Yoga Dancing (1956)

Legat School of Ballet, Tunbridge Wells, Kent. C/U shot of face of a girl performing headstand. Cut to L/S of two lines of girls standing on their heads. An elderly woman straightens one of the girls’ legs. M/S of her face (very distinguished look) as she gives instructions to the girls. The woman is Madame Legat (Nadine Nicolaeva Legat), former Prima Ballerina of the Imperial and State theatres of Moscow and St. Petersburg (Petrograd, Leningrad) and Principal Dancer of Diaghilev’s Company, founder and owner of Legat School of Ballet in Tunbridge Wells, Kent. She decided to introduce Yoga exercises as part of the school curriculum, claiming that Yoga exercise, with its multiple benefits to mind and body, is extremely helpful to ballet dancers. Yoga increases elasticity, heightens concentration, helps to co-ordinate mind and body and helps the body to relax. L/S of the girls moving their heads in the manner of Indian traditional dancing. M/S of the girls exercising. C/U shot of the face of one of th