Peter Martins
| Peter Martins | |
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Martins at the opening night of the 2009 Metropolitan Opera.
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| Born |
27 October 1946 Copenhagen, Denmark |
| Occupation | Dancer, choreographer |
Peter Martins (born 27 October 1946) is a Danish danseur and choreographer. He was a principal dancer with the Royal Danish Ballet and with The New York City Ballet, where he joined George Balanchine, Jerome Robbins and John Taras as balletmaster in 1981, retired from dancing in 1983 at which time he became Co-Ballet Master-In-Chief with Robbins, and since 1990 has borne sole responsibility for artistic leadership of City Ballet.
Born and raised in Copenhagen, Denmark, Martins studied at the School of the Royal Danish Ballet and danced with the company from 1965 to 1969. Although before that, he studied ballroom dance at the age of five. He was already an international star when he joined NYCB in 1970 as a principal dancer. He reportedly left his own native homeland of Denmark and the Royal Ballet of Denmark to dance with NYCB. Martins danced a wide variety of roles, although he may be most famous for Apollo and the Cavalier in Balanchine's Nutcracker. He danced frequently with Suzanne Farrell, although they parted acrimoniously when she left the NYCB at his insistence. She went on to found her own company. Martins was Balanchine's one and only choice to run the company, and he was made Balletmaster in 1981. He retired from dancing in 1983 and assumed the job of sole Balletmaster-in-Chief in 1990. He was Balanchine's own choice to carry on the legacy of the NYCB when Balanchine himself passed. He was the subject of the documentary Peter Martins: A Dancer.
Martins regularly choreographs new works for both companies. His first piece was Calcium Light Night set to music by Charles Ives and premiered in 1977. His more recent pieces include Octet, Friandises, Stabat Mater and the full-length ballets The Sleeping Beauty, Swan Lake and Romeo † Juliet. He also did the choreography for the Barbie movies Barbie in the Nutcracker and Barbie of Swan Lake.
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