Ravel's 'Daphnis and Chloe'

Synopsis

On today’s date in 1912, Maurice Ravel’s ballet Daphnis et Chloé received its first performance at the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris, staged by Serge Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes and choreographed by Michel Fokine.

Three years earlier, Diaghilev had approached Ravel about composing a ballet, and Ravel started working with Fokine on a scenario based on an old Greek pastoral romance about two lovers separated by pirates and reunited by the intervention of the god Pan.

Ravel was a meticulous and slow worker, and his score for Daphnis et Chloé ended up taking three years to complete. By the time of its 1912 premiere, internal squabbles in the Diaghilev company and conceptual differences between composer and choreographer had dampened everyone's enthusiasm for the project. Even Diaghilev seemed to lose interest.

In his memoirs, Pierre Monteux, the conductor of the first performance, recalled, “At first Diaghilev had been very enthusiastic with Ravel’s magnificent score, but for some reason, which I have always thought was due to the weakness of the choreography, his fervor for Ravel and his music diminished to such a low pitch that it became difficult to work as we should have on the premiere.”

Monteux continued, “But all the musicians in the orchestra, and I might say all the musicians in Paris, knew that this was Maurice Ravel’s greatest work.”

Music Played in Today's Program

Maurice Ravel (1875-1937): Daphnis et Chloe; London Symphony; Pierre Monteux, conductor; London 425 956

On This Day

Births

• 1671 - Italian composer Tomaso Albinoni, in Venice

• 1810 - German composer Robert Schumann, in Zwickau

• 1894 - Czech composer Erwin Schulhoff, in Prague. He died in a Nazi concentration camp in Wülzburg, Bavarian, in 1942.

Deaths

• 1612 - German composer Hans Leo Hassler, 47, in Frankfurt

  1884 - American composer Henry Clay Work, 51, in Hartford, Connecticut. A printer by trade, he wrote some famous popular songs, including “Grandfather’s Clock,” “Father, Come Home” and “Marching Through Georgia.”

• 1908 - Russian composer Nicolai Rimsky-Korsakov, 64, in Lyubensk, near Luga (now Pskov district) (Gregorian date: June 21)

• 1940 - American composer Frederick Shepherd Converse, 69, in Westwood, Massachusetts

• 1984 - English composer Gordon Jacob, 88, in Saffron Walden

• 1998 - German-born American composer Margaret Buechner, 76, in Midland, Michigan

Premieres

• 1912 - Ravel: ballet, Daphnis et Chloé, at the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris, by Diaghilev and the Ballet Russe, Pierre Monteux conducting

• 1929 - Hindemith: Neus vom Tage (News of the Day), in Berlin at the Krolloper

• 1937 - Carl Orff: scenic canata Carmina Burana, in Frankfurt at the Opernhaus

• 1941 - Harold Shapero: Nine Minute Overture, in New York City

• 1950 - Hindemith: Horn Concerto, in Baden-Baden, Germany, with the composer conducting and Dennis Brain the soloist

• 1953 - Britten: opera Glorianna, in London at the Royal Opera, Covent Garden

• 1968 - Harrison Birtwistle: opera Punch and Judy at the Jubilee Hall in Aldeburgh, by the English Opera Group, David Atherton conducting

• 1974 - Henry Brant: An American Requiem, in Mt. Lebanon, Pennsylvania