Probably at some time in 1948, The Sadler’s Wells Ballet, under the auspices of The British Council, received an invitation to participate in the Music Festival to be held in Florence in May 1949.
Ninette de Valois, the Sadler’s Wells director accepted the invitation and set about creating the programme. The company would be in Florence from May 20th to 30th, would perform 16 times and present 8 ballets. These included Cinderella, created by Fred Ashton in 1948, Symphonic Variations (also choreographed by Ashton), A Rake’s Progress, Hamlet and Checkmate.
Cinderella was to be performed 4 times, initially with Margot Fonteyn in the lead role. Moira Shearer danced the lead role twice.
The company was at full strength with the three other prima ballerina, Beryl Grey, Pamela May and Violetta Elvin all assuming major roles. May joined Fonteyn and Shearer in Symphonic Variations.
The company left London by train on May 15th for a journey to Florence via Paris and Milan that probably required most of the day and might have been by an overnight train. The photo of some of the company at Victoria Station prior to departure includes Shearer, May and Elvin.
Moira Shearer, Pamela May, Violetta Elvin and other members of The Sadler’s Wells Ballet at Victoria Station, May 16th, 1949 prior to their departure for Florence. Photographer unknown. Source Sadler’s Wells Archives; Islington Library.
As the first performance was not until May 20th the company would have had a few days to settle and to rehearse.
According to the Italian dance critic, Ferdinando Reyna, writing in the July-August issue of the magazine “Ballet Today”, the performances were very well received by what he describes as a discriminating Florentine audience. Picked out for particular praise were Fonteyn for her “technique, elegance and expressiveness” and Shearer for the “grace and freshness” of her performance.
Perhaps inevitably, as a result of the 1948 release of the film “The Red Shoes”, Shearer was showered with attention. In the attached photo her admirers surround the somewhat amused, somewhat bemused “star” of the film. Shearer would have to learn to live with this kind of unwanted attention for many years to come.
Moira Shearer surrounded by a few fans in Florence in May 1949. Photographer unknown. Source: Ballet Today July-August 1949.
With the conclusion of their participation in the festival most of the company returned to Britain. However, four dancers, Michael Somes, Anne Heaton, Alexander Grant and Shearer travelled on to Turkey where they were to give demonstrations and performances in Istanbul and in the capital, Ankara.
De Valois had developed a deep interest and commitment to help create a school for ballet in Turkey and in 1947 spent three weeks there sponsored by the British Council.
The visit of the four dancers was also backed by the British Council that assumed overall care of the dancers while they were in Turkey. By 1949 De Valois had sent two teachers from the Sadler’s Wells Ballet to assist in setting up the Turkish school. Thus, they would have probably been responsible for the dancers while they were rehearsing and performing.
The journey to Istanbul was by air from Rome probably on May 31st; travel between Istanbul and Ankara was via the night train.
The dancers made no public appearances in Turkey, instead performing to an audience made up of the students of the newly formed ballet school and their parents. Beyond Moira Shearer’s brief article in the August issue of “The Dancing Times” there appears to be no other record of the performances.
They gave 4 performances in the small but newly-built opera house in Ankara. Dances performed by them were supplemented by those of the more advanced Turkish students. Shearer writes that the most enthusiastically received ballet was John Cranko’s “Trisch-Trasch” that was danced by her accompanied by Michael Somes and Alexander Grant.
After 4 days in Ankara the dancers flew to Istanbul for 3 performances in a large open-air theatre with a wooden stage erected over the stone base. Apparently the weather cooperated. Shearer doesn’t mention the repertoire but it was presumably similar to that given in Ankara.
Moira Shearer and Michael Somes rehearsing in Istanbul. Anne Heaton is in the background. Photographer Sidney Nowill. Photo reproduced with permission of Edward Nowill.
After their final performance the Sadler’s Wells dancers visited the ballet school in Istanbul before flying to London.
The photos of the dancers rehearsing in Istanbul were taken by Sidney Nowill of the British Council. Like many others before and after him he writes of his admiration for Shearer because, as he puts it, she was both charming and unaffected.
The Sadler’s Wells season ended on June 20th and immediately afterwards Shearer and her fiancé Ludovic Kennedy travelled to Grasse in southern France where they had rented a villa for two weeks.
Sources.
The Star (newspaper), published in London, May 16th, 1949
Ballet Today, July-August 1949. Article by Ferdinando Reyna.
The Dancing Times, August 1949. “Turkish Delight”, article by Moira Shearer.
Constantinople and Istanbul, Ashenden (Sidney Nowill), Biography and Autobiography, Troubador Press, 2011.
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