financial assistance or guarantees to organizations, companies, and
societies; by directly providing concerts and exhibitions; or by
directly managing and operating a company or theatre. The recipient
organizations, for their part, must be non-profit or charitable trusts
capable of helping carry out the Council’s purpose of bringing to the
British people entertainment of a high standard. Such organizations must
have been accepted as non-profit companies by H. M. Commissioners of
Customs and Excise, and exempted by them from liability to pay
Entertainments Duty.
An example of the help tendered may be gathered from the fact that in
1950, eight festivals, ten symphony orchestras, five theatres,
twenty-five theatre companies, seven opera and ballet companies, one
society for poetry and music, two art societies, four arts centers, and
sixty-three clubs were being helped. In addition, two theatres, three
theatre companies, and one arts center were entirely and exclusively
managed by the Arts Council. Some of the best-known British orchestras,
theatres, and companies devoted to opera, ballet, and the drama are
linked to the Arts Council: The Hallé Orchestra, the London Philharmonic
Orchestra, the London Symphony Orchestra, Covent Garden Opera Trust,
Covent Garden Opera Company, and the Sadler’s Wells Companies are among
them. Also the Old Vic, Tennent Productions, Ltd., and the Young Vic
Theatre companies.
Government assistance to opera in twentieth century Britain did not
begin with the Arts Council. In the early ’thirties Parliament granted a
small subsidy to the Covent Garden Opera Syndicate for some two years to
help present grand opera in Covent Garden and the provinces at popular
prices. A total of £40,000 ($112,000) had been paid when the grant was
withdrawn after the financial crisis of 1931, and it was more than ten
years before national opera became a reality.
In the meantime, some ballet companies and an opera company began to
receive C. E. M. A. support. The Sadler’s Wells Opera Company and
Sadler’s Wells Ballet Company, for instance, began their association
with C. E. M. A. in 1943. C. E. M. A. was also interested in plans
stirring in 1944 and 1945 to reclaim the Royal Opera House, Covent
Garden, as a national center for ballet and opera. I have pointed out
how this great theatre in London, with a history dating back to the
eighteenth century, was leased in 1944 by the international music firm
of Boosey and Hawkes, who, in turn, rented it to the newly formed Covent
Garden Opera Trust. The Trust, an autonomous body whose original
chairman was Lord Keynes, is a non-profit body which devotes any profits
it may make to Trust projects. Late in 1949, H. M. Ministry of Works
succeeded Boosey and Hawkes as lessees, with a forty-two-year lease.
The Arts Council, in taking over from C. E. M. A., inherited C. E. M.
A.’s interest in using Covent Garden for national ballet and opera. The
Council granted Covent Garden £25,000 ($70,000) for the year ended 31
March, 1946, and £55,000 ($154,000) for the following year. At the same
time, it was granting Sadler’s Wells Foundation £10,000 ($28,000) and
£15,000 ($42,000) in those years.
The Covent Garden Opera Trust, in the meantime, had invited the Sadler’s
Wells Ballet to move to Covent Garden from their famous ballet center,
Sadler’s Wells. This it did, early in 1946, leaving behind another
company called the Sadler’s Wells Theatre Ballet. Ninette de Valois
continued to direct both groups.
It was a year later the Covent Garden Opera Company gave its first
presentation under the Covent Garden Opera Trust, and the two chief
Covent Carden companies, opera and ballet, were solidly settled in their
new home.
The Trust continues to receive a grant from the Arts Council (£145,000
[$406,000] in 1949-1950), and it pays the rent for the Opera House and
the salaries and expenses of the companies. So far as the ballet company
is concerned, the Sadler’s Wells Ballet pretty well pays its own way,
except for that all-besetting expense in ballet, the cost of new
productions. The opera company requires relatively more support from the
Trust grant, as it has re-staged and produced every opera afresh, not
using any old productions. Moreover, the attendance for ballet is
greater than that for opera.
The aim of Covent Garden and its Administrator, David Webster, is to
create a steady audience, and to appeal to groups that have not hitherto
attended ballet and opera, or have attended only when the most brilliant
stars were appearing. Seats sell for as little as 2s 6d (35¢), rising to
26s 3d ($3.67) and the ballet-and-opera-going habit has grown noticeably
in recent years. It is interesting to note the audience for opera
averaged eighty-three per cent capacity, and for the ballet ninety-two
per cent.
The two British companies alternately presenting ballet and opera
provide most of the entertainment at Covent Garden, but foreign
companies such as the Vienna State Opera with the Vienna Philharmonic
Orchestra, La Scala Opera, the Paris Opéra Comique, the Ballet Theatre
from New York, the New York City Ballet Company, the Grand Ballet of the
Marquis de Cuevas, and Colonel de Basil’s Original Ballets Russes have
had short seasons there.
The Arts Council is in association with the two permanent companies
coincidentally operating at Sadler’s Wells--the Sadler’s Wells Theatre
Ballet and the Sadler’s Wells Opera Company. Other opera and ballet
companies associated with the Arts Council are the English Opera Group,
Ltd., and the Ballet Rambert, while the Arts Council manages the St.
James Ballet Company.
All these companies tour in Britain, and some of them make extended
tours abroad. The Ballet Rambert, for instance, has made a tour of
Australia and New Zealand, which lasted a year and a half, a record for
that area.
The Sadler’s Wells Ballet has made long and highly successful tours of
the European continent. Its first visit to America occurred in the
autumn of 1949, when the Covent Garden Opera Trust, in association with
the Arts Council and the British Council, presented the group at the
Metropolitan Opera House in New York City, and in various other centres
in the United States and Canada, under my management. A second and much
longer visit took place in 1950-1951, with which visits this chapter is
primarily concerned.
Sadler’s Wells has a ballet school of something more than two hundred
students, including the general education of boys and girls from ten to
sixteen. Scholarships are increasing in number; some of these are
offered by various County Councils and other local authorities, and a
number by the Royal Academy of Dancing.
In addition to the Arts Council, I have mentioned the British Council,
and no account of Britain’s cultural activities could make any
pretensions to being intelligible without something more than a mention
of it. It should be pointed out that the major part of the British
Council’s work is done abroad.
Established in 1934, the British Council is Britain’s chief agent for
strengthening cultural relations with the rest of the British
Commonwealth, Europe, the Middle East, the Far East, the United States,
and Latin America. It is responsible for helping to make British
cultural achievements known and understood abroad, and for bringing to
the British, in turn, a closer knowledge of foreign countries.
Like many other British cultural bodies, the British Council derives its
main financial support from the Government (through grants from the
Foreign Office, plus certain sums on the Colonial and Commonwealth
votes), and is a body corporate, not a Government organization. Its
staff are not civil servants and its work is entirely divorced from
politics, though the Council has a certain amount of State control
because nine of the Executive Committee (fifteen to thirty in number)
are nominated by Government departments.
The British Council’s chief activities concern educational exchanges
with foreign countries of students, teachers, and technicians, including
arranging facilities for these visitors in Britain; they include
supporting libraries and information services abroad where British books
and other reading materials are readily available, and further include
the financing of tours of British lecturers and exhibitions, and of
theatrical, musical, and ballet troupes abroad. Sadler’s Wells Ballet
has toured to Brussels, Prague, Warsaw, Poznau, Malmö, Oslo, Lisbon,
Berlin, and the United States and Canada under British Council auspices
with great success. The Sadler’s Wells Theatre Ballet has toured the
United States and Canada, under my management, with equal success, and
is soon to visit Africa, including Kenya Colony. The Old Vic Company,
the Boyd Neel String Orchestra, and the Ballet Rambert toured Australia
and New Zealand, and the Old Vic has toured Canada. John Gielgud’s
theatre company has visited Canada. In addition, the British Council has
sponsored visits abroad of such distinguished musicians as Sir Adrian
Boult, Sir John Barbirolli, Sir Malcolm Sargent, and Maggie Teyte.
One of the British Council’s important trusts is the responsibility for
the special gramophone recordings of distinguished musical works and of
the spoken word. This promotion is adding notably to record libraries,
and is helping to make the best music available to listeners all over
the world. It is also the Government’s principal agent for carrying out
the cultural conventions agreed upon with other members of the United
Nations. These provide, in general, for encouraging mutual knowledge and
appreciation of each other’s culture through interchanging teachers,
offering student scholarships, and exchanging books, films, lectures,
concerts, plays, exhibitions, and musical scores.
The relationship between the British Council and the Arts Council is
necessarily one of careful collaboration. In the time of C. E. M. A.
many tasks were accomplished in common, such as looking after foreign
residents in Great Britain. Now the division of labor of the two
Councils is well defined, with clear-cut agreement on their respective
responsibilities for the various entertainment groups that come to or go
from Britain. The British Council helps British artists and works of art
to go ahead; the Arts Council assists artistic activities in Britain,
including any that may come from abroad. Both bodies have a number of
committee members in common, and the feeling between the groups is close
and friendly.
It is, I feel, characteristic of the British that, without a definite,
planned, long-term programme for expanding its patronage of the arts,
the British Government has nevertheless come to give financial aid to
almost every branch of the art world. This has developed over a period
of years, with accumulated speed in the last twelve because of the war,
because the days of wide patronage from large private incomes are
disappearing if not altogether disappeared, and also perhaps because of
an increasing general realization of the people’s greater need for
leisure-time occupation.
In all of this I must point out quite emphatically that it is the
British Government’s policy to encourage and support existing and
valuable institutions. Thus the great symphony orchestras, Sadler’s
Wells Ballet, Covent Garden Opera, and various theatre companies are not
run by the Government, but given grants by the Arts Council, a
corporation supported by Government money.
What is more, there is no one central body in Britain in charge of the
fine arts, but a number of organizations, with the Arts Council covering
the widest territory. Government patronage of the arts in Britain, as
has frequently been true of other British institutions, has grown with
the needs of the times, and the organization of the operating bodies has
been flexible and adaptable.
The bodies that receive Government money, such as the Arts Council, the
British Broadcasting Corporation, and the British Council are relatively
independent of the Government, their employees not being civil servants
and their day-to-day business being conducted autonomously.
There is no attempt on the part of the Government to interfere with the
presentations of the companies receiving State aid, though often the
Government encourages experimentation. A very happy combination of arts
sponsorship is now permissible under a comparatively recent Act of
Parliament that allows local government authorities to assist theatrical
and musical groups fully. Now, for instance, an orchestra based
anywhere in Britain may have the financial backing of the town
authorities, as well as of the Arts Council and private patrons.
While accurate predictions about the future course of relations between
Government and the arts in Britain are not, of course, possible, it
seems likely, however, that all of mankind will be found with more,
rather than less, leisure in the years to come. In the days of the
industrial revolution in Britain a hundred-odd years ago, the people, by
which I mean the working classes, had little opportunity for cultivating
a taste for the arts.
Now, with the average number of hours worked by British men, thanks to
trade unionism and a more genuinely progressive and humanitarian point
of view, standing at something under forty-seven weekly, there is
obviously less time devoted to earning a living, leaving more for
learning the art of living. It may well be that the next hundred years
will see even more intensive efforts made to help people to use their
leisure hours pleasantly and profitably. As long ago as the early
1930’s, at a time when he was so instrumental in encouraging ballet
through the founding of the Camargo Society, Lord (then J. Maynard)
Keynes wrote that he hoped and believed the day would come when the
problem of earning one’s daily bread might not be the most important one
of our lives, and that “the arena of the heart and head will be
occupied, or reoccupied, by our real problems--the problems of life and
of human relations, of creation and behavior and religion.” Then, “for
the first time since his creation,” Lord Keynes continued, “man will be
faced with his real, his permanent problem--how to use his freedom from
pressing economic cares, how to occupy the leisure science and compound
interest will have won for him to live wisely and agreeably and well.”
* * * * *
Stripped to the simplest explanation possible, Sadler’s Wells leased its
company to Covent Garden for a period of years. The move must have
entailed a prodigious amount of work for all concerned and for Ninette
de Valois in particular. Quite apart from all the physical detail
involved: new scenery, new musical material, new costumes, more dancers,
there was, most importantly, a change of point of view, even of
direction. With a large theatre and orchestra, and large
responsibilities, experimental works for the moment had to be postponed.
New thinking had to be employed, because the company’s direction was now
in the terms of the Maryinsky Theatre, the Bolshoi, the Paris Opéra.
The keystone of the arch that is Sadler’s Wells’s policy is the
full-length productions of classical ballets. The prime example is _The
Sleeping Beauty_, my own reactions to which, when I first saw it, I have
already recounted. In the production of this work, the company was
preeminent, with Margot Fonteyn as a bright, particular star; but the
“star” system, if one cares to call it that, was utilized to the full,
since each night there was a change of cast; and it must be remembered
that in London it is possible to present a full-length work every night
for a month or more without changing the bill, whereas in this country,
almost daily changes are required. This, it should be pointed out,
required a good deal of audience training.
The magnificent production of _The Sleeping Beauty_ cost more than
£10,000, at British costs. What the costs for such a production as that
would have been on this side of the Atlantic I dislike to contemplate.
The point is that it was a complete financial success. Another point I
should like to make is that while _The Sleeping Beauty_ was presented
nightly, week after week, there was no slighting of the other classical
works such as the full-length _Swan Lake_, _Coppélia_, _Les Sylphides_,
and _Giselle_; nor was there any diminution of new works or revivals of
works from their own repertoire.
It was in 1948 I returned to London further to pursue the matter of
their invasion of America. It was my very dear friend, the late Ralph
Hawkes of the music publishing firm of Boosey and Hawkes, the
leaseholders of Covent Garden, who helped materially in arranging
matters and in persuading the Sadler’s Wells direction and the British
Arts Council that they were ready for America and that, since Hawkes was
closely identified with America’s musical life, that this country was
ready for them.
Meanwhile, Ninette de Valois grew increasingly dubious about
full-length, full-evening ballets, such as _The Sleeping Beauty_ and
_Swan Lake_, in the States, and was convinced in her own mind that the
United States and Canadian audiences not only would not accept them,
much less sit still before a single work lasting three and one-half
hours. Much, of course, was at stake for all concerned and it was,
indeed, a serious problem about which to make a final, inevitable
decision.
The conferences were long and many. Conferences are a natural
concomitant of ballet. But there was a vast difference between these
conferences and the hundreds I had had with the Russians, the
Caucasians, the Bulgarians, and the Axminsters. Here were neither
intrigues nor whims, neither suspicion nor stupidity. On the contrary,
here was reasonableness, logic, frankness, fundamental British honesty.
George Borodin, a Russian-born Englishman and a great ballet-lover, once
pointed out that ballet is a medium that transcends words, adding “the
tongue is a virtuoso that can make an almost inexhaustible series of
noises of all kinds.” In my countless earlier conferences with other
ballet directorates, really few of those noises, alas, really meant
anything.
At last, the affirmative decision was made and we arrived at an
agreement on the repertoire for the American season, to include the
full-length works, along with a representative cross-section,
historically speaking, of the Sadler’s Wells repertoire of their shorter
works. The matter settled, I left for home.
On my return to New York, still other problems awaited me. The
Metropolitan Opera House, the only possible New York stage on which
Sadler’s Wells could appear, was faced with difficulties and
perplexities, with other commitments for the period when the British
visitors would be here.
However, thanks to the invaluable cooperation and assistance of Edward
Johnson, Alfred P. Sloan, and Mrs. August Belmont, it was decided that a
part of the season should be given to Sadler’s Wells. Had it not been
for their friendly, intelligent, and influential offices, New York might
not have had the pleasure and privilege of the Sadler’s Wells visit.
The road at last having been cleared, our promotional campaign was
started and was limited to four weeks. The response is a matter of
theatrical history.
Here, for the first time in the United States, was a company carrying on
the great tradition in classical ballet, with timely and contemporary
additions. Here was a company with a broad repertoire based on and
imbedded in the full-length classics, but also bolstered with modern
works that strike deep into human experience. Here were choreographers
who strove to broaden the scope of their art and to bring into their
works some of the richness of modern psychology and drama, always
balletic in idiom, with freedom of style, who permitted their dramatic
imaginations to guide them in creating movement and in the use of music.
By boat came the splendid productions, the costumes, the properties,
loads and loads of them. By special chartered planes came the company,
and the technical staff, the entire contingent headed by the famous
directorial trio, Ninette de Valois, Frederick Ashton, and Constant
Lambert, with the executive side in the capable hands of David Webster,
General Administrator. The technical department was magnificently
presided over by Herbert Hughes, General Manager of the Sadler’s Wells
Ballet, and the late Louis Yudkin, General Stage Director.
It was an American _ballerina_, Nora Kaye, who hustled Margot Fonteyn
from the airport to let her have her first peek at the Metropolitan
Opera House. The curtain was up when they arrived, revealing the old
gold and red auditorium. Margot’s perceptive eyes took it all in at a
glance. She took a deep breath, clasped her hands in front of her.
“Thank goodness,” she said, “it’s old and comfortable and warm and rich,
as an opera house should be.” She paused for a reflective moment and
added, “I was so afraid it would be slick and modern like everything
else here, all steel and chromium, and spit and polish. I’m glad it’s
old!”.
On an afternoon before the opening, my very good friend, Hans Juda,
publisher of Britain’s international textile journal, _Ambassador_,
together with his charming wife, gave a large and delightful cocktail
party at Sherry’s in the Metropolitan Opera House for a large list of
invited guests from the worlds of art, business, and diplomacy. Hans
Juda is a very helpful and influential figure in the world of British
textiles and wearing apparel. It was he, together with the amiable James
Cleveland Belle of the famous Bond Street house of Horrocks, who
arranged with British designers, dressmakers, textile manufacturers, and
tailors to see that each member of the Sadler’s Wells company was
outfitted with complete wardrobes for both day and evening wear; the
distaff side with hats, suits, frocks, shoes, and accessories; the male
side with lounge suits, dinner jackets, shoes, gloves, etc. The men were
also furnished with, shall I say, necessaries for the well-dressed man,
which were soon packed away, viz., bowler hats (“derbies” to the
American native) and “brollies” (umbrellas to Broadway).
The next night was, in more senses than one, the _BIG_ night: a
completely fabulous _première_. The Metropolitan was sold out weeks in
advance, with standees up to, and who knows, perhaps beyond, the normal
capacity. Hundreds of ballet lovers had stood in queue for hours to
obtain a place in the coveted sardine space, reaching in double line
completely round the square block the historic old house occupies on
Broadway, Seventh Avenue, Thirty-ninth and Fortieth Streets. The
orchestra stalls and boxes were filled with the great in all walks of
life. The central boxes of the “Golden Horseshoe,” draped in the Stars
and Stripes and the Union Jack, housed the leading figures of the
diplomatic and municipal worlds.
Although the date was 9 October, it was the hottest night of the summer,
as luck would have it. The Metropolitan Opera House is denied the
benefit of modern air-conditioning; the temperature within its hallowed
walls, thanks to the mass of humanity and the lights, was many degrees
above that of the humid blanket outside.
Despite all this, so long as I shall live, I shall never forget the
stirring round of applause that greeted that distinguished figure,
Constant Lambert, as he entered the orchestra pit to lead the orchestra
in the two anthems, the Star Spangled Banner and God Save the King. The
audience resumed their seats; there was a bated pause, and then from the
pit came the first notes of the overture to _The Sleeping Beauty_, under
the sympathetic baton of that finest of ballet conductors. So long as I
shall live I shall never forget the deafening applause as the curtains
opened on the first of Oliver Messel’s sets and costumes. That applause,
which was repeated and repeated--for Fonteyn’s entrance, increasing in
its roar until, at the end, Dame Ninette had to make a little speech,
against her will--still rings in my ears.