#swan lake - tchaikovsky

[staticsnowfall]

swan lake (1957)

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maya plisetskaya, prima ballerina of the bolshoi ballet, as odette, the swan princess

dir. by zoya tulubyeva, choreo. by aleksander gorsky

[musedelsa]

Swan Lake Ballet Program by Olga Biantovskaya

[dommnics]

Just realized I uploaded this on my other socials but not on here. A couple years ago, I was really interested in re-imagining Swan Lake as a comic, but never got far with it and put it to the side. The story found its way back to me, and I'd love to have another go at it and work it into a graphic novel after I publish my debut graphic novel trilogy KLOUD 9 (coming in 2025!)

These are some rough character designs I was playing around with for my take on the Swan Lake characters. I wanted my Odette to be a magical Filipina princess, as my dream of helping work on the first Filipina Disney princess movie seems too far off at this point in my career. So I don't really want to wait, and I'm just making my own haha!

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[one-time-i-dreamt]

I was doing a Physics test alone, but then my 60 year old professor started performing Tchaikovsky's "Swan Lake" by herself. I woke up when I tried to clap.

[souvlakic]

russian ballerina

[bambiiaangel]

bitches after watching black swan once ⋆ 𐙚 ‧₊

[notbecauseofvictories]

do not put tinkly christmas music on my classical playlist so help me god it is october.

[a4th]

Fyozai having "fun" while Dazai wears traditional japanese clothes, and Fyodor traditionnels russian clothes plz 😞

oh they surely know how to have fun!

[thecutestgrotto]

Hello! Your grafics are the best! Was wonder if you can make som Swan Lake ones? Thank you muchly!

Sorry about bad language, English not my first language. 😣😣

Anon your English is great!! 🩵🌸

Swan Lake

[summerbunnys-world]

Swan Lake

[staticsnowfall]

the famous fouettés of swan lake

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featured above is chloe misseldine, prima ballerina of american ballet theatre, as odile in ‘swan lake’.

the thirty-two fouettés in swan lake, and the embodiment of odette and odile as a whole are considered a stepping stone into a ballerina’s career as a prima. a debut is ultimately a test, a deciding factor in whether a company decides to promote a dancer or leave her alone. the fouettés of odile are difficult, requiring much strength, stamina, and training, performed during the coda after a lengthy pas de deux and variation. the legendary pierina legnani was the first ballerina to accomplish this feat in 1895, the fouettés being added just for her by choreographer marius petipa.

misseldine is the most recent ballerina to join the ranks of principal in the company: her promotion was on july 3rd, 2024, after her performance of odette/odile at the metropolitan opera house in manhattan, new york.

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footage sourced from @juliette_2626’s story on instagram, july 3rd, 2024, the met opera.

[blackswaneuroparedux]

What 'War and Peace' is to the novel and 'Hamlet' is to the theatre, Swan Lake' is to ballet - that is, the name which to many people stands for and sums up an art form.

Robert Gottlieb

It’s hard to believe that Swan Lake’s original premiere was seen as disastrous. When it first performed on 4 March 1877, at Moscow’s Bolshoi Theatre.

Tchaikovsky’s magical ballet tells the story of the doomed love of Prince Siegfried and Princess Odette. Prince Siegfried goes out hunting one night and chases a group of swans – one of them transforms into a young woman, Odette, who explains that she and her companions were turned into swans by the evil Baron Von Rothbart. The spell can only be broken if someone who has never loved before swears an oath of undying love and promises to marry her. The Prince declares his love to Odette and promises to be loyal forever.

At a grand reception at the palace, the Prince must choose a bride – but he can think only of Odette. Suddenly a fanfare announces the arrival of two guests - it is Odette! The prince dances with her and asks for her hand in marriage. But it’s not Odette - the mystery woman is the daughter of the evil von Rothbart, Odile. Odette has witnessed the whole scene. Too late, Siegfried realises his mistake.

Siegfried follows Odette to the lake and begs her forgiveness. She says she forgives him but nothing can change the fact he broke his vow. They decide to die together. The lovers throw themselves into the lake.

There are a few different theories as to how Tchaikovsky came up with the idea for Swan Lake. Though the libretto is based on a story by the German author Johann Karl August Musäus The Stolen Veil, many of Tchaikovsky’s contemporaries claimed that he was deeply fascinated by the tragic life story of Bavarian King Ludwig II - sometimes called the Swan King - who died under mysterious circumstances by drowning himself in a lake.

It is likely that Tchaikovsky chose Ludwig II as the prototype of Prince Siegfried. It is easy to tell that the composer clearly enjoyed working on the music for Swan Lake, as he wrote far more material than would ever be required. As a result, the version most commonly performed today is, in fact, an edited one, created after Tchaikovsky’s death and significantly shorter than the original work. 

Considering that Swan Lake is currently the most frequently performed ballet in the world, it's hard to imagine that it was a failure upon its premiere, with near unanimous criticism of different production aspects. Critics were universally disparaging, claiming the production was indistinctive and forgettable. They disliked the set and the choreography, thought the orchestra and dancers were subpar, and thought Tchaikovsky’s score was too complicated. The dancers who performed in the ballet’s premiere also declared Tchaikovsky’s music was too rich to accompany their balletic moves, and simply too difficult to dance to.

Because of these distractions, the actual brilliant score by Tchaikovsky got largely overlooked amidst the chaos.  Although a few critics did recognise the virtues of the masterful score, it was considered far too complex for ballet, too “noisy” and too “symphonic”, resembling the grand, weighty music of Richard Wagner. Even the initial ballet dancers deemed the music too difficult to dance to as its density clashed with the fluid and graceful balletic movements.

One of the issues for the premiere performance was the absence of the Bolshoi’s prima ballerina, Anna Sobeshchanskaya. Sobeshchanskaya rejoined the production as Odette/Odile in April 1877 but insisted on making certain changes to the choreography and score. Two years later the original choreographer, Julius Reisinger, left Moscow and was replaced by Belgian choreographer Joseph Pater Hansen. Hansen set about re-staging Swan Lake, launching his new version in January 1880.  All 33 performances of the ballet between 1877-1883 sold out, attesting to the ballet’s increasing popularity amongst audiences.

A planned revival of the ballet in the early 1890s was cast into doubt by the death of Tchaikovsky in November 1893, who didn’t live to see the ultimate success of his ballet. Tchaikovsky had written far more material than was ever required, and after his death, Riccardo Drigo took on the job of revising Tchaikovsky’s score, with the approval of his brother Modest Tchaikovsky.

The revised and edited version – commonly the version of the score used today - is considerably shorter than the original, full-length work. It premiered on 15 January 1895 by the Maryinsky Ballet at the Maryinsky Theatre to overwhelmingly positive reviews.

Call it what you like - Dance of the Four Swans, Dance of the Cygnets, The Four Little Swans - but for me the pas de quatre from Swan Lake is one of the most iconic dances in one of the most iconic classical ballets of all time. It is a coveted role for a ballerina, one that requires technical precision and teamwork. The light-hearted Dance of the Cygnets involves 16 pas de chat performed by four dancers moving sideways in exact unison with their arms interlaced. 

I’ve always found its spirit of sheer innocence and beauty breath-taking to watch. I’m left with wonder restored and a distinct feeling of the flight of innocence coming back to rest in my hardened heart.

Video: Royal Ballet's Swan Lake (2018)

[justaz]

what i find so iconic about the white violin is bro is literally his own boss music

[one-time-i-dreamt]

I was watching the Swan Lake ballet and was crying because it was so good and I kept trying to tell people about inspirations Tchaikovsky might’ve had when he wrote it and they kept ignoring me and telling me to shut up.

[manichewitz]

beauty must suffer by keron davis | link

the comments on this video when i saw it on instagram were full of lame fucks who were complaining about this being a ‘waste of pointe shoes’ which pisses me off but anyways im transfixed…the plaster statues of young dancers whose bodies are literally falling apart. the pointe shoes hanging next to a pair of boxing gloves. all the statues having pockets that show theyre hollow on the inside. the overwhelming pile of pink shoes with only a handful in black and brown. this is the first art piece ive ever seen thats about racism in the ballet world, and all of the things black dancers have to deal with in pursuit of the artistic perfection that ballet demands…goddamn. i love contemporary art. im going to be thinking about this for a while

[fonteyn]

Swan Lake's entrance to the Black Swan pas de deux performed by Ekaterina Odarenko as Odile.