Alexander Gorsky Russian Choreographer - Essay Example

Alexander Gorsky was one of the most famous ballet-masters of the beginning of 20th century. His contribution to ballet is often compared with revolution made by Fokine. Alexander Gorsky broke traditional attitude to choreography, implemented his own view of ballet, established groundings of ballet popularity in Russia. His achievements in ballet were not limited to establishment of dramatically oriented realism, he also managed to develop his own school of ballet teaching. In the essay I will describe and analyse Alexander Gorsky's life, his choreography, country he lived in, and influences of other choreographers and on other choreographers. Alexander Gorsky as a dancer. The future ballet star was born in St.Petersburg on August 6, 1971. His father was a accountant, but he had very strange hobbies as for man painting, embroidery. He didn't embroidered simple monograms on kerchiefs but very difficult religious pictures. Such interests of the father inoculated in Alexander Gorsky a taste in the beautiful. Alexander was never intended to enter ballet school, his mother wanted him to study in a school of commerce but a chance changed his life. In 1879 he accompanied his sister to the Imperial School of Ballet in St. Petersburg where she was to pass examination. During his sister examination he tried to imitate her moves and the school inspector invited him to join ballet class. (Walter Archibald Propert, 1932) Thus Alexander started his ballet career at the School of Ballet. Only a year after that Alexander Gorsky was invited to the junior class guided by Platon Karsavin who was the father of the famous prima Tamara Karsavina. Very soon Gorsky gained ballet scholarship and continued his education with such contemporaries as N. I. Volkov and Marius Patipa. In 1889 Alexander Gorsky graduated and became a part of the ballet world. The next ten year he spent as a soloist of the St. Petersburg ballet. He was involved in a wide range of ballets: main roles in La Fille Mal Gardee" and The Magic Flute", Awakening" as well as separate roles in Tannhauser", Casse-Noisette". In 1900 Alexander Gorsky reached the top level in his dancing career - he was promoted to premier dancer of the St.Petersburg Ballet. Though his fame influenced his dancing life, on 9 September, 1900 he was sent to the Moscow Ballet as a choreographer (even despite of the fact that he was eager to keep dancing). Alexander Gorsky as a director. The end of the 19th century and beginning of the 20th century were characterized by a recovery period of the arts in Moscow, only ballet didn't experience any advances. The Moscow Ballet suffered the longest decline in its history. The theatre didn't have position of choreographer, even in the staff list; popularity of the theater was so low that hall was seldom filled to a one-third; and the company of the theatre included only 70 dancers. The only functioning department of the Moscow Ballet was the ballet school, for the most part due to the talents and enthusiasm of V. Tikhomirov and I. Nikitin. Nevertheless the Moscow Ballet required strong manager-director to change the situation with attendance and the theater repertory. Alexander Gorsky started on the position of the Moscow Ballet' choreographer with famous ballet Don Quixote". Actually it wasn't a new development but a revision of Petipa's version. Alexander Gorsky spent 18 months to prepare the ballet for staging. He invited the famous painters Korovin and Golovin to develop design and produce scene settings and dressing for dancers. Gorsky managed to revive atmosphere of Spain in the ballet. Although I must admit that Gorsky staging of Don Quixote" was quite different to Petipa's one, he left some sections without a change. Gorsky interpreted ballet as an instrument in understanding a unity of artistism and performance. Don Quixote" was staged in 1900 and it became the herald of the Moscow Ballet recovery. In spite of the mixed comments of ballets critics, the theatre attendance began to increase. The next great project of Alexander Gorsky was Swan Lake". This ballet hadn't been staged since 1877, when original version collapsed and lost its attractiveness among audience. Gorsky didn't revise the whole ballet, he worked with sketches of Patipa-Ivanov version. He only changed the first and third acts, where he moved away from the symmetry of the dance groups, implemented a number of personal character scenes to show a contrast with the lyrical scenes, assigned a direction in the development of the story, and added some expressiveness to the classic ballet. (Cyril Beaumont, 1952) Alexander Gorsky as a teacher. Alexander Gorsky began his teacher career as an instructor assistant of the St.Petesburg Ballet School headed by Paul Gerdt. Here he worked closely with Vladimir Stepanov, who had invented notation education system in ballet, and after death of Stepanov Alexander Gorsky kept n development of the notation system and its implementation in the real life. Gorsky received a chance to use his notation system in staging of The Sleeping Beauty" in the Moscow Imperial Theatre where he was invited in 1898. The ballet was showed to the wide public in 1899 and in the programme of the ballet it was stated "according to dance notations based on the system of V. I. Stepanov." (The Dance Encyclopedia, 1967) The success of The Sleeping Beauty" reproduction encouraged Gorsky to proceed experimenting with notation system. He decided to create a ballet using notation and stage it in St. Petersburg. In April, 1899 he staged Chlorinda, the Queen of the Mountain Fairies" at the ballet school show. All attendants received an explanation of the ballet where it was written that the ballet "the first attempt at composing a ballet...on paper by use of the alphabet of movement invented by V. I. Stepanov. The roles were rehearsed from written-out parts, similar to those used in opera during the current school year." (The Dance Encyclopedia, 1967) Starting from 1904, Gorsky delivered regular classes in the ballet school - he always said that the main aim of his teaching was development individual creativity in the future ballet dancers. In staging and teaching processes Gorsky widely used photography as a tool of control and screening for ballet and he practiced it himself. Gorsky made photos of his actors as he taught. While describing classical dance in his written works he he used many pictures to illustrate his ideas but unfortunately his notes where lost during the Revolution in Russia. Gorsky participated in many photo shooting sessions. And I must admit very thing that Alexander Gorsky apprehended photos not just as an instrument to fold a dance, but as a kind of art, extension of ballet dance, with its own peculiarities. In 1907-1909 Alexander Gorsky published the album "Photographic studies of choreography", it was peak of his photo work. As a result came the creation in the years 1907-1909 of the album "Photographic studies of choreography". (Elisabeth Souritz, 1999) Along with choreographic practices, Gorsky worked in several public organizations linked with the ballet and tried to improve the level of ballet teaching, as well as to arise creativity. Gorsky was a chief choreographer of the Bolshoi in 1902-24, representing the special "Moscow ballet style", staging showing to the public ballets, which was later named as artistic ballets. He was a very talented person and was good in painting, writing, acting and music. Alexander Gorsky died in September 1924. References: 1. The Dance Encyclopedia. Compiled and edited by Anatole Chujoy and P. W. Manchester, Simon and Schuster, New York, 1967. 2. The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Ballet, Horst Koegler, Oxford University Press, London, 1977. 3. The Ballet Called Swan Lake. Cyril Beaumont, 1952. 4. The Great History of the Russian Ballet: Its Art and Choreography, Elisabeth Souritz, Paul Andre (Editor), Parkstone Press Ltd, 1999. 5. The Russian ballet, Walter Archibald Propert, Greenberg 1932. Read More