Le Conservatoire
Encyclopedia
Vaudeville
Vaudeville was a theatrical genre of variety entertainment in the United States and Canada from the early 1880s until the early 1930s. Each performance was made up of a series of separate, unrelated acts grouped together on a common bill...
ballet
Ballet
Ballet is a type of performance dance, that originated in the Italian Renaissance courts of the 15th century, and which was further developed in France and Russia as a concert dance form. The early portions preceded the invention of the proscenium stage and were presented in large chambers with...
created by the Danish choreographer and ballet master
Ballet Master
Ballet Master is the term used for an employee of a ballet company who is responsible for the level of competence of the dancers in their company...
August Bournonville
August Bournonville
August Bournonville was a Danish ballet master and choreographer. August was the son of Antoine Bournonville, a dancer and choreographer trained under the French choreographer, Jean Georges Noverre, and the nephew of Julie Alix de la Fay, née Bournonville, of the Royal Swedish Ballet.August was...
in 1849 for the Royal Danish Ballet
Royal Danish Ballet
The Royal Danish Ballet is one of the oldest ballet companies in the world. Based in Copenhagen, Denmark, it originates from 1748, when the Royal Danish Theatre was founded, and was finally organized in 1771 in response to the great popularity of French and Italian styles of dance...
. The ballet's setting is a dance studio
Dance studio
A dance studio is a space in which dancers learn or rehearse. The term is typically used to describe a space that has either been built or equipped for the purpose....
at the Conservatoire de Paris
Conservatoire de Paris
The Conservatoire de Paris is a college of music and dance founded in 1795, now situated in the avenue Jean Jaurès in the 19th arrondissement of Paris, France...
. Bournonville studied at the Paris Conservatoire in the 1820s with the renowned dancer Auguste Vestris
Auguste Vestris
Marie-Jean-Augustin Vestris, known as Auguste Vestris was a French dancer.Born in Paris as the illegitimate son of Gaëtan Vestris and of Marie Allard, he was dubbed "le dieu de la danse", , a popular title bestowed on the leading male dancer of each generation...
. The ballet launched the career of prima ballerina Juliette Price. A divertissement
Divertissement
Divertissement is used, in a similar sense to the Italian 'divertimento', for a light piece of music for a small group of players, however the French term has additional meanings....
within the larger work called "The Dancing School" (pas d'école) permitted Bournonville to display the basics of his style and raise them to the level of enduring art.
Summary
The first act is a recreation of a VestrisAuguste Vestris
Marie-Jean-Augustin Vestris, known as Auguste Vestris was a French dancer.Born in Paris as the illegitimate son of Gaëtan Vestris and of Marie Allard, he was dubbed "le dieu de la danse", , a popular title bestowed on the leading male dancer of each generation...
dance class of the exact type attended by Bournonville during his Paris sojourn in the 1820s. In the second act, Monsieur Dufour, an inspecteur at the Conservatoire, writes a matrimonial advertisement in the newspaper but ends up marrying his housekeeper, Mademoiselle Bonjour. Typical of Bournonville’s ballets, the plot provides opportunities for introducing different dance divertissements. In the second act, for example, the pupils of the Conservatoire make a fool of Monsieur Dufour by disguising themselves as attractive women.
Music
The vaudeville genre relied on a particular musical practice that made conscious use of well-known melodiesMelody
A melody , also tune, voice, or line, is a linear succession of musical tones which is perceived as a single entity...
that were suitable to establish period and local color and to facilitate the audience's understanding of the extensive mime
Mime
The word mime is used to refer to a mime artist who uses a theatrical medium or performance art involving the acting out of a story through body motions without use of speech.Mime may also refer to:* Mime, an alternative word for lip sync...
. The ballet's composer Holger Simon Paulli
Holger Simon Paulli
Holger Simon Paulli was a Danish conductor and composer.Paulli was a violin student of Claus Schall. He joined the Royal Danish Orchestra, and became its conductor in 1864. At the same time, he also conducted the Orchestra of the Cecilia Foreningen, and assumed the directorship of the Copenhagen...
attempted to evoke Paris in the 1820s and 1830s. The ballet opens with Paulli's orchestrated version of Weber
Carl Maria von Weber
Carl Maria Friedrich Ernst von Weber was a German composer, conductor, pianist, guitarist and critic, one of the first significant composers of the Romantic school....
's concert waltz, Invitation to the Dance
Invitation to the Dance (Weber)
Invitation to the Dance , Op. 65, J. 260, is a piano piece in rondo form written by Carl Maria von Weber in 1819. It is also well known in the 1841 orchestration by Hector Berlioz...
. Later in the score Paulli utilised Chopin
Frédéric Chopin
Frédéric François Chopin was a Polish composer and virtuoso pianist. He is considered one of the great masters of Romantic music and has been called "the poet of the piano"....
's Grande valse brillante in E-flat major and Paisiello
Giovanni Paisiello
Giovanni Paisiello was an Italian composer of the Classical era.-Life:Paisiello was born at Taranto and educated by the Jesuits there. He became known for his beautiful singing voice and in 1754 was sent to the Conservatorio di S. Onofrio at Naples, where he studied under Francesco Durante, and...
's aria "Nel cor più non mi sento
Nel cor più non mi sento
"Nel cor più non mi sento" is a soprano aria from act 2 in Giovanni Paisiello's 1788 opera L'amor contrastato, ossia La molinara, usually known as La molinara....
" from the opera La Molinara. The divertissement in act 1 (pas d'école) relies heavily on musical borrowings, and the well-known pas de trois employs nearly all of Pierre Rode
Pierre Rode
Jacques Pierre Joseph Rode was a French violinist and composer.-Biography:Born in Bordeaux, Aquitaine, France, Pierre Rode traveled to Parisat the age of 13 and soon became a favourite pupil of the great Giovanni Battista Viotti who found the boy so talented that he charged him no fee for the...
's Violin Concerto No. 7, Op. 9, from 1800, a concerto
Concerto
A concerto is a musical work usually composed in three parts or movements, in which one solo instrument is accompanied by an orchestra.The etymology is uncertain, but the word seems to have originated from the conjunction of the two Latin words...
that was used as an examination piece for young 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....
ists at the time Bournonville was living in Paris and studying with Vestris.
History
The complete two-act ballet was performed by the Royal Danish BalletRoyal Danish Ballet
The Royal Danish Ballet is one of the oldest ballet companies in the world. Based in Copenhagen, Denmark, it originates from 1748, when the Royal Danish Theatre was founded, and was finally organized in 1771 in response to the great popularity of French and Italian styles of dance...
from 1849 until 1934 when it disappeared from the repertoire, perhaps because it was considered old-fashioned. In 1942, Harald Lander
Harald Lander
Harald Lander is a Danish dancer, choreographer and artistic director of the Royal Danish Ballet.Lander started as a dancer, studying under ballet master Michel Fokine in 1926-27...
, the Royal Ballet director at the time, extracted "The Dancing School" (pas d'école) from the larger work and staged it as a one-act divertissement.
In 1995, the Royal Danish Ballet brought the complete two-act version back into the repertoire with the help of three Bournonville experts: Kirsten Ralov
Kirsten Ralov
Kirsten Ralov was a Danish ballerina.She was born to Kai and Kaja Gnatt, née Olsen, a family of dancers living in Baden, Austria. Kirsten's mother encouraged her, and her brother Poul, to train as dancers. She entered the school of the Royal Danish Ballet at the age of 22, and was associated with...
, former Assistant Director and principal of the company, principal dancer Niels Bjørn Larsen
Niels Bjørn Larsen
Niels Bjørn Larsen was a Danish ballet dancer, choreographer and balletmester. He was admitted to the Royal Danish Ballet school in 1920 and debuted in a production of Gudindernes Strid in 1933...
, and teacher Dinna Bjørn, Larsen's daughter.
By combining personal memories of the stagings in the early 1930s, Bournonville's notations, and the writings of dancer Valborg Borchsenius regarding Harald Lander’s staging in the 1930s, the three directors made it possible to re-stage the complete Le Conservatoire.