Hi,
At the moment i'm studying Petipa for dance history at A level and have been asked to put together a presentation about his life and his ballets.

The thing is, i know his ballets are "story ballets" but i'm not exactly sure what the excepted definition of a "story ballet" is. I've exhausted all my sources and would really appreciate some help??

Thanks

A story ballet is, simply put, a ballet that tells a story. An example of a story ballet is Giselle, or Swan Lake, or Nutcracker, etc. As opposed to "abstract" ballets, or plotless ballets, which have no story but sometimes can convey a general idea or mood. Most but not all of George Balanchine's ballets are plotless ballets.

And even "abstract" ballets can seem to have a "story" going on somewhere under the surface. This is especially apparent in Balanchine's "Serenade", which seems to have some sort of text down there. Why is one woman called "the dark angel", for one example? One of the best writings on this very subject is Lincoln Kirstein's modern classic Movement and Metaphor.

And welcome, Andrew, to Ballet Talk here at Ballet Alert.