At 84, Barnett dancing back into Atlanta ballet fold

Barnett exited a year short of his planned retirement when, he says, the board of directors ordered him to cut $2 million out of the $4.6 million budget he proposed for his farewell season. Dumpy facilities and a "Nutcracker" production "held together with spit and glue" were one thing, but the board's plan to eliminate a program (and dock dancers' salaries) with season tickets already sold put him over the edge. "I knew that would be the death of the company," he recalled.

There was not a dry eye in the studio when he informed his dancers and staff of his departure.

“This breaks my heart,” Barnett told The Atlanta Constitution then. “Our product is what goes on stage, and ... I don’t agree with the bottom line being everything.”

Now he can look back and see that his departure “in some ways was meant to happen. It woke people up, and the company prospered.”

There have been small signs of reconciliation between Barnett and the ballet in recent years, including teaching stints at its Centre for Dance Education, from which he had resigned as ballet master in 2000. A decade after that last difficult parting, in which Barnett charged that board members were disparaging him and diminishing his legacy, he says he moved on and hasn’t dwelled on all that drama.

Still, as this man of fierce pride talks about the rift, it’s clear that it pained him, and it’s equally clear that the olive branches extended by his successor as artistic director, John McFall, have led to belated healing for both Barnett and the company he molded and then turned professional in 1967.

That’s evident not so much in the words Barnett voices, for he shies away from the topic when asked whether healing has happened, deferring, “Oh, yeah, but it really had before. I’m not the kind of person who dwells on things. I just move on.”

Yet the best evidence of healing could be seen in the many hugs and pats on the back that he doled out in rehearsals to the company’s dancers and McFall, with whom he shares “Autumn” and “Winter” sections in choreographer James Kudelka’s interpretation of “Four Seasons.”

McFall praises his predecessor as a “master teacher” and says he felt duty bound to bring him back into the fold because Barnett represents an essential connection to his predecessor, Dorothy Alexander, who founded the company in 1929. “He is a generous man who has the grace and courtesy to patiently assist students in discovering and attaining their aspirations,” McFall said.

This latest chapter began in December with the 50th anniversary celebration of “Nutcracker,” which Barnett brought with him when he and his wife, Virginia Rich Barnett, joined the Atlanta Ballet after dancing under the great choreographer George Balanchine at the New York City Ballet.

Repeatedly rebuffed, the company hooked Barnett this time by saying it not only wanted to honor him but dancers from throughout its history. Having long felt that the troupe should do more to embrace its alumni, Barnett believed “this was important.”

The ballet hosted a dinner for Barnett and about 70 former dancers, staffers and board members, and then it introduced him at curtain call on "Nutcracker's" opening night. After he spoke, the curtain pulled back, revealing some 35 dancers from the early years.

McFall proposed the idea of his predecessor dancing in "Four Seasons," along with his long-ago "Nutcracker" partner Ann Burton Avery, during the course of planning for the reunion. Barnett, who has been commuting from his home in Asheville, N.C., wasn’t sure his balky left knee could hold up. It had required three surgeries after years of dancing eight “Nutcrackers” a week for eight weeks for Balanchine in New York before taking the show on tour.

Virginia Barnett told her husband he was out of his mind. “She always says to me, ‘Bobby, when are you going to retire?’ ” he recounted, a twinkle of mischief in his eyes. “ ‘I know you say you’re retired, but when are you really going to retire?’ ”

Barnett, who teaches part time at the South Carolina Governor’s School for the Arts and Humanities in Greenville and has coached at places as far-flung as Alaska, Hawaii and the Philippines, says his spouse knows the answer: never, if he can help it.

He’s particularly proud to be reunited with former students from his years running the ballet’s school -- Christian Clark and sisters Courtney and Kristine Necessary, all three now matured into company dancers.

Barnett says he’s impressed with the talent and training in McFall’s corps. But when this old dancer who embodies the vulnerable spirit of winter in “Four Seasons” is asked whether he’s envious of their youth, he quickly responds, “No, I don’t want to do it again, but I admire them.”

The feeling is mutual. “Really inspiring,” said one of “Four Seasons’ ” leads, Tara Lee. “Just having his nurturing presence in the studio brings a richness.” Added John Welker, who dances the central role of Man: “It’s an honor. I keep telling myself if I can dance that well when I’m his age, I’ll be blessed.”

Barnett, whose right knee had to be treated by a naturopath for a pinched meniscus since rehearsals started, downplays his footwork. Still, the effort makes his snow-white locks fall over his brow and causes him to breathe deeply by rehearsal’s end.

“This is a nice place to be,” he said with a peaceable smile. “You’ve lived your life and you’ve done what you wanted to do, and I think it’s great to be 84 and be able to get up there and move around.

“Because a lot of 84-year-olds can’t do that,” added a very rare one who can.

Dance preview

Vivaldi’s "Four Seasons”

7:30 p.m. Thursday, 8 p.m. Friday, 2 and 8 p.m. Saturday, 2 p.m. Sunday at Cobb Energy Centre. Tickets, $20-$120, at www.ticketmaster.com . 1-800-982-2787.