Choreographer and director of the Classical Ballet Theater Natalia Kasatkina has died

On March 14, at the age of 89, Natalia Dmitrievna Kasatkina, People’s Artist of the Russian Federation, famous choreographer, director of the State Academic Classical Ballet Theater, passed away. Farewell – on Saturday, March 16, in the atrium of the Bolshoi Theater. The ballerina will be buried in Snegiri in the family cemetery next to her husband Vladimir Vasilev.

There was something elusively aristocratic in her face and in her entire appearance… Natalia Kasatkina was born on June 7, 1934 in Moscow in the family of a representative of the famous Moscow merchant family, engineer D.A. Kasatkin, and children’s writer Anna Kardashova. Once, having heard a lot of unreliable rumors that her grandfather was Lenin’s driver, he asked her about it, she replied that she shaved it off (Natalia Dmitrievna had an amazing sense of humor).

– I am begging you! Someone made a joke. My grandfathers never drove anyone, they were aristocrats. Dad’s relatives have a lower status, and on my mother’s side all are aristocrats, mostly English, partly Russian, so no one could carry Lenin. They had the first car in Russia. And as my grandmother said: “When we were driving this car, the men threw themselves into the ditch because they couldn’t understand why it was driving without a horse!” They thought it had something to do with the devil.

The little girl was raised by her grandmother, whom Natalia Dmitrievna loved very much. She told me some details of her biography:

— My grandmother survived three revolutions and raised three children. Her father always dreamed of a son and gave her a male upbringing, and this allowed her to go through all the revolutions, through all the wars. There was not a single drop of Russian blood in her, but she loved Russia, knew the Russian language better than many Russians. And my grandmother dreamed of just playing the violin at the end of her life, when she had already stopped teaching. In the family, they all learned five languages, and she taught German. So my grandmother sent me to learn to play the violin. I studied for almost six years. Mom kept her diploma, where I got “A” in solfeggio. That is, I have absolute pitch. And in general, it helped me a lot, but from there I ran away into ballet.

In 1953, Natalia Dmitrievna graduated from the Moscow Choreographic School in the class of the legendary Bolshoi Theater ballerina Aunt Maya Plisetskaya Sulamith Messerer and was very proud of her teacher. After graduating from college, she was immediately accepted into the ballet troupe of the Bolshoi Theater, and all her life she recalled the extraordinary atmosphere of creativity in which she then found herself, and most importantly, the indescribable feeling of the spirit, the smell of the Bolshoi Theater, which she told many about:

— I didn’t even have the impression of some performances, but the impression of the Bolshoi Theater itself. When you go on stage and smell mixed perfumes… I not only have absolute pitch, but also absolute sense of smell. I really felt the smell of the Bolshoi Theater. From the auditorium you feel everyone, but here it all comes together and goes on stage.

From 1954 to 1976, Natalia Dmitrievna was a soloist of the Bolshoi Theater ballet troupe. She was a bright performer of the characteristic repertoire in such performances as “Swan Lake”, “Raymonda”, “Cinderella”, “Don Quixote”, “The Rite of Spring”. She was the first performer of the role of Rock in the legendary ballet “Carmen Suite” by Cuban choreographer Alberto Alonso, staged in 1967 at the Bolshoi Theater for Maya Plisetskaya.

But the main thing: at the Bolshoi Theater she met a man who became her constant companion both in creativity and in life – Vladimir Vasilev. They were called that, mixing both surnames – KasVasy. And even then, when Vladimir Yudich passed away in 2017, Natalia Dmitrievna always said “we”, without even explaining who she meant. They were inseparable from each other.

So together they entered the history of ballet with their iconic performances of the “Thaw” times “Vanina Vanini” by Nikolai Karetnikov, staged at the Bolshoi Theater in 1962, the ballet “Geologists” (Heroic Poem), released at the main theater of the country two years later, the ballet “The Creation of the World” at the Kirov (now Mariinsky) Theater, where at the premiere in 1971 such great artists as Mikhail Baryshnikov and Yuri Solovyov appeared in the leading roles.

And in 1977, Natalia Dmitrievna, together with her husband, headed the Classical Ballet Theater, created eleven years earlier by Igor Moiseev as the USSR Choreographic Concert Ensemble “Young Ballet”. It was Natalia Dmitrievna and Vladimir Yudich who were the first choreographers in the USSR who, in 1965, staged the ballet “The Rite of Spring” to the music of Stravinsky, which went down in the history of world ballet theater.

“It was 1965, after all, there was a “thaw,” Natalia Dmitrievna recalled. — We heard this music for the first time in Paris, we ran to the store, bought a player and a vinyl record. And there was a hotel there where Hitler stayed during the war, and our room was, of course, not the same, but colossal! There was a luxurious bed, and we lay on this bed and listened to music. Naturally, there was no score or clavier, and Gena Rozhdestvensky told us what this music consisted of. That it sounds like it’s complicated, but in reality it’s just complicated…

— Did Stravinsky see your performance?

– He saw it in America. Solomon Hurok (American music producer. — P.Ya.) came here and watched the repertoire of the Bolshoi Theater. Igor Aleksandrovich Moiseev advised him to watch our performance. He treated us very well, and like a true great man, he never envied anyone or competed with anyone, and that’s why he recommended our “Rite of Spring” to Solomon Izrailevich. Solomon went to America and sent a telegram that he had agreed with Stravinsky and Stravinsky would take the helm, and this performance would open the Bolshoi Theater tour. A Furtseva (Minister of Culture of the USSR. — P.Ya.) responded to this that “the emigrant Stravinsky has no reason to cling to the successes of Soviet ballet.” And then we were just a boy and a girl. But Stravinsky still came.

We met him at the hotel and had a conversation before watching the performance. Moreover, I’m a coward, and Volodya, he wasn’t afraid of anything, said: “You didn’t want there to be a libretto, but you have a theme of love?” – “Eat”. And Volodya: “But we did it.” And Stravinsky replies: “Well, that’s right! And I never said that. You know, journalists are my enemies because they write what they want.” And that’s how we went through the entire performance. We then gave him a program and asked him to sign our program. I still have it.

We made our “Rite of Spring” with the remnants of the troupe, because the Bolshoi Theater was then going on tour with “The Legend of Love,” which I adore and consider Grigorovich’s best performance. He had just taken up the position of chief choreographer of the Bolshoi, and this was his first tour. And we got retirees and recruits in the theater. When Grigorovich returned and we showed him the ballet on the upper stage, he said: “I congratulate you on a wonderful performance.”