Vladimir Bourmeister (22 January 1904 - 5 March 1971) was a

Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nation ...

choreographer best known for his choreography of Swan Lake, a

ballet Ballet () is a type of performance dance that originated during the Italian Renaissance in the fifteenth century and later developed into a concert dance form in France and Russia. It has since become a widespread and highly technical form of ...

dance by

Peter Tchaikovsky Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky , group=n ( ; 7 May 1840 – 6 November 1893) was a Russian composer of the Romantic period. He was the first Russian composer whose music would make a lasting impression internationally. He wrote some of the most popu ...

. Made in 1952, his choreography of the dance, unlike other choreographies at the time, was designed to be closely related to the original dance by Tchaikovsky whilst also being modern. The most recognized change in his choreography to the ballet was adding a prologue that showed Odette being turned into a swan by Rothbart. By the end of Bourmeister's choreography, she gets restored to herself. In the Ballroom scene of the dance, Bourmeister made Odile more like an attractive and respectable girl than a seductive

vamp The VaMP driverless car was one of the first truly autonomous cars Dynamic Vision for Perc ...

to make Siegreid portraying Odette more realistic. Bourmeister's choreography had been played over by the Stanislavsky orchestra. In 1960 the choreography was adopted by the

Paris Opera Ballet The Paris Opera Ballet () is a French ballet company that is an integral part of the Paris Opera. It is the oldest national ballet company, and many European and international ballet companies can trace their origins to it. It is still regarded a ...

. When he was invited to choreograph The Snow Maiden (mus. Tchaikovsky) for London Festival Ballet in 1961, he became the first

choreographer to work with a Western company.

References

1904 births 1971 deaths Soviet male ballet dancers {{USSR-bio-stub