New York City Ballet in September 2015. New York City Ballet New York City Ballet (NYCB) is a ballet company founded in 1948 by choreographer George Balanchine and Lincoln Kirstein. Balanchine and Jerome Robbins are considered the founding choreographers of the company. Léon Barzin was the company's first music director. City Ballet grew out of earlier troupes: the Producing Company of the School of American Ballet, 1934; the American Ballet, 1935, and Ballet Caravan, 1936, which merged into American Ballet Caravan, 1941; and directly from the Ballet Society, 1946. In a 1946 letter, Kirstein stated, "The only justification I have is to enable Balanchine
New York Theatre Ballet teacher Margaret Craske was ballet mistress for New York Theatre Ballet from its foundation until late in her life. Craske was succeeded by Sallie Wilson, a student of hers, who was ballet mistress until 2008. Wilson staged works by Antony Tudor for New York Theatre Ballet and also choreographed her own pieces. New York Theatre Ballet runs LIFT, a community program to give underprivileged children the chance to learn to dance. Steven Melendez, a former Project LIFT student, is the current director of the project. In the summer of 2013 New York Theatre Ballet began a fight against eviction from