Memories of Symphonie Fantastique
Valrene Tweedie
Valrene Tweedie, far right.
My first memory of Symphonie Fantastique is seeing it for the first time at the old Theatre Royal in Sydney when de Basil’s Ballets Russes came to Australia in 1938.
How exciting it was, with Irina Baronova as the Beloved and Paul Petroff as the Musician! How we loved them and their performances! I especially loved the second movement with the beautiful white and black ball gowns in front of the deep red backcloths, all designed by Christian Bérard (years before the black and white gowns of My Fair Lady).
We also loved Roman Jasinsky as the Young Shepherd in the third movement and Boris Belsky as the Jailer in the fourth. When I say ‘we’ I am referring to a group of girls from various ballet studios who were lucky enough to be ‘extras’ (walk-ons) in some of the ballets. When not in a performance we were always in the audience. As there were no extras in Symphonie Fantastique we saw it many times from the front.
Watching from the audience I loved the fifth movement, the Witches’ Sabbath. However I was not so fond of that movement in 1940 when I was dancing in it. The girls had to circle the stage from upstage O.P. (right) crawling and twisting from hip to hip, which was not very pleasant.
Symphonie Fantastique was in our permanent repertoire and we performed it frequently in the USA, Canada and Central and South America. It was always well received and very popular.
One particular performance I recall was in 1941 in Cuba. There was a strike in the company (previously unheard of in a ballet company. Ed), and we were missing 18 dancers. It seemed almost impossible to present the advertised ballets. But we had to. So, under the direction of Serge Grigoriev and with his determination that ‘… the show must go on …’, it did. We had a different program every day. We rehearsed each night’s ballets all day, everyone pulling their weight and doubling in roles where necessary. In Symphonie Fantastique’s second movement I was part of one of two couples who appeared first. We came waltzing across the stage, did a lift and a promenade and a few steps. However, on this occasion my partner happened to be one of the strikers, as were both dancers in the other couple, and all the other boys were making quite difficult costume changes. There was no one to partner me so David Lichine, who was dancing the lead role of the Musician, stepped in. At the end of Scene 1 he had to pull off his green jacket, put on a black one, do the little entrance with me and then quickly change jackets again to reappear as the Musician.
What difficult but inspiring days those were!
Valrene Tweedie OAM joined Col. de Basil’s company in Sydney in 1940, aged fifteen, danced in North and South America and returned home in 1952, becoming the third artistic director of National Theatre Ballet in 1953. She began full-time teaching in 1956, founded Ballet Australia to encourage new choreographers in 1960 and in 1998 received the Australian Dance Award for Lifetime Achievement.





