine, Daphnis and Chloe and she was especially renowned for her portrayal of Aurora in Tchaikovskys The Sleeping Beauty. Fonteyn also worked with choreographer Roland Petit and, later in life, when the Royal Ballet toured the United States in 1949, Fonteyn instantly became a celebrity for her performances. In the 1940s she and Robert Helpmann formed a successful dance partnership. In the 1950s she danced regularly with Michael Somes, in 1955, the year in which Fonteyn married a Panamanian diplomat, they danced together in the first colour telecast of a ballet, NBCs production of The Sleeping Beauty. In 1958 they appeared together in the first British televised version of The Nutcracker and she named Helpmann the favourite partner of her entire career. Fonteyn began her greatest artistic partnership at a time many people, including the head of the Royal Ballet, Ninette de Valois. In 1961 Rudolf Nureyev defected to the West, and on 21 February 1962 he and she was 42 and he was 24. Their performance was a success, during the curtain calls Nureyev dropped to his knees. They created a partnership that lasted until her retirement—with no pension—in 1979 at age 61. Fonteyn and Nureyev became known for inspiring repeated frenzied curtain calls, sir Frederick Ashton choreographed Marguerite and Armand for them, which no other couple danced until the 21st century
5.
Auditorium Building (Chicago)
–
The Auditorium Building in Chicago is one of the best-known designs of Louis Sullivan and Dankmar Adler. Completed in 1889, the building is located at the northwest corner of South Michigan Avenue and Congress Street. The building, which when constructed was the largest in the United States and the tallest in Chicago, was designed to be a complex, including offices, a theater. As a young apprentice, Frank Lloyd Wright worked on some of the interior design, the Auditorium Theatre is part of the Auditorium Building and is located at 50 East Congress Parkway. The theater was the first home of the Chicago Civic Opera and it currently hosts the season performances of the Joffrey Ballet. The building was added to the National Register of Historic Places on April 17,1970 and it was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1975, and was designated a Chicago Landmark on September 15,1976. In addition, it is a historic district contributing property for the Chicago Landmark Historic Michigan Boulevard District, since 1947, the Auditorium Building has been part of Roosevelt University. He was said to have wanted to make culture accessible to the working classes of Chicago. The building was to include a block and a first class hotel. Peck persuaded many Chicago business tycoons to go on board with him, including Marshall Field, Edson Keith, Martin A. Ryerson, Charles L. Hutchinson, the association hired the renowned architectural firm of Dankmar Adler and Louis Sullivan to design the building. At the time, a young Frank Lloyd Wright was employed at the firm as draftsman, and he may have contributed to the design. The Auditorium was built for a syndicate of businessmen to house a large opera house, to provide an economic base it was decided to wrap the auditorium with a hotel. Hence Adler & Sullivan had to plan a complex multiple-use building, fronting on Michigan Avenue, overlooking the lake, was the hotel while the offices were placed to the west on Wabash Avenue. The entrance to the auditorium is on the south side beneath the tall blocky eighteen-story tower, the rest of the building is a uniform ten stories, organized in the same way as Richardsons Marshall Field Wholesale Store. The Auditorium is a heavy, impressive structure externally, and was striking in its day when buildings of its scale were less common. When completed, it was the tallest building in the city, one of the most innovative features of the building was its massive raft foundation, designed by Adler in conjunction with engineer Paul Mueller. The soil beneath the Auditorium consists of blue clay to a depth of over 100 feet. Adler and Mueller designed a floating mat of crisscrossed railroad ties, topped with a layer of steel rails embedded in concrete
6.
Marius Petipa
–
Marius Ivanovich Petipa, born Victor Marius Alphonse Petipa was a French and Russian ballet dancer, pedagogue and choreographer. Petipa is considered to be the most influential ballet master and choreographer in ballet history, Petipa created over fifty ballets, some of which have survived in versions either faithful to, inspired by, or reconstructed from the original. Petipa revived a number of works created by other choreographers. Many of these revivals would go on to become the definitive editions on which all subsequent productions would be based, the most famous of these revivals were Le Corsaire, Giselle, La Esmeralda, Coppélia, La Fille Mal Gardée, The Little Humpbacked Horse and Swan Lake. All of the works and individual pieces which have survived in active performance are considered to be cornerstones of the ballet repertory. Marius Petipa was born Victor Marius Alphonse Petipa in Marseilles, France on 11 March 1818 and his mother, Victorine Grasseau, was a tragic actress and teacher of drama, while his father, Jean Antoine Petipa, was among the most renowned Ballet Masters and pedagogues in Europe. At the time of Mariuss birth, Jean Petipa was engaged as Premier danseur to the Salle Bauveau, Marius Petipa spent his early childhood traveling throughout Europe with his family, as his parents professional engagements took them from city to city. The young Marius received his education at the Grand College in Brussels, while also attending the Brussels Conservatory where he studied music. Just as he had done with his children, Jean Petipa began giving the young Marius lessons in ballet at the age of seven. At first the young boy resisted, caring little for dance. Nevertheless, he came to love this art form that was so much the life and identity of his family. At the age of nine Marius performed for the first time in a production as a Savoyard in his fathers staging of Pierre Gardels 1800 ballet La Dansomani in 1827. The violent street fighting that followed caused all theatres to be shut down for a time, the Petipa family was left in dire straits for some years. The Petipa family relocated to Bordeaux, France, in 1834 where Marius father had secured the position of Premier maître de ballet to the Grand Théâtre de Bordeaux, while in Bordeaux, Marius completed his ballet training under the great Auguste Vestris. By 1838 he was appointed Premier danseur to the Ballet de Nantes in Nantes, during his time in Nantes the young Petipa began to try his hand at choreography by creating a number of one-act ballets and divertissements. The 21-year-old Marius Petipa accompanied his father on a tour of the United States with a group of French dancers in July of 1839. Among the many engagements was a performance of Jean Corallis La tarentule at the National Theatre on Broadway, the tour proved to be a disaster, as many in the uncultured American audiences of that time had never before seen ballet. To add to the fiasco, the American impresario who arranged the engagements stole a portion of the troupes receipts
7.
Pointe shoe
–
A pointe shoe is a type of shoe worn by ballet dancers when performing pointe work. Pointe shoes were conceived in response to the desire for dancers to appear weightless and they are manufactured in a variety of colors, most commonly in shades of light pink. Women began to dance ballet in 1681, twenty years after King Louis XIV of France ordered the founding of the Académie Royale de Danse, at that time, the standard womens ballet shoe had heels. After the French Revolution, heels were completely eliminated from standard ballet shoes, the first dancers to rise up on their toes did so with the help of an invention by Charles Didelot in 1795. His flying machine lifted dancers upward, allowing them to stand on their toes before leaving the ground and this lightness and ethereal quality was well received by audiences and, as a result, choreographers began to look for ways to incorporate more pointe work into their pieces. As dance progressed into the 19th century, the emphasis on technical skill increased, because the shoes of this period offered no support, dancers would pad their toes for comfort and rely on the strength of their feet and ankles for support. The next substantially different form of pointe shoe appeared in Italy in the late 19th century, dancers like Pierina Legnani wore shoes with a sturdy, flat platform at the front end of the shoe, rather than the more sharply pointed toe of earlier models. These shoes also included a box—made of layers of fabric—for containing the toes, and they were constructed without nails and the soles were only stiffened at the toes, making them nearly silent. The birth of the pointe shoe is often attributed to the early 20th-century Russian ballerina Anna Pavlova. Pavlova had particularly high, arched insteps, which left her vulnerable to injury when dancing en pointe and she also had slender, tapered feet, which resulted in excessive pressure on her big toes. To compensate for this, she inserted toughened leather soles into her shoes for extra support, every dancer has unique feet, with variations that include toe length and shape, arch flexibility, and mechanical strength. Consequently, most pointe shoe manufacturers produce more than one model of shoe, with each offering a different fit. A shank, which is a piece of material that serves to stiffen the sole so as to provide support for the arch of the en pointe foot. The exterior of a shoe is covered with fabric, thus concealing the box and other internal structural elements. Most pointe shoes are covered with satin, but some are available with canvas exteriors, Pointe shoes are most often available in light pink colors and less commonly in black and white. Pointe shoes can often be ordered in other custom colors, the vamp refers to the shoes upper piece, measured from the platform to the drawstring, normally, longer toes call for a longer vamp. The throat is the edge of the vamp above the arch of the foot, the drawstring is located within the binding on the throat, this may be made from either elastic or lace. The box is an enclosure within the front end of the shoe that encases
8.
China
–
China, officially the Peoples Republic of China, is a unitary sovereign state in East Asia and the worlds most populous country, with a population of over 1.381 billion. The state is governed by the Communist Party of China and its capital is Beijing, the countrys major urban areas include Shanghai, Guangzhou, Beijing, Chongqing, Shenzhen, Tianjin and Hong Kong. China is a power and a major regional power within Asia. Chinas landscape is vast and diverse, ranging from forest steppes, the Himalaya, Karakoram, Pamir and Tian Shan mountain ranges separate China from much of South and Central Asia. The Yangtze and Yellow Rivers, the third and sixth longest in the world, respectively, Chinas coastline along the Pacific Ocean is 14,500 kilometers long and is bounded by the Bohai, Yellow, East China and South China seas. China emerged as one of the worlds earliest civilizations in the basin of the Yellow River in the North China Plain. For millennia, Chinas political system was based on hereditary monarchies known as dynasties, in 1912, the Republic of China replaced the last dynasty and ruled the Chinese mainland until 1949, when it was defeated by the communist Peoples Liberation Army in the Chinese Civil War. The Communist Party established the Peoples Republic of China in Beijing on 1 October 1949, both the ROC and PRC continue to claim to be the legitimate government of all China, though the latter has more recognition in the world and controls more territory. China had the largest economy in the world for much of the last two years, during which it has seen cycles of prosperity and decline. Since the introduction of reforms in 1978, China has become one of the worlds fastest-growing major economies. As of 2016, it is the worlds second-largest economy by nominal GDP, China is also the worlds largest exporter and second-largest importer of goods. China is a nuclear weapons state and has the worlds largest standing army. The PRC is a member of the United Nations, as it replaced the ROC as a permanent member of the U. N. Security Council in 1971. China is also a member of numerous formal and informal multilateral organizations, including the WTO, APEC, BRICS, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, the BCIM, the English name China is first attested in Richard Edens 1555 translation of the 1516 journal of the Portuguese explorer Duarte Barbosa. The demonym, that is, the name for the people, Portuguese China is thought to derive from Persian Chīn, and perhaps ultimately from Sanskrit Cīna. Cīna was first used in early Hindu scripture, including the Mahābhārata, there are, however, other suggestions for the derivation of China. The official name of the state is the Peoples Republic of China. The shorter form is China Zhōngguó, from zhōng and guó and it was then applied to the area around Luoyi during the Eastern Zhou and then to Chinas Central Plain before being used as an occasional synonym for the state under the Qing
9.
Pantomime
–
Pantomime, is a type of musical comedy stage production, designed for family entertainment. It was developed in England and is performed throughout the United Kingdom, generally during the Christmas and New Year season and, to a lesser extent. It is a form of theatre, in which the audience is expected to sing along with certain parts of the music. Pantomime has a theatrical history in Western culture dating back to classical theatre. It developed partly from the 16th century commedia dellarte tradition of Italy, as well as other European and British stage traditions, such as 17th-century masques, an important part of the pantomime, until the late 19th century, was the harlequinade. Outside Britain the word pantomime is used to mean miming. The Roman pantomime drew upon the Greek tragedy and other Greek genres from its inception, although the art was instituted in Rome, the English word came to be applied to the performance itself. Music was supplied by flute and the pulse of an iron-shod shoe, performances might be in a private household, with minimal personnel, or else lavish theatrical productions involving a large orchestra and chorus and sometimes an ancillary actor. The dancer danced all the roles, relying on masks, stock poses and gestures, Pantomime differed from mime by its more artistic nature and relative lack of farce and coarse humour, though these were not absent from some productions. Precursors of pantomime also included the masque, which grew in pomp, the development of English pantomime was also strongly influenced by the continental commedia dellarte, a form of popular theatre that arose in Italy in the Early Modern Period. Each scenario used some of the stock characters. These included the innamorati, the vecchi such as Pantalone, and zanni such as Arlecchino, Colombina, Scaramouche, Italian masque performances in the 17th century sometimes included the Harlequin character. In the 17th century, adaptations of the characters became familiar in English entertainments. From these, the standard English harlequinade developed, depicting the eloping lovers Harlequin and Columbine, pursued by the girls father Pantaloon and his comic servants Clown, in English versions, by the 18th century, Harlequin became the central figure and romantic lead. The basic plot of the harlequinade remained essentially the same for more than 150 years, tavern Bilkers, by John Weaver, the dancing master at Drury Lane, is cited as the first pantomime produced on the English stage. The same year he produced a pantomime on the subject of Perseus, after this, pantomime was regular feature at Drury Lane. In 1717 at Lincolns Inn, actor and manager John Rich introduced Harlequin into the theatres pantomimes under the name of Lun and he gained great popularity for his pantomimes, especially beginning with his 1724 production of The Necromancer, or, History of Dr. Faustus. These early pantomimes were silent, or dumb show, performances consisting of only dancing, spoken drama was only allowed in London only in the two patent theatres until Parliament changed this restriction in 1843
10.
Vienna
–
Vienna is the capital and largest city of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austrias primary city, with a population of about 1.8 million, and its cultural, economic and it is the 7th-largest city by population within city limits in the European Union. Today, it has the second largest number of German speakers after Berlin, Vienna is host to many major international organizations, including the United Nations and OPEC. The city is located in the part of Austria and is close to the borders of the Czech Republic, Slovakia. These regions work together in a European Centrope border region, along with nearby Bratislava, Vienna forms a metropolitan region with 3 million inhabitants. In 2001, the city centre was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site, apart from being regarded as the City of Music because of its musical legacy, Vienna is also said to be The City of Dreams because it was home to the worlds first psycho-analyst – Sigmund Freud. The citys roots lie in early Celtic and Roman settlements that transformed into a Medieval and Baroque city and it is well known for having played an essential role as a leading European music centre, from the great age of Viennese Classicism through the early part of the 20th century. The historic centre of Vienna is rich in architectural ensembles, including Baroque castles and gardens, Vienna is known for its high quality of life. In a 2005 study of 127 world cities, the Economist Intelligence Unit ranked the city first for the worlds most liveable cities, between 2011 and 2015, Vienna was ranked second, behind Melbourne, Australia. Monocles 2015 Quality of Life Survey ranked Vienna second on a list of the top 25 cities in the world to make a base within, the UN-Habitat has classified Vienna as being the most prosperous city in the world in 2012/2013. Vienna regularly hosts urban planning conferences and is used as a case study by urban planners. Between 2005 and 2010, Vienna was the worlds number-one destination for international congresses and it attracts over 3.7 million tourists a year. The English name Vienna is borrowed from the homonymous Italian version of the name or the French Vienne. The etymology of the name is still subject to scholarly dispute. Some claim that the name comes from Vedunia, meaning forest stream, which produced the Old High German Uuenia. A variant of this Celtic name could be preserved in the Czech and Slovak names of the city, the name of the city in Hungarian, Serbo-Croatian and Ottoman Turkish has a different, probably Slavonic origin, and originally referred to an Avar fort in the area. Slovene-speakers call the city Dunaj, which in other Central European Slavic languages means the Danube River, evidence has been found of continuous habitation since 500 BC, when the site of Vienna on the Danube River was settled by the Celts. In 15 BC, the Romans fortified the city they called Vindobona to guard the empire against Germanic tribes to the north
