Firebird (ballet)

The ballet was written based on Russian folk tales about the magical Firebird , which is both a blessing and a curse for the person who possessed it. Diaghilev initially drew A.K. Lyadov to write music, but Lyadov worked too slowly and Diaghilev ultimately transferred the order to Stravinsky. Ballet laid the foundation for the creative collaboration of Diaghilev and Stravinsky.

The premiere took place on the stage of the Grand Opera Theater on June 25, 1910 in the choreography of Mikhail Fokin , designed by Alexander Golovin and Leon Bakst . The orchestra was conducted by conductor Gabriel Pierne . The main parts were performed by Tamara Karsavina (the Firebird ; Stravinsky attended the rehearsals and helped Karsavina deal with the rhythm and complex musical pattern), Mikhail Fokin ( Ivan Tsarevich ), Vera Fokina ( Tsarevna ) and Alexey Bulgakov ( Koschei ).

In 1917 , during the season at the Grand Opera, Diaghilev instructed to hang out a red flag in the ballet finale in greeting to the February Revolution that happened in Russia ^[1] .

Subsequently, the Fokin ballet was included in the repertoire of the Original Russian Ballet , where the part of the Firebird, among others, was performed by Valentina Blinova and Tamara Tumanova .

• Firebird ;
• Ivan Tsarevich ;
• Tsarevna Beloved Beauty;
• Koschey the Immortal ;
• Rider of the night;
• Rider of the morning;
• The servants of the Koshcheev kingdom;
• Girls, boys, knights.

On the mountain, among the rocks, stands the castle of the evil king Koshchei the Immortal. So that no one gets into Koshchei, doesn’t steal captive beautiful princesses from the castle, doesn’t steal the golden fruits from the magic garden, the castle is surrounded by a gold carved lattice, and the garden is surrounded by a high stone wall.

Slowly the Horseman of the Night appears on a black horse in black clothes. When it leaves, it darkens; only golden apples on a tree glow. But immediately the garden is illuminated by the bright light from the Firebird. She is flying in the garden.

Ivan Tsarevich, in pursuit of a bird, enters the garden through a high stone fence. Everywhere he comes across fossilized people in the form of monsters. This Koschey turned all his enemies into stone. In the depths of the garden, Ivan sees a whole fence of fossilized knights. These are young men who penetrated the terrible kingdom in order to free, save their brides, abducted by the evil Koshchei. All of them died, all stood with motionless stones, they grew over with moss. Involuntarily, Ivan Tsarevich, blinded by the Firebird, forgets about these horrors. He wants to shoot her, and then decides to catch her alive.

When the Firebird flies up to a tree with golden apples and starts pecking them, the prince catches it. Trembles, his bird beats in his hands, prays for release. The Tsarevich holds tight, does not let go. But the bird maiden so plaintively asks, so groans that good Ivan feels sorry for her. He lets the bird out, and for this she gives him a feather of fire. “It will come in handy for you,” the Firebird says and flies away.

The prince hides his feather in his bosom and already wants to climb over the fence, but the doors open in the castle and twelve beautiful princesses appear, and behind them the most beautiful - princess Beloved Beauty. Secretly from the evil king, in the light of the moon they run out into the garden at night to frolic, play with apples. The Tsarevich’s girls do not see, they are thrown by apples, they are filled with laughter.

The apple of the Princess of Beloved Beauty flew into the bushes. She is behind him. And from behind the bush, the prince comes out, bows, gives the apple. The girls were scared, ran back. But the prince is very handsome, and is courteous and modest. He fell in love with the girls, especially the Beloved Beauty. And they accept it in their round dance games. They don’t notice how dawn comes. Gallops fast. The morning horseman on a white horse, himself in white. It is getting brighter. The girls got alarmed, run away to the castle. The Tsarevich is behind them. Beloved Beauty stops him, warns that he will die if he passes through the golden gate; closes them and runs away. But the prince loved the beloved Beauty so much that he was not afraid of anything and decided to follow her.

As soon as he cuts the gate with his saber, the whole kingdom wakes up, magic chimes are heard. From the castle, on the mountain, all sorts of monsters, servants of Koshchei, are rolling. Capturing the Tsarevich. Silenus Ivan, shaking off reptiles, but the infinite power of the filthy kingdom overcomes him. Koschey appears, old, scary. Invites Ivan for interrogation. The prince humbles himself, takes off his hat, but as he saw the sorcerer's nasty face, he could not stand it - he spat. The whole filthy kingdom screeched and roared. They put Ivan to the wall. The princess runs out, asks the tsar to forgive Ivan, but Koschey is already beginning to turn him into stone. Ivan would have died, but remembered the fiery feather. He pulled out a pen, waving it. The Firebird flies to his aid, she blinds everyone, twists everyone, throws him into the dance. Freaks dance, they can’t resist. Koschey himself dances. The Firebird starved everyone to death, slammed to the ground, and then swayed gently above them, lying in a lullaby. From side to side, the filthy ones waddle, all with their king fall asleep.

Ivan Tsarevich searches for Beloved Beauty, takes her sleeping in his arms and wants to carry her away, but the Firebird stops him. She leads the prince to a hollow. In the hollow is the casket, in the casket is the egg, in the egg is the death of Koshchei. The Tsarevich takes out an egg, shakes it - Koshcheya roots; throws from hand to hand - Koschey flies from side to side; breaks an egg on the ground - Koschey crumbles.

The filthy kingdom disappears. In place of his Christian city grows, the castle turns into a temple. Stone knights come to life. Each of them finds his bride, the one behind whom he penetrated the terrible Koshchei, for which he took a fierce curse. Ivan the Tsarevich also finds his beloved, Princess Beloved Beloved. Declares her his wife - the queen of the liberated kingdom.

Of great importance in the musical drama of the ballet are two folk themes borrowed by Stravinsky from the collection of N. A. Rimsky-Korsakov “One Hundred Russian Folk Songs”: in the “Round Dance of the Tsarev”, the lyrical culmination of the first picture, the song “Like a Kindergarten” sounds ^[2] , at the end of the second picture - the song "At the gates, the pine tree swayed" ^[3] . If the song “Like a kindergarten” in Stravinsky’s treatment retains its melodic-rhythmic appearance and lyrical character (although it undergoes intense variation), then the composer re-rhythmizes the second theme, originally noted 3/4, by 7/4, getting rid of the monotony of periodicity, and brilliantly orchestrates it in the manner of “bell-shaped” themes by Mussorgsky and Rimsky-Korsakov. Transformed in this way by the hand of a master, a straightforward song in the final apotheosis takes on a hymn character and symbolic “Russian” meaning.

Based on the music of the ballet, Stravinsky wrote three orchestral suites (1st ed., 1910, 2nd ed. 1919, 3rd ed. 1945). The third edition of the suite is dedicated to the memory of Andrei Nikolaevich Rimsky-Korsakov ).

• 1910 - the first performance in St. Petersburg on October 23 (November 5), 1910, conductor Alexander Ziloti ;
• 1919 - first performance in Geneva on April 12, 1919, conductor Ernest Anserme ;
• 1945 - first performance in New York on October 24, 1945, conductor Yasha Gorenstein .

The orchestral suites from The Firebird are among the numbers of Stravinsky’s most repertoire orchestral works. The 2nd edition (1919) is most common, although the 3rd edition (1945) contains more musical material from the ballet. The composer himself spoke to Robert Craft ^{[ specify ]} that he would prefer to use a concert version for ballet performances instead of the original score , which he would prefer to disown.

• 1921 - Fedor Lopukhov , State Opera and Ballet Theater , Petrograd.
• 1945 - Leonid Myasin , Ballet Theater , New York; sets and costumes by Marc Chagall .
• November 27, 1949 - George Balanchine , New York City Ballet , .

Balanchine, who danced in 1921 in Petrograd, staged by Lopukhov in the retinue of Koshchei and later performed the part of Koshchei staged by Fokine ( saw his performance in London in 1926), created his own version in 1949 in New York for his troupe. The scenery and costumes of Marc Chagall , remaining from the meat production of 1945 , were used. Lighting design by , conductor Leon Barzen . The main parts were performed by Maria Tolchif ( Firebird ), ( Ivan Tsarevich ), ( Tsarevna ) and Edward Bigelow ( Koschei ).

The performance remained in the repertoire until 1965. In 1970, Balanchine resumed the ballet with costumes by , the sets based on the designs of Chagall were performed under the direction of Volodya Odinokov. Dancing monsters set Jerome Robbins . In 1972, some changes were made to the ballet, in 1980 Balanchine resumed the ballet, bringing it closer to the first version of 1949.

• 1950 - Maurice Bejart, Stockholm Opera (performers Ellen Rasch, Maurice Bejart, Björn Holmgren).
• October 31, 1970 - Maurice Bejart, , Paris. Design and costumes: Joëlle Roustan and Roger Bernard, light of Dominic Roman; used orchestral suite.

Ballet for 18 dancers is closely connected with the mood of the late 1960s and the Student Revolution . Bejart heard a revolutionary, rebellious spirit in "fabulous" music; the main metaphor of the play was the eternal struggle of man for freedom, his death and rebirth ^[4] . Bezhar made his male “Firebird” under the impression of the book “Four Poets of the Revolution. Bloc , Yesenin , Mayakovsky , Parsnip ” ^[4] . Based on the postulates “Stravinsky is a Russian musician” and “Stravinsky is a revolutionary”, he gave his performance an epigraph: “A firebird is a phoenix rising from the ashes; The poet, like the Revolutionary, is the Firebird. ”

• 1975 - Boris Eifman , Leningrad Opera and Ballet Theater. Kirov .
• 2000 - Natalia Kasatkina and Vladimir Vasilev , Classical Ballet Theater N. Kasatkina and V. Vasilev , Moscow.
• 2002 - Alexey Ratmansky .
• Yuri Posokhov , .

Marc Chagall placed the Firebird as a tribute to Stravinsky on his ceiling in the auditorium of the Grand Opera Theater (1960-1964). Between the artist himself with a palette in his hands and a green bird (the "red" sector) and a magic apple tree with a white bird blazing in a flame of fire (the "yellow" sector) a musician angel flies with a body from a cello; beneath it are the domes and roofs of the enchanted city, among the fir trees there is a red Firebird. Under the red canopy, the prince and the princess are crowned; to their right is a bewitched girl, a woman carrying a fruit basket and another young couple.

• Taruskin, Richard. Stravinsky and the Russian Traditions . Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996. ISBN 0-19-816250-2

• Slonimsky, Nicholas. Slonimsky's Book of Musical Anecdotes. - Hoboken: Taylor and Francis, 2014 .-- ISBN 978-1-135-36860-9 .