Page 192 - (DK) The Classical Music Book - Big Ideas Simply Explained
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THE NOTES DANCE UP
THERE ON THE STAGE
THE NUTCRACKER (1892)
PYOTR ILYICH TCHAIKOVSKY
he 19th century brought a for dancers to explore “floating
IN CONTEXT revolution in the world of motion” and pointe work (dancing
T ballet. Earlier ballet music on tiptoe), with ever-shorter dresses
FOCUS had been largely made up of well- to allow the dancers’ feet and legs
Ballet music
known opera songs linked by to be seen. The music for these
BEFORE melodies written by a theatre earlier ballets was very much
1832 La Sylphide, the first musician. Few original scores for at the service of the dance, and
Romantic ballet, opens ballet were composed before 1820. usually written by “specialists”—
in Paris, choreographed by At this time, light Romantic composers prepared to produce
Filippo Taglioni to music ballets began to appear, dominated light, rhythmic music that would
composed by Jean-Madeleine in Europe by dancers such as Marie not upstage the dance.
Schneitzhoeffer. Taglioni, whose father Filippo
choreographed La Sylphide to Ballet moves east
1870 Léo Delibes’s ballet showcase her skills. Its central From about 1850, ballet’s center
Coppélia, about a dancing doll themes of enchantment and an began to shift from Paris to Russia,
that comes to life, is staged at ethereal female lead were a vehicle where tsarist patronage facilitated
the Paris Opéra. lavish productions. Tchaikovsky
received the commission for his
1876 Delibes’s ballet Sylvia first ballet, Swan Lake, in 1875.
opens in Paris. Tchaikovsky Approaching the commission
praises his score for Sylvia with symphonic ambition, he
above Wagner’s Ring Cycle. The heart of the created melodies associated with
AFTER classical repertory is the characters in the story. The critics,
however, were not ready for a ballet
1911 Stravinsky’s ballet Tchaikovsky–Petipa score worthy of the concert hall,
Petrushka premieres in Paris. Sleeping Beauty, and and in spite of a warm audience
no ballet is harder
1920 The Paris Opéra stages to get right. reception, critical incomprehension
the premiere of Stravinsky’s Robert Gottlieb saw the work shelved.
Pulcinella, with choreography American writer and dance critic While the choreographer on
by Leonid Massine. The Swan Lake, Julius Reisinger, had
libretto is inspired by a allowed Tchaikovsky quite a lot of
folk tale. freedom, the choreographer Marius
Petipa was more specific about
what he required of the music when
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