Topaz, Muriel

Antony Tudor, British dancer, choreographer, and teacher, was born William Cook in London, April 4, 1909. His training began in 1928 with Marie Rambert and continued with Pearl Argyle, Harold Turner, and Margaret Craske. His career included: dancer and choreographer for Ballet Club (later Ballet Rambert) from 1930-1937; founder and choreographer of London Ballet, 1937-1940; resident choreographer of Ballet Theatre (later American Ballet Theatre), New York, 1939-1950; artistic director, Royal Swedish Ballet, 1952-1964; associate director, American Ballet Theatre, from 1974; and, as teacher for the Metropolitan Opera Ballet School and Juilliard School. His works include Jardin aux lilas (Ballet Rambert, 1936), Dark elegies (Ballet Rambert, 1937), The Judgement of Paris (Westminster Theatre, London, 1938), Gala performance (London Ballet, 1938), Pillar of fire (Ballet Theatre, 1942) Dim lustre (Ballet Theatre, 1943), Undertow (Ballet Theatre, 1945), Lady of the camellias (New York City Ballet, 1951), Offenbach in the underworld (Philadelphia Ballet Company, 1954), Hail and farewell (Metropolitan Opera Ballet, 1959), Echoing of trumpets (Royal Swedish Ballet, 1963), Shadowplay (Royal Ballet, London, 1967), and The leaves are fading (American Ballet Theatre, 1975). Tudor is the recipient of the Carina Ari Gold Medal, 1973, Dance Magazine Award, 1974, Queen Elizabeth II Coronation Award, Royal Academy of Dancing, 1985, Handel Medaillion of the City of New York, 1986, Capezio Dance Award, 1987, Kennedy Center Honors List, and honorary doctorate, Oxford University. He died in New York, April 19, 1987.

Muriel Topaz was a dancer, teacher, choreographer, reconstuctor, and author. Born in Philadelphia where she studied ballet and modern dance, she was a student at New York University School of Education and the Juilliard School of Music in the early 1950's. She had a long association with the Dance Notation Bureau and was its director from 1978 to 1985. She notated works by twenty-five different choreographers including George Balanchine, Doris Humphrey, José Limón, Paul Taylor and others. She was also the rehearsal director of the Juilliard Dance Ensemble, 1966-1970, and then director of the Dance Division, 1985-1992. In 1998, she received a John Simon Guggenheim Foundation fellowship to pursue research for her Tudor biography, published by The Scarecrow Press in 2002. She died, at age 70, in 2003.

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