Shostakovich's ballets and the search for Soviet dance / Laura E. Kennedy.
| Author/creator | Kennedy, Laura E. |
| Format | Book |
| Publication Info | New York : Oxford University Press, ©2025. |
| Description | xv, 192 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm |
| Subjects |
| Contents | Introduction. Soviet ballet in the 1920s -- Shostakovich and ballet -- Reception and reassessment -- Archival collections and sources -- Shostakovich's ballets and the search for Soviet dance -- "Art without movement does not move me": Shostakovich and the path to ballet. Shostakovich's early career -- The ballet theatre. The institution ; The repertoire ; The debates -- Shostakovich and dance. "Balletic impressions" ; The ballets -- Petipa's legacy: the golden age and classical ballet. The production of 1930 -- Soviet "classical" ballet. Act I: ballet classicism ; Act II: sports ; Act III: the modern age -- New directions -- Amateur dramatics: the bolt and modern ballet. The milieu -- "High art" versus "popular art." "High art" ; "Popular art" -- Soviet "modern" ballet. Act I: the factory ; Act II: the village ; Act III; the club -- Soviet sylphs: The Limpid Stream and romantic ballet. Soviet "romantic" ballet. Act I: national dance, Shakespearean shores ; Act II: Soviet sylphs, the Marxist forest ; Act III: classical veils -- The artistic and professional milieu. The state of ballet ; Professional collaborations -- The Limpid Stream in the national hemisphere -- Shostakovich and ballet: lives and afterlives. "Symphonic ballets." Massine's Rouge et noir ; Belsky's Leningrad Symphony -- The revival of Shostakovich's ballets. Grigorovich's The Golden Age ; Ratmansky's The Bright Stream and The Bolt -- Epilogue -- Appendix A -- Appendix B: librettos. |
| Abstract | The late 1920s and early 1930s were a pivotal moment in Russian cultural development: a time of uncertainty but also of openness and experimentation in the arts and especially in dance. This book examines the three ballets composed by Dmitri Shostakovich during this period--The Golden Age, The Bolt, and The Limpid Stream--works in which the composer aimed at creating Soviet ballet until his third ballet was condemned in 1936 and he subsequently abandoned the genre. Cultural policy shifted frequently and rapidly in these years in Russia, summoning all areas of Soviet life to new orthodoxies. Like other arts, ballet emerged as a testing ground for the marriage of artistic innovation to Soviet ideology. The author argues that Shostakovich's ballets shaped the search for a Soviet approach to the genre in offering three distinct responses to these demands. In doing so, they illuminated the pressures and concerns that vied for dominance in the experimental environment of the late 1920s and early 1930s.Throughout, she draws on extensive archival materials from St. Petersburg and Moscow--many of which have not previously been published--that preserve the creative record of Shostakovich's ballets in scores, répétiteurs, photographs, libretti, costume sketches, set designs, theatre documents, and annals of performance. Backed by these primary sources, she charts the complex histories of Shostakovich's ballets, their contributions to dance in Russia, and their impact on the composer's artistic career and the genre of ballet in the twentieth century. |
| Bibliography note | Includes bibliographical references (pages 177-187) and index. |
| ISBN | 9780197698044 (hardcover) |
| ISBN | 0197698042 (hardcover) |
| ISBN | 9780197698051 (paperback) |
| ISBN | 0197698050 (paperback) |
| ISBN | (PDF) |
| ISBN | (ebook) |
| ISBN | (ePub) |
Availability
| Library | Location | Call Number | Status | Item Actions |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Music | Music Stacks | ML410.S53 K46 2025 | ✔ Available | Place Hold |