Carnival in Venice

[Maryland_Taxi]

I need to reference the composer for Carnival in Venice in a recital program booklet.

The dancer is doing a variation that she only knows as "Carnival in Venice" - it is a solo variation and the music starts out like the tune to "My Hat It Has Three Corners." The dancer's original coach is not available to clarify this for me...

Can anybody help?

Also, mildly related ... what is the proper format to reference the choreographer if the local teacher has modified a variation for the dancer, based upon Petipa's original?

Do I say, "Choreography by Sue Jones AFTER M. Petipa" or "Choreography by Sue Jones OVER M. Petipa" or "Choreography by Sue Jones OVER THE ORIGINAL" or is there some other better way?

Thanks!

[Mme. Hermine]

Isn't that the variation from Satanella by Pugni? Mel? Somebody? :shrug:

[Treefrog]

Jean-Baptiste Arban (based on a Google search).

[Hans]

My tape of the Kirov dancing the Carnival in Venice pas de deux says the music is by Pugni.

[sylphide]

Not able to answer the original question, but is Satanela an excerpt from Carnival in Venice ? I thaught it was a different ballet :shrug:

[Mel Johnson]

The tune "The Carnival of Venice" is a folk song, and its treatment for "Satanella" is by Cesare Pugni. Arban wrote fiendlishly difficult variations on the tune, which used to be used by Herbert C. Clarke as his cornet solo virtuoso piece with the Sousa Band.

[Maryland_Taxi]

Thanks for the replies.

Okay, so it the consensus that Pugni is the composer for the ballet music known as "Carnival in Venice?"

[Mel Johnson]

The way that it's treated in the pas de deux commonly referred to today as "Satanella", yes. Otherwise, it's a German folk tune made popular in an 18th-century vaudeville show called The Carnival of Venice.

[sylphide]

Mr. Johnson,

may I ask how a german folk song turned into a ballet? I am a bit mixed up. I have also heard that Strauss did a polka from Satanella. And for the plot of this ballet, is all of it the story of a devil woman who falls in love with a human, or is the love story only for the pdd part? And did the title " Le diable amoureux" ( the Devil in Love) have anything to do with this ballet? I really like this piece and would like to appreciate its history a little more.

I have tried to research this a bit, but found a lot of confusing info.

Thanks again.

[Mel Johnson]

Pugni was a notorious "borrower" of music for his ballet scores. He incorporated popular music by other composers into his work. Listen to the Taglioni variation in "Pas de Quatre". That's the second theme of a Johann Strauss, Sr. waltz called "The Suspension Bridge". Strauss meant to mark the opening of the first great modern suspension bridge in Budapest. You can hear the bridge sway in the theme of the Taglioni variation. The other thing was that the bridge was popularly known as "the wonder of the age". Small wonder here that Pugni borrowed it! He was paying a compliment as he saw it, to both Strauss and Taglioni. What Strauss thought about plaigiarism is not known to me.

I don't know the plot of the old vaudeville "Carnival of Venice" but I'll bet that there's some kind of tie-in from one show to the other. It was very popular into the first third of the nineteenth century. I've never heard or seen the whole score of Le Diable Amoreux, so I can't comment on how it's used, whether as a divertissement or part of the plot.

[sylphide]

Thanks M. Johnson!

It is well appreciated to have someone as resourcful as you!

[Maryland_Taxi]

Can I just schmooze for a second?

This forum is the most informative place on the entire internet to learn about ballet. Thanks so much.

Okay, now back to what you were doing .... :rolleyes: