Person
Biography
Moscelyne Larkin was one of five prominent dancers known as the “American Indian ballerinas of Oklahoma”—the others being Maria Tallchief, Marjorie Tallchief, Yvonne Chouteau, and Rosella Hightower, all of whom performed at the Pillow during the 1950s and 60s. She was born in 1925 to a Russian mother and Shawnee-Peoria father and was always proud of her mixed heritage. Although she began her studies in Oklahoma, she traveled to New York at the age of 13 and joined de Basil’s Original Ballet Russe by the time she was 15. She married a fellow dancer, Roman Jasinski, and later appeared with the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo. It was during this time that she was engaged for her one and only season at Jacob’s Pillow, performing two pas de deux with Michael Maule in 1955. Soon thereafter, she and her husband founded the Tulsa Ballet and she trained generations of dancers under its auspices before her death in April 2012 at the age of 87.
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