Classical Ballet One Act Ballets "Paquita Grand Pas", "Symphony in C", "Chopiniana" World famous Bolshoi Ballet and Opera theatre (established 1776) - Small Stage
Schedule for One Act Ballets "Paquita Grand Pas", "Symphony in C", "Chopiniana" 2022
Composer: Ludwig Minkus Composer: Georges Bizet Composer: Frederick Chopin Light Designer: Damir Ismagilov Choreography: Marius Petipa Music Director: Pavel Klinichev
Orchestra: Bolshoi Theatre Symphony Orchestra
Paquita Grand PasMusic by Ludvig Minkus Choreography: Marius
Petipa Staging and new choreographic version: Yuri Burlaka Music Director:
Pavel Klinichev Designer: Alyona Pikalova Costume Designer: Yelena
Zaitseva Lighting Designer: Damir Ismagilov Will be premiered on November
15, 2008.
Copyright © 2008 Marc Haegeman @ Bolshoi
Theatre
Symphony in CBallet by in one act to music by Georges Bizet
The Symphony of a Palace
Le Palais de cristal, one of the most famous ballets of the 20th century,
was presented in June, 1947, at the Paris Opera, and in March, 1948, it was
performed in New York, by Balanchine’s own company, as Symphony in C, the title
under which it is danced to this day by companies around the globe.
The story of the creation of this Balanchine masterpiece is remarkable and
comes close to being improbable. In l947, the Paris Opera Ballet was left
without a choreographer. So George Balanchine was invited to transfer to the
Opera three ballets from his New York repertoire. Having fulfilled his
obligations in this respect, Balanchine became so enamoured of the artistic
charm of the Paris dancers that he decided to present them with an unplanned
work - and this was to be Le Palais cristal. The metaphorical title, an image of
the Paris school of classical dance, was not accidental. In addition to
which, Le Palais cristal, is a choreographic portrait of the Paris Opera Ballet:
its hierarchical structure (which, in his company, Balanchine did away with) is
preserved and secured in the structure of each movement. At the center are
the etoile and the premier danseur, slightly further off are the two
soloist couples, while closer to the backdrop is the corps de ballet. All this
is a reflection of the entrenched, spatial and professional laws of the
Paris Academic Company. Balanchine had no intention of infringing these laws, he
admired them and brought out their artistic wisdom.
The seventeen-year-old Georges Bizet had written his 1st (Youthful) Symphony
as a diploma work in the year - 1855 - that he had completed his studies at the
Conservatoire. Having won the Grand Prix de Rome, Bizet went off to Italy and
was to write no more symphonies, while the score of Symphony in С gathered dust
in the Conservatoire library until 1935, when it was given its first public
performance - which, incidentally, was not a great success. Balanchine heard
about this from Stravinsky. The former read the score, adapted it for the stage,
and only after this did he begin to appreciate the musical world of the
symphonic Bizet as much as he did that of the operatic Bizet.
By giving each of the four movements its own contingent of dancers and
bringing all the participants together in an exultant finale, Balanchine
too achieved an exemplary ’reading’ of the music. Balanchine’s text follows that
of Bizet, repeating the flow of the music and the pattern of the musical form in
a skilful design and exquisite configurations. Theme, elaboration,
recapitulation, general intonation, dynamic play and, finally, the very
sound of the orchestra, its instrumental color, its agility - all this is
translated into the language of choreography with a truly hypnotic skill.
Balanchine has made a ballet about ballet. If one was to attempt to answer
the question, what is its significance, in a single word, this word would
be genius. The genius of the ensemble, the structural genius of the grand
classical pas, each of the four sections of which - entree, adagio, variations,
coda - Balanchine embellished choreographically and developed symphonically,
deploying them in space and uniting them in time - into the flow of the dance.
Le Palais de cristal is an ode to the dance logic of the grand classical
pas and, at the same time, an ode to the dance genius of the classical ballet
company.
Vadim Gaevsky (text from the handbook, abridged)
Characters and performers
ChopinianaBallet in one act to music by Frederic
Chopin
Premiered on October 31, 1958.
From the History of the Ballet
Chopiniana is the first of Mikhail Fokine`s masterpieces. The twenty-six-year
old choreographer composed it for one of the usual charity performances, which
were organized in Petersburg in their hundreds, in order to add novelty to a
classical repertoire that set the teeth on edge. But if today we were to see the
Chopiniana that was presented on February 10, 1907, we would not recognize it:
it consisted of four little genre scenes to the music of a polonaise, nocturne,
mazurka and tarantella, orchestrated by Alexander Glazunov.
In the Polonaise, Poles danced with great verve in a ballroom. In the
Nocturne, Chopin himself wrestled with his nightmares and met his muse amidst
the ruins of a monastery. In the Mazurka, a girl, who was being forced to marry
an old man, eloped with her sweetheart. The Tarantella was danced in Italian
costume against the background of Vesuvius. At Fokine`s request, Glazunov
orchestrated, specially for the occasion, one more piano piece by Chopin, the
7th Waltz.
Anna Pavlova, whose exquisite appearance brought to mind the age of romantic
ballet, danced in this waltz the role of the Sylphide, a sublime dream, eluding
The Youth`s grasp. The choreographer-revolutionary who had spent his entire life
fighting against absurdity in ballet, found in the romantic age a model of
spirituality and poetry. Inspired by the images of the great romantic ballerinas
of the XIX century and by Anna Pavlova`s dancing, a year later he created a new
version of Chopiniana.
The premiere took place at the Mariinsky Theatre on March 8, 1908. In it the
brilliant Polonaise served but as an overture, forming a counterpoint to the
elegiac mood of the overall ballet which consisted of: the Nocturne, 11th Waltz,
a Prelude, two Mazurkas, 7th Waltz and 1st Waltz, forming the coda. The work had
no plot. It just conveyed the mood of reverie and light melancholy, condition,
veering between dream and reality, of The Youth-poet, who had found himself in
the world of the Sylphides. The choreographer found an ideal cast for the
premiиre: the main roles were danced by Anna Pavlova, Tamara Karsavina, Vaslav
Nijinsky. And in 1909 they conquered Paris in this ballet during the first of
Diaghilev`s Russian Seasons.
Chopiniana at the Bolshoi Theatre
In the hundred years of its existence, only very rarely Chopiniana
has been performed by dancers with enough sensitivity to convey its stylistic
nuances. The ballet occupied a very special place in Galina Ulanova`s career:
she chose Chopiniana for her examination performance at the Leningrad ballet
school, an occasion which introduced a unique lyrical dancer to the world of
ballet, and it was in this same work that she gave her farewell performance at
the Bolshoi Theatre.
Chopiniana had its Bolshoi Theatre debut in 1932, but soon after this it was
dropped from the repertoire and it was not until 1958, thanks to the Leningrad
choreographer, Yekaterina Heidenreikh, that it was returned to the Theatre on a
more or less permanent basis. Since then not one outstanding Moscow ballerina or
lead male dancer has passed the work by.
A real sensation was the 1961 debut in the ballet of Natalia Bessmertnova
who, several years later, was to acquire an ideal partner in Alexander
Bogatyrev. The following are among the dancers who have given acclaimed
performances in Chopiana: Raisa Struchkova, Marina Kondratieva, Yekaterina
Maximova, Lyudmila Semenyaka, Nikolai Fadeyechev, Maris Liepa, Boris Khokhlov,
Alexander Godunov, Nina Ananiashvili, Alexei Fadeyechev. And today too
Chopiniana remains a much desired work with the new generation of Bolshoi
Theatre soloists.
Anna Galayda (text from the handbook, abridged)
Characters and performers
Schedule for One Act Ballets "Paquita Grand Pas", "Symphony in C", "Chopiniana" 2022
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