Ballet Archives

Photo Credit: Concert number "Lezginka" Vaslav Nijinsky from the Divertissement "Pir", 1909, Berlin   During 1907 Nijinsky was to dance the part of the Prince in Swan Lake with ballerina Anna Pavlova but he became ill and wasn't able to make the performance.  Pavlova instead finding a new partner decided to perform a solo, the  swan this  performance would be the most memorable and live on as one of her greatest performances. Nijinsky read about what the critics thought about the performance and he was happy for Pavlova and Fokine but was disappointed he couldn't be part of that success and he was disappointed he didn't get to  dance with Anna Pavlova.  In my post about Nijinsky Dancing with Anna Pavlova please see  https://balletarchives.blogspot.com/2021/03/nijinsky-and-pavlovas-almost-swan-lake.htm l for more about how that night he was sick went. During Vaslav Nijinsky dealing with a cold Bronislava Nijinska asks him about his time in Moscow. Bronisl

Photo Credit: Nijinsky in the Siamese Dance in Les Orientales, 1910 Vaslav Ninjinsky gave a mind blowing performance when he took the stage as Blue Bird from The Sleeping Beauty  Ballet Bronislava Nijinska recounts this memory in her own words.    "Three days after the first performance of Le Pavillon d' Armide, Vaslav's dream was realized. On Wednesday, November 28, 1907, he was to dance the grand pas de deux, " Princess Florine and the Blue Bird," in Act II of The Sleeping Beauty." "Nijinsky was only eighteen years old when he was chosen to appear as the Blue Bird on the stage of the Maryinsky Theatre. It was most unusual that such an important dancing part as the Blue Bird should be entrusted to an Artist in his very first ballet season in the Imperial Theatres," "Princess Florine was to be danced  by Lydia Kyaksht. I was not familiar with this excellent classical dancer, for soon after her graduation from the School, in 1902, she had only

Photo Credit Anna Pavlova and Vaslav Nijinsky from the ballet Le Pavillon d' Armide, 1907, Maryinsky Theatre in St. Petersburg, Russia. Mikhail Fokine a young new choreographer was conducting rehearsals for his one act- ballet Le   Pavillon d'Armide in 1907. The ballet   was going to premier for the first time. Both Bronislava Nijinska and her brother Vaslav Nijinsky were part of it but things don't go as planned for the rehearsal. Bronislava Nijinska recounts the stress that happened during their dress rehearsal in her own words.  "For the Divertissement Kshessinska had asked Kulichevskaya to mount a pas de deux, to music by Chopin, for her and Vaslav. Kshessinska had greatly admired Isadora Duncan since seeing her dance in an all-Chopin concert in Vienna in 1903. The following year Kshessinska had been instrumental in bringing Duncan to Russia for her first visit." "The pas de deux called "Nocturne" that Kulichevskaya mounted used both a nocturne

Photo Credit: Vaslav Nijinsky and Tamara Karsavina in the " Giselle",  Ballet, Paris,  1911    Vaslav Nijinsky the young artist of the Maryinsky Theatre was in demand the critics raved about Nijinsky and the most famous ballerinas wanted to dance with him. Bronislava Nijinska recounts her brother's popularity in her own words.   "In October he danced a peasant dance with Tamara Karsavina, a semiclassical pas de deux  from Act I of Giselle.  As soon as he came out onto the stage for his variation the audience applauded him. Afterwards he told me that though he was happy and proud to be dancing with soloists like Sedova, Kyaksht, and Karsavina, he was dreaming of the day when he would dance a grand pas de deux in Giselle, Swan Lake, or Sleeping Beauty." "But despite his youth, more and more ballerinas and premieres danseuses wanted to dance with Vaslav. Anna Pavlova often invited him to join her practice sessions with Maestro Cecchetti. She had an apartment,

  Photo Credit: Vaslav Nijinsky and his sister Bronislava Nijinska in the ballet L'Apres-Midi d'un Faune. Bronislava Nijinska memory of when she spent time with her brother Vaslav Nijinsky's new friend Prince Lvov.  Their Mother was rather fond of the Prince since he helped her avoid a court summons when her husband never payed her debt off from 1904 which she was under the assumption that he did and was full of fear when she discovered that wasn't true.  The Prince and his attorney took care of everything which put Bronislava and Nijinsky's mother at ease and she avoided the court summons.   Bronislava Nijinska recounts the memory when she met a Prince and experienced a concert with her brother Nijinsky and the Prince in her own words. "Prince Lvov, Chamberlain of His Highness and secretary of the Minister of Transport and Communications, was then about thirty-five years old, six feet tall and had dark brown hair, which he wore smoothly combed and parted. He w

Photo Credit: Bronislava Nijinska Graduation photos in 1908 Bronislava now in her last year of the Imperial Theatrical school describes how her current days go and how her and her brother Vaslav Nijinsky have completely different opinions when it comes to the school. Bronislava Nijinska recounts this memory in her own words.    "At the beginning of September I had returned to the Imperial Theatrical School for my last year there, my graduation year. Now I was to share the room for graduating students. Though there were seven of us who were to graduate that year, Yelizaveta Gerdt was not a resident student, so there were only six of us sharing the room, which was very comfortable and enjoyable in it's privacy after the long narrow dormitory of fifty students." "We each had our own table with drawers beside our beds. We could study and read in our room, were allowed to stay up later than the younger students, and could have a half hour longer in bed in the mornings.&qu