"La Sylphide" Lovensjold's score

[Solor]

I recently purchased 2 recordings of the 1834 score for Bournonville's "La Sylphide" via Amazon.com, the music of Herman Severin Lovensjold.

Luckilly after a long wait a used copy finally popped up on Amazon.com of a long out-of-print recording of the ballet, and I quickly purchased it - on the label CPO records, conducted by Harry Damgaard (conductor of the Royal Danish Theatre) & performed by the Danish Radio Symphony. The other recording I purchased is still in print - on the label Chandos, conducted by David Garforth with the Royal Danish Orchestra.

The Damgaard recording is of the full, complete, unedited score of Lovensjold, where as the Garforth recording is of the performance score - this recording includes the full overture of Act I, usually edited for performance as well as a rarely heard Pas de Deux edited out of traditional perfromances. Damgaard's recording includes James solo from Act I, which for some reason is not included in the Garforth recording.

I have 2 other recordings that have excerpts from "La Sylphide - the first is by Bonynge and has been included on 3 compilation discs released though Decca/London - the first is "The Art of the Prima Ballerina", then "Grand Pas De Deux", and then on the 10 CD box set "Fete du Ballet", the only one of the 3 still in print. This recording is of the divertessment of the Sylphs, beginning right about where the Sylphe calls her sisters to dance - this excerpt is also on the Garforth and Damgaard recordings, and are all identicle.

The second recording I have is included on the "Ballet Gala" CD from the long out-of-print 6 CD box set of rarities called "The Original Bolshoi Theatre Orchestra", conducted by Georgi G. Zhemchushin. This recording has an excerpt from "La Sylphide" which is similar to the excerpt recorded by Bonynge/Damgaard/Garforth, but it is orchestrated differently, and does not contain certain passages that are in the other recordings - for example, after the solo for flute right before the Sylphs make their entrance, the musical passage that turns up in the Bonynge/Damgaard/Garforth recording is not in the Bolshoi recording, nor is the allegro passage for violin solo.......on this disc the music is credited to Jean-Madeliene Schnietzhoeffer. II always thought that Lovensjold's score utilized sections from Schnietzhoeffer's 1832 score, but I am not certain. I know that Bournonville originally wanted to use Schnietzhoeffer's score, but that the price for the manuscript was far to much...so if that is the case, then how could Lovensjold have taken any passages from it? Maybe he had a good memory and just 'borrowed' a few themes.....but I dont know.

I have yet to see Lacotte's revival for the Paris Opera of the original 1832 Philippe Taglioni production, set to the score of Schnietzhoeffer.....perhaps the Bolshoi recording made an error in musical credits, as this same disc credits the "Le Corsaire" pas de deux to Adolphe Adam, and not Riccardo Drigo, so go figure.

[glebb]

Thanks Solor.

All I have is The Reel which I bought from iTunes, on my iPod.

It would be great if I could have the whole recording in my iTunes library.

[Marc Haegeman]

There is a third full-length recording of Løvenskiold's La Sylphide available in the 9 CD-box, released last year during the Bournonville Festival, played by the Aalborg Symphony Orchestra under Peter Ernst Lassen. It also features the complete score, including the extra 2nd Act pas de deux.

Performance practice frequently results in changes in the score. For instance in the current version of Sylphide danced by the Royal Danish and staged by Nikolaj Hübbe the French horn solo in the beginning of the forest scene in the 2nd Act has been replaced by a violin.

Whatever the liner notes state Damgaard's version seems to be closer to the performance score than Garforth, and it is edited.

And since we are talking about errors in crediting, Solor: the correct names of the composers are Jean-Madeleine Schneitzhoeffer and Herman Severin Løvenskiold .

The Schneitzhoeffer score is available on the Sylphide DVD from the Paris Opera Ballet.

[Mel Johnson]

Another thing to remember about these relatively-obscure ballet scores is that they often quoted even MORE obscure musical sources as a sort of Hit Parade. If say, Heinz-Werner Hundsfutzen composed an opera called Thusnelda the Bog Goddess and one of the numbers was a real toe-tapper, it very well could have found its way into a ballet score by any of a number of other composers.