A dance history lesson

THANK YOU for the wonderful article on Alvin Ailey [“ ‘Revelations’ Revealed,” by Lewis Segal, Feb. 19]. I never got to see it [“Revelations”], but as an ex-”boy dancer” (as we were called in those days) I appreciate the history of the dance and how it has changed.

I enjoyed Dorene Richardson’s remarks about how the dancing has become acrobatic and technique instead of being emotional. That’s been happening for some time. I recall saying in the middle 1970s that the working dancers then could technically dance circles around us but they all looked alike. I stopped going to the ballet for that reason 50 years ago.

Broadway auditions in those days were master classes given by the likes of Robbins, Fosse and Jack Cole. Also, interestingly enough, ballet was the first part of all of their auditions and if you didn’t pass that you never got to the jazz. And we each had to dance alone. Both Fosse and Robbins did coaching just like in a class.

In 1955, when I was in the Chicago Opera Ballet, we danced in “Aida” starring Tebaldi (wonderful woman!) in dark makeup. We dancers, white, were dressed in black bodysuits with white gloves, black frazzle wigs and Jolson-type blackface (white circles around the eyes and mouths.) We were the Ethiopian slaves and did an eccentric dance. And at the time it seemed perfectly all right. There were not that many black dancers working on Broadway and other than Janet Collins at the Met and Arthur Mitchell at City Ballet there weren’t any in ballet companies.

Along those lines, we’ve come a long way in 50 years.

Anyway, thank you. You know you got one person thinking. And remembering and feeling.

JOHN MOORE

Palm Springs