Ballet Music and its History

The Romantic Ballet: "Giselle"

• The ballet "Giselle" (about a girl who dies and becomes a spirit) was a huge revolution in musical composition. The original, entire score was written by a single composer Adolphe Adam. The story follows a young girl who has become a spirit after death. The score was the first example of a motiv, a signature tune for each main character, to appear in ballet.

• The following performance is from Act I of "Giselle", performed in 1977 at the American Ballet Theater. Notice how the music and dancing differs from "La Sylphide." (3:58-4:26)

The Romantic Ballet:

"La Sylphide"

• A revolution occurred in ballet composition (as well as choreography) when the ballet "La Sylphide" premiered. The ballet follows the story of a Scottish man who falls in love with a sylph, or forest fairy. The ballet was written specifically for Marie Taglioni, an Italian dancer, in 1832. The ballet is heavily influenced by Scottish dancing.

Russia Dominates the Ballet: Prokofiev

Ballet at the Opera

• In "La Sylphide", Marie Taglioni danced en pointe, and she is thought to have been one of the first dancers to wear these special shoes.

• The next listening example is the opening solo from the Royal Danish Ballet's version of "La Sylphide", danced by Ellen Price, in 1903. The film and sound quality is very poor, but you can hear the redundancy of the music.

• If a composer of opera music wanted to “make it big” during the 19th century, they must include parts for a ballet dance. This rule did not fit in with most operas because they were not suitable for dance.

The Romantic Ballet Era

• Composer Sergei Prokofiev wrote the scores “filled with passion” for "Romeo and Juliet" in 1940 (his first full ballet score) and "Cinderella" in 1945. Both scores became familiar to ballet audiences and include formal court dances that reappear throughout the performance as leit-motivs. They were significant as the ballet’s action began to unfold. Both were full-length narrative ballets.

•Romantic ballets were meant to toy with the audience’s emotions, usually containing a strong element of fantasy.

•The music of romantic ballets became “worse and worse.” Instead of being expressive, the music was boring to listen to. Again, there was more than one composer to a ballet score.

• Gioacchino Rossini was a popular opera composer, but opposed ballet compositions. When he could not recycle tunes from his earlier works, he hired others to write his ballet parts.

• This performance is from Act I, Scene II of "Romeo and Juliet." The scene depicts Romeo and Juliet's dance at the Capulet ball. The court dance that appears a leit-motiv of the ballet. The dance between Romeo and Juliet is called a pas de deux, which means "dance of two." (2:50-3:43)

• The Romantic era introduced the corps de ballet, which means “body of the ballet.”

• This era also introduced the technique of turn-out, which is when a dancer rotates their hips outward.

• Rossini actually wrote his own ballet score while working on his last opera William Tell. His music from the ballet scenes was so popular that Benjamin Britten arranged the composition for another ballet called "Soiree Musicales."

Ballet at the French Court

The Classical Ballet

• Dance was slowly evolving from the Renaissance, but ballet that is practiced today and its music began in France with King Louis XIV.

• Classical ballet was meant to define the dancer’s skills, and a new kind of music was called for. Finally, ballet music became more expressive. There were now opportunities to show the dancer’s wide range of technique and ability, called divertissements in the ballet.

• An Italian composer, dancer and violinist named Giovanni Battista Lulli (we know him as Jean Baptiste Lully) came to the French court to play in the King’s Band.

• Classical ballet originated in Russia under choreographer Marius Petipa. They had very large casts (up to 80 performers on stage).

• After the romantic ballet’s disastrous music, Russian choreographers sought out top-notch composers for their ballet productions. Piotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky was selected to work with Petipa and Ivan Vsevolozhsky, the Director of Imperial Theater in Russia. Together, they created the ballet The Sleeping Beauty which premiered in 1890.

• Lully danced with King Louis XIV in a Court production of the Ballet de la Nuit where King Louis danced the role of the Sun King for twelve hours. After the performance, Lully became the Court composer of instrumental music.

• Tchaikovsky also wrote full scores for The Nutcracker and Swan Lake, two of the most famous ballets of all time.

• Lully became influential in composing dance music by using faster tempos, especially in Minuets. He proposed the idea of one composer writing all the music for a single production, which was unheard of at the time.

• The music also revolutionized costume. The demanding choreography and expressive music called for costumes that were easier to move in, leading to the development of the tutu.

"The Sleeping Beauty" Waltz

Modern Dance

• At this time, what was considered ballet was part of a long performance that also included choral music and poetry reading. Lully suggested that different sections of the performance—including music—should be varied to keep the audience interested.

"The Rite of Spring" was only the beginning of the new movement for modern dance. More and more choreographers began to break the classical style of ballet and explore new movement during the twentieth century.

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General Information

Stravinsky's "The Rite of Spring"

•Stravinsky continued to compose ballet music, including the score for "The Rite of Spring" in 1913. The score was influenced by primitive war dances.

• The score "violated every sacred music tradition" by not having melodies, harmonies or regular rhythms.

Bibliography

• Stravinsky made his music as controversial as the ballet. Woodwind instruments had mutes, percussion was heavily used and the violins played down-bow to create a dissonant sound.

“The Beginnings of Modern Dance.” 8 March 2013: http://www.mdc.edu/wolfson/academic/ArtsLetters/art_philosophy/Humanities/beginnings/beginnings_of_modern_dance.htm

“The Firebird.” Dance-It Ballet Academic Studio. http://www.danceit.org/firebird.html

Russia Dominates the Ballet: Stravinsky

Bland, Alexander. "A History of Ballet and Dance". New York: Praeger Publishers, 1976.

• "The Rite of Spring" is considered a ballet, but sparked the movement for modern dance. Choreographer Vaslav Ninjinsky wanted to question civilization through primitive movement.

Knight, Judyth. "Ballet and its Music". London: Schott & Co. Ltd, 1973.

Bingham, Jane. "Ballet". Chicago: Heinemann Library, 2009.

•As ballet’s popularity rose in Paris in 1909, so did patron Serge Pavlovich Diaghilev. He wished to produce a ballet based on the Russian fairytale The Firebird, which was about a prince who destroys an evil magician’s realm with the help of a mystical bird.

• A huge element of ballet music is a strong rhythm.
• The music must be expressive to capture the plot of the ballet.
• Leitmotivs, or simply motivs, are signature tunes for each character.
• Most ballets have pit orchestras, especially for classical and romantic ballets.
• The conductor plays a huge part not only in the pit but on the stage. If the dancers are having difficulty keeping up with the pace of the music, it is the conductor’s responsibility to slow the music down.
• Choreographers and composers work closely together. Often, a choreographer will express ideas to the composer, who will come up with musical themes.
• Usually pieces are rhythmically varied and lively
• They are very difficult to compose!

• The ballet company established by Diaghilev was called “Ballets Russes” and it staged short, one-act ballets. The first choreographer was Mikhail Fokine, who was determined to break away from the classical ballet.

•Diaghilev asked Igor Stravinsky, a rising star in composition, to write the score for "The Firebird." Working with choreographer Michel Fokine, Stravinsky composed music that was just as mystical as the ballet’s plot.

•After "The Firebird", choreographers in Soviet Russia began to produce ballets that would take place in three acts. These ballets would take a whole evening to be performed.

Ballet Music and its History

By Danielle Pierce