Ballet "Parsley": content, video, interesting facts, history

I. Stravinsky ballet "Parsley"

The ballet "Petrushka", the music for which was written by the young composer I. Stravinsky, in 1911 became the highlight of the "Russian Seasons" in Paris. At that time, no one could have imagined that Parsley, with its inherent clumsy plastic and sad face, would become a symbol of the Russian ballet avant-garde. But the brilliant creative triumvirate of composer I. Stravinsky, choreographer M. Fokin and artist A. Benois created a masterpiece that became one of the symbols of Russian culture. The riot of colors, expressiveness, national color, manifested both in music and in costumes, decorations, choreography, led the audience into perfect admiration and established the fashion for everything Russian in Europe.

Summary of the ballet Stravinsky "Petrushka" and a lot of interesting facts about this work read on our page.

Summary

Ballet is a funny scenes in 4 scenes. On a merry Maslenitsa stroll, the attention of the variegated crowd of townspeople is chained to itself by the conjurer's farce. He brings three puppets to the stage - Petrushka, Ballerina and Arapa, who gradually come to life under the fascinating melody of his pipes and begin to behave like real people. Petrushka acutely feels his isolation from others, he is tormented by the realization that he is ugly and ridiculous. The only consolation for him is the ballerina, with whom he is passionately in love.

But the frivolous Ballerina does not understand his torments and avoids him in every way. She has another goal - to charm a stupid, lazy Arap, who, in comparison with Petrushka, seems to her beautiful and strong. She almost achieves what she wants, but in the midst of a love date Petrushka, blinded by jealousy, appears. Arap rushes at him with a saber, Petrushka tries to escape, but Arap on the street catches up with him and cuts his saber off his head. The horror of the crowd disperses the rescued Magician, who shows that Petrushka's body and head are filled with sawdust, like an ordinary doll. The fun, disturbed by the incident, is resumed, and then over the square mystically appears mischievous, lively, all teasing Petrushka, demonstrating with all his appearance the triumph of his spirit over the crowd.

A photo:

Interesting Facts

• Petrushka is a character of the Russian puppet theater, which has “older brothers” in other cultures: Pulcinella in Italy, Polichinel in France, Karagez in Turkey, Pancha in England, Gansvurst in Germany.
• One of the authors of "Petrushka" artist and librettist A. Benoit called him "ballet-street". Among his characters are mummers, hussars, coachman, organ-grinder, cook, merchant, gypsy, walking.
• In the ballet street dancer whirls under the old song "Wooden Foot". Her simple motive Stravinsky heard in one of the streets of Nice from the organ-grinder. Subsequently, the author showed up at the song - someone Spencer, and the court ordered the composer to pay him the fee.
• At the first rehearsal of the orchestra in Paris, the musicians began to laugh out loud, the Petrushka music seemed so funny to them. Conductor P. Monto needed his whole gift of conviction to explain to colleagues that Stravinsky’s music should not be taken as a joke.
• The role of Petrushka became the key in the life and work of such dancers as V. Nizhinsky, V. Vasilyev, M. Tsivin, S. Vikharev, R. Nureev and others.
• It is believed that it was Dyagilev who discovered Stravinsky’s talent for the world. When he first heard the young composer, he did not even have a higher musical education.
• Mikhail Fokin considered Tamara Karsavina the best performer of Ballerina doll. She, in turn, loved this role very much and danced her right up to the end of her ballet career.
• In 1993, a platinum coin dedicated to Stravinsky was issued. It embossed relief image of the composer against the background of the scene from the ballet "Parsley".
• Contemporaries unmistakably guessed in the characters "Petrushki" real participants of the "Russian Seasons". The image of the Magician was directly associated with Sergeev Dyagilev, who controlled his artists as a puppeteer controls the puppets. Nijinsky was compared to Petrushka, seeing in him an artist, who rose above the crowd by the power of his art.
• In 1947, Stravinsky created the second edition of Petrushka for performance by a smaller number of musicians. Instead of a “quadruple” orchestra, the score was remade for a “triple” composition, and the music for Petrushka began to exist in two versions - as ballet and as orchestral.
• Based on the ballet "Petrushka" in 1993, the Russian cartoon "Christmas Fantasy" was created.
• Stravinsky skillfully wove the motifs of famous Russian folk songs “In the Evening in the Fall of a Rainy Day”, “Wonderful Month”, “Along St. Petersburg”, “Oh, You Canopy, My Canopy”, “Do Not Ice Ice Rattling, Not Mosquito Beeping”, “ And the snow is melting. "
• The music from the ballet "Parsley" is played in the movies "Charming Mischievous", "Kiss of the Vampire", "The Virgin of Turkey".

Popular numbers:

"Along the Petersburg" (listen)

"Russian" (listen)

Dance ballerina (listen)

"Oh you, my hall, my hall" (listen)

History of creation

The ballet "Petrushka", unlike many brilliant creations, whose idea matures for a long time in the author's head, was born ... by chance. After the resounding success of the ballet "The Firebird", which premiered in 1910, Stravinsky, with the suggestion of Dyagilev, was ready to immerse himself in the work on the new ballet "The Holy Spring". The composer was aware of how complex and multifaceted the topic for which he was going to take, and decided to give himself some breathing space. Resting in Switzerland, he sketched a piece for piano and orchestra for his own entertainment, and he built musical themes in such a way that the piano and orchestral accompaniment did not harmonize with each other, but sounded obvious discord, as if entering into permanent and insoluble conflict. Subsequently, the composer admitted that during the creative process he saw a toy dancer who "takes the orchestra out of patience with his cascades of diabolical arpeggios".

As a result, the music was born, the character of which even its brilliant creator seemed strange, until one day the association struck Stravinsky - it was Petrushka! Spiky, sharp music with unexpected changes of rhythm completely corresponded to the internal content of the cocky character of Russian fair festivals. Perhaps Petrushka would have existed in the form of a concert play for a piano with an orchestra, if one day Stravinsky had not played its founder of the Russian Seasons S. Dyagilev. Intuition unmistakably prompted the experienced impresario - this is ballet, which he immediately declared to Stravinsky. Further work on the ballet fully justified its name - it was full of chaos. Instead of composing music for the proposed libretto, as is usually the case when creating a ballet, Stravinsky composed individual pieces of music, and Dyagilev and famous artist Alexander Benois, in the intervals between tours, invented what plot and events could correspond to such music. Benoit is still considered a Petretch librettist, although all its creators had a hand in building the ballet dramaturgy.

Productions

For the choreographic incarnation of “Petrushka”, Dyagilev invited choreographer and innovator Mikhail Fokin, Alexander Benois worked on the scenery. The premiere ballet was held in 1911. That evening, the stars of the Dygilev enterprise - Vaclav Nijinsky, Tamara Karsavina and Alexander Orlov - shone on the stage of the Paris Theater Chatelet. The sophisticated Parisian spectator, whom it was difficult to surprise with anything, was shocked to the depths of his soul by the luxury of the performance. In it, the Parisians saw Russian life with its national traditions, boldness, raging passions, capable of captivating anyone into their whirlpool.

However, in the homeland "Petrushka" waited for a more severe reception. To viewers and critics accustomed to the melodies of ballet music, Stravinsky’s score sounded hearing. The music of the ballet was loud, harsh, rich in "square" motifs. It took time for compatriots to appreciate its unique character, drawing and figurativeness, allowing to imagine what is happening on the stage, even with closed eyes.

In 1920, the famous dancer Leonid Leontyev transferred Petrushka to the stage of the Mariinsky Theater. Leontyev once worked with Dyagilev, so he was able to reliably recreate the psychological atmosphere of the ballet. It was the Leontief edition that was taken as the standard by ballet master K. Boyarsky, who returned Petrushka in 2008 to the stage of the Mariinsky Theater.

In 1921, Moscow’s spectators saw Stravinsky’s ballet, staged by Fokin. Leading artists of the Bolshoi Theater V. Smoltsov, E. Geltser and V. Ryabtsev played the leading roles.

In the period from 1925 to 1932. "Parsley" was set in Copenhagen, Hanover, Essen, Buenos Aires.

The production of Oleg Vinogradov at the Leningrad Opera and Ballet Theater named after A.V. Kirov in 1990. Vinogradovsky Petrushka is not a pathetic and clumsy doll, but a living young man who is infinitely alone among the surrounding soulless masks. The party of Petrushka was danced by Sergey Vikharev.

In 1992, the People’s Artist of Russia Andris Liepa attempted to restore Fokin’s two ballets, Petrushka and The Firebird, in their original form. This painstaking work took place in the Moscow cultural center "Dygilev Center", and the premieres were organized in St. Petersburg in 1993. In 1997, Liepa became the inspiration and director of the film "The Return of the Firebird". The famous dancer included in him three performances of Fokin - "Petrushka", "Scheherazade" and "Firebird". Leading male roles in the TV versions of his resurrected performances Liepa performed himself.

"Petrushka", despite the external primitivism of the plot, is extremely deep in its semantic content. It embodied the aesthetic search for a new path in the art of the beginning of the 20th century. After 100 years, "Petrushka" has not lost its relevance. This is a ballet about freedom and lack of freedom of the individual, about the struggle of a suffering lonely soul against the surrounding universal lack of spirituality. In it, as in life, fun and sadness, joy and despair intertwine, and all these feelings are expressed in a single dance dance. If 100 years ago Petrushka was perceived as a ballet sensation, then for the modern audience it is a ballet legend, the brightest diamond in the crown of world ballet art. He successfully continues to go on the stages of many theaters, arguing that real art is timeless.

We are pleased to offer ballet dancers and a symphony orchestra for the performance of numbers and excerpts from the ballet Petrushka at your event.