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Amy Bowring
Boris Volkoff is often cited as the "father of Canadian ballet," and was responsible for training several generations of Canadian dancers, including many who joined the National Ballet of Canada. A graduate of the Moscow State Ballet School, Volkoff toured with its youth company in 1924, but fled from the group while touring China. He eventually made his way to Chicago and Adolph Bolm's company via Japan, Hawaii and San Francisco. After arriving in Toronto in 1929, Volkoff took a job as ballet master and choreographer at the Loews' Uptown Theatre. He soon opened his own school and began giving public recitals in addition to mounting ice ballets for the Toronto Skating Club. In 1936 Volkoff's group of performers achieved success as Canada's representatives at the International Tanzwettspiele at the Berlin Summer Olympics. In the same year, he married dancer Janet Baldwin and the two worked together building a school and performing company. Volkoff and Baldwin collaborated with David Yeddeau, Gweneth Lloyd and Betty Farally, of the Winnipeg Ballet, to found the Canadian Ballet Festivals (1948-1954). When their marriage ended in the early 1950s, Baldwin formed her own school and performing group. During his career Volkoff created forty-five major ballets including The Red Ear of Corn (1949), which was reconstructed in 1986 as part of Dance Collection Danse's Encore! Encore! project. He made an ongoing impact as a teacher. Boris Volkoff was made an Officer of the Order of Canada in 1973, a year before his death.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Collier, Cliff. "Volkoff, Boris," The Encyclopedia of Theatre Dance in Canada/Encyclopédie de la danse théâtrale au Canada, edited by Susan Macpherson. Dance Collection Danse Press/es: Toronto, 2000.
Warner, Mary Jane. Toronto Dance Teachers: 1825-1925. Dance Collection Danse Press/es: Toronto, 1995.
RESOURCE
Available for viewing on videotape at Dance Collection Danse
The Red Ear of Corn: the 1986 Encore! Encore! reconstruction of the ballet.
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