“Bravura addresses a dearth of knowledgeable tomes about the ABT, and is filled with the kind of tidbits fanatics will revel in. Ewing writes with both the studiousness of a scholar and the emotional attachment of a son, which, when you think about it, are also components that go into making good ballet.”—The New Yorker  
 
“This compelling book, part dance history, part family chronicle, fills an aching gap on the dance bookshelf.”—Dance Magazine  
 
“An enjoyable book about ABT’s founding patron and artistic director. An undeniably good yarn. With ideal fluidity, Ewing weaves his mother’s personal and professional stories into a thoughtful narrative devoid of any sense of compromised perspective. He has a real talent for personality description and portrays all the famous people in the book—even the less admirable ones—as multidimensional, sympathetic figures.”—Backstage  
 
“ABT’s robust and rambunctious ups and downs are chronicled in rich detail, but the complicated details of wheeling and dealing never overwhelm the human stories in what Ewing calls ‘possibly the most complex and adventurous start-up ever to be attempted in the annals of dance.’”—Winston-Salem Journal  
 
“She was a realist, but she lived like an idealist, and in the darkest time she could force the sun to shine. She stood by us all with love and a will of iron and a heart like a lion. . . . When Ballet Theatre dances, it dances for Lucia.”—Mikhail Baryshnikov
 
"A book that should be read by historians, ballet artists, ballet lovers, and book lovers in general. It is a fascinating story not only about the growth of ballet in America but also of the courage and persistence of a Great Lady."—Irina Baronova

"It's high time the magnetically American story of Lucia Chase and Ballet Theatre was told. Like the history-making and aptly named company she kept, Lucia was colorful, daring, and almost self-destructively determined—an original always in passionate pursuit of the original."—Arthur Laurents

"Lucia Chase, an American original, is made vivid on these pages. For over forty years much of ballet in the U.S. rode her coattails, or vice versa—you decide."—Eliot Feld

To many people, Lucia Chase (1897-1986) was the American Ballet Theatre, and her reign as the queen of American ballet lasted for more than four decades.
 
It was Chase who brought Nureyev, Bujones, Kirkland, and eventually Baryshnikov to ABT. Under her leadership, the company worked with such legends as Agnes de Mille, Anthony Tudor, Jerome Robbins, and Twyla Tharp. Her drive, ambition, tenacity, and money kept the doors open even during the lean years.
 
A dancer when the company made its debut in 1940, she was artistic director for an unprecedented thirty-five years, from 1945 to 1980. Over the course of her career, she received numerous honors and awards, including the U.S. Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian honor.
 
Combining unique personal insights as Chase's son along with experience garnered from his own professional dance and administrative career, Alex Ewing offers the definitive story of one of the true pioneers in the world of American ballet.

Alex C. Ewing (1931–2017), Lucia Chase’s son, was chancellor of the University of North Carolina School of the Arts and former general director of the Joffrey Ballet. He served as a board member of the School of American Ballet, a member of the dance panel of the National Endowment for the Arts, and chairman of the Dance Collection of the New York Public Library. 

Sample Chapter(s):

Table of Contents

Excerpt

"This compelling book, part dance history, part family chronicle, fills an aching gap on the dance bookshelf."
--Dance Magazine

"Bravura addresses a dearth of knowledgeable tomes about the ABT, and is filled with the kind of tidbits fanatics will revel in. Ewing writes with both the studiousness of a scholar and the emotional attachment of a son, which, when you think about it, are also components that go into making good ballet."
--The New Yorker

"ABT's robust and rambunctious ups and downs are chronicled in rich detail, but the complicated details of wheeling and dealing never overwhelm the human stories in what Ewing calls 'possibly the most complex and adventurous start-up ever to be attempted in the annals of dance.'"
--Winston-Salem Journal

"Ewing has uncovered one absorbing tale after another, including tours that left ABT stranded in South America and behind the Iron Curtain. He has shown how the company got by with a four-person administration and without budgets and what he calls a serious "fundraising apparatus" until the 1970s."
--JournalNow.com

"An enjoyable book about ABT’s founding patron and artistic director. An undeniably good yarn. With ideal fluidity, Ewing weaves his mother’s personal and professional stories into a thoughtful narrative devoid of any sense of compromised perspective. He has a real talent for personality description and portrays all the famous people in the book--even the less admirable ones--as multidimensional, sympathetic figures."
--Backstage