65 replies to this topic

[Nanarina]

Birdsall, on 21 July 2012 - 06:47 PM, said:

Nanarina, on 21 July 2012 - 02:38 PM, said:

I too love and enjoy Petipa ballets in particular,, Niemerier(spelling),Sir. K. MM, Cranko, Vinogradov Lander, Lifar, Balanchine, Petit and others and feel there is technical quality in LFMG, albeit perhaps more simple? I just did not find the other Lise Solo, appealed to me, perhaps I am too used to the Royal Ballet production.  I find the music is different as well.

The key to this is that we tend to not like a different version of what we have grown up with and know well.

This is why nobody is happy when a movie comes out based on his/her favorite novel. The story we have in our heads is vivid, and nobody can put it on screen the way we think it should be created. 95% of people watching a movie version of a novel are going to be very disappointed. The new version is always going to seem like sacrilege.

It all depends on what we knew first.

I have watched both Ashton's and Gorsky's versions recently and love them both for different reasons, but that is because I am not invested emotionally in one above the other (did not grow up seeing one that touched my soul). But someone who has grown up watching one or the other is going to think the one he did not grow up with is "wrong" (for lack of a better word). It makes sense.

People like what they know and aren't usually thrilled by new versions. I'm not saying that is good or bad. It is just human nature.

But if you are a true lover of the genre, you can still  appreciate a different version of the original, it does not mean you altermatically will  prefer what you have enjoyed for years. Sometimes it can vary your preference stays with the old favourite.  But  at other times the new or different version can equally meet or surpas your original feelings.  With me take the case of the POB  2 performances of Berlioz Romeo and Juliette by Sasha Waltz, danced by Aurelie Dupont and Herve Moreau also Melanie Hurel and  Nicholas Paul in 2007. I was totally swept away by this, Modern dance  - me !!!!!! ?????. It was quite beautiful in it's own way, with choral support and the most simple effective choreography. and there was a beautiful Pas deux,  I really love it in fact it was so emotional it reduced me to tears. Over the years I have seen numerous R & J's, some I liked others I did not.  But this new work I could happily accept.

[Birdsall]

Nanarina, on 22 July 2012 - 02:33 AM, said:

Birdsall, on 21 July 2012 - 06:47 PM, said:

Nanarina, on 21 July 2012 - 02:38 PM, said:

I too love and enjoy Petipa ballets in particular,, Niemerier(spelling),Sir. K. MM, Cranko, Vinogradov Lander, Lifar, Balanchine, Petit and others and feel there is technical quality in LFMG, albeit perhaps more simple? I just did not find the other Lise Solo, appealed to me, perhaps I am too used to the Royal Ballet production.  I find the music is different as well.

The key to this is that we tend to not like a different version of what we have grown up with and know well.

This is why nobody is happy when a movie comes out based on his/her favorite novel. The story we have in our heads is vivid, and nobody can put it on screen the way we think it should be created. 95% of people watching a movie version of a novel are going to be very disappointed. The new version is always going to seem like sacrilege.

It all depends on what we knew first.

I have watched both Ashton's and Gorsky's versions recently and love them both for different reasons, but that is because I am not invested emotionally in one above the other (did not grow up seeing one that touched my soul). But someone who has grown up watching one or the other is going to think the one he did not grow up with is "wrong" (for lack of a better word). It makes sense.

People like what they know and aren't usually thrilled by new versions. I'm not saying that is good or bad. It is just human nature.

But if you are a true lover of the genre, you can still  appreciate a different version of the original, it does not mean you altermatically will  prefer what you have enjoyed for years. Sometimes it can vary your preference stays with the old favourite.  But  at other times the new or different version can equally meet or surpas your original feelings.  With me take the case of the POB  2 performances of Berlioz Romeo and Juliette by Sasha Waltz, danced by Aurelie Dupont and Herve Moreau also Melanie Hurel and  Nicholas Paul in 2007. I was totally swept away by this, Modern dance  - me !!!!!! ?????. It was quite beautiful in it's own way, with choral support and the most simple effective choreography. and there was a beautiful Pas deux,  I really love it in fact it was so emotional it reduced me to tears. Over the years I have seen numerous R & J's, some I liked others I did not.  But this new work I could happily accept.

I think it is always possible to love something new. I agree with you.

[cubanmiamiboy]

JMcN, on 22 July 2012 - 12:19 AM, said:

When you see Fille done well, you come out of the theatre on a cloud of euphoria!

But that has been exactly my point ever since I wrote my OP, JMcN...I KNOW "Fillle..", I grew up watching "Fille..", I was lucky enough to have seen the very last performances of Maria Elena Llorente, one of the youngest old school/pre Castro ballerinas dancing the role coached by Alonso herself when the choreography was still fresh in her memory as she had danced it with John Kriza in Nijinska's version in NYC coached by the first American Lissette, Lucia Chase,  and the help of Mme.Alexandra Fedorova, who knew the ballet from her Imperial times, and I LOVED it every single time I saw it..! I totally agree with you...it is a SUPERB ballet..!

JMcN, on 22 July 2012 - 12:19 AM, said:

Christian, please don't ever review Two Pigeons!!!

Ha...just give me a chance to...!

[Birdsall]

And that is wonderful! I enjoy so much the clips you show me and would love seeing the versions you talk about. But I guess my point is that just because one work of art is exquisite doesn't mean another work of art based on the same story can't be good in a totally different way.

But you are right to have your own opinion and taste and preference for a particular version. That is totally normal, and I applaud it, b/c you expose us to ballets we might not learn about otherwise.

[cubanmiamiboy]

Birdsall, on 22 July 2012 - 06:31 AM, said:

I guess my point is that just because one work of art is exquisite doesn't mean another work of art based on the same story can't be good in a totally different way.

But wait, Bart...let's make a pause here and be fair.  I NEVER said that Ashton's staging "can't be good".  I said that it didn't find it in the same technical level as Nijinska's and somehow too character-oriented for my taste , but still enjoyable..  About the "good" or "bad" notions, the world has been debating about them for thousands of years now with no definitive agreement so far, and I know I would never dream of knowing anything about the definitive answers.

[JMcN]

Tamara Karsavina, who also danced in the Petipa version, was influential in the creation of Sir Frederick Ashton's version which contains sublime and complex choreography.  I can cope with you preferring the production you know well but please do not underestimate the grace, virtuosity and subtle characterisations contained within the Ashton version.

I'm afraid the clips you have included in your posting have left me cold, probably because they are out of context.

[Nanarina]

JMcN, on 22 July 2012 - 09:25 AM, said:

Tamara Karsavina, who also danced in the Petipa version, was influential in the creation of Sir Frederick Ashton's version which contains sublime and complex choreography.  I can cope with you preferring the production you know well but please do not underestimate the grace, virtuosity and subtle characterisations contained within the Ashton version.

I'm afraid the clips you have included in your posting have left me cold, probably because they are out of context.

I totally agree JMcN, I did not find the first one at all appealing in fact I would be so "rude" as to say to me the portrayal was over acted and a bit pathetic , and did not begin to compare to Ashtons version.  It seems an attempt to concentrate on the chorfeography and does not show the character of Lise at all.   I am as already mentioned in my last post, happy to see other versions, but if I honestly feel without being biased that I do not like it,, all things considered,  my opinion stays the same.

[cubanmiamiboy]

Nanarina, on 22 July 2012 - 10:19 AM, said:

the portrayal was over acted and a bit pathetic...

To each his/her own.   No, I don't under estimate Ashton's Fille, but the overall message I'm trying to pass is that there has been continuous, beautiful "Fille" staged and danced all around before, during and after Ashton's. In France since 1789; in Russia since 1800; by Petipa from 1885 on; out to the West from Pavlova in 1912-(London) and staged by Sergueev-(Riga, 1922); back to Paris in 1922-(Balachova)- and in America in 1937-(Mordkin)-and right in NYC-(Nijinska, 1940)-from where it made it to Cuba-(Alonso,1952)- and where it has stayed as another cherished mid-century BT importation until today.  All of it from 1885 on rooted in Petipa/Hertel...all of them before Ashton's.   There is a whole generation of audiences that probably think all this previous venerable 200 years old past and somehow broken/scattered present is non existent, when in reality it has survived.   Yes, I do find Ashton's staging interesting, but being certainly biased against whatever modern attempts against continuity and faith to original Petipa, what I saw and heard didn't convinced me.

If anything...I find a tragedy that Russia wasn't able to keep such gem-(just as the Nutcracker)...one that was theirs by all rights

[Quiggin]

Cristian:

Quote

For what I remember, Balachova's name seems to be the key for which Nijinska's version was able to take form in the West.

Actually I was looking at old New York Times reviews of La Fille and at Koegler's entry in Concise Oxford Ballet, and it seems that the lineage is not so pure. Some background: Nijinska, according to Lucia Chase, was unfamiliar with the ballet "and had to be taught it step by step from the Mordkin version by Miss Chase and Mr. Romanoff." Mordkin had previously added his own choreography to his company's 1938 production. [Footnotes on La Fille NYT Jan 17. 1960]

And the Ashton version comes chiefly from the 1828 score of Louis Hérold, whereas Petipa / Ivanov uses the 1858 Berlin score of Peter Ludwig Hertel.

Koegler notes that "the ballet was given its present title when Dauberval produced it at the London Pantheon Theater in 1791" (it was La Ballet de la Paille... before) and "not until 1803 was it seen in Paris." Interestingly in the version Pavlowa brought to the United States in 1914, Enrico Cecchetti played "the low comedy role of Lise’s mother and did some very amusing burlesque dancing”. [NYT]

In the Times John Martin was delighted with the Nijinska version in 1940 and says, "Nijinska has staged her version of the work with a fine sparkle, and an attempt to suggest the flavor of another period’s art in terms of her own." But Ashton's in 1960 he ultimately likes more: "Short versions of the old ballet have been seen in the repertories of several other companies, and have been not without value, but for the first time it emerges as a masterpiece."

But now double-checking Koegler, I see that Alonso's version is based on Alexandra Balashova's version done in 1946 for Cuervos. Clement Crisp in a sketch in the Financial Times in 2003:

Quote

During the 1960s, I was invited to Ljubljana in Yugoslavia, where the Russian dancer Alexandra Balashova had staged La Fille Mal Gardee as she had performed it at the Bolshoi in 1905. Wonderfully alert and lively even in her 80s and getting ready to dance the role of the mother that evening ...

And this I thought was interesting because the score here is the older 1828 (but not oldest) one - but maybe it was an error. Jack Andersen, NYT, Jan 24, 1989:

Quote

“La Fille Mal Gardée” was originally choreographed by Jean Dauberval in 1789. But the pas de deux from it danced by Tatiana Garcia-Stephanovich and Arch Higgins clearly derived from a 19th century version, for its high leaps an delicated steps en pointe would have been unknown in the 18th century. The excerpts were staged by Ghislaine Thesmar and Adam Luders after a production by Alexandra Balachova, a Russian born teacher, and the students performed them with élan. Jeananne Albee was the pianist in Louis J F Hérold’s score.

And I want to repost this wonderful clip that Cristian once put up of Alejandro Virelles doing a La Fille variation:

[JMcN]

Quiggin,

Thanks for your most interesting and informative post.



So there are several different versions of La Fille Mal Gardee - all in their own way rooted in the original from 1789.  As it goes with any of the other classics including, as mentioned in a previous post, another French ballet Coppelia.

We can celebrate the differences and enoy them all!

[Natalia]

Thanks for the detailed report, Christian.

[cubanmiamiboy]

Natalia, on 23 July 2012 - 04:04 AM, said:

Thanks for the detailed report, Christian.

My pleasure, Natasha!

[JMcN]

Thanks Christian.

[Nanarina]

Thank you for all the information regarding La Fille mal Gardee, but what sems to be missed is the fact the ballet disappeasred into the archives for many years, in Europe, even if it was performed in Russia, I cannot remember seeing it until the Sir Fred's. version appeared., all I can remember  is a musical CD of the Bolshoi Orchestra which featured a small section from it.  So we were not privallidged to see all the other versions that appeared elsewhere.  Is it still peformed by other companies in the different versions nowadays, that is appart from School productions?  Obviously the Paris Opera Technical team choose Sir Fred's production despite having Pierre Lacotte who could have easlly researched and re-created the Petipa version, considering his La Syphide, Paquita etc.

[Alymer]

There is a version of Fille by Heinz Spoerli which was performed at the Opera some years ago.  I've also seen it in Finland.  The Balashova version is taken from the production she danced when a ballerina in Moscow.  That was by Gorsky (who gave Balashova  the nickname "Little Pony") and based on the Petipa/Ivanov version premiered in Petersburg and danced by Karsavina.  Obviously one doesn't know how much Gorsky changed.  The Balashova version has been notated and is in the Benesh collection.  I have seen one of Lisa's variations reproduced from that notation.
The Swedish choreographer Ivo Cramer produced a charming version, a reconstruction  based on the Dauberval original and performed to popular songs of Dauberval's period - I have an idea that it was the original score, but I can't be sure of that.