Synergy of musical and choreographic components on the example of the ballet "Fates" by Yulia Gomelskaya

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Contemporary art in all its directions strives to reflect current social phenomena and embody relevant, living themes. After all, art can`t be considered apolitical because social and political events influence its creators in one way or another and, accordingly, find their place in artistic images and ideas. A true artist always has a very subtle sense of the era of his time and conveys its spirit in his works.
The 20th century is especially indicative in this regard. Since the 1900s, a period of historical events on a global scale, rapid socio-cultural, scientific, technical, and technological changes have begun. The passage of time has accelerated, and art has had to keep up with the constantly changing world. Hence, the diversity of trends and directions united under the common name "avant-garde", a term that originally had a political origin and was used in the works of French socialist utopians, who endowed the artist with a special political mission.
The term avant-garde, in its artistic meaning at the beginning of the 20th century, was closely associated with politics. The political radicalism inherent in the artistic avant-garde was already a historical phenomenon (the first third of the 20th century) and was characteristic of it until the 1930s.Thus, the artist, the man of art, turned out to be a person very closely involved in social and political life and violently reacting to changes in it. This tendency continued in the 21st century.
All types of art are in search of new means and methods of expression, transmission of ideas, impressions, emotions, and reactions of the author to what is happening in the world. Thus, external reality gives rise to changes in art.Ballet is undergoing particularly great changes. In just the last half-century, the art of choreography has changed beyond recognition, and although classical ballet productions are still performed on the stages of world theaters, modern trends are increasingly embracing the field of choreography.The twentieth century became the century of revolution in the art of ballet. This is the time of transformation and rethinking of the centuries-old canons of dance, the time of discoveries and inventions in this genre, the technologization of ballet through the introduction of the latest scientific achievements in the field of mechanics and electronics, and, recently, computer technology.The main task, the aspiration of modern ballet, has become the expression of a certain idea through the plasticity of the human body.
Modern ballet expands the vocabulary of dance movements. Much depends on the theme, or rather on the idea of ​​the ballet. Based on it, the director selects a set of movements that can express what he wants to convey, and quite often there are borrowings of movements from folk dances, from modern dances, from various directions of plasticity. Thus, modern ballet has become more open to other genres and styles.
If we talk about modern ballet in general, it is more symbolic than classical ballet; it uses quotations and references to a greater extent, many productions even use such a principle of constructing a narrative as montage, i.e., they connect within themselves many separate pieces - stories, which together make up the text of the ballet. And this is a natural phenomenon. Ballet must correspond to the modern cultural situation, and for this, such changes within it are necessary.The musical accompaniment of ballet productions has also changed significantly. With the development of musical art, new achievements penetrated ballet, and the searches of choreographers took place based on modern music, characterized by innovations in the field of musical language, form, structure, genres, style, the whole complex of musical and expressive means discovered by composers of the twentieth century, opened up new opportunities for ballet theater, expanding the boundaries of experiments for choreographers. Avant-garde music had a huge stimulating effect on the development of dance art. Composers such as Alfred Schnittke and Bela Bartok made their contribution to the development of ballet music. The leading trend in the ballet art of the twentieth century was the modern style, and then, postmodernism, which existed and developed in parallel with the academic ballet school, just as avant-garde musical trends coexisted side by side with traditionalism. At the same time, modern ballets were staged to both avant-garde and classical music, or both of these trends could be combined in one production, as is the case in J. Neumeier's ballet "A Midsummer Night's Dream" (1977), which used the music of F. Mendelssohn, as well as the works of the modern Austro-Hungarian composer D. Ligeti - electronic music of a purely avant-garde nature. This type of performance, the music of which is composed of different works by one or several composers, can be called a "compilation", and it appeared because when creating new productions, choreographers do not always manage to find composers willing to work in this direction. In this type, three categories can be distinguished, depending on the style of the music used in them:
1. Productions of modern ballets to ready-made music by classical composers (Mozart, Vivaldi, Bach)2. Productions that are based on music by avant-garde composers3. Productions that combine both classical and avant-garde music
Nowadays, it has become possible to use any forms, styles, genres, and trends of modern musical art in all its diversity in ballet, as well as the use of music created in the past.A large number of ballets are staged to purely avant-garde (modern) music, especially performances of the so-called contemporary dance, that is, modern ballet. These include performances, as a rule, of one-act or individual miniatures by R. Poklitaru and Dwight Rhoden.
Modern dances staged to avant-garde (modern) music often represent a kind of rebus that must be solved. Here, one often encounters encrypted content, imaginary profundity, eclecticism, a kind of "body contortions", and everyday plasticity. But at the same time, avant-garde music encourages the creation of images that convey dynamic rhythms, urbanism, illogicality, and chaos of the modern world, and sometimes its other facets. Therefore, contemporary dance, that is, modern ballet with avant-garde music, is becoming more and more widespread.Music is a necessary and organic component of a ballet performance. It gives it emotional and figurative content and influences the dramaturgy, structure, and rhythm of the dance action.Music in ballet is a special kind of art that has common features with all other musical genres, often using them or their elements, but also has its own characteristics. It exists in unity with drama and choreography. In many ways, it determines them, but also depends on them. It can provide an emotional and figurative basis for performances. The choreographic action itself can not only be fueled by music but also be built according to the laws of music.In the history of artistic culture, there have been different relationships between music and choreography. Sometimes they were equivalent, sometimes not. In some cases, the choreography was ahead of the ballet music. In others, on the contrary, innovation in music led to choreography.
Ballet is a fusion of two arts – music and choreography – not in individual numbers but in the whole performance, which becomes a theatrical phenomenon, namely, musical and choreographic theatre. In ballet, music determines the tempo and rhythm of the action, the duration and change of certain episodes, and most importantly, it characterizes the images of the characters, the events, and situations of the plot, the development of the dramatic conflict and its outcome, that is, it is a kind of musical dramaturgy that provides the basis for the entire spectacular side of the performance. In ballet, choreography embodies music in the same way as in dramatic theatre, a verbal play is embodied in the stage action. The basis of the choreographic action is not just the script but the script and music in their unity. Since music characterizes the script images and provides the basis for the choreographic images, we can say that the drama in ballet is, as it were, “written by music”, that is, it is determined not so much by the words of the script as by the musical images and their development. The organic synthesis of music and choreography in ballet becomes possible due to the kinship of the figurative nature of these arts.Music is not a servant of either drama or dance. Attempts to give it such significance usually lead to failures. Achievements arose where a genuine synthesis of all components of a ballet performance was possible, where the choreographer worked in collaboration with the scriptwriter and composer, and where drama, music, and choreography had unity and enriched each other.This type of ballet performance, in which music and choreography are created in parallel, with close interaction between the composer and choreographer, can be called "synergetic" since such an inseparable relationship arises between these two components that, separately, they are practically not independent, and do not give the same effect of perception that occurs with their original combination.
It is this type and its features that we will consider using the example of the ballet production "Destiny" to the music of the Odesa composer Yulia HomelskaThe premiere of the ballet took place in February 2017 at the Odesa National Academic Opera and Ballet Theater. This is a ballet in two acts - the theater's original project, and is an example of a new experience in creating a performance, which, according to the directors, can safely be called a "documentary ballet" - a new genre in the field of modern ballet art and a purely national work born by a Ukrainian choreographer, a Ukrainian composer performed by Ukrainian artists.The author of the idea of ​​the ballet is the general director of ONOBT, Honored Worker of Culture of Ukraine, Nadiya Babich.The author of the libretto and choreographer is the director, laureate of international competitions, and winner of the Kyiv Pectoral Award (2016). Serhiy Kon is a former soloist of the Kyiv Modern Ballet Theatre, working under the direction of Radu Poklitaru, known for his original productions and fresh interpretations of classical ballets. Sergiy Kon, as a student of Poklitaru, also has a bright, recognizable style and choreographic language in his productions.The author's choreography of the ballet is solved in a complex polystylistic manner using various dance techniques and elements of pantomime.This production is also unique in musical terms. The music for the ballet is original, written by the Odesa composer Yulia Homelska, which further confirms the value of the Odesa school of composition. Over the years, among the productions on the Odesa stage, one can recall the ballet “Lileya” to the music of Konstyantin Dankevich, but with the help of our composers, it is possible to create an original repertoire.

"Fates" is not the first ballet in Homelska's compositional legacy. In 1997, her ballet "Jane Eyre" was staged in North Carolina (USA) and by the London Children's Ballet at the Peacock Theatre (London).A tragic death while working on the production prevented the author from being at the premiere of the second ballet. For her, this work was the last. She managed to finish the score and make a "rough recording" of the music for rehearsal work with conductor Vitaliy Kovalchuk."When I saw the score, I realized the complexity of the whole work, but there was a sporting interest in coping with this task. The music itself is modern, but very bright, understandable, the images are traceable, and it will be clear to the audience what she wanted to say and describe this or that image," said conductor-director Vitaliy Kovalchuk about the music. The ballet "Fates" maintains the general trend of modern ballet productions: a tendency towards minimalistic scenery that does not distract the viewer from the dancers' movements on stage, the rejection of traditional tutus and tights (the dancers are dressed in everyday clothes and shoes, jeans, dresses, sneakers), a wide and skillful use of modern technologies and stage special effects, the play of light, due to all this, the main emphasis is not on the stage entourage, but on the dancers' bodies. This is natural for this genre of ballet because a documentary, realistic theme is the most difficult to embody in dance. Dance has its own specific set of expressive means through which it is quite difficult to embody a dynamic plot on stage; this set is more suitable for conveying emotional states. In addition to regulated dance steps, which in their modified form are also present in modern ballet, the dance vocabulary is enriched with elements of pantomime and everyday movements. In ballets on a realistic theme, the main load falls on the gesture, which becomes intonation; that is, it replaces verbal speech. In combination with music, which in this case is a supporting and strengthening element, we can talk about "rhythmic-plastic intonation" as the main method of expression in ballets of this type.
As for the theme of the production itself, it reflects the events of the russian invasion of Crimea and part of Eastern Ukraine in 2014, which had a huge impact on Ukrainian history. The authors used this historical background as an outer canvas for personal stories of ordinary people whose lives were touched by the war. The idea of ​​the ballet itself is much deeper than the outer plot. It is the role of Fate in the fate of man, the influence of war on society, the horrors of the totalitarian regime, and the personal tragedies and joys of the common people involved in the thick of global historical events. At first impression from what you see and hear, you may initially feel some rejection, many unpleasant moments are shown too realistically and directly, and the horror of war and death is not veiled, as is customary in classical ballet. But this trend is again leading not only in dance but also in almost all forms of art at this time. After all, art reacts to the surrounding reality and has every right to reflect not only the beautiful but also the ugly at first glance. Based on this, both the expressive means and the approach to the embodiment of artistic images change. In many directions of modern dance and various varieties of free plasticity, which spread in the 20th century and are increasingly developing today, images that reflect the catastrophic nature of the modern world, themes of suffering, loneliness, uncommunicative people, the embodiment of nightmares and horrors, the illogicality of existence, irrational visions, and similar themes prevail. Therefore, plasticity becomes not directed upward, as in classical dance, but down to earth, angular, and sharp, with frequent mise-en-scènes sitting or lying on the floor, with a large number of broken, convulsive movements, with the predominance of the ugly, hideous, and even terrible over the beautiful and harmonious.The leading tendency in the embodiment of such themes in music is the departure from melody and harmony in its generally accepted sense, as a reflection of the lost support in the real, constantly changing, and unstable world.What especially distinguishes the production of "Fates" is that the music was created in parallel with the choreography, which is a very rare case in the history of ballet, because not all composers are ready for such close cooperation with the choreographer. But it was due to such parallel work that the mutual enrichment of dance and music occurred, and their inseparable connection was created. Musical intonations and leit-themes find their embodiment in dance plasticity. The main characters have their leit-timbres and, at the same time, characteristic plastic intonations.The main leitmotif through the entire musical fabric of the score is the sound of the air raid alert; it opens the Prologue, it also ends each scene, it is a symbol of the inevitable Fate, Destiny, which interferes in the lives of all the main characters. On stage, this leitmotif is associated with the appearance of a figure in a black cloak, embodying Fate - impartial and inexorable. This leitmotif is absent only at the end of the Epilogue, where the long-awaited "enlightenment" and the removal of masks finally occur, and it turns out that snow-white angel wings were hidden under the black mantle.
Upon closer examination, we can see a certain musical and dramaturgical structure of the ballet. In this production, these structural boundaries are slightly blurred, which is primarily due to the plot of a different nature.
1. Act I. Scene I. PrologueThis part acts as an introduction and refrain (A). This theme (symbol of Fate) will be repeated at the end of each chapter (except the Epilogue).2. Act I. Scene II. The Peaceful City.Section (for a rondo). A general exposition of all the characters, but without a detailed development of the themes. In essence, this is a choreographic exposition, while the musical exposition will unfold in the following numbers.3. Act I. Scene III. Girl and Boy.Section C. Exposition of two themes. This section can serve as the main movement, consisting of two sections.4. Act I. Scene IV. Unhappy.Section D. For sonata form, it plays the role of a side part.5. Act I. Scene V. Mature couple.Section E. For the sonata, it serves as a lyrical slow movement.6. Act I. Scene VI. Photographer.Section F. Has a three-part structure, which brings it closer to the structure of the third parts of sonatas (minuet or trio)7. Act II. Scene VII. Chess.Section G. Serves as the sonata's quick finale. Intonally related to Section D ("side part").8. Act II. Scene VII. Flash.Reprise for sonata form. All previous themes are revisited in a retrospective manner.9. Act II. Scene IX. Epilogue. Vitae.Plays the role of arrangement, coda.
So, we see that it is the music that dictates the dramatic structure of the performance. In general, the group of drums and percussion is very expanded and plays a significant role in the music of this ballet. In addition to the purely sound-creating effect, it provides a rhythmic basis for dance movement and also forms characteristic rhythmic complexes that play the role of leitmotifs.Each of the main characters has its field of musical intonations and timbres, as well as intonation-plastic.
In the third scene of the first act, two images stand out: the Young Woman and the Young Man, contrasting in character, different in their embodiment in music and dance. Light and airy, with flaps, the theme in the flute paints a romantic image of a girl flying, and this finds its embodiment in the dance - soft movements, light jumps, and even the use of thin scarf fabric in the dance - all this, together with the music, creates a complete image of one of the heroines.The Young man's intonation sphere is a string and brass group, second intonation, in dance, high, active jumps, more clumsy and wide plasticity.In the fifth scene of the first act, there is the lyrical center of the entire ballet – the dance of an exhausted girl who is dying, with a child in her arms, who came to the house of a young married couple. This emotional, expressive solo of the dancer, accompanied by the theme of the solo violin, is the culminating episode, in which the individuality of the hero is maximally expressed in both music and choreography.In the sixth scene of the first act, two new characters appear: the Photographer and his wife. Here, you can also observe the mutual complement of music and dance. The musical theme resembles a melody from a music box, fragile and doll-like. Such are the movements of the dancer, broken, mechanistic, clumsy. At the end of the scene, she freezes, hands down, under Rock's heavy hand, like a broken doll.One of the most revealing episodes of the interaction of music and choreography is the fourth scene of the first act, which shows the metamorphosis of another hero, the Loser, offended by fate, to the image of the Antihero. In the choreography, the two states of the hero and the transition between them are visible - from doomed and depressed to embittered and determined. The first is characterized by parterre combinations, smoother, even sluggish plasticity. The struggle with oneself, with one's dark side, which ultimately wins, is shown here in motion, and the movements appear sharp. The Antihero holds an imaginary gun in his hands and marches. This is also reflected in the music, where at the moment of transformation into the Antihero, a percussion group enters with a marching rhythm, a brass band is included, the texture is saturated, and the music itself acquires an assertive and sharp character. These rhythms, as well as dance movements, will also appear in the seventh scene in the second act and are already repeated by a group of dancers subordinate to the Antihero's totalitarian regime.
The production of "Fate" is especially distinguished by the fact that the music was created in parallel with the choreography, which is a very rare opportunity in the history of ballet because not all composers are ready for such close cooperation with the choreographer. But precisely due to such parallel work, mutual enrichment of dance and music took place, and their inseparable connection was created. Musical intonations and themes find their embodiment in dance art. The main characters have their key timbres and, at the same time, characteristic plastic intonations.The fusion of music and choreography in the embodiment of a single idea takes place in the finale, where the music, constantly striving upwards, speeds up, and the space of the stage, immersed all the time in semi-darkness, is illuminated by ascending light streams, and finally, in the middle of the stage, it opens filled with light, and the figure of the Angel slowly dissolves in this glow, just as music dissolves in silence.Perhaps only in the very finale, thanks to such an unexpected denouement, the main idea of ​​the ballet is fully revealed - all life's upheavals and sufferings are given to us for spiritual growth and lead us to the light. This production, following the idea of ​​catharsis, as the elevation of the soul through art that arises in the process of empathy and compassion, embodies exactly those plots and states that attract the viewer and make him a full participant in the events taking place on the stage, causing both fear and sympathy and a sense of belonging and responsibility.
This type of ballet production, in which the choreographer and the composer work on equal terms and together, is the most productive and artistically justified. Plastic and musical intonation merge into a single whole, forming a single flow that has a stronger impact on the viewer-listener. Music imbues even everyday, "rough" choreography with additional meanings, giving it depth and metaphor.In connection with this type of production, we can say that a Ukrainian school of modern dance is currently being formed, represented at the moment primarily by the Kyiv Modern Ballet Theater under the leadership of Radu Poklitaru and Serhiy Kon, who follow exactly this type of production, where the choreographer works very closely with the composer.Of the new ballets created with a similar approach, it is also worth noting two productions by Radu Poklitaru to the music of Oleksandr Rodin, a graduate of the Odesa National Music Academy named after A.V. Nezhdanova. This is the ballet "Up the River" (2017), based on the story by F.S. Fitzgerald's “The Mysterious Story of Benjamin Button” and “Viy” (2019), based on Gogol's novel of the same name.
Additional materialsPresentationRecording (18.02.2017)Scores