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Flames of Paris

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Flames of Paris

Flames of Paris

Flames of Paris is a full-length ballet in four acts, choreographed by Vasily Vainonen to music by Boris Asafyev based on songs of the French Revolution. The libretto by Nicolai Volkov and Vladimir Dmitriev was adapted from a book by Felix Gras. It was premiered at the Kirov Theatre in Leningrad on 7 November 1932, with Natalia Dudinskaya as Mireille de Poitiers, Vakhtang Chabukiani as Jérôme, Olga Jordan as Jeanne, Nina Anisimova as Thérèse, and Konstantin Sergeyev as Mistral. The conductor was Yuri Fayer.

The Bolshoi Ballet premiered the full work on 6 July 1933 at the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow, with Aleksey Yermolayev (Jérôme), Anastasia Abramova (Jeanne), Nadezhda Kapustina (Thérèse) and Marina Semenova (Mireille de Poitiers).

The original production and choreography was reconstructed in 2008 by Alexei Ratmansky for the Bolshoi Ballet and is available on DVD with Ivan Vasiliev and Natalia Osipova.

Background

The Flames of Paris is a so-called "revolutionary" ballet which takes as its subject the French Revolution, including in its scenario the storming of the Tuileries Palace by the Marceliers and their victorious march on Paris. The plot is taken from the book of Felix Gras Les Marceliers.

Although its setting is eighteenth-century France, it is a perfect illustration of Soviet ballet in the 1920s and 1930s, during which time there was a determined effort to find subjects in world history which reflected the more immediate situation in the Soviet Union, and to show that the October Revolution was part of more universal movements and historical events.

Analysis

In creating the choreography for this ballet, Vasily Vainonen drew upon many different sources, as did the composer Boris Asafyev. The Flames of Paris blends classical and character dancing, court and folk dances, pantomime, solo performances and group scenes.

The choreography is mostly classical but for the part of Thérèse, for example, Vainonen chose character dancer Nina Anisimova, who danced only character dances, displaying strong, expressive folk movements which symbolize the energy and the spirit of the crowd. On the other hand, the dances for Philippe, one of the Marseillais, and his bride are purely classical: the two characters dance a pas de deux which is done in the true Petipa manner. In the scene at the palace of Louis XVI there is a great deal of traditional mime and Marie Antoinette dances a minuet, which is a beautiful piece of choreography in itself.

As a further technique for putting classical dancing on the stage, Vainonen invented the roles of the pair of actors, Mireille de Poitiers and Antoine Mistral, who have been invited by the king to perform at the banquet. These were originally performed by Natalia Dudinskaya and Konstantin Sergeyev and are designed for outstanding ballet dancers who can display their virtuosity in classical pas de deux. These characters are, of course, on the side of the revolutionary mob, so that after the storming of the palace they are joined by the group in dances which include variations, codas, and the participation of an enormous corps de ballet consisting of 24, and later 32, dancers.

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