Music for the Eyes

This week the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo wound up its longest run of ballet in Manhattan history. Two reasons for its success: Chief Choreographer George Balanchine. Prima Ballerina Alexandra Danilova, once his wife. Of 24 ballets in the Ballet Russe's Manhattan repertory this season, eight were Balanchine's. The best, Concerto Barocco, consisted of a few hippy girls in black swim suits, against a plain blackdrop, contorting their bodies in strict but living counterpoint to Bach's Double Violin Concerto in D Minor. It had none of the splendiferous sets and costumes, the "story" told in pantomime, or the applause-bidding entrechats of a star dancer which attract the matinee mobs; yet it brought down the house. Balanchine's geometric wizardry made the girls' bodies spell out Bach's music for all eyes to read.

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