In 1910, "The Firebird" was put into development for the Ballets Russes. Tcherepnin was hired to write the music, but lost interest. The job was given to Lyadov. Diaghilev grew disappointed with Lyadov. He was slow to get started. The impresario recalled his impression with Stravinsky and decided the young composer was the man to write the score for "The Firebird". Stravinsky was hired.
Stravinsky was young and inexperienced. He worried whether he could meet the deadline date for the score, but accepted the job. He was flattered to be chosen from the many great musicians of the age to write the score, and just as flattered to be working with men who were geniuses in their fields.
Stravinsky worked closely with Fokine in developing "The Firebird". The result was a work in which movement, music, and scenery and costume design were integrated into one artistic whole. The stop-and-go, episodic character of classical ballet was avoided in favor of a fluid continuity from start to finish. "The Firebird" premiered in 1910 to great success.
This success led Diaghilev to hire Stravinsky to write the score for another ballet, "The Rite of Spring". The idea for this ballet was Stravinsky's, and based on a dream he had had about a virgin forced to dance to death to propitiate the god of spring. Stravinsky knew that writing this score would take a long time. He tired of it, and started to work on a concert piece for piano and orchestra to refresh himself. Stravinsky thought of this new piece as a contest between the orchestra and the piano. The orchestra finally overwhelms the piano to emerge the winner.
Stravinsky was thinking of the Russian hand puppet, Petrushka, when he wrote the concert piece: "In composing the music, I had in my mind a distinct picture of a puppet, suddenly endowed with life, exasperating the patience of the orchestra with diabolical cascades of arpeggios. The orchestra in turn retaliates with menacing trumpet blasts."
The music is modern. It uses the music of the past (folk tunes and popular songs), but departs from the simplicity of these tunes. The most modern music in the score is the music for Scene Two. This is the music Stravinsky wrote as a concert piece for piano and orchestra. The scene opens with the clash of C major and F-sharp major chords. This bitonality represents Petrushka's dual nature as a living being and straw-filled puppet.
Stravinsky put some popular Russian folk tunes into the score as well as less ethnic music such as a waltz by early 19th-century Viennese composer Josef Lanner. This waltz was inserted into Scene Three for The Ballerina and The Moor. Stravinsky put a popular French tune into Scene One ("She had a wooden leg") and was forced to pay royalties into the 1950s to the tune's writer.
Stravinsky revised and arranged the "Petrushka" score several times. In 1914, the 42-minute work was cut to a 20-minute suite for concert performance. In 1919, Stravinsky gave his permission to the Aeolian Company of London to create transcriptions for piano rolls. Stravinsky himself wrote a virtuoso piano transcription in 1921 for Artur Rubinstein. Plans for a sound movie of "Petrushka" in 1929 were dropped when Benois would not agree to the project. In 1956, Stravinsky conducted a 15-minute adaptation of the score for an animated movie.
The ballet is set during the Shrovetide Fair in St. Petersburg in 1830. Benois had many childhood memories of these fairs. He put these memories the sideshows, the little theatres, the roundabouts and other fair attractions into the first and fourth scenes of "Petrushka".
Benois designed eleven productions of "Petrushka"' over the years. His designs were always based on those of the first production of 1911. He always set the ballet in Admiralty Square, although the actual place of the fair was moved to the Winter Palace Square and finally to the Field of Mars. The fair (infamous for the heavy drinking that took place during its run) was eventually shut down by Prince Oldenburg and the Temperance Society.
All productions of "Petrushka" designed by Benois had several things in common. They all had a proscenium executed in a Russian folk style, and a backdrop showing St. Isaac's Cathedral. The costumes were accurate recreations of the clothing worn in the 1830s. The curtain that was lowered between scenes displayed the Charlatan surrounded by clouds. This curtain was replaced with a night scene of demons and monsters flying over St. Petersburg.
The second scene of the ballet shows Petrushka's lonely little room. There is a picture of the Charlatan on one wall. The original picture was damaged when the production was moved from St. Petersburg to Paris. It was replaced with a picture of the Charlatan in profile by another designer. Benois did not like this picture. He refused to speak to Diaghilev for a long time.
The third scene in the ballet is the Moor's room. This scene gave Benois much trouble. He tried many jungle animals elephants, lions, crocodiles on the wall covering of the room but was not pleased. He finally settled on a design of palm trees. This exotic design remained the same through all of Benois's later productions. It created a striking contrast to the bareness of Petrushka's room.
Fokine was born to middle class parents in 1880, and entered the Imperial Ballet school in 1889. He graduated in 1898 and immediately found a position as dancer in the Imperial Ballet. He was curious, intelligent, and ambitious. In 1902 he started to choreograph short ballets for the students of the Imperial Ballet school.
He opposed much of the traditions of the Imperial Ballet such as the circular position of a dancer's arms, the "pirouette" ending a male dancer's solo, and the lengthy curtain calls. His intent was to make each movement have meaning, to create a fluid work from start to finish unhindered by the traditional stop and go of classical ballet, and to avoid a gymnastic style of dance. He wanted his dancers to interpret musical phrases, accents, and nuances through meaningful movement. He codified his thoughts on dance in five principles.
He put his ideas to work over the next several years with encouraging success. He respected the choreographic accomplishments of the past and refused to re-choreograph older works. He preferred to work with new material. In 1907 he choreographed "Le Pavilion d'Armide". He worked with Benois for the first time on this ballet. "Pavillion" earned the critical favor of the Imperial Ballet. It was eventually staged at the Mariinsky Theatre.
It was Benois who introduced Fokine to Diaghilev. He choreographed "Les Sylphides" and a few other ballets for Diaghilev's first Paris season, and "The Firebird" and "Scheherazade" for the 1910 season. In 1911 he choreographed not only "Petrushka".
Fokine described Stravinsky's "Petruska" score as "sounds tormenting the ear and yet stimulating the imagination and stirring the soul." The dancers complained about the score and found it difficult to keep track of counts. Fokine admitted as much, but managed to make progress with the dancers and on the choreography itself. Fokine redefined ballet with this work.
In "Four Centuries of Ballet" Lincoln Kirstein writes about "Petrushka" and its creators. Fokine gave "pizzicato points" to the Ballerina, Kirstein notes, while the Moor's toes are turned out ("en dehors"), and Petrushka's toes are turned in ("en dedans"). The mechanical, flat movements of the puppets provide contrast to the natural movements of the crowd, and mime accentuates the Ballerina's vanity, the Moor's mindless pride, and Petruchka's helplessness. ballets