Contact: Mel Schierman
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THE GEORGE BALANCHINE FOUNDATION ISSUES SEVEN NEW ARCHIVAL VIDEOS
New York City — The George Balanchine Foundation is pleased to announce seven additions to its archival video series. These videos are devoted to detailed examinations of selected passages of Balanchine's choreography. In a studio setting, originators or major interpreters of some of his greatest works teach, coach, and discuss their parts with dancers of today. The overall goal of the Video Archives Program is to create an original "manuscript" of Balanchine's ballets by preserving not only the steps but the nuances of the choreography as Balanchine taught it to his original casts.
Coaches in the 2011 series include Merrill Ashley, Conrad Ludlow, Yvonne Mounsey, Mimi Paul, Helgi Tomasson, Violette Verdy and Karin von Aroldingen. Participating are contemporary dancers from Los Angeles Ballet, New York City Ballet and San Francisco Ballet.
The release of the seven new videos brings the series total to thirty-five. Edited masters are preserved in the Jerome Robbins Dance Division of the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, and for a nominal fee, copies of these are made available to non-circulating research repositories. Currently some seventy libraries worldwide house the collection.
Nancy Reynolds, dance historian, writer, and the Foundation's director of research, conceived and continues to direct the program, assisted by independent filmmaker and film professor Virginia Brooks and Nichol Hlinka, former New York City Ballet principal dancer.
For a complete list of videos shot to date and the facilities housing them, visit: https://balanchine.org/03/gbfvideoarchives.jsp
The George Balanchine Foundation is a not-for-profit corporation founded in 1983. Its mission is to create programs that educate the public and further Balanchine's work and aesthetic in order to facilitate high standards of excellence in dance and related arts.