The red poppy
The red poppy ( Russian Красный мак ) or after 1955 also The red flower ( Russian Красный цветок ) is a ballet in three acts (8 pictures) and a final apotheosis. The music was composed by Reinhold M. Glière , the libretto and the equipment are by Michail Kurilko. The ballet is dedicated to Jekaterina Geltzer , the first female lead actress. It premiered on June 13, 1927 in Moscow's Bolshoi Theater .
introduction
The red poppy is considered to be the first Soviet ballet with a modern, revolutionary theme. In the period after the October Revolution of 1917 there was heated discussion in the Soviet Union about the continued existence of the art genre “ballet”. While Anatoly Lunacharsky , the People's Commissar for Cultural Issues, campaigned for ballet, other party officials saw this art form only as an outdated court relic. Because of its incompatibility with the ideological principles of democracy and the proletariat, it no longer has any right to exist.
Eberhard Rebling aptly describes the discussion of the time:
“Others asked what a Soviet ballet should look like, especially on a contemporary theme? Some believed that the classical technique was completely useless to make contemporary people dance, so that a completely new technique would have to be created for a contemporary Soviet ballet. Others, on the other hand, denied the possibility of depicting contemporary materials in dance. So the prevailing opinion was that ballet should be limited to fairy tales and themes from the distant past. "
The red poppy then had great success with the audience and also with the party. After a year and a half, on December 23, 1928, the 100th performance took place. This year Der Rote Mohn surpassed all other classical ballets such as Sleeping Beauty and Swan Lake with 69 performances . In 1957, in the third revision, it was given the new title The Red Flower, because no one wanted to associate communist China with the importance of poppy seeds as an intoxicant.
action
The action takes place in a large Chinese port city in the 1920s. A Soviet ship has dropped anchor. The captain notices a group of half-starved, overworked coolies who are brutally driven to work by the harbor master. At night, while dancing for the sailors on board the ship, the beautiful Tao-Choa notices that the captain is trying to protect the poor coolies from the port commander. Impressed by the action of the captain, she gives him a red poppy as a token of her love. When Tao-Choa's employer Li-Schanfu hears about it, he becomes jealous and demands that she kill the captain. She refuses. Li-Schanfu, furious with anger and jealousy, stabs the girl. When she dies, she gives children red poppies as a symbol of love and freedom.
This act gave the choreographers the opportunity to characterize the heroic Chinese girl and the Soviet captain using the means of classical dance. The expressive design of Tai Choa, first by Jekaterina Geltzer, and later especially by Galina Ulanowa , contributed much to the great popularity of the piece. Sailor dances from different nations, especially the Russian "Jablotschko", character dances by Chinese coolies, Tai-Choa's dream of the old legendary China in the second act and the final vision of the future offered a lot of variety in dance. The crowd scenes depicting the suffering and later rebelling people are means of expression that were later referred to as " socialist realism ". Glière used some of his own works to design the solo numbers. The Adagio at the end of the second act is already noted in the catalog raisonné as op. 3 from 1902. Glière's great interest in folk music, especially from Central Asia, is expressed in the variety of folkloric dances, some of which are still popular and repeatedly performed today.
Sequence of scenes
1st act
- Introduction
- Dance of coolies
- Tao Choa's appearance
- Restaurant scene
- Malik's dance
- Boston Waltz
- European dance scene
- Captain's appearance and seaman's dance
- Tao Choas scene
- Variation with golden fingers
- Victory dance of coolies
- Dance of the Soviet Sailors: Apples (Jablotschko)
2nd act
- Introduction - scene in the smoking room
- Scene: Dance of the Chinese women
- Adagio of the four goddesses
- adagio
- Prelude
- Tao-Choa's vision
- Procession scene
- Swords dance
- Phoenix
- adagio
- The red ship
3rd act :
- Charleston
- Dance in the restaurant
- Chinese theater preparation
- Dance of umbrellas
- Dance of the puppets
- Chinese acrobat dance
- Scene: The conspiracy
- Scene of confusion
- Captain's scene
- Tao-Choas scene: The ship casts off
- Riot scene
- Death of Tao-Choa
- Final apotheosis
Versions
There were three main versions:
1927
Choreography by Lev Lashchilin (1st and 3rd act) and Wassili Tichomirow (2nd act). The first performance took place on June 13, 1927 in the Bolshoi Theater in Moscow.
Performers of the main roles:
- Tao-Choa - Jekaterina Wassiljewna Geltzer,
- Soviet captain - Vasily Dmitrijewitsch Tichomirow,
- Boatswain - WI Zaplin,
- Harbor Master - LK Mazkewitsch,
- Dance of the Acrobat - GK Farmanjantz,
- Juggler Dance - Asaf Messerer.
1949
Choreography by Leonid Lavrowski . The set was designed by Mikhail I. Kurilko and AN Jermolajew.
The world premiere was on December 27, 1949 in Leningrad at the SM Kirov Theater for Opera and Ballet. The conductor was EA Dubowskoi, the director RW Sakharov.
The first performance in Moscow took place on December 30, 1949 in the Bolshoi Theater .
Performers of the main roles:
- Tao-Choa - Jekaterina W. Geltzer, Galina S. Ulanowa , Olga W. Lepeschinskaja;
- Soviet captain - AR Tomski, Alexander I. Radunski,
- Harbor Master - WW Smolzow;
- Ma Li-chen (the figure was first introduced in 1949) - Mikhail M. Gabowitsch, Yuri G. Kondratow
1957
Choreography and stage design by Wassili Tichomirow and Michail I. Kurilko. The ballet was renamed The Red Flower . The first performance was on November 24, 1957 in the Bolshoi Theater in Moscow.
Further performances
- 1929 in Leningrad at the Leningrad Opera and Ballet Theater.
- 1949 and May 2, 1958 in Leningrad at the Mariinsky Theater (Kirov Theater).
- 1943 at the Public Music Hall in Cleveland , Ohio, USA, with the Ballets Russes de Monte Carlo .
- 1928 and 1930 in Sverdlovsk (Urals).
- 1928, 1949 and 1958 in Saratov .
- 1941 and 1950 in Gorki .
- 1946 in Baku at the Opera and Ballet Theater.
- 1949 in Perm .
- 1950 and 1961 in Kuibyshev .
- 1950 in Novosibirsk .
- 1962 in Volgograd .
- The second performance outside of the Soviet Union was scheduled for November 17-22, 2009 at the Teatro dell'Opera di Roma in Rome , Italy . The performances were canceled for financial reasons. The performance took place from February 12th to 17th, 2010.
- November 23-28, 2010 in Krasnoyarsk .
Sound carrier
- The Red Poppy (Complete Ballet), St. Petersburg State Symphony Orchestra, conducted by André Anichanov, 2 CDs, NAXOS 8.553496-7, 1994.
Web links
- Reinhold Glière - Catalog raisonné -
- Web site of the Teatro dell'Opera di Roma about ballet
- Pictures of the 2010 performance in Rome
- Video clip of the performance from February 2010 in Rome
credentials
- ↑ SK Gulinskaja: Reinhold Morizevich Glier Moscow "Musika", 1986, (in Russian)
- ↑ a b c Boris S. Jagolim: RM Glier, catalog raisonné (Notograficeskij spravocnik) , Moscow, 1964 (in Russian)
- ↑ Eberhard Rebling: Ballet, Yesterday and Today. Henschel Verlag Art and Society, Berlin 1957, p. 282 ff.
- ↑ Archive link ( Memento of the original dated December 24, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ Archived copy ( Memento of the original from March 18, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
