The Earliest Giselle? A Preliminary Report on a St. Petersburg Manuscript

Abstract

There are many spectacular treasures in the archive of the Theater Museum in St. Petersburg, but few perhaps are more revealing than a pair of hand-annotated nineteenth-century scores of Giselle. One is a manuscript rehearsal score, called a repetiteur, annotated measure by measure in a very neat hand with descriptions in French of the action of both acts. The other is a printed piano score; its annotations, which cover only the first act, are also in French, although written in a different (and somewhat less tidy) hand. The words used in both scores are nearly the same. The annotations in these scores, which are little known in the West, can contribute truly fresh information to our overall understanding of Giselle and also give us a far fuller picture of the relationship of mime and dance as it existed in the Romantic ballet. Moreover, dance historians and choreographers should be aware that Giselle was by no means the only ballet to have been recorded in this manner, and that a good many such scores have survived and are awaiting discovery in archives and private collections, as annotated repetiteurs were apparently frequently created and disseminated in the nineteenth century. Written for one or sometimes two musicians to play during rehearsals (a solo violinist or perhaps a cellist and violinist), annotated repetiteurs were intended to