Product Description
Based on the fairy tale The Little Match Girl by Hans Christian Anderson (1805-1875), the famous Danish writer, the Beijing Ballet School of China commissioned An-Lun Huang to compose this ballet in 1977. The play was written by Zhang Dun-yi, and the choreographers were Wu Fu-kang and Huang Buo-hong. The premiere took place in Beijing in 1977. It was performed by the school and the Central Opera House Orchestra, conducted by Zheng Xiao-ying. The music is written in Nineteen Century-Romantic style with some strong Scandinavian flavor. Margot Fonteyn, one of the most important ballet dancers of our age, claimed that the composer has composed the very, very, very good music for this ballet ! She then produced a movie of it, which has been broadcasted by the PBS of U.S.A. in early of eighties. Since the great success of the premiere, this ballet and its music have been widely performed and warmly received. A tape of it was also released in China.
This is the story of the ballet:
In a little Danish town in the nineteenth century, Betty, a little girl who lost her mother, was selling matches along the street during Christmas time. The sound of the church bell reminded her that the time was quite late, but she was unable to go home until she completed her job. An old man came to light the street lights. He gave her some money and left. Betty tried to sell her matches to a carriage, but the carriage just ran away. Snow fell, cold and hungry, she lit a match on the wall to warm herself. A group of Fire Fairies appeared. They danced around her and got her warm. Since they disappeared so quickly, Betty lit another match. She saw a big dining room with a beautiful Christmas tree and a lot of food. While some bus boys were handing her a piece of roasted goose, the typical Danish Christmas food, a nobleman in a portrait hanging on the wall suddenly moved. Everything disappeared again. Betty immediately lit the third match, a Swan Lake with a beautiful garden appeared. She met her mother with tears because the mother had passed away for years. Mother got a pair of little red shoes for her as the Christmas gift and danced with her. The Portrait nobleman brought the mother out of the scene. Everything was gone but the snow storm. The church bell sounded again, with the morning dawn, the old man came to extinguish the street lights. He found the frozen body of the little girl.
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