As a ballet dancing lover, you will always find it interesting to learn snippets of history from the past. Today I will focus on Serge Diaghilev. His mantra was “Etonnez-moi” which means astonish me and from the years 1909 to 1929 he astonished audiences all over the Western World.
In the four hundred odd years of ballet dancing’s history, you will find nothing will quite match the two decades of Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes for its thrilling performances, inspired collaborations, groundbreaking choreography and far reaching influence. The Ballets Russes Company led ballet dancing out of the nineteenth century classicism and into the modern age of dance as we know it today.
Diaghilev was a daring visionary and was amazingly enough neither a dancer nor a choreographer, although he did take small parts in some of his productions. He was an art critic, editor, connoisseur, impresario and Russian intellectual with an extra ordinary ear and eye for talent.
He assembled troupes of dancers over the years which included Nijinsky, Karsavina, Kchessinska, Spessivtzeva, Markova, Danilova and Lifar. Serge Diaghilev also time and time again cultivated choreographic genius from Nijinsky, Nijinska, Balanchine, Massine and Fokine.
Serge Diaghilev also commissioned the best composers and launched careers such as Stravinsky’s. His set designers included the likes of Picasso, Matisse and Derain.
Serge Diaghilev managed to combine all the above elements like a master chef, and served up the splendours of Russian Dancing to Western Audiences. The works that he did, revolutionised ballet’s structure, vocabulary and technique.
The Ballets Russes became the darling of fashionable Europe and only got better when success became a scandal at the premiere of Nijinsky’s The Rite of Spring. This ballet with its non balletic movements and the shocking score from Stravinsky provoked a riot. Other artistic triumphs included Les Sylphides, Scheherazade, The Firebird, Petroushka and last but not least Le Spectre de la Rose.
The Ballets Russes as expected, outlived Diaghilev. Choreographers after him including Leonide Massine, Bronislava Nijinska and George Balanchine, continued the tradition of innovation and collaboration. His successor troupes toured extensively for more than thirty years and introduced ballet to many far away places, even as far as the United States. The existence of today’s large and enthusiastic ballet audience is as much a part of Diaghilev’s legacy as the ballets that he conceived.
Tags: Balet Dance, lord of the dance