Legend of love
The director of the wonderful play “The Legend of Love” is Y. Grigorovich, the music for it was written by A. Melikov. The noisy premiere took place at the Mariinsky Theater in 1961, and four years later viewers were able to see it at the Bolshoi Theater. The performance remained in the repertoire for thirty-four years; tickets for it never stayed at the theater box office for long. The performers changed several times, and the attitude towards the production itself also changed. At first it was recognized as almost a sexual revolution in the art of ballet, but over time it began to be perceived much more calmly.
An updated version of the play was presented in 2014, and the Bolshoi Theater again introduced it into its repertoire. The fairy-tale plot tells the story of the beautiful queen Mekhmene Banu, who sacrificed her beauty to save her sister’s life. She is forced to hide her face under a burqa and suffer from love for Ferkhad, a young artist. By ordering tickets for this wonderful production, viewers will be able to find out how this story ends.
The directors managed to create a wonderful performance; the audience will definitely appreciate the wonderful music, wonderful design and excellent performance of the parts by the best soloists of the troupe.
Arif Melikov
Legend of love
Ballet in three acts 12+
Duration: 2 hours 50 minutes.
The performance has two intermissions.
Libretto by Nazim Hikmet and Yuri Grigorovich
Choreographer - Yuri Grigorovich
Production designer: Simon Virsaladze
Lighting designer: Mikhail Sokolov
Stage conductor: Pavel Sorokin
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The Legend of Love at the Bolshoi Theater
The history of the creation of the ballet Legend of Love is not entirely ordinary. The libretto for this work was written by the famous Turkish poet, playwright and public figure Nazim Hikmet. The libretto was written by Hikmet based on his own play Ferhad and Shirin, created in the 40s, when the playwright was imprisoned for political reasons. In his work, Hikmet was based on the poem of the classic of Persian poetry Nizami Ganjavi Khosrow and Shirin.
In 1958, the young Azerbaijani composer Arif Melikov began work on the ballet. The premiere took place on March 23, 1961 at the Kirov Theater, staged by choreographer Yuri Grigorovich, with scenography created by Simon Virsaladze. In 1965, Yuri Grigorovich brought the ballet to the Bolshoi Theater stage. Productions were also created in Baku, Novosibirsk and Prague. In 2014, the ballet Legend of Love returned to the stage of the Bolshoi Theater in original choreography.
| Anna Gordeeva. . "The Legend of Love" can be seen again at the Bolshoi ( News Time, 04/26/2002).
Tatiana Kuznetsova. . Both were shown at the Bolshoi Theater ( Kommersant, 04/26/2002). Maya Krylova. . Return of Yuri Grigorovich's oriental ballet ( NG, 04/26/2002). Leila Guchmazova. Taking an objective approach, it is impossible to understand why there is so much fuss around the Bolshoi Theater's "Legend of Love" ( Time MN, 04/26/2002). Elena Ryumina. . Return of Yuri Grigorovich's play to the Bolshoi Theater ( Vedomosti, 04/26/2002). Elena Gubaidullina. ( Izvestia, 04/26/2002). Svetlana Naborshchikova. . "The Legend of Love" returned to the Bolshoi Theater ( New news, 04/26/2002). Olga Gerdt. . "The Legend of Love" was returned to the repertoire ( Newspaper, 04/26/2002). Natalia Zvenigorodskaya. . Yuri Grigorovich's performance awakened nostalgia for the golden age of our ballet ( Trud-7, 04/30/2002). Violetta Mainiece. . Grigorovich once again entered the same river ( Culture, 05/16-22/2002). |
Legend of love. Big theater. Press about the performance
Vremya Novostei, April 26, 2002
Anna Gordeeva
Well forgotten old
"The Legend of Love" can be seen again at the Bolshoi
“On Sunday, during the benefit performance of our ballet prima donna, Ms. Vazem, the ancient ballet was given for the first time since its resumption Virgin of the Danube" That is, not on Sunday, but on Wednesday, the prima donna has nothing to do with it, and not “The Virgin of the Danube” at all, but “The Legend of Love”. But the current premiere of the Bolshoi Theater can easily provoke a ballet critic into the turn of the century before last. The newspaper workaholics of that time wrote about not only premieres or visits of famous touring performers - every everyday performance received a response in the press the next morning. And it is only possible to review “Legend” by talking about the actor’s work already seen. Because this is not a premiere at all.
For the first time, Yuri Grigorovich staged a ballet to the music of Arif Melikov in 1961 at the Mariinsky (then Kirov) Theater. Four years later he moved the performance to the Bolshoi. Then, in the sixties, it was an event, a shock, a sexual revolution in ballet. Queen Mekhmene-Banu, who gave her beauty to a wandering sorcerer in exchange for the recovery of her sister, who forever covered her face with a scarf and hopelessly fell in love with the court artist, had erotic dreams, and she arched painfully into the “bridge.” His sister - Princess Shirin - also paid attention to Ferkhad, without thinking twice, ran to him in the garden, and the duet, in which the dancer was lifted upside down, and her legs opened at the top in a split, made many guardians of morality hiss (the same pose was “dreamed about” and Mekhmene-Banu - as if a choreographer was repeating the movement for those who did not believe their eyes). The social pathos placed in the third act of the play (where Ferkhad abandons both sisters for the sake of laying a water supply in his native village) then ran through the eyes, like quotes from leaders in decent scientific books.
“The Legend of Love” ran at the Bolshoi Theater for thirty-four years. The cast changed (at the premiere, Plisetskaya was the queen, Natalya Bessmertnova was her sister, Maris Liepa was Ferkhad). The country was changing. Concepts of decency. Ideas about ballet. Three and a half years ago, “Legend” was removed from the repertoire. Now they have returned - with the same scenery and costumes of Virsaladze, with the same performers who worked in the last season before the temporary resignation.
The role of Mekhmene-Banu was played by Nadezhda Gracheva. The most reliable, stable and self-confident ballerina of the Bolshoi has one significant drawback: her heroines of noble blood are often so “forgotten” that it seems you meet them in a communal kitchen. And now - what a queen there is, a mixture of pride and melancholy! A simple Russian woman with an unsettled fate. The rigid graphics of arrogant poses lost their sharpness, all the lines “floated” and became simpler. And only the signature number - fouetté - was performed flawlessly. Anna Antonicheva, a restrained, reserved, sometimes almost impassive ballerina, got the role of Princess Shirin. Antonicheva's high-born persons are usually successful - but here Grigorovich staged not just a part for a princess, but a part for a girl-princess, the embodiment of spring, whose very naivety and clear beauty justifies the absolute ruthlessness of the fate of Mekhmene-Banu. The whole role is radiance, trembling, trembling fingers. With Antonicheva it comes out somewhat ponderously, every gesture is too emphasized and accentuated.
The eye rests only on Ferkhad - Nikolai Tsiskaridze. The artist understands the title of the ballet - “The Legend of Love” in a unique way: his hero is not in love with either Mekhmene-Banu or Shirin. Tsiskaridze selflessly lifts the ladies onto the upper supports, turns them around and quite carefully puts them in place - but there is not a drop of passion in these gymnastic exercises. When Ferkhad plays solo, all questions disappear: the artist is in love not with a specific woman, but with a personally invented dream. Well, let this be contrary to the entire plot - Ferkhad’s monologues are made at that technical level when the plot becomes, in principle, unimportant. A circle of jumping around the stage in the chase sequence - and an enthusiastic cry from the audience (and meanwhile, the lover, judging by the difference in tempo, clearly abandoned the girl with whom he was running somewhere halfway).
The absence of an ensemble, an internal connection between the artists, of course, undermines the performance. But whether another lineup can play better is unknown. Still, for the tone of “The Legend of Love” in the days of the first premiere, the feeling of discovery, sensation and overcoming the ban that all the artists experienced forty years ago was very important. And now only the lazy don’t lift ballerinas upside down.
Kommersant, April 26, 2002
"The Legend of Love" as the truth about ballet
The Bolshoi showed both
After a three-season absence, Yuri Grigorovich's ballet "The Legend of Love" triumphantly returned to the stage of the Bolshoi Theater. According to Kommersant columnist TATIANA KUZNETSOVA, this event is not so much cultural as ideological.
The ballet "The Legend of Love" has been on the Bolshoi stage since 1965 for exactly thirty years and three years. During this fabulous time, it faded, faded and somehow went out of fashion. Outbursts of attention to him occurred approximately once every ten years - when a new generation of artists was introduced into the performance. But since none of the followers could compare with the titans who danced the “Legend” in the 60s, interest waned in the most natural way. Just as naturally (and not at all because of the persecution of the then artistic director Vasilyev on the repertoire of the disgraced Grigorovich), the play itself fell off the bill: either they were preparing for the anniversary of the poet Pushkin, or for business trips abroad, or they staged Boris Eifman, George Balanchine and Pierre Lacotte (Pierre Lacotte) ). And when the government changed and Yuri Grigorovich returned to the theater to resume his “Swan Lake”, they decided at the same time to ask him to personally clean up “Legend”. The master and his assistants spent two months cleaning the already dancing cast (for comparison: the unknown Balanchine was staged at the Bolshoi in three weeks). And now a completely ordinary repertoire event is being presented as a great victory for Russian ballet. The freshly rehearsed “Legend” really looked instructive.
Firstly, it became clear why this “modern ballet” immediately after its premiere (in 1961 at the Kirov Theater) achieved recognition from the authorities, critics, and the public. The play by the Turk Nazim Hikmet, written in capitalist dungeons, set to music by the Azerbaijani Arif Melikov, was staged by the Russian Yuri Grigorovich as a poem about the struggle between feelings and duty. Duty, of course, won: the young man Ferkhad rejected the love of Princess Shirin, so that, having crushed a mountain, he would give his native people drink (after such an ideologically correct ballet, one could calmly award the 38-year-old choreographer the main theater of the country). Aesthetes of that time were captivated by the oriental “conventional” plasticity, harsh direction, asceticism of scenography and costumes (artist Simon Virsaladze), seeing in all this an ideological rebuff to the hateful choreodrama. The mass audience also did not have to be re-educated: the ballet turned out to be narrative and publicly accessible. The heroes opened their hearts to their loved ones, milking their left breast and spilling out the invisible contents at the feet of the chosen one; With a ladle of outstretched fingers they scooped up “love” from under their feet and brought it to their mouth. In general, only a fool would not understand who is good, who is bad, and what is happening.
Secondly, it became obvious that the remaining five original ballets of the Soviet classic are carbon copies of “Legends of Love.” The rigid scheme of the performance (four protagonists, each with their own corps de ballet and their own monologue; each mass shock scene is accompanied by a contrasting lyrical one) worked flawlessly and was capable of replication. The sparse vocabulary also turned out to be sufficient: Yuri Grigorovich spent a quarter of a century transferring from performance to performance all these reverses, upper supports, large batmans, falls to the knee - right down to the characteristic gestures, the same in the Vizier, Crassus, and Ivan the Terrible.
Thirdly, it became clear why Moscow artists have been dancing dirty for decades. The coarse grind of Grigorovich's choreography, on which generations have grown up, requires neither distinct positions, nor turnout, nor sophistication - only strength and endurance. And also a special pretentious frenzy (previously it was called obsession), for which the distinctness of the dance is even harmful. Dancers have this very obsession - and you can not pay attention to clubbed feet, a broken pirouette, a screwed up chene; but if it is not there, any performance by Yuri Grigorovich immediately turns into a primitive poster. Well, sort of like Vysotsky’s songs, which can only be listened to in his own hysterical performance.
Today's artists (from the corps de ballet to the premieres) worked as diligently as they have never worked for any Balanchine, Eifman, and especially Lacotte. Polished by tutors, brought up from infancy on the fact that the world had not yet created better choreography than this, they performed the familiar Grigorovich steps as a high ritual. But things are bad with the Vysotskys now - time has passed. Balletomanes can argue who is better - the graceful Nikolai Tsiskaridze or the athletic Dmitry Belogolovtsev, the long-legged Anna Antonicheva or the compact Marianna Ryzhkina, the confident Nadezhda Gracheva or the stunned Maria Allash. Everyone jumped, spun, worried and, as best they could, tried to match the legendary predecessors. Only Gennady Yanin, who was not burdened with reverence, was able to revive his role: despite the frankly tricky nature of the part, his hunchbacked, lame jester was stunned, like an unexpected person from the underworld.
And still, “The Legend of Love” was doomed to success. The audience, brought up on Grigorovich, reacted to the performance like Pavlov’s dog to the usual stimuli: circus upper support (whether in a split, “on a chair”) - applause, fouetté - stormy applause, jete en tournant at a fast pace, two circles - ovation. Like in a happy childhood, when Soviet ballet was a support in difficult times, when, as it is said in the booklet, “they knew how to win and be on horseback.” And to feel like you’re on top again, you just need to bring Grigorovich back to the theater. He was placed on a pedestal a year ago - after the resumption of Swan Lake. Then it didn’t work out; the production turned out to be very unclear and boring. "Legend" is more suitable for raising the national spirit. And now the choreographer with the star of the Hero of Socialist Labor on his lapel is again brought to the forefront. The hall roars, flowers fly, the master imperiously drives the corps de ballet herd to the ramp. "Groundhog Day" of some kind, by God.
Nezavisimaya Gazeta, April 26, 2002
Maya Krylova
Harsh but fair
Return of Yuri Grigorovich's oriental ballet
The young choreographer Yuri Grigorovich staged “The Legend of Love” at the Bolshoi Theater four years after the premiere in Leningrad. When many years later the venerable Grigorovich “left” the Bolshoi Theater, the 1965 ballet was removed from the playbill. Now it has been restored again.
The components of “Legends” are a libretto based on the play by the Turkish communist poet Nazim Hikmet, music by Arif Melikov, scenery (a dark fold in the form of a huge book) by Simon Virsaladze. Experts in Islam find hidden Sufi motifs that came into the ballet from the literary source - the poems of Navoi and Nizami. The events of the parable involve two queen sisters, one handsome architect, the idea of justice and a rock that must be heroically broken through so that there is water in the medieval country.
This ascetic ballet-poster in the spirit and letter of the sixties is considered by many to be Grigorovich’s best production. At the moment of its creation, the performance shocked us with the dialectic of the “objective” fate of the people and the subjectivism of private lives, unprecedented in Stalin’s ballet. No less striking was the almost dissident idea that a person’s life depends on his own choice, and not on the laws of the historical process. But Grigorovich also pleased those who demanded “educational” art from artists: his universe is glorified, and the moral conflict between “I want” and “should” is resolved in favor of duty.
Apologists did not notice the small set of ballet vocabulary and were delighted that the choreographer abolished the synonymity of the concepts of “ballet dramaturgy” and “plot”, abundant everydayisms and dances “about”, replacing them with streams of “generalizing” dances with choreographic leitmotifs. Only the lazy did not mention the Persian miniatures that inspired Grigorovich. Ballet scholars discussed dancing gold, dancing dreams of water and dancing royal wrath - all performed by a female corps de ballet. The audience gasped at the lyrical interludes-culminations, when the masses (sages, mourners, jesters, warriors, desert dwellers, etc.), emotionally shaping the situation or mood, froze in the dark, but the main characters, presented “close-up” in the flows of the local lights continue to act, dancing to project inner feelings outward. Grigorovich used here a fashionable European artistic technique: he built two streams of time, objective time and subjective time, the pace of which is regulated by the nuances of “I” experiences. Of course, now all these innovations of Thaw romanticism are long-standing traditions. But the masterfully staged mass build-up scenes still impress: the procession of the first act and the famous chase of the second - the purest chronotope according to Bakhtin, time and space, revealing each other in a single plastic whole.
The performers' task is to strictly follow the graphics of the plastic ornament, which is simple in dance but intense in physical training, and to observe Grigorovich's former ban on fussing with one's face (almost no one does). Gennady Yanin (Jester) and Mark Peretokin (Vizir) dance closest to ideal. Nikolai Tsiskaridze (architect Ferkhad), in a conversation with me, described the metamorphoses of his hero, who went from being an artist to a stonemason, with the phrase: “It’s like forcing a pianist to sculpt bricks.” Nadezhda Gracheva (Queen Mekhmene-Banu) and Anna Antonicheva (her sister Shirin) portray what they should: a tigress and a gazelle. The soloists do not have the required plastic calligraphy, at the same time elastic and flowing, like Arabic alphabet.
Today has made adjustments to the perception of the once innovative ballet. What was previously considered laconic and succinct in dance and scenography is now naive. However, the picturesquely raised hands at the wrists, multiple power lifts and the ballet East without oriental floridity received warm approval from the public. Our viewers have been brought up on the harsh simplicity of Grigorovich for decades. “Legend” for them is not some meandering opus of the over-intellectual Forsythe or Neumayer.
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New stars in old scenes |
Vremya MN, April 26, 2002
Leila Guchmazova
Myth and "Legend..."
Taking an objective approach, it is impossible to understand why there is so much fuss around the Bolshoi Theater's "Legend of Love".
We will have to remember that our pioneer childhood was spent not on Balanchine and Forsythe, but on the living classic of Soviet ballet Yuri Grigorovich and the works of critics with detailed hosannas to him. And also forget what inheritance we are giving up
The new “Legend...” was not a premiere, it was danced in both main theaters, only in the Bolshoi it fell off the bill for a short time. Therefore, the work of resuscitating it is not at all the same as what the troupe faces when recalling Balanchine’s “Symphony in C Major”. The soloists love him for the chance to show off their acting talent (especially the moans of the unloved queen Mekhmene Banu) and with the opportunity they were glad to dance the performance “on the side,” and the corps de ballet in their benefit performance handled the chase scene, wanting to appear in the best light. In general, “Legend...”, like other works of the only father of the Bolshoi Ballet for thirty years, always remains an armored train on a siding.
Nevertheless, the Bolshoi stars - Nadezhda Gracheva, Anna Antonicheva and Nikolai Tsiskaridze, “created for this role” - were not pleased with the revelations and did not overshadow the quality of the performance with the acting. Even those who saw the great trinity of the first performers Plisetskaya - Bessmertnova - Liepa only in recordings were disappointed. Except that the corps de ballet perked up: the ballet masses love a strong hand, especially a familiar one.
On "Legend..." young Grigorovich rode into the Bolshoi Theater in 1965, as if on a white horse. Today it is easy to guess both the age of the performance and its time, which played a joke on it precisely because it was a pure avant-garde. Who would give a head start to all the current masters of iron piles is the artist Simon Virsaladze: black box, exquisite light, the Koran revealed as a universe of scenery. And Grigorovich’s dance symphonism, which was so diligently postulated and sung, broke exactly into two parts. The first one is terribly painful. Dancing streams of water and disadvantaged people are adequate to the norms of Soviet ballet “to creatively comprehend the achievements of the classics,” Mehmene Banu’s vision literally quotes the masterpiece appearance of shadows in Petipa’s “La Bayadère.” The other half is what Grigorovich was recognized as talented and loved for, and now his merits are honored and forgiven. In the chase scene, he made us not notice the birth defect of Soviet ballet: when the dance was obliged to “tell a story,” and he, as a pure abstraction, protested, Grigorovich told the story precisely through the dance of masterfully constructed ballet masses. However, the plot of "Legend..." fit perfectly into the official ideology, dancing the primacy of the personal over the public and duty over calling. The romance of the Soviet sixties rested in duets and monologues, and the power of Grigorovich’s ballet tyrants even then puzzled the most perspicacious.
A wit from a ballet forum decided that “Legend...” is the Bolshoi Theater’s answer to skinheads. For readers of the “Culture” strip, the relevance is different: Gitis’s friend, an “advanced” adherent of the choreographer Grigorovich, seems to me similar to Dima Olshansky. By and large, the question is not whether there was a boy, but what is meant by a boy. Of course, not “The Legend of Love,” a masterpiece of Russian ballet of the 60s. And not the person of Yuri Grigorovich - there is no odiousness, since nine out of ten living greats have outlived their creative potential. The main question, and in the context of the new personnel shake-ups at the Bolshoi, is terribly relevant: does the resumed performance mean that it will be followed by a reconquista of Soviet ballet or is it a strategic ploy to keep the sheep-soloists safe and the wolves of the “golden age of Grigorovich” fed?
It seems that even the Bolshoi Theater does not know the answer.
Vedomosti, April 26, 2002
Elena Ryumina
Big legend
Return of Yuri Grigorovich's play to the Bolshoi Theater
The anniversary of the ballet's creator, Yuri Grigorovich, which took place in January and was not celebrated at the Bolshoi Theater, could have become an ideal occasion to turn the revival of the performance into a political action - it was in such an atmosphere that Swan Lake was performed a year ago. But the return to the stage of the choreographer’s most perfect creation turned out to be primarily an artistic event.
The living characters from the "Ballet" encyclopedia who filled the hall turned into the entourage of the premiere. In the royal box appeared John Neumeier, the cult modern choreographer who heads the Hamburg Ballet, who in the context of the premiere was interpreted as Grigorovich’s most consistent and most successful Western student. Neumeier's love for complex literary plots, his own system of views on the surrounding reality, which provokes critics to call him a choreographer-philosopher, the director's ability to construct a composition and form the individual language of each character are evidence that he studied Grigorovich's performances long before his current visit to Moscow.
For Western choreographers, “The Legend of Love” became a textbook immediately after its premiere, which took place in 1961 at the Leningrad Opera and Ballet Theater named after Kirov. Then the appearance of the performance, created by 34-year-old choreographer Yuri Grigorovich based on Persian legends, not only recorded the birth of a talented master of composing dances: “The Legend of Love” finally discredited the idea of Soviet choreographers to turn ballet into a reproduction of “The Actor’s Work on Oneself” with music and dances.
From time to time the performance is danced abroad even now - as a sophisticated exercise in the old style. In Russia, "The Legend of Love" for a quarter of a century remained not just the most modern, but also the most relevant ballet - one of the few performances in which everyone could dance their own legends of love. The greatest dancers of the Bolshoi Theater filled it with their energy.
In the first minutes, the restored performance looks almost unfamiliar, although the adjustments made by the choreographer are noticeable only to those who took the text of “Legend” in the classical heritage course at the choreographer’s department. But the harsh cloth, lamps and the doors of a huge book open on stage, made by artist Simon Virsaladze in the laconic style of the 60s, huge mass processions and the legendary trio of main characters, duets and monologues created by Grigorovich, remained in their places. It’s just that the current premiere marked the long-awaited onset of new times and the transition of “The Legend of Love” to the category of classics. They dance it not badly, but carefully, concentratedly and detachedly - like Petipa or Balanchine, putting into the text not emotional outbursts, but all professionalism and a sense of responsibility.
This does not kill “The Legend of Love” - it simply takes on a new meaning, which is what distinguishes a masterpiece from a good performance. Staged at the height of Khrushchev's thaw, that "Legend" was a play about the artist Ferkhad, who made his choice between personal feelings and duty to the people. Now, without changing the text, but having lost the oriental bliss, it has been transformed into a ballet about the great queen Mekhmene Banu (Nadezhda Gracheva), whose soul is corroded not so much by unrequited love as by limitless power.
Izvestia, April 26, 2002
Elena Gubaidullina
The best ballet by Yuri Grigorovich has been resumed
“The Legend of Love” was born more than forty years ago at the Kirov (now Mariinsky) Theater. Soon the ballet appeared at the Bolshoi and did not leave its posters for several decades. It was included in all the anthologies and encyclopedias on the history of choreography and almost risked remaining in history. At the Bolshoi Theater, “The Legend of Love” was forgotten for four whole years (for the fleeting art of ballet, this is a considerable period). Luckily, we caught it in time. Yuri Grigorovich himself worked on the renewal, restoring the performance practically without changes. The author of the music, Azerbaijani composer Arif Melikov, came to the premiere. Pavel Sorokin was at the conductor's stand.
The public warmly welcomed the returned "Legend". They began to applaud already during the action - the audience responded to the appearance of the soloists, and to the pompous crowd scenes, and to the beauty of the ornamental movements. Each act ended with a standing ovation, and the final bows lasted almost a quarter of an hour accompanied by incessant “bravos”. During one of the intermissions, I managed to talk with John Neumeier, who was present at the premiere. The enthusiastic director of the Hamburg Ballet admitted that Grigorovich's performance made a stunning impression on him.
The secret of the popularity of "The Legend of Love" is in the paradoxical combination of majestic monumentality and entertaining intrigue. The intense drama of the ballet, based on Nazim Hikmet's play, contains a love triangle, mysticism, exciting chases, and exploits. Nadezhda Gracheva (Mekhmene Banu), Anna Antonicheva (Shirin) and Nikolai Tsiskaridze (Ferkhad) somewhat toned down the pathos that was constant in Soviet ballet. They preferred pure dance, ornate and complex, to passions and emotions. The languid curves of the body, the broken lines of the arms, and the intricate jumps seemed like letters of Arabic script, as if they had come out of a giant tome.
Direct speech
Natalya BESSMERTNOVA, assistant choreographer, People's Artist of the USSR, first performer of the role of Shirin at the Bolshoi Theater:
I am very glad that “The Legend of Love” has returned to the stage. Ballet is interesting for the artists, and I hope for the audience too. This is one of the most expensive performances for me, I really loved the role of Shirin. And now, when I worked with our ballerinas, I tried to convey to them what Yuri Nikolaevich demanded from us when he staged the performance. In "Legend" everything is important - the style, the choreography, the emotional intensity, the expressiveness, and the feelings that overwhelm the characters. The viewer must be captivated by what is happening on stage, must empathize, and not just watch the dances. I'm pleased with the performers. I would like to wish them success and even greater insight into their images.
New news, April 26, 2002
Svetlana Naborshchikova
Grigorovich's lesson
"The Legend of Love" returned to the Bolshoi Theater
In the early 60s, the drama of the same name by the Turkish poet Nazim Hikmet made the rounds on many stages in the country. But only the ballet version of the play - the most conventional and farthest from the word - has survived to this day. She saw the light at the Mariinsky Theater, then, when Yuri Grigorovich received the position of chief choreographer of the main theater, she made her debut on the Bolshoi stage. After the choreographer left, the ballet, without its master's eye, began to wither and eventually disappeared. Fortunately, not for long. Grigorovich returned, showing “Swan Lake”, and restored “The Legend of Love”. The event is remarkable, since “Legend” is not only the master’s best ballet, but also, without exaggeration, one of the most significant performances of the past century. In the 41 years since the premiere, few works have appeared in the ballet world that can compete on equal terms with the magnificent creation of Grigorovich and his co-authors: librettist Hikmet, artist Simon Virsaladze, composer Arif Melikov.
The result of their collaboration is stunning in its capacity of content and laconicism of form. This is truly a work of “one breath”, where, thanks to the harmony of complementary and shading artistic wills, the synthesis of drama, music, painting and dance acquires full and complete expression. It is no coincidence that the performance opens with a short overture of only five chords (the Bolshoi orchestra under the direction of Pavel Sorokin was for some reason embarrassed to give the powerful fortissimo envisaged by Melikov): each, according to the composer, is dedicated to one of the directors (the fifth is the conductor of the Leningrad premiere of Niyazi), who worked so hard together and with such dedication that the difference in age and titles was unnoticeable.
The script, as befits an oriental legend, is simple and elegant. Queen Mekhmene Banu sacrifices her beauty to save her sister Shirin and loses a possible lover - the artist Ferkhad, who preferred Shirin. The lovers try to escape, but in vain. As a result, the sisters are doomed to loneliness, and Ferkhad goes to the mountains to get water for the thirsty people. The story of the unquenched passion of a cruel ruler unfolds against the backdrop of a single setting - an ancient manuscript, from the pages of which the heroes emerge. The scene of action is indicated by sparse details: painted cypress trees and the stylized dome of the minaret are the palace garden, the colorful pattern of the carpet is the queen’s chambers. The flickering rays of hanging vases-lamps do not disturb the mysterious twilight (after it, the bright lighting of ceremonial processions seems even more dazzling). The contrasts of the stage atmosphere coincide with the emotional changes of the music: militant marches give way to scherzo interludes and melancholy meditations. The work of a gifted student of the Azerbaijani classic Kara Garayev honorably solves the main task of the ballet score: it does not pretend to be a leader, does not overwhelm with its own concept, but dissolves in the action, avoiding “undercurrents” and subtexts. There are enough of the latter in the direction of “Legend”, in which student choreographers have long been trained in the ability to create a tense pulse of alternating episodes and frames, and make good use of close-ups, internal monologues, dissolves and other techniques of film dramaturgy. The performance also teaches how to build “multi-tiered” climaxes, marked by musical and choreographic cohesion. The climax of the first act is especially good: the multidirectional royal procession. In the orchestral tutti of its finale, the participants - warriors, horsemen, nobles and standard-bearers - are united in an emphatically symmetrical formation, deliberately rigid after the whimsical play of rhythms and trajectories (strong and precise work by the male corps de ballet led by the charismatic Mark Peretokin - Vizier).
Finally, “Legend” is an example of a dance performance through and through, but this is a separate topic. It is difficult to imagine that once the issue of performing the splits by a ballerina who is held upside down was decided at a high party level, and the prima of the Leningrad stage Natalya Dudinskaya stated that even if she had been asked to dance such a horror, she would still have refused. Today, "horror" - an exquisite combination of ornamentation ("oriental" hands with gracefully grouped fingers, finely trembling hands) and acrobatics (bridges, vertical splits, "boats", "candles") - looks very modern. And the choreographer’s demand not to “fuss around” with his face, not to play anything, completely trusting the expressiveness of the plastic drawing, is completely consistent with the current priority of form and lines.
Nature gave Nikolai Tsiskaridze plenty of both. And although the artist demonstrates his unique qualities with excessive generosity, you involuntarily accept his Ferkhad, recklessly intoxicated with youth and passion. Moreover, the object of love - the gazelle girl Shirin (Anna Antonicheva) - deserves it. Nadezhda Gracheva (Mekhmene Banu), inferior to her partners in the beauty of her build, is not inclined to weave exquisite oriental patterns, emphasizing the self-sufficient statics of poses. The actress is smart and mature, she dances in an emphatically graphic manner and, perhaps more than others, corresponds to the ascetic structure of the performance with its strict economy of expressive means.
After “Legend,” Grigorovich received an offer to create a new ballet for the Bolshoi. Perhaps “Cinderella” or “The Master and Margarita”. Will the next job be another lesson? Let's see.
Newspaper, April 26, 2002
Olga Gerdt
The big one fed him oriental sweets
"The Legend of Love" was returned to the repertoire
In a good way, the performance should have been resumed a year ago - on the fortieth anniversary of “The Legend of Love”. And not at the Bolshoi Theater, where it ran from 1965 to 1998, but at the Mariinsky, where “Legend” was first staged in 1961. Then the performance could be compared with another “oriental sweetness” of the Mariinsky stage - the ballet “The Fountain of Bakhchisarai”. To understand, finally, by contrast, why contemporaries fell in love with “Legend” so much.
This performance is truly a milestone, a turning point and a turning point. Firstly, the characters of the ballet drama stylized as the East spoke the same language for the first time. It’s not like before, when the main characters spoke in the language of classical dance, and the accompanying characters (representatives of various ethnic groups who danced at balls for tone and color) - in the language of the characteristic. For everyone - from the royal sisters, Mekhmene Banu and Shirin, to the last commoner - Grigorovich honestly, in Bolshevik style, shared the same vocabulary, imitating the bends and curls of Arabic script. Without pretensions to historicism, he opened the “East” as a revived book illustration, citing not characters, but masks of folk drama. The characters in Nazim Hikmet's drama appeared from a theatrical screen installed on the stage by artist Simon Virsaladze. The four main characters - Queen Mehmene Ban, Princess Shirin, Vizier and Ferkhad, the court artist - were accompanied by their own retinue. The larger it is, the more multi-tiered it is, the stronger the hero, the more power he has. More - from the queen and the Vizier. In the first act, in the procession scene, the courtiers and warriors take the stage for so long that they seem endless, like the tail of a snake. In the second, in the chase scene, like a boa constrictor around the victim, the rings of capture tighten around the fugitive lovers. In the third, they form multi-figured cascades at the foot of the rock, which Ferkhad is doomed to cut down to extract water.
Forty years later, it is clear that it was precisely this head-on, naive, poster-like opposition of the fragile duet of exiled lovers and the “power structures” pursuing them (Grigorovich’s Evil always looks more attractive, more spectacular and more erotic than Good) that delighted the public no less than love duets, for the first time, without embarrassment, they broadcast sugary oriental eroticism through power acrobatics. But another thing is also clear: if there are not just strong, but different and powerful performers for the four main characters in the theater, there is no one to determine and maintain the force field of the performance. It simply atrophies. Secondly, if you do not understand that the physical ideal of the sixties, the physical culture of that time, can neither be preserved nor purely mechanically transferred to 2002, then restoring the “Legend” is pointless. In the sixties and seventies, in order to destroy the cult of the celestial ballerina, it was enough to throw a veil on an Eastern woman, dress her in sports tights, and force her to stretch out in the splits.
This is not enough for today's artists. They don’t feel like “beauties, Komsomol members and athletes” at the same time. And the tragedies of duality that fed Grigorovich and a whole generation of royal ballerinas, but doomed to sacrifice beauty (like Mekhmene for Shirin), are completely unknown. Nadezhda Gracheva (Mekhmene Banu) conscientiously conveys the feelings and experiences of her heroine. But not the experience of the burqa-clad generation. Another time, another bodily culture, a different ratio of what is permitted and what is not permitted cancels out those small revolutions that turned the gymnastic achievements of ballerinas of past years into erotic revelations. Therefore, no matter how much Anna Antonicheva (Shirin) “snaps” her long beautiful legs in the air, like scissors, it doesn’t get any sweeter.
Probably only Nikolai Tsiskaridze was able to convey the taste of the former “Legend”. His Ferkhad - assertive, impetuous, collected and structured the performance that had crumbled into fragments. True, rather around himself. The audience reacted to the hero's appearances with a fanatical roar. However, she was favorable not only to Tsiskaridze, but also to all participants in the resumption. Because, probably, ballet fans are a special caste. They do not like change and prefer the homely joy of comparison - endless copies with the original source - to moving forward. They would prefer to grumble that “it was better before,” but would never agree to part with the deceased “legend” forever.
Ballet certainly gave them this little pleasure: how to feel the taste of halva by repeating the magic word a hundred times. Particular honor was given to the hero of the holiday - Yuri Grigorovich, who during the intermission tried to enter the hall unnoticed, but was forced to retreat from the claque rushing towards him, like his Ferkhad, who was hiding from the pursuit of the palace retinue. Slava caught up with the maestro during the final applause. It is done. The management of the Bolshoi Theater now has to decide: what to do so that the resumption of the best performance by Grigorovich-Virsaladze does not look like a formal nod to ballet history.
Trud-7, April 30, 2002
Natalia Zvenigorodskaya
Forever living "Legend"
Yuri Grigorovich's performance awakened nostalgia for the golden age of our ballet
The Bolshoi is reopening again. Following "Swan Lake", Yuri Grigorovich restored "The Legend of Love". He first staged this ballet at the Kirov Theater forty-one years ago, and the Moscow premiere took place in April 1965.
They say there is no need to compare, look and judge what exists today. But the action itself, the very fact of its resumption, willy-nilly, makes us look back.
Although the best forces of the current Bolshoi - Grachev, Tsiskaridze, Antonichev - are occupied in the performance, those who remember Bessmertnova, Plisetskaya, Timofeeva, Liepa in this ballet will sigh, and not even furtively.
Who can argue, Nadezhda Gracheva is a super class ballerina. Moreover, she entered a time when, in addition to high technique, genuine drama and true feeling appeared in her dance. But Plisetskaya or Timofeeva in the role of Mekhmene Ban had to, as it were, restrain and curtail the passionate temperament, submitting to the epic form of the performance, and because of this this temperament broke through even more powerfully. Gracheva works to the limit, and the impression is weaker.
Anna Antonicheva is very nice. You can see how long and persistently they put her hands on it, how diligently she follows the prescribed pattern. And it’s impossible not to look back. Don’t remember Shirin - Natalya Bessmertnova. In the bizarre ornamentation of her movements, in the elongated lines of her weightless body, and what have you - in her wrists alone there was everything - both feeling and style.
A young man with the eyes of a wild chamois, Nikolai Tsiskaridze, as always, is fabulously beautiful. It is not surprising that the languid Eastern hermits fell in love with him both at the same time. And when Ferkhad, in an uncontrollable impulse, crosses the stage in flight, you should take off with him... but in your head there is only a tricky thought: Nikolai jumped well today.
This thought does not arise when the secondary characters are on stage: the Vizier and the Jester. Hlestok, graphic Mark Peretokin. His emotions - seething molten metal - do not crush the forged pattern of movements.
The jester of Gennady Yanin is not one of the usual ballet bouncing jesters. An ominous hunchback dressed in scarlet, he flutters across the stage like a living torch. Enchanting, frightening... and yet more enchanting.
Simon Virsaladze’s sets continue to fascinate. They have a strict, unfussy beauty. Colors - black, white, lemon yellow, ash. Also the color of a fireplace glow and a bit of misted gilding. Not a single random color in the costumes.
You can treat Grigorovich any way you like. One cannot dispute the obvious - he is from the cohort of titans. This is especially clear today, in an era of lightness and transience. No, “Legend” will not deceive anyone - she is over forty, and that is certain. However, something else is also certain: the performance is still well-tailored and tightly sewn. The structure is thought out, built by the director to the smallest detail, and if its solidity and monumentality are outdated, they cause nostalgia rather than irritation. It seems that if there were artists today who were able not only technically, but also sensually to withstand roles at the level of the first performers, there would not be that treacherous boredom that creeped up on the premiere.
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Photo by Igor Zakharkin |
Culture, May 16 - 22, 2002
Violetta Mainiece
Legend is more than love
Grigorovich once again entered the same river
"Legend" (Melikov - Grigorovich - Virsaladze) is a strange ballet. There is a lot left unsaid in it, left unsaid from the moment of production. There was no religious theme at all, without which the East is not the East. I think Virsaladze secretly grieved about this - for an intelligent Georgian, the religious roots of the culture of Turkey, Persia, and the East in general are obvious. And yet, the directors “dragged” a certain mysterious figure (a Sufi dervish doctor) into the ballet, calling him the Stranger. And then they deliberately cut off the “forbidden motive”: under Soviet rule, as is known, neither gods nor prophets existed. Just like oriental erotica, although the directors “deceived” the authorities here too - “Legend” is an extremely erotic ballet, although today for some reason even the choreographer himself has forgotten about it. But then you could talk to your heart’s content “about valor, about exploits, about glory,” the pathos of which now evokes an ironic smile.
Over the past decades, a lot has changed, and some things have been turned upside down. In a word, that old “Legend” found itself in an unenviable position. The renewal brought its deepest contradictions into the light. It was never possible to overcome them.
"Legend" is undoubtedly a Russian-Soviet classic of the second half of the twentieth century. Everything was rehearsed, at first it was performed harmoniously and harmoniously, although formally.
And yet, with two performers who had already danced the “Legend”, it seemed drawn out and monotonous. And first of all, the orchestra under the direction of Pavel Sorokin is to blame. Dramatic contrasts are poorly identified in the music. There are also no precise semantic accents, and the phrasing is leveled. The performance of the orchestra does not inspire the artists at all. The choreography here is puzzling, and the music lulls you to sleep like a lullaby. So the poor fellows are tormented, waiting for the endless dances to end.
For the same reason, the trio of Mehmene Banu, Shirin and Ferkhad, stunningly mounted by the choreographer into the crowded, grandiose in scale and dynamics of the “Procession” or “Chase” scenes, which once clearly demonstrated the power and hierarchy of Eastern despotism, also “failed.” In the absence of a musical and choreographic crescendo in these compositions, the contrast intended by the directors, which previously sent goosebumps through the body, disappears.
The folk scenes seemed scanty, sluggish, “sewn on with white thread.” The people “suffer” for themselves, as it should be according to the text (you won’t object!), but with an indifferent look: they lifted the jugs, knocked them over - you see, there is no life-giving moisture! No one is captivated by some kind of exploits “in the name of...”. Gone are the days of courage and patriotism - why bother digging up a rock when there is water in the supermarket!
Grigorovich responded to the demands of the time in his own way, quietly taking away Ferkhad’s “tool of labor” - a hammer - and, without loud declarations, turning him from a stonecutter or sculptor into an oriental poet. Now Ferkhad appears from the “book” (which means a living legend). And he goes into it at the end of the performance. It is as if he was initially given a different level of existence. In the real world, the choreographer left Mekhmene Bana and Shirin, doomed to loneliness, who did not pass the test of love...
Such “semantic shifts” play into the hands of the elegant, very oriental Nikolai Tsiskaridze, whose very appearance and dance in this ballet represent a self-sufficient aesthetic phenomenon. He looks like refined lovers in ancient Persian miniatures - one of them depicts a young poet, out of abundance of feelings, fallen at the feet of his beloved. A simpler and nicer “real guy” was Dmitry Belogolovtsev’s Ferkhad, who, for lack of others, is doomed to carry out the entire heroic repertoire of the theater in splendid isolation. He is more athletic and very diligently fulfills all the choreographer’s requirements. But orientalism in any manifestation is not his element; Belogolovtsev is closer to, say, the urbanism of Balanchine’s “Agon.”
Anna Antonicheva's long-legged Shirin is beautiful in proportions; Marianna Ryzhkina's is more dramatic. Mekhmene Banu Maria Allash has a “pointed oriental flavor”; Nadezhda Gracheva dances her somewhat “blurred”, as if reluctantly. But there are no eastern queens, princesses, or mistresses on stage. Just women experiencing the hardships of fate to varying degrees.
Staten Vizier, well danced by Mark Peretokin, but for some reason the psychological background of his passionate and painful duet with the Tsarina evaporated. Only three - the ascetic Stranger by Alexei Loparevich, the infernal Jester-hunchback of Gennady Yanin and the already mentioned eastern poet Nikolai Tsiskaridze - intuitively “made their way” to the culture and beliefs of the Middle East, and above all Persia. In plastic they are calligraphers and ornamentalists; in fact, they are symbolic characters of exquisite “Persian miniatures”, imbued with mystical insights. They seem to indicate the path that a choreographer could take, if desired, when composing a modern choreographic version of an ancient legend. The old model of ballet, alas, has already outlived its usefulness, and a new one, unfortunately, has never been created.
Having remade the finale and individual scenes, Grigorovich did not undertake a major reconstruction of his own ballet, which, in order to “survive” in the current “emotional desert”, in my opinion, needs cuts, a more concentrated (two-act?) form, a change in genre - now eastern mystery may turn out to be more effective than psychological and everyday drama. But pulling off such a colossus as “Legend” alone is an impossible task even for the most gifted performers.
On the stage of the Bolshoi Theater there is a legendary performance that has become a golden national heritage of the Soviet period, “The Legend of Love”. The libretto by Nazim Hikmet was directed by the permanent director of this ballet, Yuri Grigorovich, in tandem with Simon Virsaladze. “The Legend of Love” at the Bolshoi Theater since 1965 has consistently been the highest-grossing performance every season. After a short break associated with the departure and return of Yuri Grigorovich, Moscow viewers can again enjoy this sensual and eternal story.
About the play “The Legend of Love” at the Bolshoi Theater
In Soviet times, the production, based on an oriental fairy tale with the sensuality and high degree of eroticism inherent in the genre, received many mixed reviews. The play “The Legend of Love” and the activities of its director and choreographer were even the subject of discussion at the party level.
The sensual plasticity of the dancers, the overt sexuality of relations between the sexes, the frankness unusual for classical ballet - all this produced a sexual revolution in art and trampled Soviet morality. But, despite harsh criticism, the ballet became part of the Bolshoi Theater. Today, the viewer can once again see the legendary production unchanged.
“The Legend of Love”: the plot of the play
The plot of the performance is imbued with gentle romanticism and sadness, which the stage performers were able to incredibly accurately embody in dance. The sister of the Persian queen Mehmene Badu is sick, and in order to save the girl, the ruler sacrifices her beauty. Now she is forced to constantly wear a veil, while her sister experiences the best moments of love with the young artist Ferkhad, completely surrendering to passion.
But the queen also dreams of the love of a young man, although her erotic fantasies do not go beyond dreams. The ending of the performance is the same each time, but the spectator, impressed by the performance of the actors, still believes in something that will suddenly change the course of events. Alas, Ferkhad is not constant and leaves, abandoning both women.
The cast of the play
In 1965, the premiere of the play was presented by legendary theater artists - Maya Plisetskaya, Natalya Bessmertnova, Maris Liepa. It was they who set the tone and inner spirit of the action, which is still felt today. Yuri Baranov, Karim Abdullin, Angelina Karpova, Maria Alexandrova, Maria Vinogradova, Timur Askerov, Ivan Alekseev shine in the play “The Legend of Love” 2018. Spectators will be able to see them on the Historic Stage of the theater on May 11 and 13.
Ordering ballets for the play “The Legend of Love” at the Bolshoi Theater
You can buy tickets for “The Legend of Love” without making your way across Moscow to the box office and without wasting time at our Agency, which has been providing services for connoisseurs of theatrical art for more than 10 years.
Our online service is the most convenient and allows you to get comprehensive information about the event, prices, available seats in the hall, cast and plot of the production. With us you can:
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Tickets for The Legend of Love are always in high demand, so plan your trip to the theater in advance. Discounts and special opportunities are provided for corporate clients.
You should definitely see the play “The Legend of Love” in Moscow, because this is not just a story about the strongest feeling on earth, but also a classic that even time could not change.
The ballet "Legend of Love" at the Bolshoi Theater is a spectacular and spectacular performance that is a highlight of the repertoire of the country's main theater. The production is very popular among the audience.
A little history
The premiere production was presented to the public back in 1961. This event took place in the famous Leningrad Mariinsky Theater. The ballet Legend of Love at the Bolshoi was staged to the music of the famous composer Arif Melikov, and the choreographer of the production was the famous choreographer Yuri Grigorovich.
After 4 years, the production was transferred to the stage of the Moscow Bolshoi Theater. And since 1965, the ballet “The Legend of Love” has been considered the pearl of the capital’s theater repertoire and an example of world classical ballet. At different times, such legendary artists took part in the performance as
- Ulyana Lopatkina,
- Maris Liepa,
- Lyudmila Semenyaka and other great dancers.
The choreographer of the ballet Legend of Love is the talented dance maestro Yuri Grigorovich. It was he who, in collaboration with Nazim Hikmet, wrote the libretto for the production. Khikmetov is a poet, political prisoner, who was sentenced to 28 years. And he created his deep philosophical drama precisely behind bars. The result of the joint work was a deep, harmonious and vibrant production in which music and dance complement and reveal each other.
The dramaturgy of the ballet is very intense and exciting. Therefore, viewers who bought tickets to The Legend of Love will not remain indifferent to the performance. The stage design of the ballet belongs to the famous artist Simon Virsaladze. He embodied the style of the sixties in the ballet "Legend of Love".
A distinctive feature of the production is large-scale mass processions. The main theme of the ballet is the great and all-conquering power of love. From the very first chords, the director creates an atmosphere of high intensity, which does not subside throughout the entire ballet production. Each of the heroes faces a difficult choice, a difficult compromise. Therefore, the production will appeal to all generations of theatergoers.
Plot
The plot of the ballet "The Legend of Love" is a story from one of the legends of the ancient East. Queen Mekhmene Banu had a beloved younger sister, Shirin, who became seriously ill. The queen grieved for a long time, after which she decided to take an adventure. The stranger suggested that she give back her sister’s life, but in return the queen must give up her youth and beauty. The younger sister returns to the world of the living. After this, the queen's face begins to age very quickly.
One day in the garden, the sisters meet a handsome artist named Ferkhad. Both the queen and her sister were captivated by the young man's charms. But the young man pays attention only to his younger sister. Then the queen begins to interfere with their dates. Farhad and Shirin try to escape, but they fail. The loving couple was caught and brought to the queen. The ruler sets a condition for the heroes - they will get married, but first let Farhad open a mountain spring and save the kingdom from drought. Farhad helps people, but he himself dies in the mountains.