Bach in Ballet: An Exploration of Form
Date of Award
Spring 2024
Document Type
Dissertation
Degree Name
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
Department
Music
First Advisor
Cohn, Richard
Abstract
Pioneered by George Balanchine, neoclassical ballets have no stories or characters in the conventional sense. Rather, choreographers focus on movement and its interaction with music. Form in J. S. Bach’s music is one area where choreographers have ample room for creative interventions, for unlike later eighteenth- and nineteenth-century repertoire, there is no well-developed Formenlehre tradition for Baroque music. Since the musical form of Baroque music usually resists a single, uncontested interpretation, one cannot say whether the structure of the dance simply matches the musical form or not, but the dance necessarily adds to the interpretation of the music. This question is particularly pertinent in Bach’s compositions which cannot be easily sectionalized and which do not fall into formal molds, such as preludes, fantasias, and the slow movements of concerti (as opposed to binary-form dances, for example). I argue that the neoclassical ballets choreographed to Bach’s music studied in this dissertation prime us to hear logical connections between musical events and often foretell what the audience might only realize in retrospect if they listen to the music without the dance. As such, they are likely to perceive a greater sense of formal connectedness and forward progression when they listen to the music with the choreography than without. The choreographers achieve this, for example, by taking advantage of the continuity of physical space and motion to create a sense of continuity and causality, or by re-using choreographic motives in ways that draw attention to the relationship between non-adjacent passages of music, thereby forging a tighter connection between these passages than the music does on its own. Furthermore, the continuity of physical space and motion enables these ballets to influence how an audience member might perceive potential sectional boundaries in Bach’s music. The analyses of these ballets show that the continuity of physical space and motion does not prevent dance from articulating sectional boundaries, but causes dance to articulate them differently than scholars conventionally assume music does. But within this general aesthetic of continuity and development, choreographers of neoclassical ballet after Balanchine also use a variety of choreographic strategies. A secondary goal of this dissertation is therefore to examine how they build on Balanchine differently and chart their own courses, thereby enriching our understanding of the role of Balanchine in the history of modern ballet and its current development. Chapter 1, the Introduction, lays the historical and methodological ground for the subsequent analyses. Chapter 2 examines the second movement of Balanchine’s Concerto Barocco (1941), choreographed to the second movement of Bach’s Concerto for Two Violins in D Minor BWV 1043, which is one of the first neoclassical ballets choreographed to Bach and which inspired subsequent choreographers to choreograph Bach’s music. After the Second World War, Balanchine’s influence was particularly felt in the Netherlands, which did not have a long tradition in classical ballet. In the decades after the Second World War, Dutch choreographers absorbed the influence from Balanchine into their own style of modern ballet. Chapter 3 discusses the second movement of Fantasia (1993) by Dutch choreographer Hans van Manen, choreographed to Bach’s Fantasia in A Minor BWV 922. Van Manen has learned from Balanchine the importance of rhythm in choreography but adds his own spin by taking inspiration from jazz and photography. This aspect of his choreographic style is brought to bear in his handling of form in this piece. Balanchine and van Manen in turn have inspired David Dawson, a British-trained dancer and choreographer who came to the Netherlands specifically “to learn Balanchine,” where he also danced under van Manen. Chapter 4 studies the first duet in his A Sweet Spell of Oblivion (2007), choreographed to Bach’s Prelude in E-Flat Minor from Book I of the Well-Tempered Clavier BWV 853. By dancing Balanchine repertoire and training under van Manen in the Netherlands, Dawson learned the importance of responding to the music. However, compared to these choreographers, Dawson is more sensitive to harmony, which influenced his interpretation of the form of the aforementioned prelude. Chapter 5, the Conclusion, reflects on the potential contributions of this dissertation to choreomusicology and music theory, and points to applications of an embodied approach to dance-music analysis beyond the analysis of Bach’s musical form.
Recommended Citation
Tai, Amy Ming Wai, "Bach in Ballet: An Exploration of Form" (2024). Yale Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Dissertations. 1487.
https://elischolar.library.yale.edu/gsas_dissertations/1487
