Check out this awesome round-table discussion hosted by PBS Arts Correspondent, Jeffrey Brown! Part One is shown below and Part Two is here.
About the program: “Ballet in America was once dominated by a few major companies and concentrated in New York and a handful of other cities. But today there are more than 65 professional, million-dollar-budget ballet companies all around the country.
Last week, nine of these companies brought together for a series of performances titled ‘Ballet Across America’ at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C.
{Jeffrey Brown} spoke to three of the companies’ artistic directors about the state of ballet in America: Dorothy Gunther Pugh, founder and artistic director of Ballet Memphis; Ashley Wheater, former ballet master of San Francisco Ballet and current director of Chicago’s Joffrey Ballet; and Ib Andersen, artistic director of Ballet Arizona and member of the George Balanchine Trust, the organization responsible for preserving and licensing the late choreographer’s work.” ~ Quote PBS NewsHour at PBS.org.
