BALLET CHRONICLES

This is the site for Ballet Chronicles, which is a unique work detailing, season by season, all ballets ever performed, at home or abroad, by The Royal Ballet, The Birmingham Royal Ballet and The Royal Ballet School, from when they first started public performances to the present day. I have included all full length ballets, one act ballets, and divertissements. I have also included details of all Galas performed by the three institutions.

The season by season lists of repertoire show the title of each work accompanied by the name of the Choreographer and Composer together with the Première date and Designer, in the first season of performance. There are indices for all three institutions of all full length, one act ballets and divertissements together with separate schedules “The Choreographers, The Ballets, The First Casts”, “The Composers, The Ballets”, “The Designers, The Ballets” and “ The Ballets, A Chronology”.

If you click here you will see the table of Contents which will give a better idea as to the wealth of information that is contained with my book, and if you click here you will be taken to a sample page which shows how all this information is detailed in the season by season lists of repertoire and the manner of presentation.

I have dedicated the work to “Madam” and all proceeds are paid to The Royal Ballet School White Lodge Redevelopment Appeal. I made it quite clear from the outset that any money my Book earned would be paid to The Royal Ballet School White Lodge Redevelopment Appeal and that I wanted no payment for myself even though it had cost a great deal of time and money to produce the work, and this is strictly adhered to.

I give my Book freely to the three Institutions as well as to many other bodies and individuals involved in the performing arts. If you feel that you fall within these categories and may qualify for a free copy then please apply here.

Monica Mason, the Director of The Royal Ballet, has very kindly written a wonderful foreword, and there is a list of “acknowledgements” within the Book to reflect my thanks to those who have helped me in its preparation.

I started this work when I wanted to look up the season in which The Royal Ballet last performed a certain piece and found that no such record had ever been made. The absence of such a reference work in the public domain I found quite staggering, and I was even more surprised to discover that such a record was not held by The Royal Opera House or even The Royal Ballet itself as they relied on searches of the actual performance programmes whenever they required such information.

I resolved to prepare my own Chronicle to show each and every work performed season by season little realising quite how gigantic was the task I was taking on. In fact it took over eighteen months of detailed research and very hard work just to complete the bare bones of my Book and in that time the actual performance programmes for nearly all the performances ever given by The Royal Ballet, The Birmingham Royal Ballet and The Royal Ballet School both at home and abroad (actual performances commenced in the 1926/27 season) have passed through my hands. I have spent a further two years carrying out still further research and the Book, at long last, is now nearing completion. Then it will merely require the relatively simple task of updating it each year as a further season of Repertoire is added for each Company, and bringing the History up to date also. It is intended to keep the Book updated and available for the foreseeable future, and it is intended that it will be taken over and continued by another when I have had enough.

As to the statistics of this mammoth work, I have never added up the huge number of ballets involved, but some mental guesstimates have led me to believe that there are at some 40,000 pieces of information within my Book (ballets, choreographers, composers, designers, first casts and première dates etc.). The matter of size alone means that it works better on a Computer where the “search” facility really does make a big difference, but in addition, I just did not fancy the monumental task of creating a full and proper index (the indices are of ballets only) which would have been necessary for a paper based book. Also the need for annual updating with each new season of repertoire coupled with the updating of the indices and schedules basically precludes a hard bound book, and the cost of a loose leaf version would be prohibitive.

It was always my intention that after the vast amount of hours that I have put into the compilation of this record that it would not stagnate but I that would add “improvements” periodically, and that is why I have bitten the dreaded index bullet and so the 2007 edition has the indices expanded to include divertissements and, in addition, I have added the separate schedules detailing Choreographers, First Casts, première dates, composers, and designers mentioned above. Finally the histories have been withdrawn and replaced by a synopsis of important dates and events in chronological order.

At the present time I have no plans for further “improvements” mainly because I cannot think of anything else that I can realistically add!

For this 2007 edition there is not only the .zip file available to download but an .exe file also. Whilst the .exe file is larger than the .zip version some may find this format easier to manage. There is also now an on-line version which avoids the need to download and manage a very large file, the content is identical.

If you would like to have my Book, and I sincerely hope that you will, please follow the link below and download it. All that is then necessary is to open the book and follow the instructions given within it at the “password required” stage. The acquisition of the necessary password to own and study the entire volume will cost you £25. Directions as to how payment is to be made will be given on application or you can use PayPal simply by clicking on the button below and by that means payment is possible by Debit or Credit Card. Alternatively if the on-line version is preferred, then please make the same payment and apply for your password which I will send to you together with your individual user name both of which will be needed for access to the Book using the link below.

It is only necessary to purchase my Book once, as all purchasers are notified just as soon as a new edition is available to download (or read on-line) and your computer will remember and apply your original password for the download versions so long as you save the book in the same place on your computer.

The book will only run satisfactorily in Windows 95, or later,* and a recent version of Adobe Reader is necessary to study the contents, so I have included a direct link to Adobe for their free PDF Reader download within the book itself. The on-line version is capable of being read on virtually any operating system through your Internet browser.

To download this superb Book as a .zip file - click Ballet Chronicles.zip

To download this superb reference Book as a .exe file - click Ballet Chronicles.exe

To access the on-line version - click Ballet Chronicles On-Line Version

Any questions or problems, please contact me and I will try and answer them.

Feed back? Do you want to comment on my book? If you do, please use the CONTACT facility below.

* Some Macs can emulate windows and thus run Windows programmes, and some Mac users have run e-books compiled with the software I use with complete success. I cannot, therefore, guarantee that this book will run on a Mac but …. However, the new on-line version should be perfectly capable of being read on a Mac.

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© Robert M J Kimber 2007