Delibes, Prokofiev, Stravinski

[ronny]

I just checked the poll on "best composer" on this forum and with my vote, three of six were in a dead heat with 6 votes each. So I have a question about each of these three.

On Delibes, I know about Coppelia of course, but are there any other great full length ballets that he is known for as composer? Am I missing out on something here??

On Prokofiev, I would love to enjoy his music, but the excerpts I have seen all seem to have a kind of dark tone to them. Things that start out quite promising, but then move to a kind of discord of notes. I've heard dancers say that Prokoviev allows them to express the "full range of their emotions" which I suppose means feeling "rotten" as well as happy! The exception to this is the balcony scene in Romeo and Juliet... that is very nice, really moving and wonderful. So my question is this, is there a Prokofiev ballet that shows off his more harmoneous nature?

And on Stravinski... did Stravinski compose for full length ballets? I was thinking that maybe his music was not composed for a ballet, but simply adapted to ballet at a later time. But either way, I would be interested in knowing of any complete Stravinski ballets.

That poll brought a lot of my questions to mind. Hope this is not too many things for one post. Any comments on any of these three composers would be interesting to me. Thanks

[Paquita]

I believe the Balanchine Sylvia pdd is to Delibes' music.

I also find Prokofiev a bit dark but not in a sombre or morbid way, his music is very heavy and dramatic usually, which is great in R&J. I love the balcony pdd too! I love his Cinderella score, though sometimes the tone is a bit heavy for a fluffy fairytale story.

Good question, I'm having trouble thinking of any full length Stravinsky Ballets. Petroushka, Firebird, Rite of Spring, Rubies (Jewels is full length but not all Stravinsky), Agon, Pulcinella, Apollo... there are so many, but I think they are all 1 act ballets.

[Estelle]

Originally posted by ronny

On Delibes, I know about Coppelia of course, but are there any other great full length ballets that he is known for as composer?   Am I missing out on something here??

Delibes also composed the full-length ballet "Sylvia", which was choreographed by the POB ballet master Louis Mérante in 1876 and revived by Léo Staats in 1919. A reconstruction of it was performed in Paris in 1979, but it hasn't been danced since then (but John Neumeier created his own version for the POB in 1997), and in general it's not as well known as "Coppélia". But George Balanchine did a pas de deux on it, "Sylvia pas de deux", and it still is in the NYCB's repertory.

And in my opinion, that's a lovely musical score.

And he had also composed the music for Saint-Léon's "La Source", premiered in 1866 at the Paris Opera. As far as know, nothing remains of that choreography. But part of the score is used in Balanchine's "La Source", premiered in 1968 by the New York City Ballet (and it also includes some music from "Sylvia"). Also some of it is used in Leo Staats' "Soir de f^ete", created in the 1920s and still in the repertory of the POB.

On Prokofiev, I would love to enjoy his music, but the excerpts I have seen all seem to have a kind of dark tone to them.  Things that start out quite promising, but then move to a kind of discord of notes.  

Well, I'm not a fan of Prokofiev's ballet scores either...

And on Stravinski... did Stravinski compose for full length ballets?  I was thinking that maybe his music was not composed for a ballet, but simply adapted to ballet at a later time.  But either way, I would be interested in knowing of any complete Stravinski ballets.

I don't think he wrote any score for a full-length ballet. But he composed a lot of scores for shorter works: one-act "story ballets" like "The Firebird", "Pétrouchka", "The rite of spring",

"Apollo", "Pulcinella", "Les Noces" for Diaghilev's Ballets Russes, and also abstract ballets like "Agon" in 1957 for George Balanchine. (I don't know if "Orpheus" and "Jeu de cartes" were composed especially for ballet). And also there were many of his works which were not composed especially for ballet, but which were used for ballet later, like "Symphony in 3 movements", "Violin concerto", "Capriccio for piano and Orchestra" (the score for "Rubies"), "Scherzo a la russe", "Movements for piano and orchestra", "Monumentum pro gesualdo", "Concerto in D for string orchestra" (used in Jerome Robbins' "The Cage"), "Dumbarton Oaks"...

PS: Paquita, we must have been posting at the same moment!

[Richard Jones]

'La Source' (according to the ref. books) was actually a collaboration between Delibes and Minkus (before the latter went to Russia). Besides 'Coppélia' and 'Sylvia', Delibes wrote for the opera stage (esp. 'Lakmé'), and also included dances in his incidental music for the play 'Le Roi s'amuse' - music found in Arbeau's 'Orchésographie' of 1588 is used by Delibes for this play.

Prokofiev first tried his hand at ballet music with 'Ala and Lolly' for Diaghilev (1914) - trying to carry on the prehistoric trend after Stravinsky's 'Rite of Spring' - but Diaghilev didn't like it after all so Prokofiev made it into a concert suite (The Scythian Suite). Eventually it was choreographed by someone else. There then followed three works for Diaghilev: 'Chout' (Fr. spelling of Russian for 'Buffoon'), 'Le pas d'acier' (Diaghilev's nod in the direction of Soviet constructivism), and 'The Prodigal Son' (the last work Diaghilev commissioned). With 'The Prodigal Son', Prokofiev became more lyrical (in places! - the bit about the drunken revellers leading the son astray is inevitably not at all lyrical, for instance, but I find it all very effective); however, Prokofiev wasn't too keen on Balanchine's interpretation of his music.

Prokofiev then wrote 'Sur le Borysthene' for Paris (chor. Lifar). 'Romeo and Juliet' was written after his return to the USSR, to be followed by 'Cinderella'; his last ballet was 'The Stone Flower', which wasn't produced till the year following his death

(chor. Lavrosky in 1954).

Stravinsky didn't write a ballet to fill a whole evening, but he wrote a host of shorter ones! Not only that, but so much of his concert music has been choreographed that it was possible for NYCB to mount a Stravinsky Festival in 1972 (the year after his death) in which 31 ballets to his music were performed.

His original ballet scores (with dates of first perf.) are:

Firebird (1910); Petrushka (1912); The Rite of Spring (1913); The Song of the Nightingale - which was a re-arrangement of part of the music from an earlier opera - (1920); Pulcinella (1920) - based on music by Pergolesi (1710-1736) - it is now known that some of the music which formed the basis for this score was not by Pergolesi after all, though it hardly matters - Stravinsky wins through!; Les Noces (1923) - the score was complete, but not orchestrated, by 1917, and the music belongs to an earlier era; Apollon Musagete (1928) - which later had its name changed to 'Apollo'; Le Baiser de la Fée (based on Tchaikovsky's music) - (1928); Jeu de Cartes (1937); Scenes de Ballet (1944); Orpheus (1948); Agon (1957).

In addition he wrote these scores which had strong choreographic elements:

'Renard' (comp. 1916) and 'The Soldier's Tale' (1918), are both described as burlesques; Stravinsky wanted the action to be mimed or danced with singers (in Renard) or speaker (in the Soldier's Tale) off-stage. Renard was first produced by the Ballets Russes in 1922 (Nijinska). Different productions of these have varying degrees of dance quality. 'Perséphone' was written for Ida Rubinstein (ch. Joos 1934) - she was originally an actress, so the leading role calls for the performer to recite as well as dance. The score involves a narrator, tenor soloist, chorus, children's chorus, and orchestra - you get value for money with that one (if it's ever done). 'The Flood', another theatre piece (a 'musical play') was produced by Balanchine for CBS TV in 1962.

In 1942, Barnum and Bailey's Circus produced Stravinsky's Circus Polka, choreographed by Balanchine for '50 elephants and 50 beautiful girls' as 'an original choreographic tour-de-force'! The venue was Madison Square Garden. It had 425 performances!

'Danses concertantes' was not written as a ballet, but as an abstract series of dances for concert performance (f.p. 1942) but has often been choreographed, as have many others of his concert works.

Happy listening!

[ronny]

Wow! Thanks for these comprehensive replys. I took notes on these things since there is so much information here. You all really answered my question completely and is very much appreciated. I am going to look for these peices from Stravinski (probably on tape since I live in a remote area) and you also have me interested in Cinderalla by Prokofiev and Sylvia by Delibes, and possibly La Source. This is a great resource for me. Thanks again.