What was ballet originally for

In the early twentieth century, the Russian theatre producer Serge Diaghilev brought together some of that country's most talented dancers, choreographers, composers, singers, and designers to form a group called the Ballet Russes. The Ballet Russes toured Europe and America, presenting a wide variety of ballets.

Here in America, ballet grew in popularity during the 's when several of Diaghilev's dancers left his company to work with and settle in the U. Of these, George Balanchine is one of the best known artists who firmly established ballet in America by founding the New York City Ballet.

These huge spectacles helped keep courtiers amused - court life could be monotonous and boring, and being able to dance was a necessary social accomplishment. He was known as the Sun King. Apollo was the Greek god of peace and the arts. The Sun, a heavenly body which gave life to all things was seen as the perfect symbol for the young king.

Eventually it became impossible for amateur dancers to reach the standards demanded by the dancing masters and composers. Here the first professional theatre dancers were trained and dance moved from the court into the public theatres. Charles Nicolas Cochin, Ballet at Versailles, engraving, Versailles had no theatre, so temporary stages were set up around the palace and in the gardens.

Here the stage has been set up in the grounds with the palace itself visible in the background. Such lavish celebrations helped impress foreign dignitaries and reinforced Louis' image as absolute ruler.

Louis and his courtiers often took part and Louis' nickname, The Sun King, came from his performance as Apollo, the Greek god of the sun, in the Ballet de la Nuit in In some ways Louis' whole life was a performance, played out on the stage of Versailles: people even watched him get up in a morning and go to bed.

A comedy-ballet called the Princess of Navarrewas produced as part of the celebrations of a royal marriage: the King's son, the Dauphin, had become engaged to Maria Theresa of Spain. The composer Jean Philippe Rameau was asked to write the ballet in partnership with the author Voltaire now best known for his satirical novels such as Candide.

Voltaire found the commission a trial he had to write to a precise specification and everything he wrote was constantly checked by a number of officials. To make matters worse, he and the official in charge of the entertainment disagreed about everything. Following the French Revolution of , women abandoned paniers and corsets for floating Grecian style dresses, which emphasised the body. Dancers followed fashion and these dresses meant they could perform a greater range of movement.

They now wore flat slippers, which allowed greater flexibility in the foot, and women developed the trick of rising on tiptoe on demi-pointe. Now that costumes had become freer, men and women could dance together.

Museum no. Combining dance, music and song, the earliest ballets were enactments of events from mythology, heavy on gods and heroes, and featuring wildly fantastical costumes and masks. Court ballets reached their pinnacle during the reign of Louis XIV, a keen dancer himself, who was dubbed the Sun King after his role in Le Ballet de la Nuit , which ran from sunset to sunrise.

His personal ballet master, Pierre Beauchamp, choreographed many of the dances performed at Versailles and is credited with codifying ballet as a system of movement. Following the French fashion, theatres and opera houses sprang up across Europe during the s, positioning ballet dancers as part of a cosmopolitan community of performers, nobles and intellectuals. By mid-century, several choreographers were developing ballet as a story-telling medium, with the familiar gods and heroes, but also nobles and princesses, peasants and romantic trysts.

Women contributed to this age of experimentation, although they remained in the minority. In an age when few women ventured into the public spotlight, danseuses were a fascinating and often highly regarded novelty. Poetry was written in their praise, gossip exchanged, and paintings commissioned by earnest admirers; Frederick the Great kept a portrait of Barbara Campanini in his study.

The French Revolution and the wars that followed profoundly altered ballet, sweeping away the lingering, courtly trappings of baroque dance. Dancers shed their heeled shoes and heavy brocades in favour of light, looser-fitting outfits that allowed them a wider range of movement. The era became synonymous with dazzling feats. The introduction of soft slippers encouraged multiple pirouettes and higher leaps, and a new trick — posing en pointe — was pioneered by dancers like Fanny Bias and Amalia Brugnoli.

While ballets based on mythological themes persisted, choreographers increasingly focused on character, realism and nationalist values. New works, inspired by Romantic themes, transported audiences to the medieval past or exotic locales like China, Arabia or Mexico. Aided by innovative scenic effects, ballet by the s was an enchanting realm of Gothic ruins and distant lands, enticing an ever-growing audience.

In , the Paris premiere of La Sylphide introduced a distinctive Romantic style of dancing: a theatrical vision in which femininity, landscape, folk elements and the supernatural fluidly combined. The new style, popularised by Marie Taglioni as the eponymous sylph, was one of airy restraint and softened arms, and was marked by the use of pointe work as an artistic element, rather than a show of virtuosity. However, their appeal was equalled by an extraordinary vogue for national dances.

The great Romantic ballerinas, including Fanny Elssler, Fanny Cerrito and Taglioni herself, danced a dazzling array of balleticised czardas, polkas, mazurkas and boleros. The period remains synonymous with the poetry and fire of these intrepid female celebrities. The first professional ballet companies and troupes began forming and touring Europe to perform ballets for royalty and aristocratic audiences. The history of ballet gets very interesting during the s due to significant change and growth from new ideas.

The focus became mostly on the ballerina, even having females portray male roles. As the 19th century was a period of significant social change, the themes of new ballets changed too, moving away from the royal and aristocratic and into romantic ballets. Several ballerinas also began experimenting with dancing en pointe, bringing pointe shoes to ballet in the early s.

This was significant because up until then, pointe shoes were seen as a type of ungraceful stunt. This undoubtedly brought a new sense of allure and excitement to ballet, fostering admiration for the obvious difficulty of dancing on your toes. The pointe shoe would soon become an icon of both graceful movement and technical skill. During this time, famous choreographers such as Marius Petipa, Enrico Cecchetti, August Bournonville and Jules Perrot, were creating what would eventually be known as the great story classical ballets.