Today is a special day for those of us who love Classical music. On November 22nd, 1928 the first performance of Ravel's Bolero occurred in Paris.
Source of this information: http://www.brainyhistory.com/days/november_22.html
Maurice Ravel lived from March 7, 1875 until December 28, 1937 and was a French composer of Impressionist music. Although Bolero certainly has grown into a piece of music which most people enjoy, in contrast Ravel himself "considered the piece trivial and once described it as "a piece for orchestra without music." Originally composed as a ballet commissioned by Russian ballerina Ida Rubenstein, the piece, which premiered in 1928, is Ravel's most famous musical composition.
"The work had its genesis in a commission from the dancer Ida Rubinstein, who asked Ravel to make an orchestral transcription of six pieces from Isaac Albéniz' set of piano pieces, Iberia. While working on the transcription, Ravel was informed that the movements had already been orchestrated by Spanish conductor Enrique Arbós, and that copyright law prevented any other arrangement from being made. When Arbós heard of this, he said he would happily waive his rights and allow Ravel to orchestrate the pieces. However Ravel changed his mind and decided initially to orchestrate one of his own previously-written works. He then changed his mind again and decided to write a completely new piece based on the musical form and Spanish dance called bolero. While on vacation at St Jean-de-Luz, Ravel went to the piano and played a melody with one finger to his friend Gustave Samazeuilh, saying "Don't you think this theme has an insistent quality? I'm going to try and repeat it a number of times without any development, gradually increasing the orchestra as best I can." This piece was initially called Fandango, but its title was soon changed to "Boléro"." (source:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bol%C3%A9ro
A Hollywood film titled Bolero (1934), starring Carole Lombard and George Raft, made major use of the theme in Ravel
Source of this information: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maurice_Ravel
It is interesting to note that the word "Bolero" "is a name given to certain slow-tempo latin music and its associated dance and song. There are Spanish and Cuban forms, which are both significant, and which have separate origins. The term is also used for some art music. In all its forms, the bolero has been popular for over a century, and still is today." (source:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bolero ) To learn more about this work of music (including a discussion of the first performance of the piece please click on the link I placed before this sentence.
Here is a performance of this work, I found on Youtube: This performance is conducted by
Christoph Eschenbach with the orchestra being the Orchestre de Paris and took place on November 5,2007.
The performance requires you first listen to the top video and then the bottom one:
I hope you enjoy this performance:
