Music & Ballet How ballet music took centre stage | Page 4

Ballet music: on the fringes
Ballet music took a step forward with the advent
of the ballet pump. This seemingly small change
opened up a world of possibilities for ballet
composers. While before, ballet dancers wore
hard shoes that had a somewhat restrictive
effect on their movements, this new footwear
allowed for more free and expressive kind of
choreography: male dancers lifted ballerinas
into the air, while the performers were
increasingly able to dance on pointe.
Consequently, the music was adapted to suit this
more daring kind of choreography. Meanwhile,
Adolphe Adam’s score for Giselle (1841) was the
first ballet music it use motifs to represent
particular characters.
Ballet and its accompanying music came more to the
fore in the 18th century with composers such as
Jean-Philippe Rameau and the form of the opera-
ballet, in which the narrative was manifested partly
through dance and partly through song.
Rameau’s Les Indes Galantes arguably inaugurated
this more lightweight style. Inspired by a visit by
members of the Native American Mitchigamea tribe
to the court of King Louis XV, the ballet was highly
successful when it was first staged by the Académie
Royale de Musique in 1735. Watch the Gothenburg
Symphony perform an orchestral suite of this
seminal piece of Baroque-era ballet music here.