Gaîté parisienne (literally "Parisian gaiety") is a 1938 ballet based on music by Jacques Offenbach, arranged by Manuel Rosenthal. The ballet had the original title of Tortoni, after a Paris café, but Rosenthal recalled that Count Étienne de Beaumont, the ballet's librettist, later came up with the ballet's eventual title.[1]
Léonide Massine had originally commissioned this ballet from Roger Désormière, but Désormière was unable to fulfill the commission for lack of time, according to Rosenthal.[1] Rosenthal and Désormière were friends, and Désormière asked Rosenthal to take on the commission. Rosenthal was originally not inclined to fulfill this assignment, and initially said to Désormière:
"I don't know Offenbach well; I'm not used to orchestrating the music of other people; I don't want to do it; I don't know Miasine [Massine]".[1]
However, Désormière was insistent enough that Rosenthal eventually accepted the task. Massine directed Rosenthal's selection of the Offenbach excerpts. After the completion of the score, when Rosenthal showed it to Massine, he initially rejected the ballet. Rosenthal then proposed that Igor Stravinsky act as arbitrator over the acceptance of the score, to which Massine agreed. Upon hearing the music, Stravinsky strongly advised Massine to accept Rosenthal's score. However, because of the poor relations between Massine and Rosenthal, Rosenthal himself did not conduct the first performance of the ballet, and instead Efrem Kurtz was conductor for the ballet's premiere, which was on 5 April 1938 at the Théâtre de Monte Carlo.[1][2] Massine danced the role of the Peruvian tourist in the premiere.
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The full ballet, as well as a concert suite, has been frequently performed and recorded. Efrem Kurtz, who conducted the world premiere, recorded some of the music for Columbia Records on 78-rpm discs. In 1947, Arthur Fiedler and the Boston Pops Orchestra recorded the ballet for RCA Victor; this high fidelity recording was later issued by RCA as its first 33-1/3 rpm LP in 1950. In 1954, Fiedler recorded the concert suite in stereo, his first stereophonic session for RCA. Rosenthal himself made four recordings of the ballet.[1]
In 1941, Warner Bros. produced a Technicolor version of the ballet as staged by the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo, featuring many of the original cast members, including Léonide Massine and Frederic Franklin. Directed by Jean Negulesco, this film was included as a "Warner Night at the Movies" bonus feature on the 3-DVD set of The Maltese Falcon.
In 1954, Victor Jessen recorded the ballet on film, which has subsequently been released on video.
The setting is the Café Tortoni, in Paris during the Second Empire. The ballet does not have a conventional narrative.
Various members from all levels of society meet, including upper-class aristocrats, high society-ladies, as well as a lower-class flower girl, along with the professional can-can dancers. The glove seller becomes the attention for various rival suitors, including a baron and an officer. Another suitor is a Peruvian tourist with two carpetbags, full of jewelry, hoping to make his fortune in Paris. In due course, a quarrel between the customers ensues. After order is restored, the ballet culminates in a high-spirited can-can, the celebrated can-can from Orpheus in the Underworld. However, with the "Barcarolle" from Les contes d'Hoffmann as the featured music after the can-can, the café customers disperse and the café closes for the evening. The ballet ends as the Peruvian is left alone, ready to search for new adventures.
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