The worst ballet class music in the world #1
A long time ago, my friend and colleague Susie Cooper and I had a lot of fun trying to think of the worst possible music for certain exercises in a…
A list of ballet music surprises
Another list-on-a-page post – this time, it’s a collection of my 2009 Advent Calendar posts which were ‘musical surprises’ from the world of ballet music. The ‘surprises’ are probably one…
Yet another French song in The Nutcracker
I don’t know how I could have left this out of my ‘borrowings in the Nutcracker’ posts. The opening tune of Mère Gigogne is the French nursery rhyme Giroflé girofla.…
Music for ballet class, circa 1921
Kosloff's "Russian Ballet Technique, as Taught", published in 1921, contains a one-page guide to matching appropriate music to exercises in a typical ballet class of the day. For teachers and…
The Scotch Snap: everything you needed to know, and a hundred more questions
Scotch Snaps: The Big Picture from Philip Tagg on Vimeo. This is probably the most interesting video I’ve ever seen on a musical question. If you want to know why,…
Tchaikovsky’s Großvater
Tchaikovsky’s Großvater: two sources The source of Tchaikovsky’s Großvater (the “grandfather dance” in the party scene in Act 1 of The Nutcracker, and the tune that Schumann quotes in Carnaval…