Tchaikovsky’s Masterpiece When he was 80 years old, Alexandre Benois (1870-1960, designer for Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes) wrote an ecstatic recollection of his youthful impressions upon seeing the Petipa/Tchaikovsky Sleeping Beauty ballet four times in seven days, starting with its second performance in 1890 in St. Petersburg. As soon as they could, he and his friends […]
10. Delibes
The Composer The French composer Léo Delibes (1836-91) wrote two of the finest ballet scores to have survived changing times and tastes: Coppélia (1870) and Sylvia (1876), both premiered at the Paris Opéra. The composer’s formal training was at the Paris Conservatory, including organ lessons in addition to composition studies under Adolphe Adam (who wrote […]
9. Exotic Imports
Le Corsaire A pirate with a bandana on his head, his bare-chested slave, and a beautiful slave woman in a tutu: not the usual candidates to be featured in a ballet at the Paris Opéra in 1856, but that’s who the choreographer Joseph Mazilier and his co-librettist Jules Henri Vernoy de Saint-George put center stage […]
8. Music for Women in White
La Sylphide The Scottish bridegroom James first fell asleep on the stage of the Paris Opéra in 1832, to music of Jean Schneitzhoeffer. He was awakened by a “sylphide” or fairy with wings who wanted to lure him away from his bride Effie, with all the characters’ movements directed by Italian choreographer Filippo Taglioni (1777-1871).Though […]
7. Waltzing in Time
It is the Correct Thing — to remember that the waltz-step changes every few years, and that a blunder in dancing is very like a crime. –The Correct Thing in Good Society, 1888 That quotation is taken from Elizabeth Aldrich’s book From the Ballroom to Hell. And indeed, using the history of the waltz as one example, […]
6. Peasants, Aristocrats, and Statues
La Fille mal gardée Before the 1789 premiere of La Fille mal gardée (the poorly-guarded daughter), main characters of ballets and dance entertainments were most apt to be gods and goddesses, or kings and lesser nobles—but hardly “common people.” Consistent with the formal tone of courtly portrayals or powerful mythological characters, the music for early […]