From Stage to Page

Born in Toronto, Canada in 1873, Maud Allan (born Ulah Maud Allan Durrant) would go on to have an important career as a dancer, having initially begun her artistic career as a pianist. In the late 1870s, the Durrant family moved to San Francisco when, by the mid-1890s, at the recommendation of her music teacher, Prof. Eugene Bonelli at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, Allan went to Germany to study music in Berlin. She also travelled to Weimar, where she was a student of pianist, Ferruccio Busoni.

While in Germany – a period which saw the hanging of her beloved brother, Theo, for the murder of two young women – Allan began to shift her interest from the piano to dance, focusing primarily on the dances of Ancient Greece. The creative and original Allan took great delight in researching and designing her costumes, many of which she herself sewed. Allan, a lifelong solo dancer, did not consider her unique manner of movement to have much to do with dance, rather, her routines were known as “musically impressionistic mood settings.” The tall, athletic Allan had no formal dance training and had disliked having been compared to Isadora Duncan, another barefoot dancer.

Following her first dance performances in Vienna in 1903, Allan travelled throughout Europe, dancing before countless people of distinction. The list of individuals with whom Allan had some level of acquaintance and for which she mentions in her book, includes Sarah Bernhardt, Johannes Brahms, Ferruccio Busoni, François Delsarte, the Earl and Countess of Dudley, Yvette Guilbert, Joseph Joachim, King Edward VII, Princess Eugènie Murat, Marcel Remy, Franz Stuck, Eugène Ysaÿe and many others.

Having danced to the music of composers such as Bach, Brahms, Chopin, Rubinstein, Schubert, Tchaikovsky and others, Allan is best remembered for her dances of Salomé, the origins of which are described in her book and for whom Marcel Remy composed the music. The controversial dance was sought after by audiences worldwide, bringing rise to “Salomania.” Allan also played the lead role in a private performance of Oscar Wilde’s play, Salome, which was still banned from public performance in England. A resulting lawsuit initiated by an ultra-right-wing Conservative MP, brought scandal to Allan’s career.

Nevertheless, Allan continued dancing and also began acting. During the Second World War, she settled in Los Angeles, working as a draughtswoman at Macdonald Aircraft. Having once enjoyed considerable fortune, she died forgotten and a pauper, in 1956, at the age of eighty-three.

Most refreshing in her book, My Life and Dancing, published in 1908, is the author’s imagination, particularly in the form of fairies and “Fairyland” and she held particular affection for nature, books, museums, galleries, artistic freedom and even her beloved dollies. In her memoir, Allan also speaks of her fond memories of winters in Canada and of her views on the importance of the education of women.

According to the Maud Allan archives at the Dance Collection in Toronto: “While she did operate her own dance school briefly in London in the 1940s, she did not mentor any dancers who could continue to perform her very personal choreographic aesthetic and thus her dance works are lost.” Numerous artifacts of Maud Allan ephemerae can be found at the Dance Collection.

Born in Toronto, Canada in 1873, Maud Allan (born Ulah Maud Allan Durrant) would go on to have an important career as a dancer, having initially begun her artistic career as a pianist. In the late 1870s, the Durrant family moved to San Francisco when, by the mid-1890s, at the recommendation of her music teacher, Prof. Eugene Bonelli at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, Allan went to Germany to study music in Berlin. She also travelled to Weimar, where she was a student of pianist, Ferruccio Busoni.

While in Germany – a period which saw the hanging of her beloved brother, Theo, for the murder of two young women – Allan began to shift her interest from the piano to dance, focusing primarily on the dances of Ancient Greece. The creative and original Allan took great delight in researching and designing her costumes, many of which she herself sewed. Allan, a lifelong solo dancer, did not consider her unique manner of movement to have much to do with dance, rather, her routines were known as “musically impressionistic mood settings.” The tall, athletic Allan had no formal dance training and had disliked having been compared to Isadora Duncan, another barefoot dancer.

Following her first dance performances in Vienna in 1903, Allan travelled throughout Europe, dancing before countless people of distinction. The list of individuals with whom Allan had some level of acquaintance and for which she mentions in her book, includes Sarah Bernhardt, Johannes Brahms, Ferruccio Busoni, François Delsarte, the Earl and Countess of Dudley, Yvette Guilbert, Joseph Joachim, King Edward VII, Princess Eugènie Murat, Marcel Remy, Franz Stuck, Eugène Ysaÿe and many others.

Having danced to the music of composers such as Bach, Brahms, Chopin, Rubinstein, Schubert, Tchaikovsky and others, Allan is best remembered for her dances of Salomé, the origins of which are described in her book and for whom Marcel Remy composed the music. The controversial dance was sought after by audiences worldwide, bringing rise to “Salomania.” Allan also played the lead role in a private performance of Oscar Wilde’s play, Salome, which was still banned from public performance in England. A resulting lawsuit initiated by an ultra-right-wing Conservative MP, brought scandal to Allan’s career.

Nevertheless, Allan continued dancing and also began acting. During the Second World War, she settled in Los Angeles, working as a draughtswoman at Macdonald Aircraft. Having once enjoyed considerable fortune, she died forgotten and a pauper, in 1956, at the age of eighty-three.

Most refreshing in her book, My Life and Dancing, published in 1908, is the author’s imagination, particularly in the form of fairies and “Fairyland” and she held particular affection for nature, books, museums, galleries, artistic freedom and even her beloved dollies. In her memoir, Allan also speaks of her fond memories of winters in Canada and of her views on the importance of the education of women.

According to the Maud Allan archives at the Dance Collection in Toronto: “While she did operate her own dance school briefly in London in the 1940s, she did not mentor any dancers who could continue to perform her very personal choreographic aesthetic and thus her dance works are lost.” Numerous artifacts of Maud Allan ephemerae can be found at the Dance Collection.

Born in Toronto, Canada in 1873, Maud Allan (born Ulah Maud Allan Durrant) would go on to have an important career as a dancer, having initially begun her artistic career as a pianist. In the late 1870s, the Durrant family moved to San Francisco when, by the mid-1890s, at the recommendation of her music teacher, Prof. Eugene Bonelli at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, Allan went to Germany to study music in Berlin. She also travelled to Weimar, where she was a student of pianist, Ferruccio Busoni.

While in Germany – a period which saw the hanging of her beloved brother, Theo, for the murder of two young women – Allan began to shift her interest from the piano to dance, focusing primarily on the dances of Ancient Greece. The creative and original Allan took great delight in researching and designing her costumes, many of which she herself sewed. Allan, a lifelong solo dancer, did not consider her unique manner of movement to have much to do with dance, rather, her routines were known as “musically impressionistic mood settings.” The tall, athletic Allan had no formal dance training and had disliked having been compared to Isadora Duncan, another barefoot dancer.

Following her first dance performances in Vienna in 1903, Allan travelled throughout Europe, dancing before countless people of distinction. The list of individuals with whom Allan had some level of acquaintance and for which she mentions in her book, includes Sarah Bernhardt, Johannes Brahms, Ferruccio Busoni, François Delsarte, the Earl and Countess of Dudley, Yvette Guilbert, Joseph Joachim, King Edward VII, Princess Eugènie Murat, Marcel Remy, Franz Stuck, Eugène Ysaÿe and many others.

Having danced to the music of composers such as Bach, Brahms, Chopin, Rubinstein, Schubert, Tchaikovsky and others, Allan is best remembered for her dances of Salomé, the origins of which are described in her book and for whom Marcel Remy composed the music. The controversial dance was sought after by audiences worldwide, bringing rise to “Salomania.” Allan also played the lead role in a private performance of Oscar Wilde’s play, Salome, which was still banned from public performance in England. A resulting lawsuit initiated by an ultra-right-wing Conservative MP, brought scandal to Allan’s career.

Nevertheless, Allan continued dancing and also began acting. During the Second World War, she settled in Los Angeles, working as a draughtswoman at Macdonald Aircraft. Having once enjoyed considerable fortune, she died forgotten and a pauper, in 1956, at the age of eighty-three.

Most refreshing in her book, My Life and Dancing, published in 1908, is the author’s imagination, particularly in the form of fairies and “Fairyland” and she held particular affection for nature, books, museums, galleries, artistic freedom and even her beloved dollies. In her memoir, Allan also speaks of her fond memories of winters in Canada and of her views on the importance of the education of women.

According to the Maud Allan archives at the Dance Collection in Toronto: “While she did operate her own dance school briefly in London in the 1940s, she did not mentor any dancers who could continue to perform her very personal choreographic aesthetic and thus her dance works are lost.” Numerous artifacts of Maud Allan ephemerae can be found at the Dance Collection.

Born in Toronto, Canada in 1873, Maud Allan (born Ulah Maud Allan Durrant) would go on to have an important career as a dancer, having initially begun her artistic career as a pianist. In the late 1870s, the Durrant family moved to San Francisco when, by the mid-1890s, at the recommendation of her music teacher, Prof. Eugene Bonelli at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, Allan went to Germany to study music in Berlin. She also travelled to Weimar, where she was a student of pianist, Ferruccio Busoni.

While in Germany – a period which saw the hanging of her beloved brother, Theo, for the murder of two young women – Allan began to shift her interest from the piano to dance, focusing primarily on the dances of Ancient Greece. The creative and original Allan took great delight in researching and designing her costumes, many of which she herself sewed. Allan, a lifelong solo dancer, did not consider her unique manner of movement to have much to do with dance, rather, her routines were known as “musically impressionistic mood settings.” The tall, athletic Allan had no formal dance training and had disliked having been compared to Isadora Duncan, another barefoot dancer.

Following her first dance performances in Vienna in 1903, Allan travelled throughout Europe, dancing before countless people of distinction. The list of individuals with whom Allan had some level of acquaintance and for which she mentions in her book, includes Sarah Bernhardt, Johannes Brahms, Ferruccio Busoni, François Delsarte, the Earl and Countess of Dudley, Yvette Guilbert, Joseph Joachim, King Edward VII, Princess Eugènie Murat, Marcel Remy, Franz Stuck, Eugène Ysaÿe and many others.

Having danced to the music of composers such as Bach, Brahms, Chopin, Rubinstein, Schubert, Tchaikovsky and others, Allan is best remembered for her dances of Salomé, the origins of which are described in her book and for whom Marcel Remy composed the music. The controversial dance was sought after by audiences worldwide, bringing rise to “Salomania.” Allan also played the lead role in a private performance of Oscar Wilde’s play, Salome, which was still banned from public performance in England. A resulting lawsuit initiated by an ultra-right-wing Conservative MP, brought scandal to Allan’s career.

Nevertheless, Allan continued dancing and also began acting. During the Second World War, she settled in Los Angeles, working as a draughtswoman at Macdonald Aircraft. Having once enjoyed considerable fortune, she died forgotten and a pauper, in 1956, at the age of eighty-three.

Most refreshing in her book, My Life and Dancing, published in 1908, is the author’s imagination, particularly in the form of fairies and “Fairyland” and she held particular affection for nature, books, museums, galleries, artistic freedom and even her beloved dollies. In her memoir, Allan also speaks of her fond memories of winters in Canada and of her views on the importance of the education of women.

According to the Maud Allan archives at the Dance Collection in Toronto: “While she did operate her own dance school briefly in London in the 1940s, she did not mentor any dancers who could continue to perform her very personal choreographic aesthetic and thus her dance works are lost.” Numerous artifacts of Maud Allan ephemerae can be found at the Dance Collection.

Born in Toronto, Canada in 1873, Maud Allan (born Ulah Maud Allan Durrant) would go on to have an important career as a dancer, having initially begun her artistic career as a pianist. In the late 1870s, the Durrant family moved to San Francisco when, by the mid-1890s, at the recommendation of her music teacher, Prof. Eugene Bonelli at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, Allan went to Germany to study music in Berlin. She also travelled to Weimar, where she was a student of pianist, Ferruccio Busoni.

While in Germany – a period which saw the hanging of her beloved brother, Theo, for the murder of two young women – Allan began to shift her interest from the piano to dance, focusing primarily on the dances of Ancient Greece. The creative and original Allan took great delight in researching and designing her costumes, many of which she herself sewed. Allan, a lifelong solo dancer, did not consider her unique manner of movement to have much to do with dance, rather, her routines were known as “musically impressionistic mood settings.” The tall, athletic Allan had no formal dance training and had disliked having been compared to Isadora Duncan, another barefoot dancer.

Following her first dance performances in Vienna in 1903, Allan travelled throughout Europe, dancing before countless people of distinction. The list of individuals with whom Allan had some level of acquaintance and for which she mentions in her book, includes Sarah Bernhardt, Johannes Brahms, Ferruccio Busoni, François Delsarte, the Earl and Countess of Dudley, Yvette Guilbert, Joseph Joachim, King Edward VII, Princess Eugènie Murat, Marcel Remy, Franz Stuck, Eugène Ysaÿe and many others.

Having danced to the music of composers such as Bach, Brahms, Chopin, Rubinstein, Schubert, Tchaikovsky and others, Allan is best remembered for her dances of Salomé, the origins of which are described in her book and for whom Marcel Remy composed the music. The controversial dance was sought after by audiences worldwide, bringing rise to “Salomania.” Allan also played the lead role in a private performance of Oscar Wilde’s play, Salome, which was still banned from public performance in England. A resulting lawsuit initiated by an ultra-right-wing Conservative MP, brought scandal to Allan’s career.

Nevertheless, Allan continued dancing and also began acting. During the Second World War, she settled in Los Angeles, working as a draughtswoman at Macdonald Aircraft. Having once enjoyed considerable fortune, she died forgotten and a pauper, in 1956, at the age of eighty-three.

Most refreshing in her book, My Life and Dancing, published in 1908, is the author’s imagination, particularly in the form of fairies and “Fairyland” and she held particular affection for nature, books, museums, galleries, artistic freedom and even her beloved dollies. In her memoir, Allan also speaks of her fond memories of winters in Canada and of her views on the importance of the education of women.

According to the Maud Allan archives at the Dance Collection in Toronto: “While she did operate her own dance school briefly in London in the 1940s, she did not mentor any dancers who could continue to perform her very personal choreographic aesthetic and thus her dance works are lost.” Numerous artifacts of Maud Allan ephemerae can be found at the Dance Collection.

Born in Toronto, Canada in 1873, Maud Allan (born Ulah Maud Allan Durrant) would go on to have an important career as a dancer, having initially begun her artistic career as a pianist. In the late 1870s, the Durrant family moved to San Francisco when, by the mid-1890s, at the recommendation of her music teacher, Prof. Eugene Bonelli at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, Allan went to Germany to study music in Berlin. She also travelled to Weimar, where she was a student of pianist, Ferruccio Busoni.

While in Germany – a period which saw the hanging of her beloved brother, Theo, for the murder of two young women – Allan began to shift her interest from the piano to dance, focusing primarily on the dances of Ancient Greece. The creative and original Allan took great delight in researching and designing her costumes, many of which she herself sewed. Allan, a lifelong solo dancer, did not consider her unique manner of movement to have much to do with dance, rather, her routines were known as “musically impressionistic mood settings.” The tall, athletic Allan had no formal dance training and had disliked having been compared to Isadora Duncan, another barefoot dancer.

Following her first dance performances in Vienna in 1903, Allan travelled throughout Europe, dancing before countless people of distinction. The list of individuals with whom Allan had some level of acquaintance and for which she mentions in her book, includes Sarah Bernhardt, Johannes Brahms, Ferruccio Busoni, François Delsarte, the Earl and Countess of Dudley, Yvette Guilbert, Joseph Joachim, King Edward VII, Princess Eugènie Murat, Marcel Remy, Franz Stuck, Eugène Ysaÿe and many others.

Having danced to the music of composers such as Bach, Brahms, Chopin, Rubinstein, Schubert, Tchaikovsky and others, Allan is best remembered for her dances of Salomé, the origins of which are described in her book and for whom Marcel Remy composed the music. The controversial dance was sought after by audiences worldwide, bringing rise to “Salomania.” Allan also played the lead role in a private performance of Oscar Wilde’s play, Salome, which was still banned from public performance in England. A resulting lawsuit initiated by an ultra-right-wing Conservative MP, brought scandal to Allan’s career.

Nevertheless, Allan continued dancing and also began acting. During the Second World War, she settled in Los Angeles, working as a draughtswoman at Macdonald Aircraft. Having once enjoyed considerable fortune, she died forgotten and a pauper, in 1956, at the age of eighty-three.

Most refreshing in her book, My Life and Dancing, published in 1908, is the author’s imagination, particularly in the form of fairies and “Fairyland” and she held particular affection for nature, books, museums, galleries, artistic freedom and even her beloved dollies. In her memoir, Allan also speaks of her fond memories of winters in Canada and of her views on the importance of the education of women.

According to the Maud Allan archives at the Dance Collection in Toronto: “While she did operate her own dance school briefly in London in the 1940s, she did not mentor any dancers who could continue to perform her very personal choreographic aesthetic and thus her dance works are lost.” Numerous artifacts of Maud Allan ephemerae can be found at the Dance Collection.

Born in Toronto, Canada in 1873, Maud Allan (born Ulah Maud Allan Durrant) would go on to have an important career as a dancer, having initially begun her artistic career as a pianist. In the late 1870s, the Durrant family moved to San Francisco when, by the mid-1890s, at the recommendation of her music teacher, Prof. Eugene Bonelli at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, Allan went to Germany to study music in Berlin. She also travelled to Weimar, where she was a student of pianist, Ferruccio Busoni.

While in Germany – a period which saw the hanging of her beloved brother, Theo, for the murder of two young women – Allan began to shift her interest from the piano to dance, focusing primarily on the dances of Ancient Greece. The creative and original Allan took great delight in researching and designing her costumes, many of which she herself sewed. Allan, a lifelong solo dancer, did not consider her unique manner of movement to have much to do with dance, rather, her routines were known as “musically impressionistic mood settings.” The tall, athletic Allan had no formal dance training and had disliked having been compared to Isadora Duncan, another barefoot dancer.

Following her first dance performances in Vienna in 1903, Allan travelled throughout Europe, dancing before countless people of distinction. The list of individuals with whom Allan had some level of acquaintance and for which she mentions in her book, includes Sarah Bernhardt, Johannes Brahms, Ferruccio Busoni, François Delsarte, the Earl and Countess of Dudley, Yvette Guilbert, Joseph Joachim, King Edward VII, Princess Eugènie Murat, Marcel Remy, Franz Stuck, Eugène Ysaÿe and many others.

Having danced to the music of composers such as Bach, Brahms, Chopin, Rubinstein, Schubert, Tchaikovsky and others, Allan is best remembered for her dances of Salomé, the origins of which are described in her book and for whom Marcel Remy composed the music. The controversial dance was sought after by audiences worldwide, bringing rise to “Salomania.” Allan also played the lead role in a private performance of Oscar Wilde’s play, Salome, which was still banned from public performance in England. A resulting lawsuit initiated by an ultra-right-wing Conservative MP, brought scandal to Allan’s career.

Nevertheless, Allan continued dancing and also began acting. During the Second World War, she settled in Los Angeles, working as a draughtswoman at Macdonald Aircraft. Having once enjoyed considerable fortune, she died forgotten and a pauper, in 1956, at the age of eighty-three.

Most refreshing in her book, My Life and Dancing, published in 1908, is the author’s imagination, particularly in the form of fairies and “Fairyland” and she held particular affection for nature, books, museums, galleries, artistic freedom and even her beloved dollies. In her memoir, Allan also speaks of her fond memories of winters in Canada and of her views on the importance of the education of women.

According to the Maud Allan archives at the Dance Collection in Toronto: “While she did operate her own dance school briefly in London in the 1940s, she did not mentor any dancers who could continue to perform her very personal choreographic aesthetic and thus her dance works are lost.” Numerous artifacts of Maud Allan ephemerae can be found at the Dance Collection.

Born in Whitney Point, New York, in 1875, Ethel Newcomb would go on to have an important career as a concert pianist, having performed across Europe and the United States in the early 1900s, including under the batons of Richard Strauss and Ossip Gabrilowitsch. In later years, she devoted her attention to teaching. She died in 1959 at the age of eighty-three.

Ethel Newcomb is perhaps best known for her book, Leschetizky As I Knew Him, published in 1921. Brimming with detail and written in an easy, conversational style, the book recounts endless stories from her period of study in Vienna, under the guidance of the celebrated piano teacher, Theodore Leschetizky. Newcomb studied with Leschetizky from 1895-1903 and, in the years immediately following, served as one of his teaching assistants.

From stories about Leschetizky's infamous Wednesday evening classes to those about Viennese cultural life, as well as firsthand accounts of celebrated artists, patrons and members of the nobility, including Emperor Franz Joseph I, the book offers a friendly window into the world of a young American female pianist studying in Europe during the years leading up to the First World War.

Born in Whitney Point, New York, in 1875, Ethel Newcomb would go on to have an important career as a concert pianist, having performed across Europe and the United States in the early 1900s, including under the batons of Richard Strauss and Ossip Gabrilowitsch. In later years, she devoted her attention to teaching. She died in 1959 at the age of eighty-three.

Ethel Newcomb is perhaps best known for her book, Leschetizky As I Knew Him, published in 1921. Brimming with detail and written in an easy, conversational style, the book recounts endless stories from her period of study in Vienna, under the guidance of the celebrated piano teacher, Theodore Leschetizky. Newcomb studied with Leschetizky from 1895-1903 and, in the years immediately following, served as one of his teaching assistants.

From stories about Leschetizky's infamous Wednesday evening classes to those about Viennese cultural life, as well as firsthand accounts of celebrated artists, patrons and members of the nobility, including Emperor Franz Joseph I, the book offers a friendly window into the world of a young American female pianist studying in Europe during the years leading up to the First World War.

Born in Whitney Point, New York, in 1875, Ethel Newcomb would go on to have an important career as a concert pianist, having performed across Europe and the United States in the early 1900s, including under the batons of Richard Strauss and Ossip Gabrilowitsch. In later years, she devoted her attention to teaching. She died in 1959 at the age of eighty-three.

Ethel Newcomb is perhaps best known for her book, Leschetizky As I Knew Him, published in 1921. Brimming with detail and written in an easy, conversational style, the book recounts endless stories from her period of study in Vienna, under the guidance of the celebrated piano teacher, Theodore Leschetizky. Newcomb studied with Leschetizky from 1895-1903 and, in the years immediately following, served as one of his teaching assistants.

From stories about Leschetizky's infamous Wednesday evening classes to those about Viennese cultural life, as well as firsthand accounts of celebrated artists, patrons and members of the nobility, including Emperor Franz Joseph I, the book offers a friendly window into the world of a young American female pianist studying in Europe during the years leading up to the First World War.