Fairies in Sleeping Beauty

[Jane S]

Alison, I don't think they're anyone in particular - just made up names - they appeared for the first time in Aurora's Wedding, which was put together from bits of the Diaghilev production, using the music previously given to the four Jewel Fairies, and choreographed probably by Nijinska. De Valois danced in it at one time.

 

The RNB's first, pre-war, production reverted to the Jewels, but for the 1946 Messel production Ashton rechoreographed the Florestan and his Sisters idea, and it and the Jewels have been swapped in and out at Covent Garden ever since, sometimes in the same production.

 

The characters apparently don't  appear in any of the well known fairy tales but if you'd like an invented back story for them - and have pleny of time - try this !

 

[FLOSS]

Florestan and his Sisters made their first stage appearance in the 1921 London production of The Sleeping Beauty which , on advice, Diaghilev called The Sleeping Princess to avoid the ballet being  confused with the popular pantomime of the same name. According to Dyenely Hussey's account of Tchaikovsky's score for the ballet in 1921 Diaghilev replaced the Jewel Fairies with this pas de trois because he though that by the third act of the ballet the audience might well feel that they had seen too many fairies. Diaghilev could have been right about this because he had added a seventh fairy to the usual six Prologue Fairies. Although he had cast Lopokova as the Lilac Fairy he thought that the waltz written for that character needed a dancer who was taller than she was He  therefore decided that Lopokova should dance to the music for the Sugar Plum Fairy while Tchernicheva danced to the waltz written for the Lilac Fairy.  Of course no one would  be able to get away with tinkering with the score and the choreography in that manner today as the music is so well known. But you have to remember that 1921 was the first occasion on which the full ballet had been seen in the West. The audience did not know the ballet. They were unlikely to be familiar with Tchaikovsky's score as the composer was not that highly regarded at that time. Diaghilev presented the ballet with a modern twist. Stravinsky was hired to re-orchestrate the score and Nijinska to provide new choreography when needed. As far as the Three Ivans are concerned Diaghilev felt the production needed to display its Ballet Russes credentials so the coda of the grand pas de deux was allocated to three new characters whose Russian origins were beyond dispute because of their names and the style in which they danced.

 

 The 1946 staging of The Sleeping Beauty was, I think, intended to establish the fifteen year old company's right to be resident at Covent Garden. By departing  from the text used in its 1939 staging and adopting some of the changes incorporated into the London staging of the ballet seen some  twenty five years before, the Sadler's Wells Company was not just laying claim to the right to be acknowledged as part of the Russian Imperial and Ballet Russes traditions it was also creating an instant and enduring tradition and  establishing its artistic identity as a classical ballet company. The opulence of the staging was intended to evoke not only the ballet's nineteenth century origins but to withstand comparison with memories of the earlier Diaghilev production in London. The 1946 staging included the Three Ivans and a pas de trois in place of the Jewel Fairies. But in the 1946 production Ashton's Florestan and his Sisters was a display piece for its cast rather than an antidote to a surfeit of fairies. On opening night it was danced by Michael Somes, Moira Shearer and Gerd Larsen.

 

The 1946 staging included at least one further major change to the  text which the company had danced in 1939 and that was a change made from 

 necessity. In 1939 Sergeyev had staged a waltz for the company for a cast of twelve male and twelve female dancers. By 1946 the fact that the waltz had a mixed cast was causing practical problems. According to Joy Newton who was Ballet Mistress at the time as soon as a  group of men became useful in the waltz they would disappear into the armed forces.  As the company was far less international in those days and a significant part of the company were British born conscription would continue to be a challenge for the company's management and the careers of its male dancers until it was abandoned in 1963. Ashton's solution to this problem was to create a waltz for an entirely female cast. Ashton choreographed at least two all female waltzes for the company. Those who saw both of them  say that they preferred the 1946 waltz.

[Guest]

I would like to know which version of the Garland Dance is preserved in the filmed version of Fonteyn in Act 1 from 1969? 

[FLOSS]

The Garland Dance performed on the recording made in 1959 is not one that I have seen in the theatre so I don't think that  I am in a position to say how accurately the recording reflects the choreography which the company was performing in the theatre in the late fifties or what it might have looked like in the theatre. As far as I know Ashton was responsible for adapting the ballet for television so he decided what to cut and what to preserve for a broadcast whose main purpose was not to reveal the choreographic wonders of The Sleeping Beauty but to make Fonteyn's Aurora available to as large an audience as possible. I think it unlikely that he would have created a new version for the broadcast. As far as this Garland Dance is concerned it is unfortunate that the positioning of the cameras means  we do not have an unobstructed view of it as  it begins. Instead we are forced to peep at a couple of dancers who are  clearly on the periphery of the dance from behind the backs of a couple of courtiers. Sadly we cannot be sure that we ever see the waltz as you might have hoped to see it in the theatre. 

 

The Opera House's record of the company's ballet productions, performances and the changes to the choreographic text is only of limited assistance in tracking the story of Ashton's Garland Dances.  When it comes to following an individual choreographer's work on a production which was revived over several decades, the information that a specific section of the text was created by a particular choreographer may tell you everything you need to know about it or it may tell you very little because unless you know what changes were made to a section of choreography in a particular season and whether they were retained or dropped you may be unaware that a choreographer has been tinkering with his own work or has restored a version he made earlier on in his career.  The other complicating factor is that unless it is made clear you may think that the version you first encounter is the first one the choreographer made.  Here for what it is worth are the results of my researches about Ashton's Garland Dances.

 

Ashton made three versions of the Garland Dance, one  for Peter Wright's 1968 production of the ballet using a mixed corps and two made for earlier productions using an all  female corps. According to David Vaughan Ashton's first all female Garland Dance was created during the war to deal with the loss of male dancers to conscription. This is the version which resurfaced in the production de Valois staged for the company in 1977. It can be seen in the 1978 recording of the ballet. While Madam said that her staging was based on Nikolai Sergeyev's 1939 production for the company it might have been more accurate to say it was based on the revised version of that production. The Garland Dance in the 1959 recording would therefore seem to be Ashton's second thoughts on the dance. As far as his third version is concerned I saw it in my very early days of ballet going but I remember nothing about it which might be because according to Vaughan it was staged  as background action to the Princes' entrance or it might be that I was not that interested in the corps de ballet at that time. We are told that the tape on which the first part of the 1968  production was recorded was later wiped so it is unlikely that we shall ever know what it looked like. Sadly unlike its quest for missing episodes of Dr Who the BBC has shown no interest in trying to find out whether anyone has a recording  of the missing sections of the ballet.

 

 

 

[CHazell2]

On 30/03/2021 at 14:05, FLOSS said:

Sadly unlike its quest for missing episodes of Dr Who the BBC has shown no interest in trying to find out whether anyone has a recording  of the missing sections of the ballet.

 

 

 

I wish that someone have recorded the missing sections as I always wanted to see that production and it would be interesting to see the contrasts between the Messel production and the Ashton/Wright one.

[jonac]

My understanding is that the names of the five fairies in the Prologue of The Sleeping Beauty, i.e. Fairy of  the Crystal Fountain, Fairy of the Enchanted Garden, etc., were used by the Sadler's Wells Ballet in 1939, and of course are used in the Royal Ballet's current production. (I believe the same, or very similar, names were used by the Atlanta Civic Ballet some time or another.) I cannot find any reference to such names being used prior to 1939. Does anyone know how Crystal Fountain, Enchanted Garden, etc., came to be used, and why? I have wondered whether Sergeyev brought these names out of Russia.

[Pas de Quatre]

jonac, you asked about this in February and there were many replies on the thread, so you just need to look back at it.

[Bluebird]

36 minutes ago, Pas de Quatre said:

jonac, you asked about this in February and there were many replies on the thread, so you just need to look back at it.

 

Here's the link:

 

[jonac]

The replies I received in February were very helpful and I've just looked back at them. But I do not see that they answer the question I posed this afternoon; namely, how the names presently used by the Royal came to be used, and why.

[alison]

Thanks, Bluebird: I've merged the two threads for ease of reference.

[Sebastian]

13 hours ago, jonac said:

The replies I received in February were very helpful and I've just looked back at them. But I do not see that they answer the question I posed this afternoon; namely, how the names presently used by the Royal came to be used, and why.

Jonac, just to let you know that I sent you a PM (private message) on February 18. Having just checked the message box I see my note to you is marked “Not read yet”. You might like to have a look in your messages (the envelope icon on the top right of the screen).

[alison]

I thought of this thread recently when I was reading one of Alastair Macaulay's pieces from this month's Links thread: it might be of interest.

 

https://www.alastairmacaulay.com/all-essays/wdfute8hetzbvnwlatg0bqwag0o9ha

[Fonty]

I am still trying to work out how dancers spot to the front while turning on the diagonal!

[Fiona]

Yes!  I believe Anna Rose O'Sullivan cleverly performed the diagonal pirouettes this way in the Tchaikovsky  PDD with Sambe.  I first saw this feat performed by Tiler Peck in NYCB.

[Pas de Quatre]

That is what Balanchine always required of his dancers - so absolutely correct to spot to the front (audience) in Tchaikovsky Pas de Deux.

[LinMM]

Does this mean that you are travelling on diagonal, but stepping out sideways( at 180 degree angle)  on this diagonal so remain facing the front to spot the turns...so you don’t actually face the way you are stepping? 
Not very good at describing things but that’s the only way I can see you would be able to do it if more than one turn.
Well other  than turning your head to the audience at the last minute after the turn...might get a whiplash injury if too much of that though!! 

[Pas de Quatre]

Yes, I just checked in the book "Suki Schorer on Balanchine Technique". She says that for piqué (posé) turns the step out should be sideways.  If anyone is interested, this is a fabulous book about Balanchine's way of working.