Boston Ballet

In 1956, E. Virginia Williams moved the ballet school she founded from a studio in Back Bay to 186 Massachusetts Avenue, across from the Loew's State Theatre in Boston. At this point in time, the school offered classes starting at a children's level all the way to a professional division.

In 1958, out of her Boston School of Ballet (which was sometimes called The New England School of Ballet), E. Virginia Williams formed a small dance group named The New England Civic Ballet. The group primarily performed at small local festivals and venues around New England.[2]

From 1958-1962, the New England Civic Ballet performed regionally, dancing various pieces such as a three-act Nutcracker, Les Sylphides, and repertory works by E. Virginia Williams, Sydney Leonard, Lev Ianov, and Jean Paige.[2]

In August 1962, the New England Civic Ballet performed as part of the 30th year of the Jacob's Pillow Dance Festival. At this point, the New England Civic Ballet was considered a semi-professional company, and began calling themselves the Boston Ballet.

In December 1963, The Boston Globe reported that a Ford Foundation grant of US$144,000 to the Boston Ballet School had given birth to Boston's first and only professional ballet company. The total Ford Grant was $7,756,000, the largest private subsidy made to a single art form at the time. In part, based on the recommendations of George Balanchine and W. McNeil Lowry, the grant provided for the formation of several professional ballet companies. This included the Boston Ballet, Pennsylvania Ballet, Cincinnati Ballet, and Washington Ballet. Balanchine was a strong supporter of this initiative. He was Boston Ballet's artistic advisor for several years, and gave the new company several of his works.[3]

In 1979, Boston Ballet opened the Nervi Festival in Italy, and in 1980 was the first American dance company to perform in the People's Republic of China.[4][5] The Company made its London premiere in 1981, with a full-length production of Swan Lake.[5] In 1983, Boston Ballet presented Don Quixote on Broadway with Rudolf Nureyev as guest artist, after touring the United States, Mexico, France, and Italy. Boston Ballet performed Mark Morris's Mort Subite at the PepsiCo Festival in Purchase, New York in 1986,[5] and performed at the BESSIE Dance and Performance award ceremony at New York City Center in 1987.

Boston Ballet made its debut at the Kennedy Center in Washington DC, in January 1990. Thay May Natalia Dudinskaya, Konstantin Sergeyev, and assistant artistic director Anna-Marie Holmes staged a new production of Swan Lake with Boston Ballet dancers performing with dancers from the Kirov Ballet and the Bolshoi Ballet. In 1991, Boston Ballet moved into their current headquarters at 19 Clarendon Street in Boston's South End,[6] after touring throughout Spain in July.

In 2005, the company added James Kudelka's Cinderella, George Balanchine's Coppélia, Jewels, Midsummer Night's Dream, the American premiere of Jirí Kylián's Black and White, John Cranko's Onegin, The Taming of the Shrew, and Romeo and Juliet to its repertoire. Boston Ballet additionally appointed Jorma Elo as its resident choreographer. Elo created at least six works for the company, including Plan to B, Brake the Eyes, and Le Sacre du Printemps. During the summer of 2007, the company completed a second tour of Spain. Boston Ballet's touring included appearances at the Guggenheim Museum's Works & Process series, the "Fall for Dance" festivals held at New York City Center and Orange County Performing Arts Center, and performances at the Spoleto Festival USA and the Kennedy Center's Ballet Across America series in the spring of 2008. Boston Ballet embarked on its first tour to Seoul, South Korea in the summer of 2008, presenting works by George Balanchine, Twyla Tharp, and Christopher Wheeldon not previously performed there. In the fall of 2009, Boston Ballet's sole performance venue became the Boston Opera House.[7]

Boston Ballet maintains a repertoire that includes classics such as Marius Petipa's The Sleeping Beauty and August Bournonville's La Sylphide, contemporary versions of classics such as Mikko Nissinen's Swan Lake and John Cranko's Romeo and Juliet, and works by contemporary choreographers including William Forsythe, Jirí Kylián, Mark Morris, David Dawson, Val Caniparoli, Christopher Wheeldon, and Helen Pickett. Over 35 performances employ the entire company and more than 250 Boston Ballet School students who join in the production every year. Boston Ballet's The Nutcracker has been performed annually since 1963.[8]