Music
Diaghilev secured the employment of many great music composers for his ballets. This served to distinguish his ballets from many 19th-century ballets, for which the music had usually been provided by less inspired composers such as Riccardo Drigo, Ludwig Minkus, and Cesare Pugni.
Diaghilev commissioned many original scores, and borrowed freely from the existing musical canon. His ballets included music by artists such as Debussy, Milhaud, Poulenc, Prokofiev, Ravel, Satie, Respighi, Stravinsky and Richard Strauss.
The impresario also engaged conductors who were, or became eminent in their field during the 20th century, including Pierre Monteux (1911-16 and 1924), Ernest Ansermet (1915-23), Edward Clark (1919-20) and Roger Désormière (1925-29).
Read more about this topic: Ballets Russes Choreographers
Famous quotes containing the word music:
“Slow, slow, fresh fount, keep time with my salt tears;
Yet slower yet, oh faintly gentle springs:
List to the heavy part the music bears,
“Woe weeps out her division when she sings.”
Droop herbs and flowers;
Fall grief in showers;
“Our beauties are not ours”:
Oh, I could still,
Like melting snow upon some craggy hill,
Drop, drop, drop, drop,
Since nature’s pride is, now, a withered daffodil.”
—Ben Jonson (1572–1637)
“From where Pan’s cavern is
Intolerable music falls.
Foul goat-head, brutal arm appear,
Belly, shoulder, bum,
Flash fishlike; nymphs and satyrs
Copulate in the foam.”
—William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)
“Hell is full of musical amateurs: music is the brandy of the damned.”
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950)