Perth Amboy evening news., 1922-04-06

thing to the ballet, as Russia did,
remains 10 be 1t is not easy
to evolve anything racially char
acteristic cut of modern America
because Of the melting pot atmos-
phere. There are possibilities in the
Indian dancing, however, and negro
forms are an almost untouched field.
The cake walk and shuffling steps
and mannerisms of the negro dances
adapted for ballet with suitable mu-
sic and settings would be very in
teresting.
There are American institutions,
too. that offer dance material. Few
people would think of a newspaper
cartoon as the germ of a ballet, yet
Adolph Bohm is doing a ballet with
specially written music. based on a
newspaper comic sheet character
called "Krazy Kat"
But whether America adds any
of its personality to the ballet or
not, most of the important ballet
work of The nea future will be done
here. Mr.. T~chernikoff believes. Bal
let Is featured in operas, spectacu-
lar stage productions, vaudeville
programs. and recitals.
Ballet is popular and yet, strange
ly enough. people know very little of
its history or technique. Mr.. Tcher-
nikoff tells of a series of recitals
given by himself and several other
dancers which were accompanied by
lectures on the history of ballet and
demonstrations of the exercises and
positions on which ballet dances are
built. To most of the audience these
exercises were the novelty of the
program.
T-hnr1 i- a oraaf Ina1 ~ pnfSYndar-
standing in this country regarding
the ballet, Mr.. Tchernikoff finds.
For instance" he says. there is
a popular belief that a dancer must
begin studying as a small child and
spend years doing nothing but ex-
e~rcises. This idea discourages many
aspirants to ballet who feel that they
cannot enter the work because they
missed this early training. Pavlowa
did not begin to study dancing until
she was about IL years old. and even
then she studied a number of other
subjects at the school which she at
tended.
Years of work do not necessarily
make a great dancer. Many a bal
lerina hiss worked as hard and as
long as Pavlowa without achieving
prominence because she lacked the
rare combination of a strong con-
stitution, a body suited in build for
ballet work, personality. finished
technique and a gift for pantio-
mime. Lacking any one of these
qualities a dancer may just miss be-
ing a star. Yet the idea persists
that the main requisite for a success
full career as a dancer Is to start
training as a child of three.
Another misconception regarding
ballet is that a dancer must be a
montrosity Of muscle. We know now
that there is such a thing as over
training. The French ballet dane
ers used to give unnecessary atten
ton TO exercises hat over devel-
oped certain muscles. The bend of
the knees called a pile would be
practiced by a ballet dancer four
times in each of the five positions
of the feet, alternating the right
and left foot, or forty times in all.
This woul1 develop the knee muscles
so that they were not beautiful, and
vet there was no particular benefit
derived from p~racticing this simple
bend of the knee so strenuously.
Both the muscular back. arm and
leg, and the normal appearing body
are seen on the stage today. The
dancer of great muscle may be a
good technician, but not necessa-
rily So"
Such faliacies about the bal ct
have become deeply rooted, MIR.
.ITchernikoff says, because so little
has been seen of the art in this
tountry. Until recently. ballet in
the United States was a fami lar
spectacle rrainly in New York and
Chicago, where the big opera COM
panies maintain their corps OF dane
ers Other cities saw exhibitions
only enthusiastically. But now,
with the development of community
opera and with ballet schools spring
ing up over the country we have the
prospect of ballet as popular