Ballet
Strange Blossom
By CLIVE BARNES
JUST presuming, for ened. The pity of this is that nobody could call the RoYat moment, that it possesses one, Ballet's music policy enlight-
it is one of the few ballet cornpanies in the Western world the
chestra. Yet the 0 ro fiexamplers t -r at e equipped ts ppoeud wt outstanding with i nag post-war music the company has so far mustered has been Stravinsky's Agon, given a fevi execrably played renderings. The harassed, but generally admirable, Chief Conductor, John Lanchbery, manages to keep up a very fair levet of performance, but what is performed IS 105 commendable. Only the other day we had 3 lucky-dip pas de deux with musical contributions from no less than Minkus, Drigo and NO: ballet music's three most notorious hacks. Coven' Garden was so embarrassed it understandablY suppressed the name of Pugni from the Pre' gramme. Of course, the musical standards of the Diaghilev Ballet were not beyond question. The treatment by Tommasini of Scarlatti in 11:e Good-Humoured Ladies, while probably fine If: its day, now sounds almost barbarous. For tha. matter I personally have never cared for the idea of orchestrating Chopin piano pieces in Les Sylphides. Chopin does not take kindly to orchestra, and I have yet to hear a totallY satisfactory orchestral score for this ballet. The best to my knowledge is that made by Beniarnitt Britten in 1940 for American Ballet Theatres,' but even the old Covent Garden version by R°:', Douglas is at least serviceable. This season n was laughingly replaced by a new orchestration by Sir Malcolm Sargent. According t° source close to Henry Fairlie's Lord Dilhorne; I am not expecting to hear Sir Malcolm's etfr't again, despite certain press reports to the contrary. When Fonteyn and Nureyev danced io Le; been replaeof Sylphides last week it had already for which relief much thanks. Performances °E this ballet come and go, and, to be h°nes: an exception, a performance as delicate as sv,_ae precious few of them leave any trace. Here EL dew on a spider's web, as elegant an ensernb':e as a Spurs passing movement. Fonteyn, choosing the Prelude rather that: the Mazurka more customarily allotted to t work's prima ballerina, danced with an inscro'; able air of mystery. Her tight-drawn oval communed with faeric fancies, her darlel'as trembled on the pinnacles of dreams. Here wall a muse fit for a poet. and Nureyev, es languorous athleticism, weaved strange mYster.ies to Chopin. The by now shop-soiled boutli' • te of Fokine's conception—too often seeming if a dummy chocolate-box left dusty in a srila; confectioner's window—were miraculously rte newed. The gentle choreography (so intittia_ this Chopin) unfolded like a strange bl°ss°I" under the moon, justifying travellers' tales Ile legends, On such a night as this , . . it was ° of those always rare performances.
Previous page
