Raisa Struchkova (1925-2005).

Raisa Struchkova was a great Bolshoi ballerina with a rhapsodic style and impeccable technique, although always dancing in the shadow of Galina Ulanova's genius. She was trained at the Bolshoi Ballet School under Yelizaveta Gerdt, and in 1937 created the title role in the popular Soviet ballet The Baby Stork while still a student at the school. Following her graduation in 1944, she attracted attention with her performance in Rostislav Zakharov's Cinderella. She married Alexander Lapauri, a fellow student at the Bolshoi School. Struchkova and Lapauri made their Western debuts with a concert group of Soviet artists in London in 1954, dancing together in Leonid Lavrovsky's Walpurgis Night. They also performed several ecstatic duets for which they became famous, including Assaf Messerer's Moskowski Waltz, which featured hair-raising leaps and catches, and wild, air-borne lifts and runs. But beyond these sensational Soviet party pieces, Struchkova was a serious ballerina, notable especially for her Giselle, and for her Maria, the abducted, harp-playing heroine of Zakharov's The Fountain of Bakhchisaray.

Following her retirement from the stage in 1967, Struchkova taught in the choreographer's faculty at GITIS (The Theatrical Institute of the Arts), and in 1981 she founded the Moscow ballet magazine, Ballet, which she edited and wrote for until 1995. In 1993 she mounted the full-length Swan Lake for the English National Ballet. She continued to teach and coach until her death in May.