4.6. How did ballet develop after the founding of that school?
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This article is from the Ballet and Modern Dance FAQ, by Tom Parsons twp@panix.com with numerous contributions by others.
4.6. How did ballet develop after the founding of that school?
The century after the founding of the "Acad'emie" marked the rise
of professionalism in ballet. Ballets like the "Balet Comique de la Royne"
were danced by noblemen, but after the founding of the "Acad'emie", the
nobility were gradually reduced to the status of spectators and patrons,
and ballet was performed by trained, professional dancers.
Early ballet differed from what we see to-day in several ways.
First, performance was "in the round": dancers performed on the floor of
a hall, with the audience surrounding them and looking down at them. It
was as if ballet were performed in a stadium. Ballet started using the
proscenium stage some time in the mid-1700s, and this had a considerable
influence on technique. Second, dancers did not have the great extensions
we see now; the leg was rarely raised higher than 45 degrees off the floor.
Third, dancers do not appear to have jumped very much: most dancing was at
ground level, "terre-`a-terre". The change to greater extension and more
steps of elevation may have resulted from the use of the proscenium stage,
since both extension and jumps are visually more effective there. Finally,
dancers wore heavy costumes--and *masks*. (Tights weren't invented until
about the time of the French Revolution.) Ballets in those days typically
represented the deeds of classical gods and heroes, and the masks may have
been thought appropriate for such roles. Dancers were still wearing masks
in the latter part of the eighteenth century; Noverre (question 4.7)
complains about them in his "Letters" of 1760.
Beauchamps must have had a large body of experience to draw on.
It would be interesting to know just when the organization of a ballet
class took the form it has to-day, but it was probably very soon after
the founding of the "Acad'emie" and may have been Beauchamps's work. He
is credited with naming the five positions of the feet, introducing more
steps of elevation, and emphasizing turnout. The positions and turnout are
mentioned in a book dating from around 1700. The degree of turnout was
probably only moderate; the 90-degree turnout we recognize as the ideal
to-day (i.e., with the feet in a straight line, pointing in opposite
directions) was a gradual development.
The first important book after the founding of the "Acad'emie"
seems to have been "Ma^itre `a Danser" ("The Dancing Master"), by Pierre
Rameau (1725). This book contains descriptions of pirouettes, beaten
steps, and jet'es, and it particularly emphasizes the arms. (The entire
second half of the book is devoted to the use of the arms.)
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