Episode
(484) Deborah Wingert on Marcia Dale Weary, Balanchine, and Preserving Ballet Lineage
- Podcast
- Conversations on Dance
- Published
- Mar 11, 2026
- Duration seconds
- 3940
- Processing state
not_requested- Canonical source
- https://shows.acast.com/conversations-on-dance/episodes/484-deborah-wingert-on-marcia-dale-balanchine-and-preserving
Actions
POST https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/conversations-on-dance-6317/episodes/484-deborah-wingert-on-marcia-dale-weary-balanchine-and-preserving-ballet-lineage/transcription-requests
Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode.GET https://stenobird.com/podcast/conversations-on-dance-6317/484-deborah-wingert-on-marcia-dale-weary-balanchine-and-preserving-ballet-lineage.md
Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource.
Summary
Listen to Conversations on Dance ad-free on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/cw/conversationsondance Today on the Conversations on Dance podcast, we talk with former New York City Ballet dancer and Balanchine répétiteur Deborah Wingert about her early training at Central Pennsylvania Youth Ballet, where rigorous daily classes, musical and artistic context, and early teaching responsibilities shaped her discipline and curiosity. Wingert recounts being accepted to the School of American Ballet, performing key workshop roles, and joining NYCB at 16, including formative experiences and personal coaching from George Balanchine before his death in 1983. She describes thriving as a detail-oriented “sponge,” navigating later casting and body-image pressures, and building a wide repertory across Balanchine and Robbins works. After leaving NYCB, she began teaching privately and at multiple New York schools, then expanded into staging Balanchine works around the world. 00:00 Meet The Hosts 00:11 Debra Wingert Overview 01:35 First Ballet Spark 04:16 CPYB Magic And Context 06:31 Rigor And Early Teaching 14:24 SAB Audition And Move 16:50 Workshop Breakthrough Roles 18:57 Joining NYCB At Sixteen 25:10 Balanchine Coaching Moments 27:21 Life After Balanchine 28:19 Other SAB Teachers 33:22 Body Image And Confidence 35:09 Backstage Ballet Devotion 35:34 Staying in the Company 36:39 Outside Projects and Robbins 38:07 Leaving NYCB and Starting to Teach 40:55 Outreach and Repertory Staging 43:10 Learning to Stage New Works 45:33 Musicality and Version Options 51:18 Keeping Patterns and Details Alive 55:56 Dream Ballets and Future Stagings 01:04:06 Closing Thanks and Signoff LINKS: W…