Question about Re-Orchestrating the old Ballets

[Solor]

I remember the 1st time I ever heard "La Bayadere" and "Don Quixote" re-done by Lanchbery, I thought it was amazing (I was about 12 or so and I flipped over it). Before then I had all those ballets on CD and I had them in their original arrangement. Im 24 now, and I stioll get a kick out of listening to the re-done scores, now that I have them all on CD. I know lots of people arent to thrilled with Lanchbery's arrangements inparticular

I was wondering if anyone knew, why did this begin? Was it Nureyev's idea when he staged "Corsaire" grand pas in the west for the 1st time? Just curious why people started re-orchestrating the music to ballets of Drigo and Minkus (EVEN ADAM'S SCORE OF "GISELLE" WAS RE-DONE BY LANCHBERY! which in my opinion is fine in its original arrangement).

FYI - - - - If anyone wants to get a hold the Lanchbery's version of Minkus's "Don Quixote, it is available on the Orchestra Victoria (the Sydney Opera House Orch.) web page.

[Mel Johnson]

One of the problems with arranging ballet scores is what's left to work from. If there's a piano score, all well and good. An arranger can work from that, but more often than I'd like to say, the only thing to work from is the concertmaster's first violin part, with other voices added as cues. Giselle is a kind of case in point. There is a piano arrangement made around 1925 from which most re-arrangements are made today. With the advances in archive and library sciences, many old scores are being found, and that's to the good. It's part of the "Information Explosion" that began in the 1970s. If you can find the original score, and obtain the necessary permissions to use it, then that's the best. If you find that you own it personally then that's the very best! I remember having to sit down with an arranger once, sing out a section of an obscure score; and he had to take it down in dictation and arrange from that single snippet. That is the absolute pits. And even worse than that was Akira Endo having to sit down with a Giselle score and add and subtract bits FROM MEMORY that accompanied the version we were doing.

[Solor]

Speaking of "Giselle", I have a recording by Richard Bonynge (conducting) doing the complete score of Adam for the ballet..the liner notes say that it is the complete recording, in the original arrangement by Adam. Have you ever heard it? Its gorgeous, and in print! You should get it!

[Mel Johnson]

Thanks, I've heard it. It's the result of those "advances in archives and library sciences" I talked about.

[doug]

I think, in some cases, original orchestrations have viewed as weak-sounding or sparse and have subsequently been beefed up for bigger sound and to make them "legitimate" for modern audiences. I'm of the opinion that this generally does not work musically. The straightforward nature of most melodies and harmonies of music of this period does not stand up to enhanced orchestration. Delibes' Pas des fleurs (Petipa's Jardin anime) has for years and years, possibly for a century, been performed with enhanced orchestration, although the original has been available from several accessible sources.