Lauren King
FORMER NEW YORK CITY BALLET PRINCIPALS PATRICIA McBRIDE and ADAM LUDERS COACH THE SEDUCTION SCENE FROM LA VALSE
New York City: On September 23 2024, in the NYCB studios at Lincoln Center, working with NYCB principal dancers Indiana Woodward, Chun Wai Chen, and Taylor Stanley, Patricia McBride and Adam Luders coached the roles originated by Tanaquil LeClercq, Nicolas Magallanes and Frank Moncion from La Valse. Alan Moverman, NYCB solo pianist, accompanied the session with Nancy Reynolds interviewing the coaches at the conclusion of the studio session.
NYCB General Director Lincoln Kirstein saw La Valse as a metaphor for the fall of the Hapsburg Empire. In the ballet, following a series of divertissements, critic Arlene Croce wrote, "the whole of society pitches into the abyss." In a ballroom of another century, a young woman is seduced, then danced to death by a mysterious stranger. Of the heroine, historian Nancy Reynolds observed, “La Valse may have been the quintessential role of Tanaquil Le Clercq, not only for its angular sophistication and doomed half-innocence, which she was superbly equipped to project, but for the eerie parallel between her waltz with Death and her real-life paralysis from polio in 1956” (Repertory in Review). After Le Clercq's tragedy the ballet was not performed for six years, when Balanchine chose the young Patricia McBride for the role. Coached by Balanchine and Le Clercq, McBride brought to it an otherworldly, almost vampire-like characterization, with an element of sophistication. "She found her own qualities of radiance and apprehension and she danced exquisitely" (critic P.W. Manchester). As seen in The Night Shadow (La Sonnambula), the final movement of Serenade, and his earlier Cotillon, Balanchine's mystic sensibility is on display in other works as well.
The GBF Video Archives document the insights of dancers, often principals from original casts or those who worked closely with Balanchine. The Archives mission is to preserve this knowledge and pass it on to today's dancers, scholars, and audiences. The Archives are available world-wide through public and university libraries, and digitally through the George Balanchine Foundation website for those working in the dance field and using these resources in their work. In addition, the interview components can be accessed on the Balanchine Foundation's YouTube channel.
PATRICIA MCBRIDE, in a long and illustrious career with NYCB, had an extraordinarily large number of works choreographed on her by George Balanchine, including “Rubies” (Jewels), Tarantella, Who Cares?, A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Hermia), Harlequinade (Columbine), Brahms-Schoenberg Quartet (Intermezzo), Union Jack, Coppélia (Swanhilda), and Divertimento from Le Baiser de la Fée, among several others. McBride was also favored by Jerome Robbins, who created principal roles for her in Dances at a Gathering, The Goldberg Variations, The Four Seasons, and Opus 19/The Dreamer. With her frequent partner Edward Villella she performed on concert stages around the world. Among her other partners were some of the most noted dancers of her generation, including Mikhail Baryshnikov, Helgi Tómasson, and Peter Martins. McBride danced for five presidents. She is the recipient of a Dance Magazine Award and the Kennedy Center Honors. After her retirement from performing in 1989, she joined the faculties of the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music and the Chautauqua Institute, before taking up a senior position at the Charlotte Ballet in 1996, where she continues to teach and set excerpts of Balanchine ballets. For the GBF Video Archives she has been recorded coaching her created roles in “Rubies,” Tarantella, Who Cares?, Harlequinade, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Brahms-Schoenberg Quartet, The Nutcracker, The Steadfast Tin Soldier, and Le Baiser de la Fée.
ADAM LUDERS began his ballet training at the Royal Danish Ballet School and graduated to become a member of the Royal Danish Ballet in 1968. He was a principal dancer with London Festival Ballet (1973–5) and New York City Ballet (1975–94) creating roles in Balanchine's Davidsbündertänze, Kammermusik No. 2, and Walpurgisnacht, as well as Robbins's In Memory of... among others. Since retiring he has taught widely, including at the School of American Ballet, and staged Balanchine repertory for the George Balanchine Trust. Trained in the Bournonville tradition, Luders was the classic ‘danseur noble’. He is part of the last generation of dancers who worked closely with Balanchine at the New York City Ballet and has danced most of the Balanchine and Robbins repertoire. Luders is famous for his skill in pas de deux, and he has partnered most of Balanchine’s ballerinas as well other international stars. For the Interpreters Archive he has coached the first movement of Brahms-Schoenberg Quartet and excerpts from Davidsbündlertänze, Ballade, Kammermusik No. 2, Orpheus and Vienna Waltzes.
CHUN WAI CHAN, born in Guangdong, China, and trained at the Guangzhou Art School from 2004 to 2010. In 2010 he was a finalist at the Prix de Lausanne, which earned him a full scholarship to study with Houston Ballet’s second company, Houston Ballet II. In 2012 Chan joined Houston Ballet as a member of the corps de ballet and he was promoted to principal dancer in 2017. Chan joined NYCB as a soloist in August 2021, and in May 2022 was promoted to principal dancer, making a name for himself as a skilled partner in such ballets as the Cavalier in George Balanchine's The Nutcracker ©, Apollo, Emeralds, Diamonds, and Liebeslieder Walzer.
TAYLOR STANLEY, born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, began their dance training at the age of three at The Rock School in Pennsylvania. Stanley joined the NYCB, first as an apprentice, then as a full member in September 2010 and was promoted to soloist in February 2013 and to principal dancer in May 2016. Their repertory includes works of Balanchine: Apollo, Agon, Duo Concertant, A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Puck), Square Dance; Robbins: Opus 19, Dances at a Gathering; and Martins: Romeo + Juliet (Romeo), and Barber Violin Concerto. Stanley was featured in the Interpreters Archive coaching of Episodes.
INDIANA WOODWARD, born in Paris, France, began her dance training in Venice, California, and continued her studies at SAB. In 2012 she joined NYCB and was promoted to soloist in 2017 and principal in 2021. Her repertory includes works of Balanchine: Nutcracker (Sugar Plum, Dewdrop); Apollo (Calliope); Liebeslieder Walzer; Ratmansky: Solitude; Robbins: Four Seasons (Spring), Dances at a Gathering; and Martins: Sleeping Beauty (Aurora), Les Sylphides. For the Video Archives, Patricia Wilde coached Woodward in her roles from George Balanchine's The Nutcracker® (Marzipan), Caracole, Western Symphony and Swan Lake (pas de trois); in addition, Allegra Kent coached Woodward in Stars and Stripes (Corcoran Cadets).
NANCY REYNOLDS is the founding director of the George Balanchine Video Archives. She is a former dancer with New York City Ballet and has been Director of Research for The George Balanchine Foundation since 1994, when she conceived the Video Archives program. Among her books are Repertory in Review: Forty Years of the New York City Ballet; No Fixed Points: Dance in the Twentieth Century (with Malcolm McCormick); and Remembering Lincoln. In 2013 she received a “Bessie” award for “outstanding service to the field of dance.”
PAUL BOOS, Director of the Video Archives since 2021, is a former dancer with NYCB and répétiteur for the George Balanchine Trust. His work for the Trust has been presented at several theaters, including the Maryinsky, Bolshoi, Paris Opera, La Scala, Pacific Northwest Ballet, and Boston Ballet. He also is a guest teacher abroad and locally.
The George Balanchine Foundation is a not-for-profit corporation established in 1983 with the goal of creating programs that educate the public and further Balanchine’s work and aesthetic. Among the GBF’s major initiatives are the Video Archives, in which dancers who worked closely with Balanchine teach and coach their roles with the dancers of today (Interpreters Archive) or recreate sections of ballets that are rarely performed or in danger of disappearing (Archive of Lost Choreography). Legendary dancers who have taken part in this project include Alicia Alonso, Jacques d’Amboise, Suzanne Farrell, Frederic Franklin, Melissa Hayden, Allegra Kent, Alicia Markova, Patricia McBride, Maria Tallchief, Violette Verdy, Patricia Wilde, Edward Villella, and others, working with dancers from such companies as New York City Ballet, American Ballet Theatre, Pittsburgh Ballet Theatre, and San Francisco, Boston, Pacific Northwest and Suzanne Farrell ballets.
In 2007 the Foundation announced a major initiative, the online publication of the Balanchine Catalogue, a fully searchable database giving first-performance details of all known dances created by Balanchine and supplemented by lists of companies staging his ballets, a bibliography, a videography, reference resources, a database of roles Balanchine performed, and related information. The project was made possible by a leadership grant from The Jerome Robbins Foundation. An expanded and updated version, enhanced by visuals, was introduced in June 2022 (www.balanchine.org).
The George Balanchine Foundation expresses its profound gratitude to the following donors: Agnes Gund, Barbara D. Horgan, The New York State Council on the Arts, the Pettit Foundation, Nancy R. Reynolds, and The Rockefeller Brothers Fund; and to Robert Brenner, Leslie Tonner Curtis, The National Endowment for the Arts, Meryl Rosofsky and Stuart H. Coleman, The Evelyn Sharp Foundation, Denise Littlefield Sobel, Resa and Heiner Sussner, and I. Peter Wolff.
