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“If Svetlana was born again, she would still have come to dance.”

Once their stage careers were over, Adyrkhayeva and her husband Aleksey Zakalinsky, a soloist at the Bolshoi Theatre who had danced leading roles in The Nutcracker, Swan Lake, The Stone Flower and The Fountain of Bakhchisarai, set up an international ballet theatre, which toured around Russia and the other Soviet republics, or what would soon become former Soviet republics. It was not for another 12 years that the Bolshoi Theatre would call upon Svetlana again.

There may have been many different paths that brought Adyrkhayeva’s colleagues into ballet, but the path which she travelled was uncommonly unpredictable, and almost quite accidental. Svetlana was born in the small village of Khumalag, in the mountain republic of North Ossetia, where everyone knew how to sing and dance. But not everyone understood the world “ballet”. And no-one had seen ballet at first hand. Who discovered that the future ballerina had talent, and when? That was just one of the many questions that I wanted to ask Svetlana Adyrkhayeva, so, while I was in Moscow to attend a rich harvest of ballets this past October, I asked her for an interview. First she invited me to watch her running a class, and then a rehearsal. Once they were over, we had a chat in a small café in the theatre.

Svetlana, thanks very much for finding time to talk to me, or, should I say, to the readers of an English-language ballet website. My first question is: how did you find your way from a village in the mountains to ballet school?

When I was eight, a neighbour of ours ran into our house and said to my mother: “Taissya, have you heard? They said on the radio that some teachers are coming here from Leningrad. They’re going to be choosing kids to go away and learn to dance.

The young Svetlana Adyrkhayeva © S I Chadov in the collection of Natasha Dissanayake

How do you feel about letting yours go?” “No, how can I?” my mother replied. But as soon as I heard about the dancing, I started nagging my mother: “Oh Mum, please, I really want to”. As kids, we always danced on special occasions – people in Ossetia generally sing and dance a lot - but I didn’t know what ballet was. I just asked to be allowed to go off and learn to dance. Who knows? They might let me in. So my mother and I travelled to Vladikavkaz - or Dzaudzhikau, as it was known then – the capital of North Ossetia. The event was taking place at the Pioneer Palace, but everything had already finished by the time we got there. However, Varvara Mey, from the Vaganova Academy, said: “Well OK, I’ll take a look at the girl”. They got me to undress down to my panties, and then they started casting their eyes over me. I didn’t understand any Russian – I just did what my mother told me to do. Many years later, Varvara Pavlovna told my daughter that “as soon as I took hold of your mother’s foot, I didn’t let go”. And it’s true – I didn’t go back to the village. If I had, my grandmother would never have let me go again. My mother had to go and get all the paperwork, and the only reason she agreed to me leaving was because I would be going with a whole group of children, and we would be accompanied by a child-minder from Ossetia. My mother felt reassured.

You said that you were only eight years old. But normally the academy only takes children who are 10 and above?

Yes, that’s true – they normally admit children after they’ve been at school for three years, whereas I was only at the end of my first year. But for some reason they took me. A specialist teacher taught me not only Russian, like the other children from Ossetia, but also gave me a general education to cover the second and third years that I was missing.

When you completed the academy, you were undoubtedly the “prima” of your year. Why didn’t you end up at the Kirov/Mariinskiy Ballet?

Fyodor Lopukhov, who was the artistic director for ballet at the Kirov Theatre from 1951 to 1956, wanted to invite me into the troupe. He used to call me “the little Circassian girl” and was very good to me [the Russian word for “little Circassian girl”, “cherkeshenka”, has acquired a romantic quality, inspired by the portrayal of young Caucasian women in the poetry of Pushkin and Lermontov – N.D.]. Lopukhov was chairman of the state examination commission and travelled to the exams in the same bus as we did, because he lived in the academy courtyard. After the exams, he said, with what appeared to me to be regret: “Well, little Circassian girl, they didn’t let me keep you. You’ll be leaving us.” The reason could be described as political. In Soviet times, children from the various republics were sent off to study at the country’s main academies so that, once they had completed their schooling, they could go back and work in their own republics. When our Ossetian intake was finishing off at the Vaganova, Vladikavkaz’s new opera theatre was still being built, and so our class and the Russian classes – three classes all told – were sent to perform at the newly built theatre in Chelyabinsk in the Urals.

I was very disappointed. I had never imagined that I would end up having to leave Leningrad. But I got a lot out of Chelyabinsk. I instantly became the principal dancer and was given only leading roles. At 17 I was already able to dance Odette/Odile.

And how did you get invited to the Bolshoi?

At the time, Moscow was playing host to a series of scheduled 10-day festivals showcasing literature and the arts from various Soviet republics. In August 1960, I took part in the North Ossetia festival. The principal ballet-master for the event was a well-known dancer from the Bolshoi Theatre, Sergei Koren’, who had also graduated from the Vaganova Academy. He took a look at me. My feeling was that if I was dancing leading roles, then everything must be fine but he took such a decision that I am even embarrassed to tell you. It will sound as if I am praising myself, which is not typical of me. He decided to use six of my pieces in the concert and to make them the focus for both halves of the concert programme: the Black Swan’s pas-de-deux, the adagio from Giselle, the adagio from Aurora with four cavaliers, the Dying Swan and two pieces based on the music of Ossetian composers – Ilya Garabayev’s Romance and a dance from the Dudar Khakhanov ballet Khetag. Koren’ himself choreographed these two pieces for me. I worked and practised all pieces and, because I was seen as capable, I didn’t worry too much. So then we went off to Moscow and started rehearsing in the Tchaikovsky Hall, where Moiseyev’s folk dance company usually rehearsed, and then suddenly Koren’ said: “Joining us for today’s rehearsal will be Galina Sergeyevna Ulanova”. I was dumbstruck. Why? Whatever for? When I was still at the academy, I remember her coming to Leningrad, and rumours going around that “Ulanova’s in the main rehearsal studio”. We ran along the corridors and pressed our noses to the windows so that we could look into the hall and take a peek. And so now Ulanova’s coming to a rehearsal to watch me? That was her final year before her retirement from dancing and so she was choosing pupils for coaching.

I danced for her, and she made several comments. She took a look at my point shoes and said: “I’ll send you some shoes tomorrow. What size are you?” It turned out that we were the same size. The next day she gave Koren’ two pairs of good ballet shoes to give to me. They were unlike anything I had. I was so happy and had no idea about the sharp twist of fate that lay in store. And I never ever wore those shoes. Many years later, I brought them into the theatre and said: “Galina Sergeyevna, please sign them for me for posterity”. She saw that they were still new and unworn, and gasped.

Our two concerts took place in the Bolshoi Theatre. At the time, the ballet’s artistic director was Leonid Lavrovsky. I guess Ulanova and he decided that my debut should be Swan Lake, since they knew I had already danced it. The debut was scheduled for 11 September 1960. Ulanova rehearsed me twice in the studio: I needed to learn the Bolshoi’s version of Act 3: each theatre has its own way of going about it. I was given a rehearsal with orchestra and was due to dance excerpts of the ballet with Nikolai Fadeyechev, who had partnered Ulanova and Plisetskaya. Then I noticed that a lot of people had gathered, and ballet dancers were standing in the wings, curious to see who this girl was who had been given Swan Lake. I glanced at the auditorium. A door opened and in came Marina Semyonova, who, along with Ulanova, had been my idol since childhood. I had

Svetlana Adyrkhayeva as drawn by Valery Kosorukov © Valery Kosorukov and from the jubilee gala programme celebrating Adyrkhaeva

never even so much as dreamt that I might find myself in their hands. I pulled off all the various sections and was just completing the 32 fouettes, which I usually completed on points. At that time there was no linoleum and the floor was wooden. My shoe slipped and I landed on my back side. Oh my God, what a nightmare! Galina Sergeyevna came up to me, lifted me up and said: “Don’t worry, don’t worry, get up, my little one!” “What a disgrace!” I whispered to her. “There’s no disgrace,” she said. Later I was told something that I would never forget, that she said: “Tell that girl that the great and the good have accepted her”.

In the West they like to use labels: a typical Bolshoi ballerina, a typical dancer from the Vaganova and so on. But, as a graduate from the Vaganova who worked at the Bolshoi for almost the whole of her life, how do you see yourself?

I believe the Vaganova Academy is the best, and that’s nothing to do with the fact that I studied there. That really is the way it is, it really does lay down strict academic foundations. But the Bolshoi school also has a lot of positives, such as breadth of movement and expressiveness. In my opinion, what’s best is a combination of these two schools. I really appreciate the way that both Varvara Mey and Yelena Shiripina taught me the canons of ballet at the Vaganova Academy; and I also appreciate the freedom of dance that I was helped to acquire at the Bolshoi.

It’s clear that in spending time with different teachers and working with different tutors, you borrowed something useful from each one. But now, looking back, who do you think gave you the most?

My greatest stroke of luck at the Bolshoi was that I was coached by Ulanova and went to Semyonova’s class. Galina Sergeyevna was calm and even-tempered, while Marina Timofeyevna liked to make sharp comments and to catch you out. One time her criticism even made me cry. In a spiteful voice she said: “I told you not to get involved with me”. Sobbing, I mimicked her intonation and said: “I wanted to, and got involved”. She burst into laughter.

But while I was at school, I was a very obedient, dutiful girl, and did absolutely everything that Varvara May ordered me to do over the course of four years. At the time the course lasted nine years. For the last five I was taught by Yelena Shiripina. She was a remarkable teacher and made me understand how and why I should perform a certain movement. Tremendously strict, she could simply throw you out of class. And I was thrown out of her class, for not paying enough attention. So, for example, she would explain something, and I would have a quick look out of the window. She couldn’t tolerate anyone not paying enough attention and insisted on complete concentration. She threw me out for three days. Each day I would stand by the door, waiting for her, apologizing and asking her to let me back in. She paid absolutely no attention. The other girls would arrive for class, while I stood by the door. But then after she let me back in, I focused on her every word and movement. Now I understand her so well. Sometimes you explain things to the girls, show them how to do something – some pick it up straight away, while with others it goes in one ear and out the other. It’s such a shame. She taught us the importance of utmost self-discipline. After all, is there any way of achieving anything without that level of self-discipline?

Yes, you became a masterful performer and were always in immaculate shape. And you became a mother at a time when it was very rare for ballerinas to do so. What made you decide to have children?

Well, first of all, I really loved children. I decided to have children just when I was at my busiest with my work. In 1968 they put on Spartacus, and I was dancing Aegina. By the winter of 1969, I was pregnant, but initially I didn’t tell anyone and carried on working. Lyosha, my husband, really

Svetlana Adyrkhayeva as Mekhmene-Banu in Legend of Love © Alexander Makarov and from the jubilee gala programme celebrating Adyrkhaeva

wanted us to have a child. At that time it was ages since the theatre had performed Legend of Love, and so one day Yuri Nikolayevich [Grigorovich] calls me in and says: “We’re going to go with Legend again, so get ready to dance”. And then I had to own up to him that I was expecting a child. He put his head in his hands and said: “So what am I going to do with you now?”

Your daughter’s now 39. What does she do?

Unfortunately, her fate in ballet wasn’t what we had hoped for. Fatima has the same build as I do, and in a book about me there’s even a photograph of two feet stretched out – mine and hers as a child – where everything’s elegant and just right. She has all the attributes, she’s got a talent for dance and did well at the Bolshoi Ballet Academy, but the Bolshoi didn’t take her. I’d rather not talk about the reasons. It was nothing to do with her. It’s sad, but it’s now in the past. She was very disappointed. She danced with Vyacheslav Gordeyev’s Russian Ballet and with a number of other companies. But it could all have been so different. She doesn’t dance any more.

That’s sad. Returning to your career, was there a particular role which stood out for you, which you were particularly fond of?

There’s a little bit of me in every role. I really loved Swan Lake. That’s the sort of ballet where you can show everything that you’re capable of. If you manage to pull it off, then you’ll prove to yourself that you’re a ballerina. The most important thing is to prove something to yourself. But there was another role which I just naturally enjoyed. That was Mekhmene-Banu in Legend of Love. That role encapsulates precisely the sort of choreography and sense of rhythm that came to be a part of me, and I flowed into the part quite naturally. I loved dancing Aegina and the Mistress of the Copper Mountain in The Stone Flower, but I quite simply wallowed in the image of Mekhmene-Banu.

You’ve just given a list of roles which confirm that you’re a Grigorovich ballerina.

Yes, of course I really loved his choreography. The very first time I found out about the role of Mekhmene was during rehearsals for another ballet. Kasyan Goleizovsky was staging Leili and Medzhnun. He was already pretty old, and Grigorovich was sitting next to him and helping him to apply the finishing touches. Natasha Bessmertnova and Misha Lavrovsky were rehearsing. Meanwhile, I had no part in the show and was watching the rehearsal with the girls, sat way back in the hall. And then suddenly Grigorovich turned to me and said: “Svetlana, come over here”. I went over to him, and he said: “I’m going to be putting on Legend of Love (at the time Legend of Love wasn’t in the repertoire), and it will be Plisetskaya and you dancing Mekhmene”. We knew that the Kirov was staging this extraordinary ballet. I’d only been at the theatre for three years and I found myself rooted to the spot: Maya Plisetskaya and me? I danced all the production rehearsals and then both dress rehearsals. They said that Plisetskaya wasn’t sure whether to dance, but in the end she danced the premiere. For me, this role was the greatest gift. Later on, Nina Timofeyeva also danced this role.

Now you’re a teacher and a tutor. How long have you been doing that?

Well, our group of leading soloists was dismissed in 1988, and so I didn’t work at the theatre for 12 years. They did recruit for teachers and Yuri Nikolayevich could, of course, have kept me on as a teacher, but I wasn’t on his list of choices. Nevertheless, when he needed someone to introduce dancers to ballets with which they were unfamiliar, he would turn to me. Nina Semizorova had to be taught the role of Mekhmene, Galya Stepanenko - the role of Aegina, and in these instances Grigorovich called me in. People who had previously performed those roles were working for the theatre at the time, but for some reason he called me in. And then in 2000, Boris Akimov became the artistic director, invited me to the theatre and handed me my first student, Olga Stebletsova. Then others appeared on the scene. My girls are good, hard-working.

What’s the most important aspect of your work with them?

The most important thing I need to do is to help unearth whatever lies hidden within the dancer, and at the same time not to pressure her, so that she doesn’t become afraid of opening up. After all, sometimes they’re not even aware of their own potential. It’s important for me not only to teach them about technique, and to perfect complex movements, but also to make sure that they can make these movements “sing out” through their body, to make sure these movements “burst into speech”. I also need to fill them with hope and make sure that they are always ready for the best. Sometimes you see a ballerina walking along the corridor to class looking as if she’s just got out of bed. I tell my girls: “We’re in a profession where we’re expected to be beautiful. Our nice deportment, our nice habits and our image should always be on show, that’s our nature.” And I work hard to make sure that in class they’re always standing in an elegant pose, even when they’re listening to me explaining something. That’s what we used to be taught at the Vaganova and at the Bolshoi. And so my girls never show up to class and to rehearsals wearing the first thing they could grab in the morning, overalls or shapeless pants.

Now I look back at that morning class and the rehearsal and can see how Adyrkhayeva works at this. All wearing elegant training gear to the lesson, her dancers looked so well-groomed; it was as if they were preparing to audition for a role. And with every single gesture, with every remarkably beautiful demonstration, Svetlana herself, with her slim, elegant figure, seemed to confirm: she practises what she preaches.

Adyrkhaeva's releve in 2nd position on a book cover- "Classes in Classical Ballet" by Asaf Messerer, Iskusstvo, Moscow, 1967. © Iskusstvo

Her students don’t just appreciate Svetlana, they adore her. Anna Antonicheva, an experienced leading ballerina, explains why four years ago she left her permanent teacher and moved over to Adyrkhayeva. “I wanted to work with a master from the Petersburg school,” she said. “She outlines the style of a particular ballet with great precision and clarity, she leads you from one task to the next and she whips you into shape.” Katya Krysanova calls Adyrkhayeva her “second mother”, while Anastasia Stashkevich admits that “I wouldn’t hesitate to share my innermost feelings with her, and I know she would understand”. Anna Leonova loves not only her teacher’s lessons and rehearsals, but also admires Svetlana’s patience and stamina. Her students well know the misfortunes their dear Svetlana Dzantemirovna has had to face. They know that, after spending the whole day in the theatre, she returns home to her beloved husband, who has been bedridden for several years with illness. The girls can’t help but value her tenderness and kindness towards them, and the fact that she never raises her voice and is never in a bad mood. Last spring they all had a chance to say thank you to her, by dancing in her honour on her 70^th birthday.

A special gala concert took place on the Bolshoi’s New Stage on 16 May 2008. Enthroned in the royal box was the head of the Republic of North Ossetia, who travelled specially to Moscow to congratulate the birthday girl, a source of pride for her distant mountain republic. And sitting modestly next to him was the culprit responsible for this festive event – an elegant woman with gentle, restrained manners and a warm gaze in

Svetlana Adyrkhayeva as drawn by Valery Kosorukov © Valery Kosorukov and from the jubilee gala programme celebrating Adyrkhaeva

her large brown eyes – Svetlana Adyrkhayeva, a ballerina from the “golden age” of the Bolshoi Ballet.

The concert opened with a ball, the palace act from Swan Lake. Looking on as Anna Antonicheva danced the role of Odile, it may be that Svetlana was casting her mind back to 1960, and her own debut in this ballet. Next came Act 2 of Spartacus, with Katya Krysanova in her role as Aegina. The third part was a divertissement. Footage from the 1960s and 1970s appeared up on the screen: Svetlana dancing variations of Aegina and Kitri – refined, academic, and tasteful. Then there’s her rehearsing with Ulanova. And then after that – her students, performing on stage excerpts from the ballets which Adyrkhayeva performed at the Bolshoi. Dancing the adagio from Legend of Love was a guest, the Mariinsky Theatre’s Ulyana Lopatkina, who had come down to Moscow specially for the evening. “I couldn’t not come, Adyrkhayeva is a great ballerina,” Lopatkina said. By way of a greeting from Svetlana’s home in the Caucasus, the children’s folk dance ensemble “The Little Dzhigits” burst onto the stage. With their fiery, daring Ossetian dancing, the boys earned tumultuous applause from the audience, who then provided a standing ovation when the heroine of the evening appeared on stage. One young boy presented her with an enormous bouquet, a multitude of red, white and yellow flowers recreating the pattern of North Ossetia’s national flag. Svetlana couldn’t hold on to the bouquet and handed it back to the boy, while everyone taking part in the concert laid bouquets at her feet. That’s how they celebrated.

And the next morning, the birthday girl arrived at the theatre at the usual time, ready to carry on working with her pupils.