smitty1931

During the LP era I owned a CD of the music to the ballet The Bronze Horseman. It was never reissued on CD. Has anyone seen this ballet? If so, when and where? The bronze horseman is a statue in St Petersberg of Peter the Great pointing to the West. I saw this statue while in St Petersberg and it is very impressive!

Has anyone seen this 2008 DVD? Please review it, as it is pretty pricey and I don't want to waste money. Thanks.

I recently purchased this DVD and was pleased at the quality of the performance. The music is Tchaikovskyesque. The dancers are good, the production first class and the photography excellent. I recommend it to all ballet fans. DG 00440 073 4416

In another thread I asked if anyone had seen this ballet with Nijinskys original choreography. In researching I found the book LE SACRE DU PRINTEMPS by Shelley Berg/1988 which describes a number of versions including the Nijinsky. I recommend it to those interested in this masterpiece. Your local library can get it for you.

I have a Russian video of this, can't exactly reccommend it as every time I've attempted to watch it I've fallen asleep - it's that boring.

Oh well, I wasn't going to comment because I haven't watched this since I got through it the first time about 5 years ago. And could barely get through it. Also never tried to watch it a second time.

But I see I'm not alone, so....

It's more or less a vehicle for Plisteskaya, as I recall she emotes throughout and changes costumes constantly. I do remembering that her vivid personal charisma comes through and her performance more or less reflects the level of her technique of the times that I did get to see her live in the early/mid 70s.

so it was somewhat of a momento for me.

I have this on a Russian bootleg VHS and the quality is poor; I can't estimate how much is due to the original and how much to the shoddy copy .

If you are a Plisetskaya fan, this may be for you.

I thank both of you for your reply. I believe I will pass on this DVD. Smitty

Has anyone out there seen the DVD of this ballet? Would you recommend its purchase to a ballet Fan? I noticed it is dated 1976, what is the quality of the photography? Thank you for your opinion.

Smitty, you asked about Monteux reminiscences, and I don't know about that, but the composer was there, and relying on my memory of what I've read -- or heard, as there was a recording for CBS/Sony of Stravinsky reading his little essay, Aprops Le Sacre -- he was deeply hurt by the musically conservative ballet audience's noisy rejection of the music before they'd even heard it through once! One person was even supposed to have called out scornfully, as the bassoon begins the piece playing high above its usual register, "What instrument is that?"

Soon after, Monteux conducted it again in a concert situation, and a different audience waited until the end to cheer wildly, and Stravinsky took applause after embracing the perspiring conductor: "It was the wettest hug of my life." The enthusiastic crowd carried the alarmed composer out into the street on their shoulders, with some police to protect him. So the story goes, when Diaghilev, who was jealous of any of his associates' success outside his company, heard about this, he said sneeringly to Stravinsky, "Our little Igor has to be escorted out of his concerts by the police, like a prize-fighter!"

A marvelous story, one that I had not heard before. I had the privilege to see Stravinsky conduct his opera Nightingale in Washington, D.C. When he came out on two crutches the entire audience stood in silent homage until he reached the podium and then broke out in cheers and applause. An unforgettable experience! Smitty

Good and difficult questions, all. Sacre is a huge milestone in the history of dance, the kind of work that has achieved notoriety beyond the dance world. It has been labeled as a turning point in the development of western art, tagged as the "first real modern dance", used as a metaphor for the displacement of World War I, and blamed for the eventual dissolution of the Balelt Russe -- not in that order(!)

The original ballet only had a handful of performances, and did not last in permanent repertory. It was, though, the topic of considerable speculation, both academic and artistic. It was, in a way, like Woodstock -- people were proud to claim that they had been in the audience for the event. And like Woodstock, over time it has come to mean almost more as an event than as an actual artwork.

Several choreographers have made work to the score since its 1913 debut, and though some of them have lasted far longer in active repertories, none of them have made the same 'splash' as the original. Most of the dance world thought it was lost beyond retrieval, but historians Millicent Hodson and Kenneth Archer were not convinced it was hopeless. Many of the dancers who had been in the original production had taught what they remembered in various situations, and there were extant renderings of the sets and costumes. Hodson and Archer began to compile all this material, laying out sketches alongside the score. They knew that Marie Rambert, who Diaghilev had hired to assist Nijinsky analyse the score, had made copious notes, but they didn't actually find that document until they were almost finished with their compilation.

Robert Joffrey was an enthusiastic collector of anything having to do with the Ballet Russe -- he'd had Massine set some his early work on the company and encouraged Hodson and Archer to keep working on Sacre -- finally when they were ready to start staging, they worked first with the Joffrey. The version of the work they created, using the Rambert documents to check their work, is not a reconstruction of the original choreography so much as it is a new creation using all those original materials. I cannot say that it is the same ballet, but it is certainly the closest that we can get (time travel being what it is). And in some ways, the hullabaloo this restaging created in the dance world echoed the ruckus the original work inspired.

PBS broadcast a Dance in America program in the 1989, featuring extensive interviews with Hodson and Archer as well as a cleanly filmed version of the company in the ballet. Since then, H and A have staged the work on a few other companies, including the Paris Opera and the Maryinsky -- these have been filmed and broadcast in various places. (see here for some conversation about film versions) I don't know if anyone has it in their active repertory at this moment, but I imagine it is around and about in the Ballet Russe anniversary programming this year.

If you're interested in some of the history surrounding the work, I highly recommend Shelly Berg's "Le Sacre du Printemps: Seven Productions from Nijinsky to Martha Graham" It's out of print so you might have to interlibrary loan it (try you local college library), but she's an excellent historian and her descriptions of the different works are visceral and evocative.

Like most dance fanatics, you just have to mention Sacre to get my full attention -- it's a fascinating ballet.

Thank you for your excellent post. I will try to obtain the Shelly Berg book. Smitty

Has anyone out there seen a ballet company do this ballet to Nijinsky's choreography? Just what made the audience at the first performance so upset? Monteux was the conductor, did he ever make any comments about that performance? Is there a DVD that does justice to the original concept?

I too have just bought this DVD and share your opinion of it, Smitty. I am really happy with it and would say that I have watched parts of it every day for a week. I know the music is not sublime but I must say bits of it continue to run through my brain. The dancing pleases me enormously and the whole ridiculous story is fun.. I would love to know more about the making of this version as the costuming and cast of thousands are a delight. My only regret is that I now have DVDs of all the big narrative ballets and despair that there will be no more.( Hoping that POB Raymonda this year will be good)

Thank you for backing up my judgment. I presume you own the POB PAQUITA with choreography by Lacotte and the delightful version of COPPELIA by the Australian Ballet. I thought the Bolshoi version of RAYMONDA was well danced. What a pity that so many fine ballets remain unrecorded. Smitty

i'm not skilled in provided links to previous BT discussions but surely there have been any number of posts around the time of this DVD's release about this ballet and its filming in the Bolshoi Theater.

There's one here : http://ballettalk.invisionzone.com/index.p...amp;mode=linear

and here : http://ballettalk.invisionzone.com/index.php?showtopic=20668

and here : http://ballettalk.invisionzone.com/index.php?showtopic=20971

I wish I was as proficient at ballet dancing as at search engines...

Thank you for the references. I looked them up and found them very interesting. Did you see the production when it played New York in 08? Smitty

I recently purchased this DVD BEL AIR BAC201 and was delighted with this seldom seen ballet. The production is lavish, the dancers first class (Zakharova and Filin) and the photography is excellent. I believe any ballet fan will enjoy this outstanding DVD.

I don't see Ansanelli bearing much of a resemblance to Fonteyn looks wise, other than they both have dark hair.

True, but Ansanelli is a dancer. (If the makers of "Isadora" back in the Sixties had cast Lynn Seymour as in the title role, she wouldn't have been an exact physical match, but in spirit and style she would have been as close to Isadora as anyone could have gotten.)

Duff also strikes me as a little young for the movie's time frame described in the article - she will be playing the middle aged Fonteyn, not the young dancer. So in the best of all possible worlds a suitable mature ballerina would be cast in the role, although no one springs to mind offhand.

It may be, of course, that the filmmakers don't intend on showing much if any dancing, in which case the project would indeed be worth very little....

Thanks for commenting, everyone! Keep posting.

(Edited to note that my comment was in response to Old Fashioned's post and not Helene's, which I didn't see before posting, and so I've altered this post slightly to reflect that.)

Has anyone out there seen the DVD "MARGOT"? It is a complete coverage of her life and dancing thus no need for a movie, i.e a phony portrait.

I wonder if any one out there has seen a ballet set to Rachmaninoff's Symphonic Dances? If so, when, where and who did it? The music is so beautiful and danceable I am surprised some noted choreographer has not picked it up.

As a fan of Fonteyn you owe it to yourself to see the DVD titled MARGOT. Your library can probably get a copy for you. Absolutely fascinating!

Is there a DVD of a ballet that is outstanding in its combination of fine dancers, excellent corps, splendid production and outstanding orchestra. I know this is asking a great deal, but certainly one must come close.

Where are the DVDs of these fine ballets- Daphnis et Chloe, Gaite Parisienne, La Boutique Fantasque, Etudes, Pineapple Poll, Good humored ladies, Graduation Ball, Rodeo, Billy the Kid, etc. Do we really need another version of Swan Lake? Dont the people at the top of the chain realize that DVDs will introduce people to Ballet and this will result in ticket sales. As a horrible example see the sales of CDs now representing only 4 % of sales! Can you imagine what this does to future sales to live concerts.