Peter Ludwig Hertel

La Fille Mal Gardee

Peter Ludwig Hertel (1817-1899) composed the score for La Fille mal gardée (Das schlecht bewachte Mädchen; The Badly Guarded Girl) in 1864 for a new production choreographed by Paul Taglioni at the Königliches Opernhaus in Berlin. The ballet itself, originally created by Jean Dauberval in 1789, is one of the oldest surviving full-length ballets in the classical repertory, and Hertel's score replaced earlier compilations of popular melodies with an original Romantic ballet score. Taglioni's production premiered in Berlin on November 7, 1864, and proved an immediate success, later serving as the musical foundation for the influential revivals by Marius Petipa and Lev Ivanov in St. Petersburg (1885) and Alexander Gorsky in Moscow (1903). Although many modern productions (notably Frederick Ashton's celebrated 1960 staging for The Royal Ballet) employ John Lanchbery's adaptation based primarily on Ferdinand Hérold's 1828 score with selected music by Hertel, the 1864 Hertel version remains a landmark in ballet history and continues to be performed and recorded, an enduring contribution to one of the world's most beloved comic ballets. Instrumentation: 2(both dPicc).2.2.2: 4.2.3.0: Timp.Perc(1-2): Hp: Str (4.4.3.3.3 in set). This edition has been orchestrated by William McDermott.