It’s well known that Stravinsky borrowed tunes from Lanner for the ballerina in Petrushka. I knew about the Schönbrunner waltz Op. 200 [link to score], but I was pleased to find the other tune on page two of the Steyrische Tänze Op. 165 [link to score].
The Steyrische Tänze Op. 165 by Lanner – source of one of the ballerina tunes in Petrushka
This is why I love IMSLP – it gives you a chance to recover sources like this. I can remember reading a book or programme note about Petrushka that said in a supercilious tone Stravinsky was caricaturing the facile melodies of Lanner’s waltzes, and in a sentence like that, Lanner gets pushed further to the bottom of the heap of composers that one is not supposed to like, or even look at – you can just rely on some secondary source to tell you what to think. I’m not saying that when you look at it again, you realise that Lanner was a master composer and this is a wonderful piece – but I do like to have the opportunity to hear this music without the modernist composer’s, musicologist’s or critic’s sneer all over it (hear it for yourself here.) It opens with a waltz in 3 bar phrases (like the Glinka Valse Fantaisie), and is really rather nice.
The only reason I found it was because I’ve realised that the Steyrische (or “Styrian”) has got just the right degree of turgidness for a certain kind of ronds de jambe exercise, so I was hunting around IMSLP to see if there were any good ones to add to the repertoire. I’ve played the Schönbrunner waltz several times in class, and no-one’s ever said “That’s Petrushka!” so I wonder if they’d notice if you played this. Of course, if they did, the nice thing is that they’d think you were playing Stravinsky, so you could put on your Stravinsky face and make out that it was really hard.
I’ve also played “Po dikim stepyam Zabaikalya” which is also quoted in Petrushka, and no-one’s ever noticed either the folk song or thought it was from Petrushka (they’ve not noticed the other folk tune – Я вечор млада во пиру была – that I play sometimes, either).