Ballet in three acts with choreography and libretto by Filippo Taglioni, music by L. Wilhelm Maurer, sets by Fedorov, Serkov, Shenian, and Roller.

Pierre Lacotte, the choreographer and dance historian who has previously reconstructed Filippo Taglioni's La Sylphide and Giselle, has now produced another of the master's works. L'Ombre ("The Shadow") was created by Taglioni for his daughter Marie and premiered in St. Petersburg in 1839; this production was introduced by Lacotte's company in Nancy last spring.

Not performed for almost fifty years, L'Ombre has a story that foreshadows Petipa's better known La Bayadere. The knight Loredan is engaged to the Countess Angelica, who dies from a poisoned bouquet of flowers presented to her by a jealous duchess. She returns in the form of a shadow, at first seen only by the disconsolate Loredan, and then appears before the duchess at her engagement to Loredan, forcing her to sniff the poisoned bouquet. As the duchess dies, the palace crumbles in ruins and Angelica leads Loredan to another world.

Alessandra Ferri and Julio Bocca, both known in the U.S. for their performances with American Ballet Theatre, were guests in the leading roles. With her fragile arms and floating quality, Ferri is the perfect reincarnation of a Taglioni heroine. Bocca is admirable, with his princely bearing and excellent technique.

Nineteen-year-old Amaya Iglesias was outstanding in the role of the duchess. She and Noella Pontois, a former etoile of the Paris Opera Ballet, also alternated in the leading role, partnered by Andrei Fedotov. (Iglesias and Fedotov are the company's principal dancers.) The corps de ballet is very young but possesses clean technique, good line, and a sense of style. Aurelia Schaefer, Isabelle Bourgeais, James Anderton, and Cyrille de la Barre were notable in the supporting roles.

The costumes and decor, also adapted by Lacotte, were extremely ornate, as was typical of the period. The musical score "after Wilhelm Maurer" is far less interesting than Schneitzhoeffer's for Sylphide or Adam's for Giselle, but has been ably arranged and reorchestrated by Michel Queval, conductor of the Paris opera Orchestra

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LUDWIG WILHELM MAURER

Born in Potsdam in 1789 and died in St Petersburg in 1878, Maurer was initially a violin pupil of Carl Haack in Berlin and became a violinist in the Prussian court orchestra in 1803. After his dismissal in 1806 due to the turmoil of war, he travelled to Russia and made connections in the musical life of the cities of Riga and Moscow. After ten years as concertmaster in Hanover, he returned to Russia, where he initially entered the service of Count Vsevolozhski in St Petersburg. In 1834, he gave the first performance of Beethoven's Violin Concerto op. 61 in St Petersburg. Maurer was hired in 1835 as music director at Saint Petersburg's French Theatre. From 1841 to 1862, he worked as inspector of the Imperial Orchestra and from 1841 to 1871 as conductor of the symphony concerts of the St Petersburg Concert Society. Based on a libretto by Filippo Taglioni, Maurer created the ballet music L'Ombre, which was premiered in December 1839 at the Bolshoi Theatre in St. Petersburg with choreography by Filippo Taglioni and with Marie Taglioni in the leading female role. Pierre Lacotte reconstructed this ballet in 1993 for the Ballet de Lorraine in Nancy

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