...... and they sounded great

The Album Notes for the recording of Richard Bonynge's Giselle

(c) 2016 Gita Mistry, all rights reserved

On Sunday I mentioned my collection of student LPs which I have just discovered (see Look what I've found! 10 April 2016). After as we had seen the Bolshoi's Don Quixote at the National Media Museum Gita and I returned to her home to try out the records on her sound system.

It took a minute or so to adjust the system for these antique recordings but sure enough the overture and morning sounds of the opening scene of Lanchberry's orchestration of Herold's fee emerged loud and strong. There was some hissing and static but quality of the sound was extraordinary. Better that I was able to produce on my portable record player which had been my 21st birthday present from my parents.

As we had done Jane Tucker's intensive a few days earlier Gita placed Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet on the turntable. When the Dance of the Knights came on we counted the beats to the girls' entrance. We were tempted to stride across the room and start our glissades but movement might have destabilized the system. Instead we rehearsed the steps in our minds and metaphorically flew with Juliet when the orchestra played her variation.

After Romeo and Juliet we played side 1 of Swan Lake and then side 1 of The Nutcracker. We could have listened to them all night had we not had jobs to do in the morning.

Look what I've found!

(c) 2016 Gita Mistry, all rights reserved

Whereas most of my contemporaries St Andrews spent their pennies on Sergeant Pepper or Revolver I spent mine on ballet music. My pride and joy was this recording of the complete score of Giselle conducted by Richard Bonynge but I have other treasures too. I went to graduate school in Los Angeles in 1972 and thought this music collection was lost for ever - until I found it today. I have Ansermet's recording of The Firebird, Clifford Curzon's Symphonic Variations, von Karajan's Sacre du Printemps, Lanchberry's Fille mal gardee, Pistoulari's Graduation Ball and many, many more. 

My tutors had expected me to get a first but I came away with a second - albeit a respectable one or so I am told as St Andrews did not divide the second class honours class in those days. At least part of the reason may be that I listened to those records when I should have been revising.   I was ballet mad. Together with my frequent trips to London for Covent Garden, the Wells, the Festival Hall, the Coliseum or events with the London Ballet Circle and, after 1969, Glasgow to see Western Theatre Ballet not to mention my first classes with Sally Marshall in the sports centre it is a wonder that I graduated at all.

I have not touched these records since graduation.  I do not have a vinyl turntable but Gita does so I have entrusted these records to her, Tonight, after Don Quixote we shall try one to see whether it still produces sound. If it does, I shall be over the moon.

Fille is to us what Napoli is to the Danes - but other countries love Fille too

La Fille mal gardée is to us what Napoli is to the Danes. Napoli. is their national ballet by their most famous choreographer even though it is set in Southern Italy.  Fille is English even though it is set in Normandy. How could it be otherwise with choreography by Ashton, music by Lanchberry and sets by Osbert Lancaster?

But wait. It is also very French as Brigitte Lefèvre explains in the clip above.   The very first production was in Bordeaux on the eve of the storming of the Bastille.  On the anniversary of that insurrection this year the Ballet of the Paris Opera are dancing Ashton's ballet at the Palais Garnier. If this film is anything to go by they can reclaim it for themselves. Quelle joie! Quelle delice. Here are the details if you want to see it.

But Fille is also Russian.  Ashton drew heavily on the experience of Tamara Karsavina who had danced the ballet in St Petersburg.  And now the compliment has been returned for Ashton's version was danced last year at the Mikhailovsky Theatre in St Petersburg.

And the Americans love Fille too for it is in American Ballet Theatre's repertoire.