George Balanchine

George Balanchine was born Georgiy Melitonovich Balanchivadze in Saint Petersburg, Russia, on April 30, 1983, to a Georgian father and a Russian mother. His father, Meliton Balanchivadze, was an opera singer and composer who helped found the Tbilisi Opera and Ballet Theatre and later served as Minister of Culture of the short-lived Georgian Democratic Republic. His mother, Maria Nikolayevna Vasilyeva, was the daughter of a German man named Nikolai von Almedingen, who left the family early on; she took her mother’s surname. Maria played piano well and worked at a bank. She loved ballet and saw it as a way to climb out of the lower ranks of Saint Petersburg society, though she wanted her son to join the military. Balanchine had three siblings, including a brother, Andrei Balanchivadze, who became a well-known Georgian composer. Even after moving to the United States, Balanchine stayed connected to his Georgian roots and engaged with Georgian artists across the Iron Curtain.

As a child, Balanchine had little interest in ballet, but his mother insisted he audition alongside his sister Tamara, who shared her mother’s passion. At age nine, in 1913, he moved from rural Finland to Saint Petersburg and entered the Imperial Ballet School, studying under Pavel Gerdt and Samuil Andrianov. He danced at the Mariinsky School and Theater until it closed in 1917 due to government decree; it reopened in 1918 and was later renamed the State Academic Theater of Opera and Ballet. While still a teenager, Balanchine began choreographing experimental works for the Mikhailovsky Theatre in Petrograd, including *Le Boeuf sur le toit* (1920) and a piece for *Caesar and Cleopatra*. His first choreographed piece, a pas de deux called *La Nuit* (1920), was not approved by school directors. He also created *Enigma*, performed in bare feet. After graduating in 1921, he enrolled at the Petrograd Conservatory, studying piano, music theory, counterpoint, harmony, and composition, while dancing in the corps de ballet at the State Academic Theater. He graduated in 1923 and remained in the corps until 1924. During this time, he met and married dancer Tamara Geva. In 1923, with Geva and other dancers, he formed a small ensemble called Evenings of the Young Ballet, which presented a three-part performance including homages to Marius Petipa and Mikhail Fokine, plus his own choreography.

Balanchine became one of the most influential choreographers of the 20th century, often called the father of American ballet. He co-founded the New York City Ballet and served as its artistic director for over 35 years. His style is known for plotless ballets with minimal costumes and sets, set to classical and neoclassical music. He fused the standards of the Imperial Ballet School with movement styles he picked up on Broadway and in Hollywood, creating his signature neoclassical approach. He was highly musical, expressing music through dance, and worked closely with leading composers like Igor Stravinsky. In 1933, arts patron Lincoln Kirstein invited him to America; together they founded the School of American Ballet in 1934 and the New York City Ballet in 1948.