They asked Ailey to choreograph some dances. In 1953, Lester Horton died suddenly, and the company was left without a director. In Los Angeles, he rejoined the Lester Horton Dance Theatre. While in San Francisco, Ailey danced with a touring company and soon made the decision that dance was what he really wanted to do no matter how risky it was.
In 1951, he changed his mind and decided that he wanted to have a more stable career, so he transferred to San Francisco State College to major in romance languages. He also worked in Horton’s stage crew and danced with the company. Teaching was a stable, dependable career dance was dramatic and exciting, but risky.Īiley applied for and received a scholarship to take dance composition and technique classes with Lester Horton. For a period, Ailey considered changing his major from teaching to dance. He was attracted to Horton’s highly theatrical style of modern dance and his obvious interest in Native American culture and dances. In 1949, Ailey’s interest in dance resurfaced, particularly after he saw a dance given by the Lester Horton Dance Theatre. Ailey had to work after school as a teenager to help his mother earn living expenses.Īfter he graduated from high school in 1948, he went to the University of California at Los Angeles with the plan of becoming a teacher. As a schoolboy, he took dance lessons, and became especially good at tap dancing (which was popular at the time), but he did not take it that seriously. His parents separated when he was young, and Ailey was a lonely child who began to write poetry at an early age. His 17-year-old mother was so poor and malnourished that she was unable to nurse him. I didn’t want all the same bodies, or all the same color, in my company.I want my dancers to feel that they were not just black dancers, that they were part of society."Īlvin Ailey Carl Van Vechten Īlvin Ailey was born in 1931 in Rogers, Texas. When he came to the Broadway stage, he found the perfect combination of people and opportunities to realize his dreams.Īiley, explaining why he wanted to create an integrated dance company, said: "I’ve always felt that I wanted to celebrate differences in people.
Ailey was a pioneer who started his own company. "Modern Dance" is a phrase that refers to a wide range of nonballetic dance forms.
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