Celebrating 50 Years with the Charleston Ballet
When Andre Van Damme sowed the seeds of the Charleston Ballet 50 years ago, he did so with the same artistic integrity he would have devoted to a troupe with international prestige.
He came here from Belgium where he was premier 'danseur etoile' or lead dancer with the Brussels Royal Opera. Anyone who met him recognized that he was someone special, whether it was his reputation as a dancer, his passion for work or just his accent. Of course the evitable question though usually unspoken was "If he is so great, what is he doing in Charleston ?" The answer, "We were just lucky."
World War II changed life in Europe for Van Damme, his wife Maggy and their young daughter, Marie-Claude. The arts were at an impasse financially, there was political unrest and the voice of an American soldier - Orrin Hill of Charleston, West Virginia - and a singer at the Metropolitan Opera, kept urging them to try their luck in America. They accepted the challenge; a brave thing to do as they arrived knowing only two English words, yes and kitchen. The first year was spent in New York, then two more Charlestonians entered the scene - Belgian duo-pianists John and Jose Hiersoux - who begged them to take one more leap, buy an existing ballet school and go on concert tour with them.
The First Dance
I had recently returned from the School of American Ballet in New York and soon learned that although Van Damme had been attending the same institution, we had never met. (He was in the professional class; I was not.) It did not take much persuasion to join his small band of dancers. We toured quite a few cities before Van Damme decided that since regional ballet troupes were springing up all over the United States , why not start a Charleston Ballet? The charter was granted in January 1956 and by April we had a company, public support, advertising and an orchestra for the debut concert.
Ballet is based upon discipline and it did not take the dancers long to realize that Van Damme was a strict taskmaster. No excuse short of a fatal disease was acceptable for missing a class or rehearsal.
Some of the ballets were showcases for Van Damme's favorite roles, such as Spectre de la Rose, Tyl Eulenspiegel and Petrouchka. But one of the perks of directing his own company was that he was able to unleash his talent for choreography. In three and a half decades he created more than 100 original works. Along the way we became versatile in many styles of dance. Spanish, from the first performance of Capriccio Espagnole to more versions of Bolero than I can remember, Russian and Slavic with Russian Easter, The Fair, The Wedding, Gypsy and Slavonic Harvest. Classics were always on the program, from Les Sylphides and The Seasons to Symphony in White, while a flair for the contemporary produced Girl of Rampart Street, The Roof and Street Corner.
Then there were the "mask" ballets. Male dancers were not exactly in abundance so to conceal the fact that most of the dancers were female, we often found ourselves robed, hooded and masked - Masque of the Red Death comes to mind. We began to think like Samurai warriors in Japanese Kabu. In The Recluses we all went crazy; in Black Widow we personified insects. Other works from Van Damme's fertile imagination included Mobile, in which the dancers on three levels of platforms portrayed dangling objects reacting to the wind, and Motions, all done with black unitards, fluorescent paint and black light.
Dancing Through the Years
Van Damme became proficient in English, although an occasional slip had us all giggling. For example, he once told a dancer to enter with a snack bar on his shoulder. We think he meant knapsack.
Some of the ballets were big productions, especially Carmina Burana, Genesis, Joan of Arc and Coppelia, requiring major sets and extensive costuming. Through it all Maggy Van Damme worked as hard offstage as her husband did onstage. She often designed costumes, which turned her attic and garage into storage space - and her front yard into a kaleidoscope of colored grass. Weekends during the summer months would find a small crew of us painting scenery on the lawn and driveway. Afterwards we rewarded ourselves with covered dish dinners.
Both of the Van Damme daughters, Marie-Claude and Monique, who was born in Charleston, danced with the company. Monique showed a special flair for character roles.
Occasionally we took the show on the road, appearing in many towns throughout West Virginia, usually in high school auditoriums or gymnasiums. Logan, Lewisburg, Beckley, Parkersburg - it did not matter that they were not the most artistic settings; we were promoting ballet anywhere we could. Along the way the Charleston Ballet received the titles of Centennial Ballet, to coincide with the state's 100 th birthday and the official West Virginia State Ballet Company. We were the first dance group to perform at the new Cultural Center, presenting two Gershwin scored ballets, Concerto In F and Rhapsody In Blue.
While most of the ballets were created by Van Damme, he encouraged me to give choreography a whirl. Though I did many, my favorites were Games and Far Out.
A Quarter Century
Twenty-five years passed, calling for a three night anniversary celebration in 1981. Guest artists of national and international fame joined us and topped the festivities with a company production, Celebration Waltz. To coincide with the occasion, Van Damme wrote The Charleston Ballet, Twenty-Five Years of Dedication .
The company continued to flourish and I would be remiss not to credit the hundreds of dancers, stage crew members and set, lighting and costume designers who made it possible.
A real crowd pleaser was The Flappers, staged in the style of the Roaring '20s, with Kim Pauley dancing a knock-out Charleston . Her technical ability and daring brought her many a challenging role and she soon emerged as the company's principal dancer. Van Damme created many roles especially for her including The Rose and La Peri.
In the 1983-84 season, we devoted an entire year to producing the full-length Romeo and Juliet and began the practice of importing male guest artists.
Passing the Torch
The ballet lost its director in February 1989 when Van Damme died suddenly of esophageal cancer. As assistant director, I finished out the season, but advised the board to look for another director. Fortunately, they gave that chance to Kim Pauley who has been a great credit to her mentor. Despite the fact that she could have danced with any national company, she chose to stay in Charleston.
"I felt that I was meant to be here," she said upon becoming the troupe's new director.
In a recent interview Pauley admitted, "I was overwhelmed. I had no idea of the energy it took to run the company. But I took the attitude to do things as they had been done, change what did not work for me and to use whatever technology was available. I look back and know that I had gotten exposure to all the facets of running a ballet company.experiences were shared with me that did not have to be shared," she says of what she gained through working closely with the Van Dammes.
For the 1989-90 season, Pauley took Variation, a work that Van Damme had created for her on part of a Dvorak score and used the full score to choreograph Serenade. In 1991-92, she presented Madam Butterfly by a Japanese choreographer, and La Fille Mal Gardee, which she described as a turning point in her directorship by bringing in a group of young male dancers.
The Turning Point
Oleg Briansky's Romeo and Juliet pas de deux received its American premiere here in '92 and the next year Pauley added a third set of performances to the season. And would you believe a ballet based on the music of Patsy Cline favorites? Country Moon was the title, again showing the company's versatility. "For the 40 th anniversary in 1996 we did the full-length version of Coppelia," says Pauley, "and in '97 we presented a short version of The Nutcracker."
One of Pauley's favorite works as a choreographer was the Beatles' ballet, She Loves You. "I was proud of that," says Pauley. "And it was challenging to create ballets to chamber music," she says of several collaborations with the Montclaire String Quartet.
Throughout the past 15 years, Pauley's greatest challenges have been marketing the product, finding money and getting audiences. "I have no problem finding guest artists or ideas for ballets. The guests have found their experiences here to be so positive." Among the rewards, she cited the lifelong friendships that are formed between dancers. "What you share is so unique," she explains.
In 1989 the company budget was between $40,000 and $45,000. "Now it is between $250,000 and $275,000, which is nothing for what we present," says Pauley. Funding comes from the Fund for the Arts, West Virginia Commission on the Arts, National Endowment for the Arts, corporate and private funding and from the Greater Kanawha Valley Foundation for special projects. The studio moved from Quarrier Street to the Masonic Temple, starting with one large studio, an office and dressing room. Today there is a second studio, a theatre workshop and an additional office.
"To date we have done full-length versions of the five great classic ballets - Giselle, Swan Lake, Coppelia, Sleeping Beauty and The Nutcracker, which has become an annual collaboration with the West Virginia Symphony. That's pretty remarkable for a company of this size," Pauley observes.
As to the company's growth, she said, "I would like to take it to a higher level professionally; have a corps of professional dancers to add to the younger talent.
"I learned from the Van Dammes what it means to be an artist. And I try to inspire that passion in others. All I wanted to do was dance and now, as administrator, I have to keep the company going and share what I have learned. And I feel I am passing on Mr. Van Damme's choreography and ideas through me," she says.
