Don Quixote - Dance of the Matadors

[Amy]

The Royal Opera House posted this on their YouTube channel today from Carlos Acosta's production of Don Quixote:

I thought this was worth talking about because this is a very unusual staging of this dance; the use of dialogue is a very modern touch and quite tacky...

This dance has an interesting history; it was originally composed by Minkus for his ballet Zorayia, the Moorish Girl in Spain, which Petipa choreographed and staged in 1881. It's been widely believed that Alexander Gorsky interpolated this number into Don Quixote for his 1902 revival, but that's actually not the case. The Dance of the Matadors was already in Don Quixote by the time Gorsky revived it because it's part of the Don Quixote music score that was published in 1882. So the likelihood is that it was actually Petipa interpolated it into Don Quixote.

[Janneke]

I enjoyed the shouting! It added something lively. Would love to see more of that in ballets. It made me realise how dancers are such silent moving images.