La Revue de Cuisine is a jazz ballet in one act by Czech composer Bohuslav Martinů

Bohuslav Martinu

Bohuslav Martinů was a prolific Czech composer of modern classical music. He was of Czech and Rumanian ancestry. Martinů wrote six symphonies, 15 operas, 14 ballet scores and a large body of orchestral, chamber, vocal and instrumental works. Martinů became a violinist in the Czech Philharmonic...

. It was created for sextet: Clarinet

Clarinet

The clarinet is a musical instrument of woodwind type. The name derives from adding the suffix -et to the Italian word clarino , as the first clarinets had a strident tone similar to that of a trumpet. The instrument has an approximately cylindrical bore, and uses a single reed...

 (B flat), Bassoon

Bassoon

The bassoon is a woodwind instrument in the double reed family that typically plays music written in the bass and tenor registers, and occasionally higher. Appearing in its modern form in the 19th century, the bassoon figures prominently in orchestral, concert band and chamber music literature...

, Trumpet

Trumpet

The trumpet is the musical instrument with the highest register in the brass family. Trumpets are among the oldest musical instruments, dating back to at least 1500 BCE. They are played by blowing air through closed lips, producing a "buzzing" sound which starts a standing wave vibration in the air...

, Cello

Cello

The cello is a bowed string instrument with four strings tuned in perfect fifths. It is a member of the violin family of musical instruments, which also includes the violin, viola, and double bass. Old forms of the instrument in the Baroque era are baryton and viol .A person who plays a cello is...

, Violin

Violin

The violin is a string instrument, usually with four strings tuned in perfect fifths. It is the smallest, highest-pitched member of the violin family of string instruments, which includes the viola and cello....

 and Piano

Piano

The piano is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. It is one of the most popular instruments in the world. Widely used in classical and jazz music for solo performances, ensemble use, chamber music and accompaniment, the piano is also very popular as an aid to composing and rehearsal...

, composed in 1927. Premiered Nov. 1927, Prague. Suite premiered Jan. 1930, Paris.

Work

In response to a commission by Božena Neběská and to a scenario by Jarmila Kröschlová, [Martinů] wrote a witty curtain-raiser called Pokušení svatoušká hrnec (Temptation of the Saintly Pot) and with it scored his first popular success under the revised title La Revue de cuisine. Here the dancers play a variety of cooking utensils which swagger their way through a naïve episode of kitchen life. The marriage of Pot and Lid is in danger of being broken up by the suave Twirling Stick. Pot succumbs to his flattery. Dishcloth makes eyes at Lid but is challenged to a duel by Broom. Pot, however, tires of Twirling Stick and longs for Lid's caresses, but Lid cannot be found anywhere. Suddenly an enormous foot appears from the wings and kicks him back on stage. Pot and Lid kiss and make up and, flirting once again, Twirling Stick goes off with Dishcloth.²

Structure

The ballet is in ten movements:
1.) Prologue (Allegretto)

2.) Introduction (Tempo de marche)

3.) Danse du moulinet autour du caudron (Poco meno)

4.) Danse du chaudron et du couvercle (Allegro)

5.) Tango (Danse d'amour. Lento)

6.) Duel (Poco a poco allegro. Tempo di Charleston)

7.) Entracte (Lamentation du chaudron. Allegro moderato)

8.) Marche funèbre (Adagio)

9.) Danse radieuse (Tempo di marche)

10.)Fin du drame (Allegretto)

The suite is in four movements: Prologue, Tango

Tango music

Tango is a style of ballroom dance music in 2/4 or 4/4 time that originated among European immigrant populations of Argentina and Uruguay . It is traditionally played by a sextet, known as the orquesta típica, which includes two violins, piano, double bass, and two bandoneons...

, Charleston, and Final.

The score for the suite was published in Paris shortly after its premier. The full score for the ballet was discovered in the early 1990s in the archives of the Paul Sacher Foundation in Basel and published in Paris in 2004.¹

The music involves complex time schemes - for example the Final, which involves an opening piano solo marked "Tempo di marcia". This section switches between 2/4, 3/8 and 4/8 in an almost unpredictable fashion, generating the desired rhythmical offbeats typical of the jazz of the period.

Further jazz

Jazz

Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...

 influences are seen in the instrumentation: the piano using rich harmony and dissonance

Consonance and dissonance

In music, a consonance is a harmony, chord, or interval considered stable, as opposed to a dissonance , which is considered to be unstable...

, the muted trumpet reminiscent of the jazz bands of the era, and the repeated use of pizzicato in the cello part, echoing the use of the double bass in jazz.

This is a progressive piece of music which helps to draw the link between early and mid twentieth-century music.

Selected recordings

• Czech Philharmonic Orchestra, cond. Christopher Hogwood. Supraphon 2004. SU 3749-2 031