What can I add to the title?

Indeed.

What? Bessmertnova just one year ago and now Maximova. I am dumbfounded.

My heart goes out to Maximova's family and close colleagues, especially her beloved husband, Vladimir Vasiliev.

May Katya Maximova -- the eternal princess-soubrette of Russian Ballet -- rest in peace.

Does anybody have a link? It doesn't have to be a full obituary, but it's news, and the services are liable to have it.

There is this in Italian, the first paragraph of which I have hastily translated:

http://www.ilmessaggero.it/articolo.php?id...HOME_SPETTACOLO

Ekaterina Maximova, the famous Russian ballerina of the Bolshoi, People's Artist of the USSR, has died in the early hours today at Moscow, at the age of 71 years. It was announced by the direction of the Moscovite theatre, where she spent her entire artistic life, dancing in particular with Vladimir Vasiliev, her husband and partner on the stage.

And this from ITAR-TASS in English:

http://www.itar-tass.com/eng/level2.html?N...6&PageNum=0

I have just heard from a friend in Moscow that the death of Ekaterina Maximova has been reported. She was not known to be ill but died during the night.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fB4bCy_3mS4

That is such sad news; she was only 70. My condolences to her company and especially to her husband, Vladimir Vasiliev.

RIP, Miss Maximova.

http://www.russiatoday.com/Art_and_Fun/200...dies_at_70.html

Two more articles in Russian:
http://gazeta.ru/culture/2009/04/28/a_2980218.shtml
http://www.izvestia.ru/culture/article3127965/

Just read in the russian media - HOW SAD
Ekaterina Maksimova passed away

What sad news!

Rest in peace Miss Maximova

Oh no, I can't believe this news. Katya Maximova was one of the most sublime and legendary dancers of the 20th century. Her Juliet, Aurora, Kitri, Masha and Phrygia were unforgettable. I always marveled at her gorgeous legs, amazing arched feet, and beautiful extension.

Then of course there is is her magical partnership with her husband Vladimir Vasiliev. I could go on for pages about that. They were stunning and profound in everything they did together. Theirs was one of the great romances in ballet history. Their deep chemistry jumped off the stage/tv screen when they were performing or in interviews. My heart bleeds for her husband who must be crushed by her loss. Volodya was so deeply in love with Katya -- God help him through this devastating time. Oh dear, now I'm actually sobbing. If anyone knows the cause of her death, please share it with us.

No! I am in tears as I post this. May she rest in peace, and may God give peace and comfort to her husband. She was one of the highlights of humanity. She will be sorely missed. Sunrise: February 1, 1939. Sunset: April 27, 2009.

One time I read an obituary on Audrey Hepburn that said that "somewhere beyond the blue she's enchanting the angels".
I'm sure that Miss Maximova is there too, in that "somewhere", enchanting her peers...


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0zHA6dMrf8...feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aNr3ToCDxPM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uPAiiYZ7_RE&NR=1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZJpXPdmhbgg...feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yP5p-hjOsyc...feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xjR0WjhQ0zM...feature=related

The first time I saw Yekaterina offstage she looked like a pretty young girl who should be at school and not a ballet dancer with one of the world’s great ballet companies.
I was fortunate to see her dance many times and I cherish deep memories of her in many roles. For me Yekaterina Maximova became Katerina, became Phrygia, became Masha, became Kitri and achieved extraordinary success in so many other roles. When I first saw Maximova and her husband who were not too different in age to myself, their extraordinary projection of youth resonated deeply with me. In London she was much loved and with her husband, we were privileged to see performances of one of the great partnerships of the 20th century. Arnold Haskell seeing her dance Don Q pas said that Maximova "...had the wittiest feet since Anna Pavlova."
There is a today headline on http://gazeta.ru/culture/2009/04/28/a_2980218.shtml which Ilya posted, which reads, “Yekaterina Maximova - The little elf of the Bolshoi?
Which I found an extremely poignant description of this wonderful childlike woman and great artist.
To her husband Vladimir Vasiliev and her mother I send my sincere condolences and the ballet world for me is a a lesser place than it was yesterday.

Didn't they just celebrate their fiftieth wedding anniversary?

A long romance. A lot to be thankful for.

I too am overwhelmed with sadness and cannot think what to write. I hardly saw her at all--just once when she must have been over 50 in a showcase program in Chicago put together by her husband, the great Vasiliev for what seemed to be a pick-up group of dancers. She was breathtaking--not breathtaking "for over fifty," but breathtaking. Vasiliev had designed a pas de deux showcasing her in lift after lift. The piece was very much what I think of as old-style Bolshoi, and her beauty and fluidity were like no "older" ballerina I had ever seen. I give him credit for the canny choreography, but she made the "canny" into a grab-your-heart thrilling work of art. I was there with a non-ballet going friend who was similarly dazzled though she came to the performance with none of my emotional investment in Maximova's earlier career with the Bolshoi.

Since then, through video and youtube, I have had some other indirect exposure to her vivid, beautiful dancing and characterizations in more standard repertory--Nutcracker and Don Quixote. I remember stumbling over a black and white Don Quixote pas de deux solo just a year ago or so via youtube and feeling as if I had been given a sudden illumination, a sort of balletomane vision: "Oh! THAT'S how it's supposed to look." In every video I have ever seen of her, she has, too, an extraordinarily engaging personal quality--she inspires love, as she did that one time I saw her on stage.

Leonid, I was so struck by the same thing. I only saw her live once, when she came to San Francisco ca 1989 with he Moscow Classical Ballet. She danced the pdd from Bejart's Romeo and Juliet and looked 14 years old. (She was roughly 50 at the time). The costume for that is a white unitard and pointe shoes, absolutely unforgiving costume; the house was small, the audience sat close to the stage, there was no place for her to manufacture an illusion except inside herself, and she did nothing that wasn't Juliet.

What a noble talent!

I am shocked by the sudden passing Ekaterina Maximova. She was truly one of the best-known female ballet dancers during the later Soviet era in Russia, and was BELOVED on both sides of the Iron Curtain because she was a huge favorite among Western ballet fans from the Bolshoi tours of the West in the 1960's, 1970's and early 1980's.

She's dancing in Heaven right now, I'm sure of it.

http://www.bolshoi.ru/en/season/press-offi...x.php?id26=1220

The official diagnosis is not published yet. People from the Bolshoi tell that Maximova died in a sleep, probably because of a heart insufficiency. Her mother found her dead in a bed. Thus, Tatiana Gustavovna Shpett-Maximova (now 94) took care of her famous daughter all her life, until the very end. So sad.

We will go to Bolshoi tomorrow morning at 10 am MSK to tell Katya our Last Farewell. She always was in my life from the time I started to watch ballets. Да будет земля ей пухом (can this be translated as "let the ground be light for her as down"?).

That's exactly how I feel too, the brightest of lights in the ballet world has been extinguished.

Ekaterina was the first ballerina I ever saw in a live performance. I was 11 yrs old. She was dancing in a fulllength Don Q with her husband Vasiliev. I still remember to this day, her tremendous warmth and joy in her dancing. Ekaterina RIP

HOW SAD

I saw her in Bolshoi Theater - in Nutcracker and in Anjuta. It was absolutely magical!

She was truly noble ballerina.

My sincere condolences to her mother and to her husband.

Ekaterina, rest in peace.

A series of photos from Maximova's funeral is at Yahoo news.

http://news.yahoo.com/nphotos/Famed-Bolsho...b335b349434b868

There is also something on youtube about her funeral: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H0nvOKC9Lhs

There don’t seem to have been any updates regarding the cause of death, which was not reported. I do recall reading years ago an article that said Maximova had once attempted suicide. I hope that did not happen here. (Not intended to encourage speculation, please note, just a comment.)

Lovely dancer. Rest in peace.

Wow...I didn't know that.

Does anyone know if it's possible to send notes of condolence to Vladimir Vasiliev? Can it be done care of The Bolshoi?

I assume the Bolshoi would see that people's notes reached V V.

There was a short obituary for Maximova in the July 2009 (print) edition of Opera News, noting that "Maximova was one of the Bolshoi stars who danced in the last program presented at the old Metropolitan Opera House on Thirty-ninth Street and Broadway."

this undated press photo from the UK notes in some captioning on the back that it was run as in advance of the Bolshoi Ballet's appearances at the London Coliseum for a 6-week season.
perhaps UK BT members can thus date the photo.
the dancers deplaning are led by Maksimova, with, i assume, V. Vasliev behind her and perhaps B. Akimov in lighter color suit behind Vasliev.

Great pic...!
(Notice the old Aeroflot logo on the left upper side. The next text is from Wikipedia)

"Plans were afoot to replace the old Soviet-era hammer and sickle logo, which some people in the West treat as a reminder of Soviet communism. However, as it was for over 70 years the most recognisable symbol of the company, the logo was, in the end, retained".

I imagine the picture was taken in the summer of 1974.