Fountains, mythological images, music and dancers from the royal court filled the large hall of the Petit-Bourbon in Paris on October 15, 1581. There, the “Ballet Comique of the Queen“ was presented - the performance that is often defined as the first true court ballet.
An important clarification is that this is a court performance, not a public performance in the modern sense. The audience was King Henry III, Queen Louise of Lorraine, Queen Catherine de' Medici and invited representatives of the court. The venue is also not the Palace of Versailles, which at that time did not yet play the role of a royal residence, but the Petit-Bourbon hall near the Louvre.
A Royal Wedding Performance
The production is part of the celebrations on the occasion of the marriage of Duke Anne de Joyeuse, favorite of Henry III, and Marguerite de Vaudémont, half-sister of Queen Louise. The organization was entrusted to the Italian Balthazar de Beaujolais – musician, dancer and choreographer who worked for the French court.
The story follows the adventures of the sorceress Circe, known from Homer's “Odyssey“. The plot allows for the combination of poetry, vocal and instrumental music, dance, costumes, sets and stage mechanisms in one performance. It is this unity that distinguishes the performance from earlier court dance entertainments.
The production features Queen Louise and ladies from the court. The music is associated with the names of Girard de Beaulieu and Jacques Salmon, the verses are by Nicolas Fioll de La Chenet, and the sets and costumes were created by the artist Jacques Patten.
Five hours of dance, music and allegory
“The Queen's Ballet Comique“ lasts about five hours - a duration that shows how different the court performance was from the modern ballet performance. The dance is not a stand-alone act, but part of a complex allegory in which order and harmony are restored after Circe's intervention.
This is how the chronicler Pierre de L'Étoile describes the performance. His assessment has been preserved as evidence of the impression that the performance left on contemporaries.
In 1582, the libretto was printed in Paris. It preserves the description of the scenes and the arrangement of the performance and makes the work one of the best documented early events in the history of European ballet. Therefore, „Ballet Comique of the Queen“ remains not just a festive program for a royal wedding, but an important boundary between court entertainment and ballet as an independent stage form.
Sources: larousse.fr, accaddeoggi.it