Vaganova Today: The Preservation of Pedagogical Tradition

by Catherine E. Pawlick

“An extensive and thorough compilation of numerous sources with unique insights on Vaganova and her methodology. The author has had access to several important figures in Russian ballet who knew Vaganova and/or her students. Confronting the dilemmas facing the art of classical ballet,  Vaganova Today  is a thought-provoking read.”—John White, author of  Advanced Principles in Teaching Classical Ballet Agrippina Vaganova (1879–1951) is revered as the visionary who first codified the Russian system of classical ballet training. The Vaganova Academy of Russian Ballet, founded on impeccable technique and centuries of tradition, has a reputation for elite standards, and its graduates include Mikhail Baryshnikov, Rudolf Nureyev, Natalia Makarova, and Diana Vishneva. Yet the “Vaganova method” has come under criticism in recent years.
           
In this absorbing volume, Catherine Pawlick traces Vaganova’s story from her early years as a ballet student in tsarist Russia to her career as a dancer with the Mariinsky (Kirov) Ballet to her work as a pedagogue and choreographer. Pawlick then goes beyond biography to address Vaganova’s legacy today, offering the first-ever English translations of primary source materials and intriguing interviews with pedagogues and dancers from the Academy and the Mariinsky Ballet, including some who studied with Vaganova herself.  Catherine E. Pawlick  danced with ballet companies in the United States before moving to St. Petersburg, Russia, where she lived for six years, observing classes at the Vaganova Academy and rehearsals and performances at the Mariinsky Theatre. Fluent in French and Russian, she has written on dance for the  San Francisco Chronicle ,  Ballet Review , and  Dance Europe . 

296 pages, Hardcover

First published September 4, 2011

Reviews

[Katrina Sark · Rating 3 out of 5]

p.xiii – Russia of the twenty-first century was different from the one I had seen a decade previously, but vestiges of the Communist system remained, and still remain today. Lack of hot water for three weeks each summer, surly shopkeepers, the double-pricing system for foreigners, a dearth of common Western goods, cheap electricity and gas, and exponentially expensive real estate are just some of the elements that characterize St. Petersburg today. Unlike in the West, daily survival in Russia remains a real challenge that puts the glorious world of ballet in perspective. It becomes easy to understand at least one reason that this art form of beauty and harmony has flourished for centuries: at its height, it provides an idyllic alter-reality that allows the views to escape the drudgery of daily living for a few hours each night.

Chronology

1738 – Anna Ivanova signs a decree opening the “Dancing School of Her Highness” (Imperial Dance School)
1779 – Reorganization of the dance school into the Imperial Theatre School (uniting dancers, musicians, and dramatic actors)
1836 – Imperial Theatre School moved from 93 Canal Griboedova to a new building of #2 Theatre Street (Rossi Street), where Italian architect Carlo Rossi, with the help of Alberto Cavos and engineers specially built the first Russian ballet studio with wooden floors.
1847 – Marius Petipa arrived in St. Petersburg (ballet master at Mariinsky from 1869)
1892 – Entico Cecchetti taught at the school until 1902, reviving interests in male dancing and bringing the Italian virtuosity to dance
1897 – Vaganova graduated from Imperial ballet school and joined the Mariinsky Theatre
1904 – Mikhail Fokine began teaching in the school; in 1907 he choreographed his first version of Chopiniana, in 1911 became ballet master of Mariinsky and remained until 1918
1910 – Vaganova danced the Wltz in Fokine’s Chopiniana, and Giselle in 1915
1916 – Vaganova retired from the stage and began teaching at Akim Volinsky’s School of Russian Balllet (Baltflot)
1917-18 – Mariinsky renamed the State Academic Theatre of Opera and Ballet
1918 – Imperial Theatre School renamed the State Petrograd Theatrical (Ballet) School
1920-51 – Agrippina Vaganova taught at the school
1924 – The school became the Leningrad Choreographic School
1931-37 – Vaganova worked as Artistic Director of the Kirov Ballet, staged The Flames of Paris (1932), The Fountain of Bachchisarai (1934) Lost Illusions (1936), and Partisan Days (1937)
1932 – Alexander Pushkin started teaching at the school
1934 – Vaganova published Basic Principles of Classical Ballet (Osnovy Klassicheskogo Tanza)
1935 – Theatre renamed “Kirov” after the assassinated Sergei Kirov, the mayor of Leningrad
1941-44 – Evacuation of the school to Perm
1957 – School museum is opened. The School is renamed after Vaganova
1988 – 250-year anniversary of the School. A new building and renewed museum opened
1990 – School toured the United States for the first time
1992 – School renamed Vaganova Academy of Russian Ballet
1993 – Pedagogical Faculty organized an advanced degree program for training ballet masters
1998 – Modern dance classes introduced
2007 – The Academy extended its course of study from 8 to 9 years to unify the system with other European training systems

Introduction

p.3 – The French school at the end of the nineteenth century was characterized by overly decorative movements described by Vaganova as “saccharine sweetness” with flaccid poses and limited virtuosity. The Italian school, on the other hand, according to Vaganova, focused on virtuosity at the expense of poetry and substance. The main guides to classical ballet included the four-volume issues of The Letters about Dance by Noverre, published upon the order of Tsar Alexander I in 1803-04, and Calro Blasis’ The Code of Terpsichore, published in 1928, which codified existing French technique and laid the foundation for the Italian school. Russia had nothing systematized or codified of its own. The result was a mix of styles, but an uncategorized and unstandardized one.

p.4 – Vaganova’s efforts to take the best from the existing knowledge, improve upon it, systematize it, and further develop virtuosic technique was unprecedented in Russia. She worked to teach dancers a conscious approach to each movement. Her students not only learned steps, but the reason for them and how they should be executed.
Vaganova’s system taught dancers to dance with the entire body to acquire harmony of movement and to expand their range of expression.

Vaganova the Dancer

p.11 - During her study with Olga Preobrajenska, Vaganova began to think about how to judiciously clarify the movement, force the entire body to work, subdue all of the muscles into working. These early attempts at analysis were also attempts to unify the French and the Italian methods into another distinct form.

Preobrajenska left the stage in 1920. In 1921 she emigrated, teaching in Milan, London, Buenos Aires, and Berlin. Beginning in 1923 she taught at her own studio in Paris. It should be noted that Paris and it environs had scores of ballet schools at the time, but Preobrajenska’s school achieved such a reputation that the most famous ballerinas considered it an honor to study with her. On was here that she trained two of the three “baby ballerinas” chosen by George Balanchine as stars of the first post-Diaghilev Ballets Russes company: Tamara Toumarova and Irina Baranova.

Vaganova Today

p.132 – Irina Trofimova (one of the few pedagogues who was trained by Vaganova herself and still teaches at the Academy) pointed out how the Russian audience shifted with the advent of Communism in Russia: “Part of Vaganova’s merit is that she defended classical ballet during the Russian Revolution. That was her principle, because at the time people cried out that Tchaikovsky is garbage. She wrote articles, attended meetings under conditions of cold and famine. Then in the ‘20s, after the war, everyone left Russia and headed West, but Vaganova remained and struggled to set the classics. I’m not sure why she stayed, but I think she wanted to build her career here. After the war, another type of viewer came to the theatre. No longer was it filled with lovely people dressed in silks and furs, but common folks in boots and overcoats. Nonetheless they loved the ballet.”

p.134 – In the United States, The Nutcracker is perceived by most people as a holiday event rather than a ballet theatre experience. It is also the single most important fundraising opportunity for most ballet companies, and it is the only exposure to ballet that many Americans have. In Russia, on the other hand, The Nutcracker is performed by numerous ballet companies year-around, not only in December, and t represents a very small segment of most citizen’s theatre experience.

[Nora Blue · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this book with a companion book, a biography of Vaganova. The two support each other very well. Vaganova Today is a collection of interviews gathered from prominent dancers, teachers, coaches and reviews and journal articles about whether the curriculum and style of the ballet academy has changed. these provide ample evidence for both sides of the argument pro and con .

















with curr

[Martha Anne Toll]

Here’s my review of this book in Pointe Magazine. https://pointemagazine.com/book-revie...

[Kelly · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Vagnova method is the premier method of teaching ballet. The full effectiveness of it can be seen in many of the world's leading ballerinas, including those from Russia, Ukraine, China, Germany, and more and more the USA and Canada.

Vaganova Today collects articles and interviews of prominent dancers, teachers, coaches and reviews focused on how the tradition and pedagogical techniques have changed over the years. It is a very interesting read, but probably more useful for teachers and balletomanes than stude
nts.

[Alyssa · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Ballet is a terribly difficult profession, involving complete self-sacrifice: You cannot eat, you cannot drink you have to sleep a little, at the minimum. You have to have a regime of food and of upbringing and, of course, every day you have to take class and rehearse and prepare new parts." ~Kurgapkina.