Frederick Ashton retirement in 1963, in the company known successively as the Vic-Wells Ballet, the Sadler's Wells Ballet and the Royal Ballet. He succeeded de Valois as director of the company, serving until his own retirement in 1970. Ashton is widely credited with the creation of a specifically English genre of ballet. Among his best-known works are "Façade" (1931), "Symphonic Variations" (1946), "Cinderella" (1948), "La fille mal gardée" (1960), "Monotones" I and II (1965), "Enigma Variations" (1968) and the feature film ballet "The Tales of Beatrix Potter" (1970). Ashton was born in Guayaquil, Ecuador, the fourth of the five children of George
Voices of Spring (Ashton) of works by Ashton, marking 25 years since his death, and was danced alternatively by Yuhiui Choe and Alexander Campbell, and Emma Maguire and Valentino Zuchetti. Voices of Spring (Ashton) Voices of Spring is a short "pas de deux" ballet by Sir Frederick Ashton, set to the music of the Frühlingsstimmen waltz by Johann Strauss II. It was originally written to be included as a divertissement in a 1977–78 production of Strauss's operetta "Die Fledermaus" by the Royal Opera, alongside an adaptation of the Explosions-Polka, and first performed as an independent piece by the Royal Ballet in late 1978. The