Probably less well known is the connection between coronations and ballet. The British royal family famously love to dance, especially the Scottish reels favored by Queen Victoria. They also seem to have inherited her love of ballet, and the coronations of the 20th century were accompanied by special ballet performances. In her history of ballet entitled Apollo's Angels, Jennifer Homans comments that Diaghilev's Ballets Russes "in June 1911. . . arrived for its first London season." The famous ballet company "appeared at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, on the eve of George V's coronation; five days later the company danced at the coronation gala itself for the king and queen in a theater adorned with roses and audience in full formal dress, glittering with gold and diamonds." Queen Mary probably influenced this ballet season. She always proudly said that she had been taught to curtsey by Queen Victoria's favorite ballerina, Marie Taglioni, who was Princess May's early dance teacher. In 1937, when King George VI was crowned, there was another coronation ballet season, with a gala perfornance directed by Margot Fonteyn. She also danced at the Vic-Wells Coronation Year Ball at Royal Albert Hall. This season included performances by the Ballets Russe de Monte Carlo and by Alicia Markova and Anton Dolin. In her coronation year, 1953, Queen Elizabeth II became patron of the Royal Academy of Dance, which annually awards the Queen Elizabeth II Coronation Award in her honor. During the same year, Malcolm Arnold wrote "Homage to the Queen" as the official coronation ballet, commissioned by the Sadler's Wells Ballet. The ballet featured four queens of earth, air, fire, and water, with Margot Fonteyn as the queen of the air. Premiered on Coronation night, June 2, "Homage to the Queen" was designed by Oliver Messel, whose nephew later married Sadler's Wells patron Princess Margaret. This ballet was revived for the Queen's 80th birthday. Recordings of the "Homage to the Queen" music are available on the Internet, but because of something to do with licensing, excerpts will not play in my area. Perhaps the title "Homage to the Queen" was a reference to "Homage to Queen Victoria, Waltz," by Johann Strauss I, written for the first grand ball of Victoria's reign in 1838. Here the Waltz plays with a painting of Queen Victoria in her coronation robes: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B02oDpKGEBM The Coronation Festival in July 2013 will include "a celebration of music and dance over the past 60 years." Music and dance have always accompanied the ritual of coronation, and the old courtly art of ballet has become an important part of modern coronation festivities.
Edited by Jinja on March 6, 2013, 3:36 pm
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