1729–1808

Dancer
Choreographer

A Distinguished Family.

Gaetano Vestris was born into a family notable for its dancers and musicians. His elder sister Teresa Vestris (1726–1808) was a prominent dancer at the Paris Opera during the 1750s, before becoming a courtesan. Gaetano's younger brother Angiolo also became a dancer, performing in Paris and then later in Stuttgart in the pantomime ballets that Jean-Georges Noverre produced there. In total, nine members of the family were connected with the Opera in Paris or distinguished themselves in the field of dance or music during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Thus like the Bach family, who provided church and court musicians for the German principalities throughout the eighteenth century, the Vestris family was a major force on the Parisian musical and dance scene. Gaetano himself trained at the Paris Opera and performed there between 1749 and 1780. His career thus coincided with the rise of...