NYCB Vol. 17 No. 8 - Le Tombeau de Couperin

Lauryn Johnson
Jan 25
2 min read

Wilhelmina Frankfurt & David Richardson. Photo by Martha Swope, 1976. NYPL

In 1976 at the Maurice Ravel Festival, Balanchine premiered the ballet, “Le Tombeau de Couperin.”

Anna Kisselgoff declared, this ballet was, “was the masterpiece of the [Ravel] Festival, a ballet that deserves to endure with the best of the Balanchine repertory and one whose creative and intellectual underpinnings are first-rate.

“In ‘Le Tombeau de Couperin,’ Mr. Balanchine has used the 18th-century court dances that inspired Ravel as his own point of departure. Court dance has frequently been at the base of Mr. Balanchine’s own ballets, but here he is closer to the folk-dance forms that were themselves refined into court dance.

Wilhelmina Frankfurt, Victor Castelli, Judith Fugate, David. Photo by Martha Swope, 1976. NYPL

“’Le Tombeau de Couperin’ shares something with the recent revival of Balanchine’s “Square Dance,” but is an ensemble work par excellence and the eight couples who performed it, did so outstandingly.

“The ballet’s four sections revolve around the basic units of two quadrilles, or two sets of squares formed by four couples. the two quadrilles do not fully merge until the last section. They frequently mirror each other, but they also fall into patterns in which separate groups alternate while doing the same steps and never seem to be boringly repetitive.

“The folk forms are visible: curtsies, reels, promenades and later, a chain dance. But the steps remain classical and in decorum—a picture of dance at its most civilized.”

—Anna Kiseelgoff, New York Times, 1976