Itinerant challenges and newspaper support: The Johannesénske Balletselskab’s Norwegian tour 1878-1879

Abstract

In March 1878 the Johannesénske Balletselskab travelled over the mountains from Östersund in Sweden to the Norwegian city of Trondheim.1 The Johannesénske Balletselselskab was used to travelling: in various shapes and forms, this ensemble had been on the road for almost thirty years. From March 1878 to October 1879, they gave people in smaller and peripheral towns the opportunity to see ballet for the first time. Performances were given in sixteen smaller and larger cities along the Norwegian coast. Trondhjem, Tromsø, Molde, Christianund, Aalesund, Bergen, Stavanger, Arendal, Larvik and Fredrikshald (Halden) were visited in 1879. In 1879 the dancing took place in cities closer to Kristiania: Fredrikstad, Moss, Holmestrand, Tønsberg, and finally Drammen.2In several places, the ensemble stayed long enough to offer dance lessons, thus teaching dance was also an important part of their itinerant life alongside the performances. In 1878, Johannesénske troupe consisted of ballet master and director Johan Fredrik Johannesén with wife Catharina and five “grown up children”: Jenny, Augusta, Josefine, Edmund and Alfred. When the family settled in Kristiania in November 1879, they had given 105 performances. The Johannesénske Balletselskab’s Norwegian tour is, in my opinion, of great interest to Norwegian dance- and theatre history. The family was, to the best of my knowledge, the first ballet ensemble of any nationality to undertake such an extensive tour of Norway