Symphony in E-flat is a plotless ballet made by John Clifford, danced to Stravinsky's early Symphony in E-flat, Op. 1 (1908), one of the composer's student-period orchestral works rather than one of his better-known ballet scores. It entered the repertory as part of New York City Ballet's 1972 Stravinsky Festival, premiering on June 20, 1972 at the New York State Theater, Lincoln Center, with Gelsey Kirkland and Peter Martins in the leading roles.
What is danced
The source article gives only the fact of the premiere, its cast, and the score used; it does not describe steps, formations, or a synopsis, so nothing about the actual choreography can be verified from it. What can be said with confidence is limited to structure implied by the music itself: Stravinsky's Op. 1 is a four-movement, late-Romantic symphony (closer in idiom to Tchaikovsky and Glazunov than to the composer's mature neoclassical voice), which suggests a symphonic, musically-driven ballet built in discrete movements rather than a narrative work — but this is an inference from the score's known character, not a description drawn from the article, and no choreographic vocabulary can be attached to it responsibly.
Because the article names two principal dancers (Kirkland and Martins) rather than an ensemble or corps, the work likely centers on a leading couple, possibly with supporting demi-soloists or corps typical of NYCB's plotless, Balanchine-lineage repertory of this period — again an inference from casting, not a documented fact. No set pieces, pas de deux, or divertissements are named in the source, so none can be reported here.
Context
The premiere is dated to New York City Ballet's Stravinsky Festival, a company-wide event built entirely around the composer's music; this places the work within a specific, well-documented moment in ballet history even though the article itself supplies no further detail about that festival's aims or scale (this framing is added from outside knowledge, not the article). John Clifford was, at the time, a dancer and emerging choreographer within the Balanchine-trained NYCB ranks, and this piece reflects the company's practice of setting younger in-house choreographers against scores the festival made newly available — a company-and-era inference, not something the article states.
How to watch it
The article supplies no synopsis or described vocabulary, so there is nothing here to direct a viewer's attention toward beyond the pairing of a rarely-staged early Stravinsky symphony with a plotless ballet structure. Anyone attending or researching a revival should treat the choreography itself as undocumented by this source and seek programme notes or archival film for concrete detail.
Credits
- composer: Igor Stravinsky