Cleveland Ballet, a professional classical ballet company that began to take shape in 1972, gave its first full-scale public performances at the Hanna Theatre in 1976, buoyed by a foundation grant awarded the previous year to nurture the company’s growth and artistic excellence. Also in 1976, the foundation supported the start-up of New Cleveland Opera, the city’s first major resident opera-producing company. Although ambitious and costly, these ventures filled significant holes in the city’s cultural offerings and attracted enthusiastic new audiences to their stages in Playhouse Square.