BALLET IN LEICESTER SQUARE

A rare find, we have the 1992 Dance Books of Cecil Court Covent Garden publication which is sub-titled 'The Alhambra and the Empire 1860-1916.' More than half a century separated the golden age of Romantic ballet and the revelation of Diaghilev's Ballets Russes. This book focusses on ballet in two famous London music halls of these years and is an engaging evocation of the social milieu. Music halls provided a fertile new ground for ballets to flourish engaging the interest of a new public not so cultured as those who frequented the opera house. In particular, ballet became centred in Leicester Square where the Alhambra and the Empire nightly attracted thousands to see variety acts in one half and ballet in the other. Both theatres established permanent corps de ballet, and every programme regularly presented two ballets produced by choreographers of high repute. At the Alhambra mainly by a sequence of leading Italian ballet masters and later by a distinguished Russian, Alexander Gorsky. At the Empire by Katti Lanner. A galaxy of ballerinas visited, among them the flamboyant Pitteri, Pertoldi who was so admired by Bernard Shaw, whose technique was so impeccable that Espinosa called her 'the complete Paladino', and the legendary Legnani and the celebrated Cecchetti. The Empire became a shrine to worship Adeline Genée and after her retirement Phyllis Bedells, the first English Prima Ballerina, and the Russian Lydia Kyasht. The company relied heavily on the beauty of the spectacle and costumes by such designers as C. Wilhelm. Sometimes women played male parts and the technical demands would seem basic, but nonetheless since they never appeared at any one time in more than two ballets, which might run nightly for six months or even a year, they were able to achieve an impressive display of precision. The ballet companies of these two theatres did not survive the First World War. Revue was replacing variety, and the Ballets Russes revealed a new aesthetic and major art. 192pp with index of names and of ballets, musical comedies, operas, plays etc. and appendices of principal dancers. Well illustrated with archive photos of the stars and productions and some pencil sketches. One colour plate at frontispiece.