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In 1963, the South
African government established four professional ballet companies, one in each of the four provinces, and Staff would eventually work with them all: the companies of the Cape Performing Arts Board (CAPAB Ballet), the Natal Performing Arts Council (NAPAC Ballet), the Performing Arts
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Staff was soon invited to join
Rambert's Ballet Club, as her performing group was then called. For the next twelve years, from 1933 to 1945, he worked with the Rambert company as both a dancer and choreographer. Except for two seasons with the Vic-Wells Ballet, 1934/35 and 1938/39, and a brief stint
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Staff married four times. He wed his fellow Ballet
Rambert dancer Elisabeth Schooling in 1942, and she danced in many of his early works. He next married English dancer Jaqueline St. Clere, followed by South African musical comedy actress Heather Lloyd-Jones. All three of these marriages ended in
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Returning to
Britain in 1947, Staff spent the next few years as an international freelance. He served as resident choreographer of the Metropolitan Ballet (1947–1948), toured Australia with Ballet Rambert (1948), toured the United States and Canada with Sadler's Wells Ballet (1949), and was
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subsequently appointed ballet master and choreographer at the Empire
Theatre (1950) on London's Leicester Square. In 1953, he went back to South Africa and in 1955 founded his own company, the South African Ballet, for which he choreographed or produced more than fifteen works, including
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Upon completion of his military service, Staff returned to his homeland in 1946 and joined the South
African National Ballet in Cape Town. There he danced in his own ballets and produced works in which he had appeared in England, notably Nijinsky's
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it remained in the
Rambert repertory for many years. During the war years in England—September 1939 to May 1945—Staff served as a captain in the Argyle and Sutherland Highlanders but was released temporarily to choreograph
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Thereafter, Staff was artistic director of PACOFS Ballet in
Bloemfontein from 1969 until his death in 1971. Among the six ballets he created for this company were two notable works made in 1970:
84:(15 June 1918 – 10 May 1971) was a South African ballet dancer, choreographer, producer, and company director. He was a major figure in the history of European theatrical dance in South Africa.
274:(1965), to music by Benjamin Britten. Moving on to the Transvaal in 1966, he worked in Johannesburg until 1968 as resident producer and choreographer with PACT Ballet under the direction of
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in London. After Lloyd returned to
England in 1933, she encouraged her young pupil to join her. At age fifteen, Staff moved to London to continue his training at Rambert's school in
221:(1940), to the music and text of Sergei Prokofiev. All these works displayed his facility for witty invention that would characterize many of his later ballets. He also created
329:(1971), set to a commissioned score by Newcater, was planned as the first full-length ballet with an indigenous South African theme. The title character, known as the
205:, set to music by William Boyce, it was made for Ballet Rambert in 1938. Over the next two years, he contributed three of his best works to the company's repertory:
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Council of the
Transvaal (PACT Ballet), and the Performing Arts Council of the Orange Free State (PACOFS Ballet). For CAPAB Ballet, based in Cape Town, he mounted
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225:(1941), a second version of his popular hit, a series of dances caricaturing different kinds of ballet. Combined with its predecessor under the title
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96:, in what is now the Northern Cape Province of South Africa. As a teenager, he moved to Cape Town, where he attended
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proved such a success that it was soon made into a film that was distributed worldwide by Twentieth Century Fox.
157:(1940), set to music of Gabriel Fauré by Andrée Howard. Other roles in his varied repertory included The Poet in
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with Walter Gore's London Ballet in 1940, he was a featured performer and choreographer with Ballet Rambert.
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290:(1966), set to music by Stephen O'Reilly and described as a "good-humoured ballet in five visions";
358:, who became a prolific choreographer in her own right as director of CAPAB Ballet, later known as
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Frank Cedric Staff was born to an Irish mother and an English father in the diamond mining town of
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both works by Antony Tudor. He also danced in several ballets by Frederick Ashton, among them
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Staff inherited many of Hugh Laing's roles in the Rambert repertory, including The Lover in
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all choreographed by Michel Fokine. He also danced such different roles as Bluebird in
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Marina Grut, "Staff, Frank Cedric," Biographies of South African Personalities, in
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341:) of the Limpopo Province. In homage to Staff, the work was rechoreographed by
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153:(1939). For the London Ballet, he created the role of The Boy, Julien, in
270:(1964), to the Prokofiev score, and for NAPAC Ballet, in Durban, he set
278:. These years were especially productive. Beside staging his popular
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by Ninette de Valois and created the role of Cupid in Ashton's
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503:"Graham Newcater," at Documentation Center for Music website,
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based on a Bushman legend and set to music by Hans Maske, and
286:(1966), set to the classical guitar music of Joaquin Rodrigo;
437:(New York: Oxford University Press, 1998), vol. 5, p. 691.
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and received his early dance training from Helen Webb and
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and mounted for CAPAB Ballet in cooperation with PACOFS.
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was a new version of Ashton's ballet of the same name. A
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For the Vic-Wells company, he appeared as Horn Blower in
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Grut and Conyers, "Staff, Frank" (1998), vol. 5, p. 692.
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divorce. Staff's fourth wife was South African dancer
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but set to music by Britten. Staff's unfinished work,
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Debra Craine and Judith Mackrell, "Staff, Frank," in
433:Marina Grut and Claude Conyers, "Staff, Frank," in
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525:Nadine Meisner, "Obituary: Elisabeth Schooling,"
294:the third rescension of his first big hit; and
209:(1939), to the piano exercises of Carl Czerny;
282:he created seven new ballets. Among them were
362:. Each of Staff's four wives bore him a son.
298:(1967), a three-act ballet set to a score by
16:South African ballet dancer and choreographer
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411:(Cape Town: Rowman & Littlefield, 1980).
333:, was Modjadji, the hereditary queen of the
558:Grut, "Staff, Frank Cedric" (1981), p. 414.
485:Grut, "Staff, Frank Cedric" (1981), p. 414.
516:Craine and Mackrel, "Staff, Frank" (2000).
302:and based on an epic poem in Afrikaans by
215:(1939), to the score by Edward Elgar; and
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407:Montgomery Cooper and Jane Allyn Cooper,
383:The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Ballet
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409:Dance for Life: Ballet in South Africa
398:(Cape Town: Human and Rousseau, 1981).
448:The History of Ballet in South Africa
422:The History of Ballet in South Africa
396:The History of Ballet in South Africa
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258:(1957), to music by Schoenberg; and
254:(1955), with music by Rachmaninoff;
435:International Encyclopedia of Dance
189:Staff's first choreographic work,
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590:South African male ballet dancers
463:(Oxford University Press, 2000).
385:(Oxford University Press, 1977).
75:Ballet dancer and choreographer
461:The Oxford Dictionary of Dance
262:(1958), to music by Sibelius.
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605:Rambert Dance Company dancers
474:Quicksilver: An Autobiography
321:derived from Menotti's opera
595:South African ballet dancers
585:South African choreographers
549:. Retrieved 8 February 2015.
507:. Retrieved 8 February 2015.
540:http://www.paeperballet.com
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476:(London: Macmillan, 1972).
177:by Nijinsky; and Death in
538:Veronica Paeper website,
529:(London), 30 June 1998).
243:L'Après-midi d'un Faune
173:by Petipa; the Faun in
104:, who had studied with
505:http://www.domus.ac.za
288:Five Faces of Euridyce
197:for himself, his wife
163:Le Spectre de la Rose,
600:Ballet choreographers
545:3 August 2020 at the
360:Cape Town City Ballet
247:Death and the Maiden.
179:Death and the Maiden,
175:Afternoon of a Faun,
171:The Sleeping Beauty,
280:Peter and the Wolf,
260:The Swan of Tuonela
199:Elisabeth Schooling
147:The Rake's Progress
256:Transfigured Night
232:Peter and the Wolf
218:Peter and the Wolf
304:N.P. van Wyk Louw
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58:(1971-05-10)
41:15 June 1918
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580:1971 deaths
575:1918 births
343:David Poole
203:Walter Gore
181:by Howard.
102:Maude Lloyd
82:Frank Staff
56:10 May 1971
25:Frank Staff
569:Categories
366:References
331:Rain Queen
323:The Medium
227:Czernyana,
88:Early life
37:1918-06-15
339:ba Lobedu
272:Apollo 65
236:Czerny 2.
207:Czernyana
94:Kimberley
45:Kimberley
543:Archived
252:Don Juan
223:Czerny 2
319:SĂ©ance,
420:Grut,
201:, and
125:Dancer
116:Career
308:Raka
296:Raka
234:and
141:and
53:Died
31:Born
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