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The Little Humpbacked Horse.(Pugni/Gorsky after Petipa/SL)


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I thought some of you would find this clips as fascinating as I did, as this are Burlaka's rare reconstructed/revived excerpts of this "lost" ballet.

I'll transcribe the YT's OP notes and paste the clips: ( :thanks: mrlopez2681 :flowers: )

Part 6/7 from Yuri Burlaka's marvelous gala "The Golden Age of the Russian Imperial Ballet" ("Золотой век русского императорского балета") staged for the Chelyabinsk State Ballet. Performed at the Chelyabinsk State Academic Opera & Ballet Theatre of M.I. Glinka on December 24, 2008.

--Choreography after Alexander Gorsky (1912) , Marius Petipa (1895) & Arthur Saint-Léon (1864)

--Music by Cesare Pugni, Riccardo Drigo & Boris Asafiev

This divertissement is extracted from the so-called "Under-Water Scene" of Arthur Saint-Léon's 1864 ballet "The Little Humpbacked Horse". It takes place during Act IV/Scene 1, when the protaganists Ivanushka & the Humpbacked Horse travel to the bottom of the Arctic Ocean in order to search for the Tsar Maiden's lost ring.

**Music by Cesare Pugni, unless otherwise noted -

1. Introduction

2. Variation of the White Pearl

3. Dance of two Red Corals

4. Variation of the Ocean Genie (Boris Asafiev. From a supplemental Pas de six he wrote for the ballet in 1920s)

5. Valse (originally intended as a "Dance of the Jelly Fishes")

6. Variation of the White Pearl (Ludwig Minkus. Variation for Anna Johansson from Petipa's 1892 revival of Perrot's "La Naïade et le pêcheur", aka "Ondine")

**History -

Arthur Saint-Léon's 1864 ballet "Le Petit cheval bossu, ou La Tsar-Demoiselle" ("The Little Humpbacked Horse, or The Tsar Maiden") was based on Pyotr Yershov's celebrated poem "Конек-горбунок" ("Konyok-gorbunok", meaning "Hunchback Horse"). The ballet was intended by Saint-Léon to rival the success of Marius Petipa's 1862 "The Pharaoh's Daughter". The ballet was a massive success, with its fantastical tableaux set on an enchanted Isle of mermaids, or another set in a magical Under-water world. The ballet's final act included a Grand divertissement celebrating the many peoples of the Russian Empire. Cesare Pugni's music was equally successful, & was heard at Imperial Balls for decades thereafter.

"The Little Humpbacked Horse" was revived by Marius Petipa in 1895 for Pierina Legnani with Riccardo Drigo supplementing the score. In 1901, Alexander Gorsky staged his own version for the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow, & in 1912 Gorsky brought his version to the Mariinsky Theatre. The 1912 revival included Tamara Karsavina as the Tsar Maiden. For this version Gorsky added several pieces, including the pas de trois "The Ocean & the Pearls" (seen in clip 2/2) to music extracted from Riccardo Drigo's score for Petipa's "La Perle", a ballet staged for the coronation of Tsar Nicholas II in 1896. "La Perle" was also set in an enchanted under-water place, & told the story of how the Earth Genie attempts to abduct the White Pearl, causing a colossal battle of the elements of Earth & Sea.

The Saint-Léon/Petipa version of "The Little Humpbacked Horse" was the first ballet performed by Diaghilev's original Ballet Russes.

Gorsky's version served as the basis for all subsequent revivals in Russia, but over time, the ballet became a shadow of the spectacle it once was. Like so many other ballets from the 19th century, it was survived only by its most celebrated passages. For some time the Vaganova Academy included a severly abriged version, but ti has not been performed since ca. 1989.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lfgAofD_vJs&feature=feedu

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w1iYSmNhZgQ&feature=related

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