Roland Petit

Roland Petit ( born January 13, 1924 in Villemomble the department of Seine -Saint- Denis, to the north-west of Paris, † July 10, 2011 in Geneva) was a French dancer and choreographer of international reputation.

Early career

Roland Petit, whose father ran a bistro, began at the age of nine years to dance and came to the ballet school of the Ballet de l' Opéra de Paris, where the future stars Leslie Caron Violette Verdy and were among his early partners. After the war he left the Opera and in 1948 founded his own company, Les Ballets de Paris de Roland Petit. From this period his most famous choreography, Carmen (1949 ), starring Renée ( Zizi ) Jean Maire in the title role of his wife in 1954. With her he had a daughter, Valentine.

Style

Petit can be assigned to the Nouvelle Vague of French dance which realized a shift away from the purely classical language. The tendency prevailed with him the ballet, although he also created abstract pieces. Fantastic, fairy-tale elements mixed with realism in content and presentation.

His choreography was fast, funny and very theatrically effective: he built about acrobatic elements and a pantomime and related modern, common everyday props. Also vocals were interspersed. Thus, a cross-genre close to the musical and film music was played from the beginning. Petit choreographed subsequently also for spectacular revues and films such as Daddy Long Legs with Fred Astaire, whom he greatly esteemed, and the movie musical Anything Goes.

Later work

1960 Petit turned more and more to the traditional stage dance to when he was commissioned to conduct the " Festival populaires de ballet " at the Théâtre National de Chaillot in Paris boroughs Chaillot. Petit collaborated with many companies, such as the then Sadler's Wells Ballet (now the Royal Ballet ) and the Royal Danish Ballet.

From 1970 to 1975 he was managing director and owner of the Revue Theatre Casino de Paris. In 1972 he founded the Ballet de Marseille, which he directed until 1997, inclusive. In 1992 there also a ballet school. Petit 1993 published his memoirs under the title J'ai dansé sur les flots. His last, in 2004 have placed on the stage work, which deals with one's own creative process in the course of his career, entitled Les chemins de la création. In January 2009, he celebrated with his ballet version of the bat a great success premiere at the Vienna State Opera.

Cooperation

For his productions, Petit did with other famous creative people together: Marcel Landowski, Gabriel Yared and Henri Dutilleux wrote ballet music, a specially choreographed ballet was held under stage composed by Pink Floyd, the fashion designer Yves Saint Laurent and Christian Dior designed costumes for him and artists like Pablo Picasso, Niki de Saint Phalle and Max Ernst created stage sets for his ballets. Be found in the librettos big names: Georges Simenon, Jean Anouilh and Jacques Prévert.

Works (selection)

Choreographies

  • Le jeune homme et la mort (1946 )
  • Les forains (1948 )
  • Carmen (1949)
  • Ballabile (1950 )
  • Le loup (1953 )
  • Notre- Dame de Paris ( 1965)
  • Coppélia (1975 )
  • Symphonie fantastique (1975 )
  • Le phantoms de l' Opéra
  • Les amours de Frantz (1981 )
  • The Blue Angel ( 1985)
  • Clavigo (1999)
  • Les chemins de la création (2004)

Autobiography

  • J'ai dansé sur les flots, Grasset, Paris 1993, ISBN 2-246-44931-6
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