WA ballet matriarch keeps on her toes
It's 2.30am on a Wednesday and Diana Waldron is wide awake, making nervous last-minute preparations for the opening night of Swan Lake.
It could be the early 1950s when she was a teenage ballerina in the WA Ballet Company's first productions, but it was only last month. And this version was by her own company, Perth City Ballet, in her own venue - Quarry Amphitheatre.
The nerves were always there, well before the WA Ballet Company existed, but these days she has more to worry about. From choreography and costumes to music and marketing, the 78-year-old is as hands-on as any artistic director.
Swan Lake got rave reviews but Mrs Waldron's legacy goes beyond any one production. Her story is woven into the fabric of ballet in WA.
She was already dancing in 1948 when her father took her to see Ballet Rambert at the Capitol. The great Marie Rambert invited her backstage and suggested she start formal training.
A starstruck 12-year-old Diana took the advice.
"I started with Linley Wilson and I was with her for about four years," Mrs Waldron said.
"Then Kira Bousloff came to town and started the WA Ballet Company. She called for auditions and I was the only person that turned up."
Mrs Waldron became co-artistic director of WA Ballet until 1961 when she started Perth City Ballet. It mixes ballet, musicals and drama.
Its big January shows are in the Quarry Amphitheatre at Reabold Hill, which opened in 1986.
It was Mrs Waldron and her late architect husband Ken who had the vision to turn an old quarry into a 700-seat Grecian amphitheatre.
Next January, the company will do Don Quixote with guest artists from Germany, who will stay at her City Beach home, which has two ballet studios. Between the company and her academy, Mrs Waldron works seven days a week.
Liam Croy
