I think Spartacus is more of a Russian thing than American
Interesting. Probably true - Spartacus is big for us ever since the October Revolution. The reason every sports facility in every town is named either Dinamo or Spartak (just joking).
I actually know nothing about this specific piece. Is it tinged with a Russian/Soviet hue everywhere it's produced?
Edit: ok just learned it's a Soviet work. Maybe it was not the NYCB when I watched it but some visiting group?
@Bobko It might have been. Maybe Bolshoi. I don't think it's in the Mariinsky repertory, or anywhere but Bolshoi that I know of. If you want a really interesting ballet, watch the Legend of Love, but I think it's only performed at the Bolshoi and Mariinsky. You can tell a company's country by looking at the dancers. Russians have beautiful arms and back in either style, French have beautiful legs and feet, English is just beautiful classical line, American is fat dancers, Italian have beautiful balance and ballon, there are more like Bournonville, but I've rambled enough already. And Russian dancers are taller and thinner than others.
@jon357 Not Russian music, though it has gone a little off topic. Who cares, it hard to stay on one topic of conversation.
Le papillon (The Butterfly) is a 'fantastic ballet' with music by Jacques Offenbach to a libretto by Jules-Henri Vernoy de Saint-Georges. Just glorious, I must say.
It's a beautiful ballet! Especially danced by Olesya Novikova, I think there's a recording of the variation out of context somewhere. I think Petipa once made it into a four act with extended music by Minkus, for the Bolshoi Kamenny in St. Petersburg, in I think 1873 or 1874. It's strange that he could alter the score that way, I can't imagine butchered. Though messing up the music was common at the time, look at Swan Lake or (the worst) Don Quixote.
youtu.be/watchv
It's the whole pas de deux. With Novikova and Alexander Sergeev I'm not sure the link worked, probably not.
@jon357 I was referring to Don Quixote ballet, which was made in Russia, though by Petipa, who was French. It's a very Russian ballet though, to the level of La Bayadère, but it is danced abroad.
I must be smart today, I managed to remember the "e" in Quixote. I always forget, in Russian it's Дон Кихот, nothing extra at the end. I'm so dumb I though Paquita was Pakhita because it's Пахита, with the х in the middle, which normally transcribed to kh.
@jon357 I think the same theatre with Polish National Ballet. It's quite a small company I think, but the dancers are very nice, particularly the former Bolshoi soloist Chinara Alizade (deserved to be a Bolshoi prima, but she has real Bolshoi style, so was a soloist).
I don't like Massenet either, not the really a special composer, boring I'd say. @Lyzko Yes, Thais as well he composed. In my opinion, a very bad opera.
@RussianAntiPutin It's a particularly wide stage, one of the widest in Europe of its type. That's why they do co-productions with Brussels and. Cardiff.
Massenet can be pretty good (though he is very uneven). Of his better known works Werther is probably the best... he was better when tied to a recognizable European world than exotic or fantasy settings....
I'm also partial to Therese (a short work, not long enough for a full evening's program).
An interesting example of a famous Polish work that is very unknown in modern Poland might be 'modlitwa dziewicy' (Maiden's Prayer) by Tekla Bądarzewska-Baranowska
It remains very popular with Asian pianists and also has an important place in the history of western swing (and north Mexican music).
