American Ballet Theatre in the context of "Metropolitan Opera House (Lincoln Center)"

Ballet is a formalized italian dance form with its origins in the Italian Renaissance courts of 15th and 16th centuries. Ballet spread from Italy to France with the help of Catherine de' Medici, where ballet developed even further under her aristocratic influence. An early example of Catherine's development of ballet is through 'Le Paradis d' Amour', a piece of work presented at the wedding of her daughter Marguerite de Valois to Henry of Navarre. Aristocratic money was responsible for the initial stages of development in 'court ballet', as it was royal money that dictated the ideas, literature and music used in ballets that were created to primarily entertain the aristocrats of the time. The first formal 'court ballet' ever recognized was staged in 1573, 'Ballet des Polonais'. In true form of royal entertainment, 'Ballet des Polonais' was commissioned by Catherine de' Medici to honor the Polish ambassadors who were visiting Paris upon the accession of Henry of Anjou to the throne of Poland. In 1581, Catherine de' Medici commissioned another court ballet, Ballet Comique de la Reine. However, it was her compatriot, Balthasar de Beaujoyeulx, who organized the ballet. Catherine de' Medici and Balthasar de Beaujoyeulx were responsible for presenting the first court ballet ever to apply the principles of Baif's Academie, by integrating poetry, dance, music and set design to convey a unified dramatic storyline. Moreover, the early organization and development of 'court ballet' was funded by, influenced by and produced by the aristocrats of the time, fulfilling both their personal entertainment and political propaganda needs.

In the late 17th century Louis XIV founded the Académie Royale de Musique (the Paris Opera) within which emerged the first professional theatrical ballet company, the Paris Opera Ballet. The predominance of French in the vocabulary of ballet reflects this history. Theatrical ballet soon became an independent form of art, although still frequently maintaining a close association with opera, and spread from the heart of Europe to other nations. The Royal Danish Ballet and the Imperial Ballet of the Russian Empire were founded in the 1740s and began to flourish, especially after about 1850. In 1907 the Russian ballet in turn moved back to France, where the Ballets Russes of Sergei Diaghilev and its successors were particularly influential. Soon ballet spread around the world with the formation of new companies, including London's The Royal Ballet (1931), the San Francisco Ballet (1933), American Ballet Theatre (1937), the Royal Winnipeg Ballet (1939), The Australian Ballet (1940 as the predecessor Borovansky Ballet), the New York City Ballet (1948), the Cuban National Ballet (1948), the National Ballet of Canada (1951), and the National Ballet Academy and Trust of India (2002).

Raymond Martin Barallobre Ramirez (January 3, 1930 – March 26, 2025), known professionally as Ray Barra, was an American ballet dancer, ballet master, choreographer and ballet director who worked mostly in Europe. He was a soloist with the American Ballet Theatre and from 1959 a principal dancer of the Stuttgart Ballet, where he danced parts in creations by John Cranko including Romeo in Romeo and Juliet with Marcia Haydée as Julia, and the title role in Onegin. He created major roles in ballets by Kenneth MacMillan, Las Hermanas and Song of the Earth. After retiring from the stage due to an injury, he worked as a ballet master first with the Berlin State Ballet, then with John Neumeier at the ballet of the Oper Frankfurt and the Hamburg Ballet. He was associate director of the Spanish National Dance Company, and created several choreographies internationally.

Joaquín De Luz (born 1976, Madrid, Spain) is a Spanish ballet dancer. He was formerly with the American Ballet Theatre (ABT), and a principal dancer with the New York City Ballet (NYCB). He is currently director of Spanish National Dance Company.

La Bayadère (lit. 'the temple dancer'; Russian: Баядерка, romanized: Bayaderka) is an 1877 ballet, originally staged in four acts and seven tableaux by the French choreographer Marius Petipa to music by Ludwig Minkus and libretto by Sergei Khudekov [ru]. The ballet was staged for the benefit performance of the Russian Prima ballerina Ekaterina Vazem, who created the principal role of Nikiya. La Bayadère was first presented by the Imperial Ballet at the Imperial Bolshoi Kamenny Theatre in St. Petersburg, Russia, on 4 February [O.S. 23 January] 1877. From the first performance the ballet was hailed by contemporary critics and audiences as one of the choreographer Petipa's masterpieces, particularly the scene of act II The Kingdom of the Shades, which is one of the most celebrated pieces in all of classical ballet.

Nearly all modern versions of La Bayadère are derived from Vladimir Ponomarev [ru] and Vakhtang Chabukiani's redacted version staged for the Kirov/Mariinsky Ballet in 1941 that has remained in the company's repertory to the present day. Outside of the Soviet Union, Natalia Makarova staged the first full-length production of La Bayadère in 1980 for American Ballet Theatre, a version that is itself derived from Ponomarev and Chabukiani's production of 1947.

Raymonda (Russian: Раймонда) is a grand ballet in three acts, four scenes with an apotheosis, originally choreographed by Marius Petipa to the music of Alexander Glazunov (his opus 57) and libretto by Lydia Pashkova. Raymonda was created especially for the benefit performance of the prima ballerina Pierina Legnani, and first presented by the Imperial Ballet at the Imperial Mariinsky Theatre on 19 January [O.S. 7 January] 1898 in Saint Petersburg, Russia. Among the ballet's most celebrated passages is the Pas classique hongrois (a.k.a. Raymonda Pas de dix) from the third act, which is often performed independently.

Today Raymonda is performed by many ballet companies throughout the world with choreography that is derived primarily from the Kirov Ballet's 1948 revival as staged by Konstantin Sergeyev. Sergeyev greatly altered, and in some cases changed entirely, Marius Petipa's choreography, particularly in the dances for the corps de ballet. The choreography as revised by Sergeyev remains the traditional text for most of the world's productions of Raymonda, among them Rudolf Nureyev's version for the Paris Opéra Ballet and Anna-Marie Holmes's version for American Ballet Theatre, respectively.

The Vaganova Academy of Russian Ballet is a school of classical ballet in St Petersburg, Russia. Established in 1738 during the reign of Empress Anna, the academy was known as the Imperial Ballet School until the Soviet era, when, after a brief hiatus, the school was re-established as the Leningrad State Choreographic Institute. In 1957, the school was renamed in honor of the pedagogue Agrippina Vaganova, who cultivated the method of classical ballet training that has been taught there since the late 1920s. Many of the world's leading ballet schools have adopted elements of the Vaganova method into their own training.

The Vaganova Academy is the associate school of the Mariinsky Ballet, one of the world's leading ballet companies. Students of the school have found employment with ballet and contemporary companies worldwide, such as the Bolshoi Ballet, The Royal Ballet, American Ballet Theatre and the Mikhailovsky Ballet.