1
00:00:01,120 --> 00:00:04,080
Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class from how

2
00:00:04,120 --> 00:00:13,400
Speaker 1: Stuff Works dot com. Hello, and welcome to the podcast.

3
00:00:13,440 --> 00:00:17,319
Speaker 1: I'm Holly Frying, and I'm so Since this is a

4
00:00:17,360 --> 00:00:19,600
Speaker 1: season where a lot of people in our listener base

5
00:00:19,640 --> 00:00:23,240
Speaker 1: have just seen The Nutcracker, including me, I had just

6
00:00:23,280 --> 00:00:26,680
Speaker 1: saw it on Thursday, which is a ballet standard for

7
00:00:26,760 --> 00:00:29,360
Speaker 1: Christmas time, it seemed like a good time to delve

8
00:00:29,400 --> 00:00:32,960
Speaker 1: into where ballet began and how it became codified. And

9
00:00:33,000 --> 00:00:35,600
Speaker 1: we have covered a couple of famous ballet dancers on

10
00:00:35,640 --> 00:00:39,400
Speaker 1: the podcast, including Marie Taglioni in two thousand thirteen and

11
00:00:39,440 --> 00:00:43,199
Speaker 1: Maria taal Chief in and after each of those we

12
00:00:43,240 --> 00:00:46,520
Speaker 1: had a number of requests for a general ballet history episode,

13
00:00:46,600 --> 00:00:51,120
Speaker 1: so finally, years later, here we are with a lot

14
00:00:51,120 --> 00:00:55,360
Speaker 1: of caveats because this episode is a two parter, and

15
00:00:55,480 --> 00:01:00,360
Speaker 1: even so it leaves so much out. Ballet's big innings

16
00:01:00,400 --> 00:01:02,720
Speaker 1: in the Royal Court of France meant that in many

17
00:01:02,760 --> 00:01:06,440
Speaker 1: ways it became tied to national identity, not just in France,

18
00:01:06,480 --> 00:01:08,840
Speaker 1: but in the various places that it developed after that,

19
00:01:09,080 --> 00:01:11,520
Speaker 1: which also meant that the political shifts of the Western

20
00:01:11,600 --> 00:01:14,080
Speaker 1: world impacted it in a variety of ways, and we

21
00:01:14,160 --> 00:01:17,120
Speaker 1: cannot put a comprehensive history of the West into a

22
00:01:17,120 --> 00:01:21,479
Speaker 1: ballet episode, or really into any one episode. So it's

23
00:01:21,560 --> 00:01:25,480
Speaker 1: just a lot of things touched this particular topic, uh,

24
00:01:25,520 --> 00:01:30,520
Speaker 1: in ways that are not easy to be inclusive of everything. Also,

25
00:01:30,560 --> 00:01:32,440
Speaker 1: because of the way ballet developed, there is a good

26
00:01:32,440 --> 00:01:34,919
Speaker 1: bit of French history and a smattering of other nations.

27
00:01:34,920 --> 00:01:40,360
Speaker 1: But again brief. Additionally, if you love ballet, I feel you.

28
00:01:40,440 --> 00:01:42,640
Speaker 1: I studied dance for a long time and I would

29
00:01:42,680 --> 00:01:45,479
Speaker 1: really really be happy to wax rhapsodic over every single

30
00:01:45,520 --> 00:01:47,720
Speaker 1: step in Ghazelle, which is one of my personal favorites,

31
00:01:48,120 --> 00:01:52,160
Speaker 1: or talk about the astonishingly beautiful costumes in Balanchine's Jewels.

32
00:01:53,000 --> 00:01:54,840
Speaker 1: Oh they're really pretty. Google that if you want to

33
00:01:54,840 --> 00:01:57,480
Speaker 1: see some pretty things. But we can't go to in

34
00:01:57,600 --> 00:02:01,640
Speaker 1: depth into anyone ballet, although Aaglione in law Selphie does

35
00:02:01,680 --> 00:02:04,040
Speaker 1: get a good bit of talk because it's a pivotal

36
00:02:04,040 --> 00:02:06,720
Speaker 1: moment in ballet history. So in short, I just want

37
00:02:06,720 --> 00:02:10,200
Speaker 1: to reiterate the brief in the title A brief History

38
00:02:10,200 --> 00:02:12,880
Speaker 1: of Ballet, even though it is in two parts. Yeah,

39
00:02:12,919 --> 00:02:18,200
Speaker 1: I am imagining a whole college course that's like a

40
00:02:18,639 --> 00:02:21,720
Speaker 1: history of Europe and Asia through the lens of ballet

41
00:02:21,800 --> 00:02:25,040
Speaker 1: that would be fascinating. Um, I had a whole college

42
00:02:25,080 --> 00:02:28,240
Speaker 1: course and even it still covered only Western and could

43
00:02:28,240 --> 00:02:32,720
Speaker 1: not get to everything, Like it's just too much. And

44
00:02:32,760 --> 00:02:35,240
Speaker 1: like I said, there are so many pieces, and I

45
00:02:35,240 --> 00:02:37,000
Speaker 1: think part of it. We'll talk about this at the end.

46
00:02:37,040 --> 00:02:41,639
Speaker 1: But the way ballet migrated around through dancers traveling and

47
00:02:41,720 --> 00:02:45,400
Speaker 1: dancing teachers traveling, it also gets really complex in terms

48
00:02:45,440 --> 00:02:49,839
Speaker 1: of the world stage, literally, because everything is touching each

49
00:02:49,840 --> 00:02:52,840
Speaker 1: other in ways that might not happen in the development

50
00:02:52,880 --> 00:02:57,440
Speaker 1: of some other cultural phenomenon. Right, So humans have undoubtedly

51
00:02:57,520 --> 00:03:00,320
Speaker 1: danced in some way or another pretty much for as

52
00:03:00,360 --> 00:03:03,920
Speaker 1: long as we have existed. But while most people have

53
00:03:04,000 --> 00:03:07,679
Speaker 1: a natural response of moving when there's rhythmic music, it's

54
00:03:07,720 --> 00:03:12,480
Speaker 1: not necessarily structured or choreographed. The average person might know

55
00:03:12,680 --> 00:03:16,520
Speaker 1: some popular contemporary steps, or you could be like me

56
00:03:16,560 --> 00:03:18,600
Speaker 1: and no none of them and just be awkward all

57
00:03:18,600 --> 00:03:21,440
Speaker 1: the time. You might break those out at weddings or

58
00:03:21,520 --> 00:03:26,920
Speaker 1: other social engagements, but comparatively few have formally studied dance,

59
00:03:27,800 --> 00:03:30,519
Speaker 1: and for a long time there was no formalized dance

60
00:03:30,560 --> 00:03:34,440
Speaker 1: in Western culture. Over time, performers who had been entertaining

61
00:03:34,440 --> 00:03:37,160
Speaker 1: in the courts of Europe, such as jugglers and acrobats

62
00:03:37,400 --> 00:03:41,000
Speaker 1: were then also asked to teach their audiences how to dance,

63
00:03:41,560 --> 00:03:44,760
Speaker 1: and this blended the worlds of performance and social dancing,

64
00:03:44,840 --> 00:03:48,240
Speaker 1: and it created an entirely new profession, that of the

65
00:03:48,320 --> 00:03:51,880
Speaker 1: dance educator who taught grace and etiquette as well as

66
00:03:51,960 --> 00:03:55,320
Speaker 1: dance steps. The man who's often cited as the first

67
00:03:55,440 --> 00:03:59,840
Speaker 1: dancing master in the Western timeline is Domenico to Piacenza,

68
00:04:00,120 --> 00:04:02,920
Speaker 1: and truthfully, there were probably other people before him, but

69
00:04:03,000 --> 00:04:06,800
Speaker 1: he's the first one that's really documented. Piacenza wrote the

70
00:04:06,880 --> 00:04:10,360
Speaker 1: first dance manual in Europe in fourteen sixteen. It was

71
00:04:10,440 --> 00:04:14,200
Speaker 1: titled on the Art of Dancing and Directing Choruses. It's

72
00:04:14,240 --> 00:04:17,279
Speaker 1: important to note that Piacenza, who was about sixteen when

73
00:04:17,279 --> 00:04:19,600
Speaker 1: this work was published, was doing what a lot of

74
00:04:19,680 --> 00:04:22,719
Speaker 1: dance instructors were doing at the time, combining both music

75
00:04:22,760 --> 00:04:26,440
Speaker 1: and dance in his work. Yeah uh, we'll see more

76
00:04:26,520 --> 00:04:30,480
Speaker 1: later on that dance runs very parallel with music, and

77
00:04:30,839 --> 00:04:33,040
Speaker 1: see it even once it gets to a very theatrical point,

78
00:04:33,080 --> 00:04:37,159
Speaker 1: A lot of opera and dances very linked. Piacenza, who

79
00:04:37,160 --> 00:04:39,599
Speaker 1: eventually was knighted in the Order of the Golden Spur

80
00:04:39,960 --> 00:04:43,560
Speaker 1: choreographed dances for a variety of social events for nobility,

81
00:04:43,920 --> 00:04:48,000
Speaker 1: including weddings and festivals throughout Italy. In the last decades

82
00:04:48,040 --> 00:04:51,000
Speaker 1: of his life, several of those dances and their accompanying

83
00:04:51,080 --> 00:04:55,200
Speaker 1: musical notations were published. His ideology and teaching focused on

84
00:04:55,240 --> 00:04:58,839
Speaker 1: things like really understanding musical tempo and letting it guide

85
00:04:58,880 --> 00:05:02,080
Speaker 1: the body and all also maintaining a light and agile

86
00:05:02,080 --> 00:05:04,800
Speaker 1: mode of movement, always ready to move on to the

87
00:05:04,800 --> 00:05:08,840
Speaker 1: next step. And his writing he stated quote this necessitates

88
00:05:08,839 --> 00:05:12,520
Speaker 1: that at each tempo, one appears to have seen Medusa's head,

89
00:05:12,800 --> 00:05:15,760
Speaker 1: as the poet says, and be of stone in one instant,

90
00:05:15,839 --> 00:05:18,680
Speaker 1: and in another instant take flight like a falcon driven

91
00:05:18,720 --> 00:05:22,039
Speaker 1: by hunger. He really saw dance as a union of

92
00:05:22,240 --> 00:05:25,719
Speaker 1: intellect and effort to create beauty, and he thought that

93
00:05:25,760 --> 00:05:28,960
Speaker 1: it helped to be naturally beautiful to be the best

94
00:05:29,000 --> 00:05:33,880
Speaker 1: possible d answer something I think people still think today. Yeah,

95
00:05:33,960 --> 00:05:36,359
Speaker 1: I love his advice about like always be ready to

96
00:05:36,400 --> 00:05:40,080
Speaker 1: move again, because when you see UH novices learning steps,

97
00:05:40,120 --> 00:05:42,480
Speaker 1: that's usually what trips them up is that they are like,

98
00:05:42,560 --> 00:05:44,799
Speaker 1: I'm thinking about this step, I have completed this step,

99
00:05:45,160 --> 00:05:47,080
Speaker 1: and then other people are moving onto the next step

100
00:05:47,080 --> 00:05:49,400
Speaker 1: while they're like, I have completed the step UM. So

101
00:05:49,640 --> 00:05:51,599
Speaker 1: that in and of itself is really good advice, but

102
00:05:51,680 --> 00:05:53,520
Speaker 1: then it gets kind of lame when it's like, oh,

103
00:05:53,560 --> 00:05:57,880
Speaker 1: you better be pretty um. One of Piacenza's students was

104
00:05:57,920 --> 00:06:01,880
Speaker 1: Antonio Cornezzano, who was poet and a biographer as well

105
00:06:01,960 --> 00:06:04,480
Speaker 1: as a dancing master. A lot of these people had

106
00:06:04,600 --> 00:06:09,200
Speaker 1: very diversified resumes. Antonio became the dancing master of some

107
00:06:09,279 --> 00:06:12,919
Speaker 1: of Milan's most wealthy and influential families, and he wrote

108
00:06:12,960 --> 00:06:15,320
Speaker 1: his own book, Book of the Art of the Dance.

109
00:06:15,960 --> 00:06:20,680
Speaker 1: Another of Domenico de Piachens students, Gugliemo Abreo di Pizzarro,

110
00:06:21,040 --> 00:06:25,440
Speaker 1: who is often seen as Giovanni Ambroggio because that's the

111
00:06:25,520 --> 00:06:28,680
Speaker 1: name he assumed later on in his life, contributed also

112
00:06:28,839 --> 00:06:32,680
Speaker 1: to the early Western record of codified dance. In his

113
00:06:32,800 --> 00:06:35,359
Speaker 1: fourteen sixty three book treat Us on the Art of Dancing,

114
00:06:35,600 --> 00:06:39,840
Speaker 1: he included descriptions of dozens of large scale court dances

115
00:06:39,920 --> 00:06:42,000
Speaker 1: from the era. Yeah, at this point, a lot of

116
00:06:42,040 --> 00:06:46,919
Speaker 1: what was being written down and and codified was not

117
00:06:47,000 --> 00:06:49,800
Speaker 1: about steps, but like the shapes that people should make

118
00:06:49,880 --> 00:06:52,720
Speaker 1: in a in a ballroom, to create a dance uh

119
00:06:52,760 --> 00:06:55,400
Speaker 1: and Italy continued to be central in Europe in the

120
00:06:55,400 --> 00:06:59,720
Speaker 1: incorporation of structured and choreographed dance into its celebrations and

121
00:06:59,760 --> 00:07:03,440
Speaker 1: a throughout the fifteenth century and into the sixteenth. On

122
00:07:03,560 --> 00:07:07,520
Speaker 1: January ninety one of the most famous productions of the

123
00:07:07,560 --> 00:07:11,080
Speaker 1: Renaissance era was staged. It was called Festa del Paradiso

124
00:07:11,240 --> 00:07:14,360
Speaker 1: or Feast of Paradise, and that was staged by Leonardo

125
00:07:14,440 --> 00:07:17,400
Speaker 1: da Vinci, based on the work of poet Bernardo Balencioni

126
00:07:17,520 --> 00:07:21,560
Speaker 1: in Milan. Festa del Paradiso was part performance art and

127
00:07:21,680 --> 00:07:24,800
Speaker 1: part architectural marvel, and it was staged to celebrate the

128
00:07:24,800 --> 00:07:29,480
Speaker 1: marriage of gian Galileso Sforza and Isabella of Aragon. The

129
00:07:29,520 --> 00:07:33,640
Speaker 1: production had lavish scenery that depicted Jupiter surrounded by planets

130
00:07:33,640 --> 00:07:37,080
Speaker 1: and stars. The stage revolved in Roman gods and goddesses

131
00:07:37,120 --> 00:07:40,240
Speaker 1: were all included in this welcomed Isabella. There have been

132
00:07:40,560 --> 00:07:44,120
Speaker 1: entire books written about this one event, but for the

133
00:07:44,160 --> 00:07:47,720
Speaker 1: purposes of this discussion, the germane aspect is that there

134
00:07:47,880 --> 00:07:51,720
Speaker 1: was an entire prologue of dance performances in honor of

135
00:07:51,760 --> 00:07:55,960
Speaker 1: the newlyweds. Yeah, there have been various modern recreations of

136
00:07:56,000 --> 00:07:59,000
Speaker 1: this event, but it is just described in all writing

137
00:07:59,320 --> 00:08:01,200
Speaker 1: as this is honish ing thing. It's like one of

138
00:08:01,200 --> 00:08:04,120
Speaker 1: those things that the people that were there for it

139
00:08:04,560 --> 00:08:07,600
Speaker 1: were almost revered for having been at a marked an

140
00:08:07,640 --> 00:08:11,760
Speaker 1: important moment in history. And coming up, we are also

141
00:08:11,800 --> 00:08:14,040
Speaker 1: going to talk about a woman who has mentioned on

142
00:08:14,080 --> 00:08:16,880
Speaker 1: the podcast fairly frequently and who has been the focus

143
00:08:16,880 --> 00:08:19,520
Speaker 1: of some of our recent classics, and that's Catherine de Medici.

144
00:08:19,880 --> 00:08:21,880
Speaker 1: But first we are going to pause and have a

145
00:08:21,880 --> 00:08:33,360
Speaker 1: little sponsor break up. To this point, the slow codification

146
00:08:33,400 --> 00:08:36,240
Speaker 1: of dance was happening largely in Italy, but if you

147
00:08:36,280 --> 00:08:39,640
Speaker 1: are even passingly familiar with ballet you know that all

148
00:08:39,640 --> 00:08:42,160
Speaker 1: of the terminology for it is in French. Uh and

149
00:08:42,200 --> 00:08:44,880
Speaker 1: we actually have Catherine de Medici to thank for that.

150
00:08:45,840 --> 00:08:48,520
Speaker 1: When Catherine married on Red the second of France in

151
00:08:48,600 --> 00:08:51,600
Speaker 1: fifteen thirty three, she brought a lot of Italian customs

152
00:08:51,640 --> 00:08:54,880
Speaker 1: and culture into the French court. It wasn't as though

153
00:08:54,880 --> 00:08:57,559
Speaker 1: France did not have plenty of culture of its own,

154
00:08:57,760 --> 00:09:01,440
Speaker 1: but Catherine missed the very over the top celebrations that

155
00:09:01,480 --> 00:09:04,120
Speaker 1: she had been growing up with, so she encouraged the

156
00:09:04,120 --> 00:09:07,280
Speaker 1: development of the kinds of dances and events such as

157
00:09:07,640 --> 00:09:10,480
Speaker 1: Biletti and Bally that she had loved at home back

158
00:09:10,480 --> 00:09:14,000
Speaker 1: in Italy. At this point, these ballets, as the French

159
00:09:14,080 --> 00:09:17,559
Speaker 1: called them, were formal social events, although in some cases

160
00:09:17,559 --> 00:09:22,000
Speaker 1: the specific steps were adapted as performances. Yeah, but even

161
00:09:22,000 --> 00:09:25,160
Speaker 1: those performances were not like set apart from the event.

162
00:09:25,280 --> 00:09:28,240
Speaker 1: They were kind of in the middle of it, almost

163
00:09:28,240 --> 00:09:30,560
Speaker 1: the way you would have like a dance line at

164
00:09:30,559 --> 00:09:33,840
Speaker 1: a modern event where people go through and they show

165
00:09:33,840 --> 00:09:36,640
Speaker 1: off their skills. Kind of like that, except much more

166
00:09:36,800 --> 00:09:40,480
Speaker 1: formal and not as freestyle. And of course if you

167
00:09:40,520 --> 00:09:42,839
Speaker 1: have listened to the podcast, you know that Katherine de

168
00:09:42,880 --> 00:09:46,240
Speaker 1: Medici was involved in all manner of political intrigue, and

169
00:09:46,280 --> 00:09:48,680
Speaker 1: she was no innocent. So I don't want to try

170
00:09:48,679 --> 00:09:51,240
Speaker 1: to paint a picture of her as some benevolent purveyor

171
00:09:51,320 --> 00:09:54,960
Speaker 1: of culture from Italy to France. But her influence on

172
00:09:55,000 --> 00:09:59,479
Speaker 1: the arts of Europe is significant. In one Balthazar to Bourgeoio,

173
00:09:59,600 --> 00:10:02,240
Speaker 1: who had traveled from Italy to the court of France

174
00:10:02,240 --> 00:10:05,960
Speaker 1: in fifteen fifty five as a musician, staged the first

175
00:10:06,080 --> 00:10:10,040
Speaker 1: ballet that we have the complete record for his creation

176
00:10:10,160 --> 00:10:13,559
Speaker 1: was Ballet Comique de la Rene and that's the Queen's

177
00:10:13,640 --> 00:10:17,199
Speaker 1: comic ballet. It was created as part of the celebration

178
00:10:17,280 --> 00:10:19,760
Speaker 1: of the marriage of Marguerite de Lorand to the Duke

179
00:10:19,880 --> 00:10:25,160
Speaker 1: de Joyeus in October. That was October fifte and this

180
00:10:25,280 --> 00:10:29,160
Speaker 1: performance included singing and poetry as well as dancing. It

181
00:10:29,240 --> 00:10:32,680
Speaker 1: also lasted five and a half hours. Uh. This was

182
00:10:32,800 --> 00:10:36,000
Speaker 1: expensive to produce and the price tag for that particular

183
00:10:36,040 --> 00:10:39,720
Speaker 1: piece of entertainment was three point six million gold francs.

184
00:10:39,840 --> 00:10:43,079
Speaker 1: And yes, there were absolutely people at court who spoke

185
00:10:43,200 --> 00:10:46,240
Speaker 1: very critically of that level of expenditure at a time

186
00:10:46,280 --> 00:10:48,480
Speaker 1: when France was in conflict and should not have been

187
00:10:48,480 --> 00:10:53,199
Speaker 1: throwing money around. But this production also had a massive influence.

188
00:10:53,559 --> 00:10:56,480
Speaker 1: For one thing, it's at a trend and inspired courts

189
00:10:56,520 --> 00:11:01,320
Speaker 1: of other countries to similarly stage massive theatrical performances. It

190
00:11:01,400 --> 00:11:04,480
Speaker 1: also sparked not only the development of ballet as an

191
00:11:04,600 --> 00:11:08,720
Speaker 1: art form, but also opera. Ballet Comique de Lorraine was

192
00:11:08,920 --> 00:11:13,000
Speaker 1: a narrative. It was the story of Searcy from Homer's Odyssey,

193
00:11:13,280 --> 00:11:16,680
Speaker 1: although it's ultimately the King of France to whom Searcy

194
00:11:16,800 --> 00:11:20,360
Speaker 1: bows in this version. The performance was given by members

195
00:11:20,360 --> 00:11:22,480
Speaker 1: of the courts, and while it may be called the

196
00:11:22,520 --> 00:11:24,719
Speaker 1: first ballet. It was not up on a stage. It

197
00:11:24,800 --> 00:11:27,760
Speaker 1: was just in the middle of a ballroom. Yeah, like said,

198
00:11:27,880 --> 00:11:31,880
Speaker 1: everybody's just kind of at the same level, dancing, sharing

199
00:11:31,920 --> 00:11:36,240
Speaker 1: their their production. This performance had been the result of

200
00:11:36,280 --> 00:11:39,240
Speaker 1: more than a decade of effort and philosophizing about art

201
00:11:39,559 --> 00:11:42,720
Speaker 1: at the Academy depoisy in de Musique, which was founded

202
00:11:42,720 --> 00:11:46,400
Speaker 1: in fifteen seventy by Catherine's son, Charles the ninth of France.

203
00:11:46,760 --> 00:11:50,080
Speaker 1: He gets the same disclaimer as his mother regarding often

204
00:11:50,120 --> 00:11:53,200
Speaker 1: being uh the cause of a lot of political intrigue,

205
00:11:53,240 --> 00:11:56,600
Speaker 1: not just a benevolent patron of the arts. The academy

206
00:11:56,720 --> 00:11:59,360
Speaker 1: was established on the idea that humans could achieve a

207
00:11:59,400 --> 00:12:02,880
Speaker 1: certain level of spiritual grace through the study of the arts,

208
00:12:02,960 --> 00:12:04,880
Speaker 1: and this sort of runs parallel to the use of

209
00:12:04,920 --> 00:12:08,440
Speaker 1: theatrical spectacles and celebration is a way to counter the

210
00:12:08,480 --> 00:12:12,280
Speaker 1: heavy conflict of France at the time, conflict that this

211
00:12:12,720 --> 00:12:16,199
Speaker 1: family in the royal staging. These ballets were often party too,

212
00:12:16,640 --> 00:12:19,880
Speaker 1: and also often the cause of and in terms of

213
00:12:19,920 --> 00:12:24,120
Speaker 1: ballet's history Ballet comique de Lorraine. It started another trend.

214
00:12:24,160 --> 00:12:27,400
Speaker 1: In addition to just inspiring other nations to do the

215
00:12:27,440 --> 00:12:30,240
Speaker 1: same basic thing that was the ballet de cour or

216
00:12:30,280 --> 00:12:33,280
Speaker 1: the court ballet. That just means that it was dances

217
00:12:33,320 --> 00:12:35,960
Speaker 1: in which the performers and the audience were mostly all

218
00:12:36,080 --> 00:12:40,040
Speaker 1: members of the court, with monarchs sometimes participating as performers.

219
00:12:40,400 --> 00:12:42,600
Speaker 1: It was sort of a by us for us art

220
00:12:43,080 --> 00:12:47,040
Speaker 1: in an extremely exclusive sense, and it also made dancing

221
00:12:47,080 --> 00:12:50,400
Speaker 1: a serious and intellectual form of expression in the French court,

222
00:12:50,480 --> 00:12:54,680
Speaker 1: so it could reflect political and religious ideologies. There was

223
00:12:54,720 --> 00:12:57,320
Speaker 1: a degree to which these court dances were really being

224
00:12:57,440 --> 00:13:00,320
Speaker 1: used to soothe the minds of the aristocra. See. It

225
00:13:00,320 --> 00:13:03,439
Speaker 1: was sort of like, look how ordered and beautiful all

226
00:13:03,480 --> 00:13:07,000
Speaker 1: of this is. France is obviously doing just fine. Frances,

227
00:13:07,120 --> 00:13:10,440
Speaker 1: We're doing great. You got look what we make. We're

228
00:13:10,559 --> 00:13:14,319
Speaker 1: so amazing. Uh yeah. It's one of those weird things

229
00:13:14,400 --> 00:13:20,199
Speaker 1: where you realize just how completely uh separate the lives

230
00:13:20,360 --> 00:13:22,840
Speaker 1: of the haves and have nots were at this period.

231
00:13:23,760 --> 00:13:27,520
Speaker 1: The ballet decour and its predecessors were fundamentally just building

232
00:13:27,520 --> 00:13:29,960
Speaker 1: on existing dance steps that would be part of any

233
00:13:30,040 --> 00:13:33,400
Speaker 1: fancy social function, and because of that, write ups on

234
00:13:33,480 --> 00:13:36,240
Speaker 1: staging had always been pretty vague about how to actually

235
00:13:36,280 --> 00:13:39,079
Speaker 1: do these steps. It appears that there was a presumption

236
00:13:39,200 --> 00:13:41,760
Speaker 1: that the reader of any such documentation would just know

237
00:13:41,880 --> 00:13:44,640
Speaker 1: how to do the bassa dants or the gavut, So

238
00:13:44,720 --> 00:13:47,680
Speaker 1: instructions tended to focus on the shapes that the dancers

239
00:13:47,679 --> 00:13:50,320
Speaker 1: should form up in where they should physically be in

240
00:13:50,400 --> 00:13:54,319
Speaker 1: relation to other groups or other dancers. Uh And throughout

241
00:13:54,400 --> 00:13:58,079
Speaker 1: this period these dance performances were still part of much

242
00:13:58,200 --> 00:14:02,840
Speaker 1: larger productions that included singing in spoken words segments. Finally,

243
00:14:02,880 --> 00:14:07,120
Speaker 1: in fIF someone wrote down an instruction manual of how

244
00:14:07,120 --> 00:14:10,520
Speaker 1: to actually do the steps of ballet and how those

245
00:14:10,520 --> 00:14:13,360
Speaker 1: steps should interact with the music. The author of this

246
00:14:13,400 --> 00:14:17,480
Speaker 1: work was Jehan Tabureau, who was a priest. Writing as Twine,

247
00:14:17,840 --> 00:14:22,000
Speaker 1: ar Beaux or Cassography not only codified all of these

248
00:14:22,000 --> 00:14:24,160
Speaker 1: court dances dating back to the twelfth century, but it

249
00:14:24,200 --> 00:14:26,520
Speaker 1: also did so in a way that made it accessible

250
00:14:26,560 --> 00:14:30,840
Speaker 1: to everyone. Yes, theoretically, are bows writing could be picked

251
00:14:30,880 --> 00:14:32,760
Speaker 1: up by any novice and they would go, now, I

252
00:14:32,800 --> 00:14:36,440
Speaker 1: know how to dance. The reign of Louis the fourteenth

253
00:14:36,640 --> 00:14:39,400
Speaker 1: famously put France on the map as the nexus of

254
00:14:39,440 --> 00:14:42,280
Speaker 1: the arts in Europe, and Louis the fourteenth was in

255
00:14:42,320 --> 00:14:45,120
Speaker 1: many ways far more interested in art than politics, and

256
00:14:45,200 --> 00:14:48,200
Speaker 1: his decision to bolster all kinds of arts when he

257
00:14:48,240 --> 00:14:50,800
Speaker 1: was king shaped the identity of France in ways that

258
00:14:50,880 --> 00:14:54,920
Speaker 1: continue to reverberate today, and dance was certainly part of that.

259
00:14:55,400 --> 00:14:58,480
Speaker 1: But his predecessor, Louis the Thirteenth, who reigned from sixteen

260
00:14:58,520 --> 00:15:01,560
Speaker 1: ten to sixteen forty three, was also really enamored with

261
00:15:01,600 --> 00:15:05,880
Speaker 1: the ballet de cour. He was regular and enthusiastic participant

262
00:15:05,920 --> 00:15:08,720
Speaker 1: as a performer and as a designer, and under Louis

263
00:15:08,800 --> 00:15:11,400
Speaker 1: the Thirteenth, ballets were still very much part of a

264
00:15:11,440 --> 00:15:14,760
Speaker 1: party atmosphere at court. They became raucous and filled with

265
00:15:14,800 --> 00:15:18,880
Speaker 1: innuendo and even crass humor, and they were wildly popular,

266
00:15:19,400 --> 00:15:21,640
Speaker 1: a little too popular to some degree, because in some

267
00:15:21,680 --> 00:15:24,320
Speaker 1: cases the king couldn't even get through the crowds that

268
00:15:24,360 --> 00:15:27,600
Speaker 1: were gathering to see the performances to make his entrance.

269
00:15:27,680 --> 00:15:29,800
Speaker 1: He had all clumped up to see the king and

270
00:15:29,840 --> 00:15:32,200
Speaker 1: could not because they were blocking him. It was during

271
00:15:32,240 --> 00:15:35,720
Speaker 1: Louis the thirteenth time as monarch that the stage emerged,

272
00:15:35,840 --> 00:15:38,600
Speaker 1: bringing the spectacle of ballet up off of the floor,

273
00:15:38,960 --> 00:15:41,280
Speaker 1: and it's also when the idea of the audience and

274
00:15:41,320 --> 00:15:46,040
Speaker 1: the performers occupying separate spaces really established itself, at least

275
00:15:46,040 --> 00:15:50,040
Speaker 1: as related to ballet. Theaters were built with backstage areas

276
00:15:50,080 --> 00:15:53,040
Speaker 1: and entrance wings and the types of riggings that enabled

277
00:15:53,080 --> 00:15:55,080
Speaker 1: the performance of the ballet to become more of an

278
00:15:55,200 --> 00:15:58,480
Speaker 1: artful deception. When the audience had shared the floor with

279
00:15:58,520 --> 00:16:01,000
Speaker 1: the performers, there was never any real way to just

280
00:16:01,120 --> 00:16:04,480
Speaker 1: lose yourself in the willful suspension of disbelief that the

281
00:16:04,600 --> 00:16:07,840
Speaker 1: characters in the story were real. But when the artists

282
00:16:07,880 --> 00:16:11,160
Speaker 1: were creating a show separated from the crowd and only

283
00:16:11,280 --> 00:16:15,040
Speaker 1: seen in character and all the scenery tricks were concealed,

284
00:16:15,040 --> 00:16:17,080
Speaker 1: the audience could get swept up in the magic of

285
00:16:17,080 --> 00:16:21,600
Speaker 1: the performance. Incidentally, the phrase suspension of disbelief would not

286
00:16:21,640 --> 00:16:25,200
Speaker 1: be coined for another two hundred years, when Coleridge wrote

287
00:16:25,200 --> 00:16:27,640
Speaker 1: about that idea. And next up, we are getting to

288
00:16:27,680 --> 00:16:29,760
Speaker 1: the man who often gets a lot of credit when

289
00:16:29,800 --> 00:16:32,520
Speaker 1: it comes to ballet's development, as I mentioned a moment

290
00:16:32,560 --> 00:16:35,320
Speaker 1: ago King Louis the fourteenth. But before that we are

291
00:16:35,320 --> 00:16:36,920
Speaker 1: going to have a little break and have a word

292
00:16:36,960 --> 00:16:48,320
Speaker 1: from a sponsor. During Louis the Fourteenth's very long rain

293
00:16:48,480 --> 00:16:51,240
Speaker 1: that stretched from the mid seventeenth century into the early

294
00:16:51,280 --> 00:16:55,680
Speaker 1: eighteenth century, the idea of really perfecting dance steps came

295
00:16:55,720 --> 00:16:59,520
Speaker 1: into focus, establishing a true standard of technique, which remains

296
00:16:59,520 --> 00:17:02,640
Speaker 1: a key ozone of ballet practice today. And Louis the

297
00:17:02,640 --> 00:17:07,280
Speaker 1: fourteenth loved dancing. He began performing at age thirteen, and

298
00:17:07,320 --> 00:17:10,080
Speaker 1: he was quite good, both because he had a very

299
00:17:10,160 --> 00:17:15,280
Speaker 1: natural talent and because he practiced for several hours every day.

300
00:17:15,520 --> 00:17:18,159
Speaker 1: We should mention that during this time, social dance was

301
00:17:18,200 --> 00:17:21,120
Speaker 1: also at a fever pitch of popularity. While the king

302
00:17:21,200 --> 00:17:24,320
Speaker 1: and other dancers perfected their steps for presentation, they and

303
00:17:24,320 --> 00:17:26,439
Speaker 1: the rest of the court were also working on steps

304
00:17:26,480 --> 00:17:30,960
Speaker 1: for the ballrooms less theatrical activities. The menuet in particular

305
00:17:31,000 --> 00:17:33,600
Speaker 1: became an important dance and was often the grand finale

306
00:17:33,640 --> 00:17:36,760
Speaker 1: of a series of dances at a large celebration, and

307
00:17:36,840 --> 00:17:40,560
Speaker 1: both social dance and performance dance continued to be intertwined.

308
00:17:41,160 --> 00:17:45,240
Speaker 1: For example, Les Plaisi deligen chant that's the Pleasures of

309
00:17:45,240 --> 00:17:49,000
Speaker 1: the Enchanted Island was a three day event that featured

310
00:17:49,040 --> 00:17:53,080
Speaker 1: performers doing everything from serving food at banquets to dancing

311
00:17:53,119 --> 00:17:56,720
Speaker 1: in the finale ballet. This took place at Versailles in

312
00:17:56,800 --> 00:17:59,920
Speaker 1: sixteen sixty four, as that property was beginning its train

313
00:18:00,080 --> 00:18:03,000
Speaker 1: edition from being a hunting lodge to becoming a palace,

314
00:18:03,440 --> 00:18:07,480
Speaker 1: and the whole spectacle both entertained and reinforced the hierarchy,

315
00:18:07,560 --> 00:18:11,400
Speaker 1: rank structure, and level of royal favor of everyone involved.

316
00:18:11,920 --> 00:18:15,160
Speaker 1: Louis the fourteenth was both the star and an observer,

317
00:18:15,480 --> 00:18:18,840
Speaker 1: so for the climactic finish, a professional dancer took over

318
00:18:18,880 --> 00:18:21,359
Speaker 1: the lead that Louis the fourteenth had been performing, so

319
00:18:21,400 --> 00:18:24,000
Speaker 1: that the king could sit back and watch. Loui the

320
00:18:24,040 --> 00:18:28,040
Speaker 1: fourteenth also founded the first formal dance institution in the

321
00:18:28,080 --> 00:18:32,480
Speaker 1: Western world, l Academy Royal to Dance, in sixteen sixty one,

322
00:18:33,240 --> 00:18:36,360
Speaker 1: and to head up this enterprise, he selected thirteen dancing

323
00:18:36,400 --> 00:18:39,080
Speaker 1: masters for the academy, and they had a list of tasks.

324
00:18:39,119 --> 00:18:42,480
Speaker 1: They needed to develop standards of dance technique. They needed

325
00:18:42,480 --> 00:18:45,800
Speaker 1: to document existing ballets so they could be repeated according

326
00:18:45,840 --> 00:18:48,159
Speaker 1: to those standards, and they had to test and a

327
00:18:48,280 --> 00:18:52,400
Speaker 1: credit dance teachers. These thirteen masters, who called themselves the Elders,

328
00:18:52,440 --> 00:18:55,679
Speaker 1: were of course highly connected to the royal court, and

329
00:18:55,720 --> 00:18:57,720
Speaker 1: the problem with all of this was that there was

330
00:18:57,840 --> 00:19:01,640
Speaker 1: already a performers guild in France which included dancers as

331
00:19:01,640 --> 00:19:06,000
Speaker 1: well as acrobats, musicians, etcetera. And the professional dancers who

332
00:19:06,000 --> 00:19:09,880
Speaker 1: appeared in court productions alongside the nobility were already members

333
00:19:09,920 --> 00:19:14,320
Speaker 1: of that existing guild, Confrairie de Saint Julien de Menetrier,

334
00:19:14,920 --> 00:19:17,480
Speaker 1: which had been founded in Paris in thirteen twenty one.

335
00:19:17,520 --> 00:19:20,840
Speaker 1: So it was a long standing tradition, and in addition

336
00:19:20,880 --> 00:19:24,680
Speaker 1: to challenging the long standing guild's power, this new dance

337
00:19:24,720 --> 00:19:29,560
Speaker 1: academy also argued guild members attempted to divorce dance from music,

338
00:19:29,600 --> 00:19:33,520
Speaker 1: which was completely anathema and in their opinion, disrespectful to

339
00:19:33,600 --> 00:19:37,240
Speaker 1: both aspects of the arts. While this academy system created

340
00:19:37,280 --> 00:19:40,560
Speaker 1: tension and set up some dancing teachers as courtiers, making

341
00:19:40,600 --> 00:19:44,400
Speaker 1: them wealthy in the process, the real goal of notating

342
00:19:44,520 --> 00:19:47,919
Speaker 1: dance and written form was for Louis the fourteenth to

343
00:19:48,000 --> 00:19:52,000
Speaker 1: be able to export ballet. Basically, he wanted French influence

344
00:19:52,000 --> 00:19:54,000
Speaker 1: in the arts to be codified so that it could

345
00:19:54,000 --> 00:19:58,520
Speaker 1: be admired and emulated, and this was the case with academies.

346
00:19:58,560 --> 00:20:02,960
Speaker 1: He established an other sciplines as well, including architecture, painting,

347
00:20:03,000 --> 00:20:06,720
Speaker 1: and fencing. Yeah, he's come up in in a number

348
00:20:06,720 --> 00:20:09,760
Speaker 1: of episodes on the show, uh and he really was

349
00:20:10,440 --> 00:20:14,639
Speaker 1: the beginning of France being the tastemakers of Europe and

350
00:20:14,680 --> 00:20:16,240
Speaker 1: then the rest of the world. That was kind of

351
00:20:16,240 --> 00:20:19,080
Speaker 1: a very calculated move on his part that they would

352
00:20:19,119 --> 00:20:21,560
Speaker 1: be the best at all of the arts. And at

353
00:20:21,600 --> 00:20:24,960
Speaker 1: this point LaBelle dance, also known as French noble style

354
00:20:25,040 --> 00:20:28,680
Speaker 1: dance or baroque dance, starts to really become a precursor

355
00:20:28,760 --> 00:20:32,120
Speaker 1: to what we'd call classical ballet today. But at this point,

356
00:20:32,119 --> 00:20:35,240
Speaker 1: though there were women involved in court performances, it was

357
00:20:35,280 --> 00:20:38,520
Speaker 1: all really about male performers rather than women, and LaBelle

358
00:20:38,560 --> 00:20:43,320
Speaker 1: dance was a male only form. Simultaneously, the ballet cour

359
00:20:43,520 --> 00:20:47,640
Speaker 1: was shifting into a new format, Moliere's comedy ballet, which

360
00:20:47,720 --> 00:20:50,800
Speaker 1: were shorter, tighter productions than these hours and hours and

361
00:20:50,840 --> 00:20:53,960
Speaker 1: hours and hours long spectacles that the court had been

362
00:20:54,000 --> 00:20:57,280
Speaker 1: seeing up at this point, or becoming the favored iteration

363
00:20:57,359 --> 00:21:01,080
Speaker 1: of these types of performances. They still bind dance and

364
00:21:01,119 --> 00:21:04,440
Speaker 1: spoken word theater, and even as they skewered the nobility

365
00:21:04,520 --> 00:21:07,320
Speaker 1: and ambition and the dishonor of using dance to move

366
00:21:07,400 --> 00:21:12,000
Speaker 1: up socially as the bourgeois gentilan did, they were applauded

367
00:21:12,080 --> 00:21:15,920
Speaker 1: for their wits rather than condemned. For basically mocking the audience.

368
00:21:16,240 --> 00:21:18,600
Speaker 1: It was also under Louis the Fourteenth's watch that the

369
00:21:18,640 --> 00:21:21,960
Speaker 1: five positions of the feet that are key to ballet

370
00:21:22,000 --> 00:21:25,480
Speaker 1: were first laid out as established by Pierre Beauchamp, the

371
00:21:25,600 --> 00:21:28,639
Speaker 1: director of the Academy Royal de Dance, and he also

372
00:21:28,680 --> 00:21:33,320
Speaker 1: devised a notation system that was codified later by Raoul J. Fourier,

373
00:21:33,960 --> 00:21:36,840
Speaker 1: and Foyer published this notation and other notes on things

374
00:21:36,880 --> 00:21:40,119
Speaker 1: such as armed positions and ideal bodies for dance in

375
00:21:40,119 --> 00:21:43,680
Speaker 1: his seventeen hundred book kore Grophie u lau de de

376
00:21:43,840 --> 00:21:47,000
Speaker 1: clare la dance. So that's choreography or the art of

377
00:21:47,040 --> 00:21:52,240
Speaker 1: describing dance. Meanwhile, the Academy Royale de Musique, founded in

378
00:21:52,320 --> 00:21:57,080
Speaker 1: sixteen sixty nine, would eventually become the Paris Opera. Jean

379
00:21:57,280 --> 00:22:00,960
Speaker 1: Baptiste Lulie became head of the organization and sixteen seventy two,

380
00:22:01,000 --> 00:22:03,440
Speaker 1: and he made a series of moves to ensure the

381
00:22:03,520 --> 00:22:07,639
Speaker 1: organization's power and prestige. Included negotiating terms that made it

382
00:22:07,680 --> 00:22:11,000
Speaker 1: illegal for other theaters to stage productions of the same

383
00:22:11,080 --> 00:22:16,480
Speaker 1: size and scale as the royally established institution. Over time,

384
00:22:16,640 --> 00:22:20,760
Speaker 1: ballet performances started to fall under the auspices of this organization. Yeah,

385
00:22:20,840 --> 00:22:23,040
Speaker 1: that's a little bit of a political intrigue. They kind

386
00:22:23,080 --> 00:22:25,879
Speaker 1: of took power from the Academy de Dance and that

387
00:22:26,000 --> 00:22:28,200
Speaker 1: is where we're going to leave off for the moment. Uh.

388
00:22:28,280 --> 00:22:31,119
Speaker 1: Next time, we are literally picking up right where we

389
00:22:31,240 --> 00:22:33,919
Speaker 1: left off, and we are going to feature a major

390
00:22:33,960 --> 00:22:37,480
Speaker 1: milestone in the dance world right off the bat. Do

391
00:22:37,960 --> 00:22:41,520
Speaker 1: you have some listener mail before we close out? May we?

392
00:22:42,359 --> 00:22:45,239
Speaker 1: I do? I have to postcards. I'm trying to when

393
00:22:45,280 --> 00:22:46,800
Speaker 1: we do postcards, I'm trying to do a couple at

394
00:22:46,800 --> 00:22:49,760
Speaker 1: a time. Our first postcard that I wanted to mention

395
00:22:49,840 --> 00:22:53,200
Speaker 1: is from our listener, Jess Uh. It is from the

396
00:22:53,280 --> 00:22:57,119
Speaker 1: Warsaw Uprising Museum. She just wrote, high, I recently visited

397
00:22:57,160 --> 00:23:00,480
Speaker 1: the Warsaw Uprising Museum in Warsaw, Poland, an event unknown

398
00:23:00,480 --> 00:23:02,880
Speaker 1: to me until I visited, but it plays a big

399
00:23:02,920 --> 00:23:05,680
Speaker 1: part in the city and countries national identity and could

400
00:23:05,680 --> 00:23:08,439
Speaker 1: be an interesting topic idea for your podcast. Thank you

401
00:23:08,480 --> 00:23:11,840
Speaker 1: for your great podcast, Jess. This is a very striking picture.

402
00:23:11,880 --> 00:23:13,480
Speaker 1: I want to say it's beautiful, but there's a little

403
00:23:13,480 --> 00:23:15,240
Speaker 1: bit of melancholy to it, but it's really lovely, So

404
00:23:15,320 --> 00:23:18,760
Speaker 1: thank you Jess for thinking of us. I'm always so

405
00:23:19,359 --> 00:23:22,520
Speaker 1: so odd that people take time while they're traveling to

406
00:23:22,600 --> 00:23:24,600
Speaker 1: write us a postcard, because I can't even manage that

407
00:23:24,680 --> 00:23:28,720
Speaker 1: for my closest friends. Our second postcard comes from our listener, Phoebe.

408
00:23:29,080 --> 00:23:32,719
Speaker 1: It is from Baias and Sebastian. Write Steer, Tracy and Holly,

409
00:23:32,720 --> 00:23:34,960
Speaker 1: thank you for all you do to make history accessible

410
00:23:34,960 --> 00:23:37,800
Speaker 1: and entertaining. I've been listening to your podcast for about

411
00:23:37,800 --> 00:23:39,520
Speaker 1: one and a half years now, and while I don't

412
00:23:39,520 --> 00:23:42,119
Speaker 1: always get around to every episode, I love all of

413
00:23:42,160 --> 00:23:44,040
Speaker 1: them that I do here. There's no shame in that

414
00:23:44,080 --> 00:23:46,840
Speaker 1: we all have finite time to listen to things I

415
00:23:46,880 --> 00:23:49,040
Speaker 1: can't keep up with my podcast. I will never shame

416
00:23:49,080 --> 00:23:51,720
Speaker 1: anybody over that one. Uh this is my third year.

417
00:23:51,800 --> 00:23:53,480
Speaker 1: She goes on to say of living in Spain, and

418
00:23:53,520 --> 00:23:55,480
Speaker 1: it can get a bit lonely and isolating living in

419
00:23:55,480 --> 00:23:58,879
Speaker 1: a foreign country with a foreign tongue. Your podcast is

420
00:23:58,920 --> 00:24:00,400
Speaker 1: one of the few I listened to you to make

421
00:24:00,440 --> 00:24:02,960
Speaker 1: myself more comfortable here, so thank you for always keeping

422
00:24:02,960 --> 00:24:05,199
Speaker 1: me company. I wanted to write to tell you how

423
00:24:05,280 --> 00:24:08,359
Speaker 1: much I enjoyed your episode about Catalina di Rauzo, The

424
00:24:08,400 --> 00:24:11,120
Speaker 1: Lieutenant nun. I used to live in Pamplona and would

425
00:24:11,119 --> 00:24:14,200
Speaker 1: go to Donastia often, and I loved getting to learn

426
00:24:14,240 --> 00:24:17,640
Speaker 1: about such a dynamic character from my own backyard. This

427
00:24:17,720 --> 00:24:19,440
Speaker 1: is coming to you so late because I wanted to

428
00:24:19,440 --> 00:24:22,520
Speaker 1: get you a postcard from there. Uh. So she then

429
00:24:22,560 --> 00:24:26,720
Speaker 1: describes what the postcard is, which is um a main

430
00:24:26,800 --> 00:24:30,159
Speaker 1: beach which is called lak Anka which means the shell. Uh.

431
00:24:30,200 --> 00:24:32,399
Speaker 1: And then she says, keep up the absolutely excellent work

432
00:24:32,600 --> 00:24:35,840
Speaker 1: and more about Spain please. Uh she It's so delightful,

433
00:24:35,880 --> 00:24:37,440
Speaker 1: and thank you so much, Phoebe. It's a really cool

434
00:24:37,480 --> 00:24:42,199
Speaker 1: panoramic postcard. So it's a beautiful long landscape view of

435
00:24:42,200 --> 00:24:44,639
Speaker 1: this area and it looks absolutely gorgeous and makes me

436
00:24:44,680 --> 00:24:46,679
Speaker 1: want to visit. If you would like to write to us,

437
00:24:46,720 --> 00:24:49,080
Speaker 1: you can do so at History Podcast at how stove

438
00:24:49,119 --> 00:24:52,000
Speaker 1: works dot com. You minus everywhere on social media as

439
00:24:52,040 --> 00:24:54,359
Speaker 1: Missed in History, and you can visit us on our website,

440
00:24:54,359 --> 00:24:56,720
Speaker 1: which is Missed in History dot com. It would also

441
00:24:56,760 --> 00:24:59,080
Speaker 1: be grand of you to subscribe to the show, which

442
00:24:59,119 --> 00:25:01,520
Speaker 1: is something you can do on Apple podcast, the I

443
00:25:01,640 --> 00:25:09,960
Speaker 1: Heart Radio app, or wherever you get your podcasts. For

444
00:25:10,040 --> 00:25:12,560
Speaker 1: more on this and thousands of other topics, Visit how

445
00:25:12,600 --> 00:25:14,480
Speaker 1: staff works dot com, m