Word: coppeli
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...latest revision by Director Ninette de Valois of that old charmer, Coppélia starring petite Ballerina Nadia Nerina, a whirlwind dancer, a vivacious actress and an impudent comedienne all at once. Coppelia, as generations of balletgoers know is a mechanical doll who all but wins the heart of a young man. Dolls of several nationalities dance in the dollmaker's workshop, elegantly costumed peasants gambol m the village square, and occasionally the story stops for a joyful pas de deux: in short, a delightful show...
...pieces, the dancing lesson called "Konservatoriet" and the pas de deux from the "Flower Festival in Genzano," they found it-gay, pretty romanticism instead of the drawn-steel tension of the Diaghilev tradition, verve and enthusiasm instead of icy perfection. Surprise of the program was a snippet from Coppélia, choreographed in 1896 by Danish Hans Beck after the French ballet-master, Saint-Léon. If the Delibes music was as familiar as an old song, the peasanty dancing was like hearing it sung in another language, and audiences loved the piquant combination...
...years passed, he wrote (and published) dozens of songs and began to reach for the more ambitious forms of composition. In 1944 he submitted a pair of operas to the Met, one of them based on Racine's Phèdre, the other a one-acter from Coppée's Le Passant (The Passerby), whose plot might have been taken from his own wandering life...
...pupil of famed Adolphe (Giselle) Adam, wrote with a symphonic fluidity that made much of the ballet compositions of his contemporaries sound like music for setting-up exercises. In all, he turned out about 20 operettas and operas (including Lakmé) and several ballets (Coppélia and La Source). For Sylvia (written in 1876), Delibes used a 16th century story of a Greek shepherd who falls in love with one of Diana's huntresses. She repulses him until the god Eros steps in. In a scene reminiscent of The Perils of Pauline, a robber khan ab ducts Sylvia...
Among the standout performers: Character Dancer Gerda Karstens, as a dour old Quaker lady whose stiff movements and deadpan face seemed to disapprove of what her feet were doing; lithe, pretty Ballerina Inge Sand, who danced Delibes' Coppélia on the second night; Erik Bruhn, who bounded through the Nutcracker; and Frank Schaufuss and Mona Vangsaa, who gave a touching performance of ill-fated young love in Romeo and Juliet. Londoners, used to the heady perfection of Sadler's Wells, loved the more natural Danes, brought them back again & again to bow to the applause-a thrill...