1. The structure of symphonic ballet is music-dance structure. The structure of drama ballet is drama-dance structure. This is a major difference in principle.
Symphony ballet always starts from music when conceiving and arranging the structure of dance drama (dance), while drama ballet takes drama (story) as the fundamental starting point. We know that ballet is a comprehensive art, which includes dance, music, drama, literature, art and so on. Among them, dance is closely related to music and drama. Drama ballet is too "backward" to the dramatic side, and even some famous drama and ballet masters like zakharov and Lavlowski invited drama directors to give artistic guidance when they were creating and rehearsing Tears of Bach Salaj and Romeo and Juliet (both of which are called drama and ballet classics). They ignored the dominant position of music, especially dance, which led to the life, poverty, simplification and formulation of dance language. They often deal with the conflict and development of dramatic contradictions in ballet in the form of pantomime, so there is a problem of pantomime. Because they overemphasize and pursue the so-called "real life", they inevitably lead to the externalization of life and even fall into the mud pit of naturalism. Although dramatic ballet once played a positive role in promoting the development of ballet art in a specific historical period, it eventually fell into a serious crisis and declined because it could not overcome the potential contradiction between its own creative ideas and creative methods. Even in the Soviet Union, where creative ideas are conservative, drama ballet has almost become a derogatory term.
Symphony ballet has seriously summed up the experience and lessons of success and failure of drama ballet, critically inherited and carried forward the essence of drama ballet, such as strengthening the integrity of ballet drama structure, deepening the ideological content of ballet, expanding the scope of subject matter, communicating the connection between ballet art and modern life, and widely popularizing ballet art. A new generation of symphonic ballet masters, such as Grigolo Vichy, Bie Riski and vinogradov, have made new explorations on the basis of the above achievements in drama ballet. The first major problem they have to solve is the dominant position of Shaanxi and Fujian music, especially dance in dance drama. Symphony and ballet music have their own internal dramatic structures. Music not only shows the character and emotion, the social or natural environment in which the character lives, but also reflects the emotional atmosphere of the development of the situation and the behavior of the character. At the same time, it also reveals the development of its internal contradictions and conflicts through the infiltration, expansion, deformation, intersection and comparison of various themes. This dramatic structure of music is also the basis of the structure of symphony dance drama (dance). The choreographer (choreographer) must conceive in strict accordance with the structure of music, arrange the development of plot and conflict, and then embody the dramatic structure of symphony or ballet music through dance language and dance image. Therefore, the structure of symphonic dance drama is music and dance structure, and music is its foundation and starting point.
Give an example to illustrate. We know that the first movement of a symphony is generally sonata-like, and we can also say that a symphony is actually a sonata played by an orchestra. This is because sonata form can reveal complex and profound dramatic content in many aspects compared with other instrumental forms. When we teach symphonic choreography, we also take sonata form as a learning unit. Learning to compose sonata-style choreographers can create symphonic dance dramas.
The sonata form consists of three basic parts: the performance part, the expansion part and the reproduction part. The presentation part can be preceded by an introduction, and the reproduction part can sometimes be followed by an end. The general presentation part has two contrasting themes, namely, the main part and the auxiliary part. In the development department, these two themes intersect to form contradictions and conflicts, which are full of strong drama. When the main part of the reproduction part is still reproduced in the original key, the auxiliary part appears in the main key through the connecting section, thus achieving the tonality unity of the reproduction part. Obviously, every director who has a little knowledge and respect for music can't ignore the rigorous dramatic structure of sonata. He must arrange two contrasting or conflicting dance themes in the presentation department according to the main department and the deputy department, then let the two themes cross and conflict in the development department to form some kind of drama, and finally summarize the two dance themes in the reproduction department to make them fit in. This is also the law that we often follow in ballet. It can be said that the dance based on sonata form (also called sonata form) is the embryonic form of large-scale dance drama. This shows the importance of music structure to dance drama (dance) structure.
Second, the main artistic techniques of symphonic ballet are freehand brushwork, generalization and symbol, while the artistic techniques of dramatic ballet are mainly realism, imitation and graphic life. This main difference comes from the two completely different construction methods mentioned above.
We know that music is the art of expressing emotions. "Love is cause, sound is life". There is even an incisive exposition in China's ancient "Yue Ji" that "every sound comes from people's hearts, and emotions move in the middle, so it is shaped in the sound". The great Russian writer Tolstoy once said, "Music is the shorthand of human feelings". Engels said that music is "revealing the noblest and most sacred thing in human feelings, that is, the deepest secret, and showing it in the voice."
Dance is also the art of expressing emotions, and the ancients had a wonderful description of the artistic characteristics of dance long ago. For example, in Preface to Shi Mao, "Emotion moves in the middle, form in words, and words are insufficient, so I lament. I lament my inadequacy, so I don't know how to dance when I sing songs. " Dance has its own "independent kingdom" and its own unique laws. One of the most important laws is that dance can only express certain emotions, but can't directly express certain thoughts. Dance choreographers can only indirectly express some thoughts, even philosophies, through emotional refraction, certain plots or shaping dance images.
Music and dance are both non-semantic arts. They have the same artistic characteristics-freehand brushwork, generality, symbolism, virtuality, visualization, suggestibility, lyricism, poetry and polysemy. It is these attributes of * * * that provide a prerequisite for the symphonization of dance, greatly broaden the performance field of dance, enrich the dance language and choreography, further explore the ontological consciousness of dance, and promote the development of dance art. In the past, there was a deep-rooted prejudice in the dance industry that some music could not be danced at all, and some themes were completely unsuitable for choreography. Symphonic ballet completely breaks these rules in people's minds. Modern choreography can be choreographed with any music and any theme. For example, Evman, a new generation director in Leningrad, successfully put Dostoevsky's masterpiece Idiot on the ballet stage. This is beyond the reach of drama and ballet.
Drama ballet unilaterally emphasizes the drama plot and its so-called "authenticity". To a great extent, this violates the characteristics and unique laws of dance, turning poetic dance into vernacular storytelling, making dance a vassal of drama and a tool to imitate and illustrate life. In this way, the essence of dance is stifled, and its leading position in dance drama is lost.
We might as well compare drama ballet to China's meticulous painting and symphonic ballet to China's freehand painting. It is true that meticulous painting has its existence value, but in thousands of years, freehand brushwork in art is undoubtedly the peak of China's painting. Drama and ballet often try to make every detail more real like meticulous painting, and the result is more false. For example, in a Soviet dance drama, a tank made of plywood "went on stage", which caused the audience to burst into laughter. The truth of life and the truth of art are two different concepts. Drama and ballet often confuse them? Euphemistically called "reflecting life", it is actually imitating and illustrating life. Krassowska Ya, the first authoritative ballet historian and critic in the Soviet Union, correctly pointed out: "Symphonic ballet overcomes not the shortcomings of drama ballet, but its whole creative principle system." Romeo and Juliet, a ballet created by the Soviet ballet master, is regarded as the pinnacle of drama ballet. But Lovelowski pursues Shakespeare's plays, not prokofiev's music. So the colorful life on the stage in Verona, Italy, and the deep and philosophical music have formed many contradictions. Lovelowski unconsciously dug a gap between the stage and the orchestra pit. More than 20 years later, the young choreographer vinogradov (now the chief choreographer of the ballet company of Leningrad Kirov Theatre) finally bridged this gap in Novosibirsk, and made prokofiev stand in front of Shakespeare. Although life on the stage has lost some of its original colorful and joyful atmosphere, Verona has become a gloomy prison. However, with the help of prokofiev's music, vinogradov went deep into the hearts of the hero and heroine, making his ballet version higher than that of "Chess" by Lavlowski.
Similarly, in 1954, Lavrovski showed his gem flowers at the Moscow Grand Theatre. Grigorovic, a young choreographer, challenged the famous authority of drama and ballet in 1957 and rehearsed "Gemstone Flower" in Leningrad Kirov Theatre. As a result, the great authority was defeated in Maicheng, and Grigorovic's "Gemstone Flower" became a classic that initiated the era of Soviet ballet symphony. The reason is that Lavlowski devoted himself to reappearing the life pictures in Ural folktales on Baazov, and put aside prokofiev's music. Grigorovic and the composer discussed the complex contradiction between the artist's career and love in the play. It can be seen that symphonic ballet does not overcome some shortcomings of dramatic ballet, but denies a series of basic creative principles, and shapes dance images and reflects life with completely different artistic techniques. Those cliches that attack symphonic ballet without paying attention to the dance image and ignoring the reflection of life are completely untenable. It is precisely because symphonic ballet firmly grasps the characteristics and laws of dance art that the dance image it creates is more vivid and perfect than that of dramatic ballet, and the life it reflects is richer and deeper than that of dramatic ballet. This is by no means a subjective assumption, but an indisputable fact proved by artistic practice.