Many moons ago, I saw a ballet called "Serenade" for the first time. It was the most beautifully mysterious thing I'd ever seen, and turned me into a balletomane overnight. Soon after, I began talking to more experienced balletgoers and noticed they referred to this ballet as "SerenODD," which struck me as odd indeed, particularly since I'd learned by then that this was the first ballet Balanchine had choreographed for American dancers. Nevertheless, not wishing to be thought a Philistine, I adopted the European pronunciation myself. Not only adopted it, I confess that over the years, I've felt pity for the uninitiated who call the ballet "Serenade," just like the title of the music. (I've never yet heard anyone refer to Tschaikovsky's "SerenODD for Strings.") A few years ago, I even qualified for membership in the "Serenade Society." Pronounced in the normal American way, this sound like an organization promoting euthanasia. In fact it is composed of people who have made bequests to NYCB in their wills. And I have it on official NYCB authority that it is pronounced "SerenODD Society."

Does anyone know why we say SerenODD? Is it because Mr. B said it that way, or is there another reason? Do younger balletgoers still observe this odd custom? Do they care?

Joan Acocella once wrote an article on how to pronounce it, and the jist of it was that logically is should be sereNADE, as in the English word, and that sereNOD was affected and pseudo-French. I have always said NADE after I read the article (I don't remember where it was, or if I still have it--I will check), but however you pronounce it, it is a beautiful ballet. I was just rereading Danilova's autobiography (which isn't indexed, boo hiss) and she has a paragraph on what she thinks Serenade is about, which was really lovely.

the dancers pronounce is 'sere NOD'

It may be affected and pseudo-French, but it is much more euphonious as a ballet title. I am sticking to my soft "a" without a care in the world for those who may think I am silly......

I am so glad this knotty problem is out in the open at last, to be discused without shame or embarrassment. For years I have been innocently pronouncing 'Serenade' in the correct way, i.e., exactly as it is spelt, as if 'serenade' rhymed with 'lemonade' (and after all, nobody would dream of saying 'lemonODD'). Then I saw a video of a Balanchine programme where Peter Martins uttered the dread 'SerenODD', and since then I have been in an agony of indecision as to how to pronounce the name of this most exquisite of Balanchine works.

Now I know, thanks to Balletalerters, that I was right all along. SerenADE it is from now on. What a blessed relief!

Hmmm. Shouldn't the company's own usage be the determining factor, pretentious or not?

We're Americans, it's an American ballet, it's SerenADE. End of story.

Not end of story, Manhattnik [img]smile.gif[/img] I'm with Juliet on this one!!!

Me too. And for the best of reasons [img]smile.gif[/img] I always heard it pronounced "Serenade" -- who got that pronunciation from the dancers. So SerenADE sounds weird to me.

Joan Acocella's article was in Dance Ink, now defunct.

Seeing as Mr. B. had to change his name so that we Americans could pronounce it, perhaps it's appropriate that we Yanks, pronounce his first American ballet, the way he wanted! [img]smile.gif[/img]

Actually, Mr. B didn't change his name, Diaghilev did it for him, so the French could pronounce it.

Well, the Russian word for "Serenade" is "Serenada" (first "a" sounds exactly like the last: -ah), so "SerenODD" is probably an americanization of how Mr.B used to pronounce it. May be [img]smile.gif[/img] .

[ January 14, 2002: Message edited by: Roma ]

I pronounce it "Sérénade", but I'm biased. [img]biggrin.gif[/img]

Doesn't Balanchine himself pronounce it both ways in the 2-part television programme about him? I've always seen that as licence to use either.

Back when I was studying "Music Repertoire and Literature" and we had to kick the mammoths out of the classrooms before we could begin class, I studied with a professor who had studied at Juilliard, and said it "say-ray-NOD" - not that I was particularly paying much attention at that point, being a sort of xenophobe brass player, and string works were only good to play poker during. [img]wink.gif[/img]

Maybe Balanchine said it both ways, but in BALANCHINE PART 1 AND 2, I recall the interview with him saying SerenADE.

I found the Dance Ink articke, from Vol 2, no. 1, April 1991, in case anyone wants to check. Its called You Say "Potahto", and is fun to read. She does argue for SereNADE, on the basis that it is an American ballet, and the music is not SereNOD for Strings. So do we want to talk about pronouncing Agon? Mary

I like Roma's answer. A man has a right to name his own ballet. How 'bout, "It's SerenODD and the music is Tchaikovsky's SerenADE for Strings?"

I think he thought it was AH-gon, but so many of us like to think it's Ah-GONE.

right you are! though i thought it was a(short as in ask)-gon....

I always say "AY-gon."

I know, I'm a philistine.

Maybe we should get back to the beginning,
does anyone know how Tchaikovsky pronounced
his Serenade for Strings?

The one person who would have known how Tchaikovsky pronounced it is Balanchine. In "Balanchine's Tchaikovsky," by Solomon Volkov, Mr. B says, "When I was doing Serenade, Tchaikovsky encouraged me. Almost the whole Serenade is done with his help." But he fails to state how Tchaikovsky felt about Balanchine's switching the order of the third and fourth movements.

Kevin, this is what I was saying. Tchaikovsky would have said SerenAHDA [img]smile.gif[/img] , not SerenODD, certainly not SerenADE. Does it really matter though? I can't for the life of me pronounce Davidsbundlertanze correctly without having a shot of vodka first (see "dead composer" thread) but I love the ballet [img]smile.gif[/img]

all right, so i went to someone who worked for him and asked those two questions. she says balanchine pronounced it "Ser-e-nahd-"with a little hint of an a-type sound at the end. and she says that Agon came out like a(short a but muted)-gohn (like a French type of pronunciation and with the accent on the second syllable).

I beginning to think that the root of the
problem is not how Serenade is pronounced but how
it is spelled when translated from the Russian
cyrillic letters to the english alphabet.
Many Russian proper names are sometimes spelled
differently like the chorographer Fedor Lopukhov
is Lopoukhov or Lopokhov and his sister Lydia
spelled her last name Lopokova,of course the "a"
on the end of the name indicates feminine gender
as with most Russian last names.
Its us English-Americans,to be political correct,
who slept thru spelling class as children and now
we can't spell worth a HOOT !!!!

KEVIN

I have been watching "Serenade" since 1945---and it was always --Seren-ODD.

How do you pronounce Agnes DeMille's "Rodeo"? DeMille pronounced it Row-day-o, not the American Rode-ee-o-----and that is about American as a ballet can get.

A lot of how Serenade is pronounced has to do with the publisher of the score marks the score. I believe that most American editions of Serenade in C for Strings were printed in France, with French markings for tempo, and so forth. Ergo, Se-re-NOD. Now, as to say, Vaughan Williams' "Serenade to Music", published by Boosey & Hawkes, Seh-reh-NADE (long A) would be the preferred pronunciation.

And Rodeo is a nice conundrum. If you are in Texas, it's pronounced one way, in Wyoming, another way, and in California, definitely Ro-DAY-oh. Maybe Agnes had been talking the idea over with uncle Cecil.

[ February 19, 2002: Message edited by: Mel Johnson ]

Well, I'm from Wyoming, and run people out of the state who say roDAYo, but I do think that is how the ballet is pronounced. I just have a very hard time saying it that way without feeling like an effete Eastern snob.

Well I'm not well versed in the history of these ballets, but I agree that what the choreographer pronounced or probably pronounced should be respected. But the snobery of the ballet world probably requires Ro-day-o rather than
Ro-dee-o [img]smile.gif[/img] . It's trickier with Serenade since Sere-naid, Sere-nod and Sere-nad all have a certain elegance depending on your inclination. My first instinct is to say Sere-naid, like the verb to sing to someone.

As I was trying to navigate the ever-perplexing NYCB website (where IS the information about the repertoire?), I came across a pronunciation guide. They've recorded people saying the titles to most of the ballets in their repertoire. It's a great idea, but poorly (sometimes amusingly) executed: if NYCB audiences went around trying to pronounce Serenade the way the very proper Frenchwoman does on the site, we'd all sound like a bunch of pretentious twits! (Just try saying Sarabande and Danse in conversation the way she does and see what kind of reaction you get, lol!) Apparently, Italian titles are supposed to be pronounced with a French accent as well. And I'm pretty sure every single German title is flat-out mispronounced.

It got me thinking that a decent rule of thumb for American usage might be to approximate the pronunciation of the original language using only sounds intrinsic to American English, and with American stress-rhythms. HARmony-lay-ruh for Harmonielehre, for instance; SerenODD or SerenAYD with a hard America r and our back-of-throat e's.

Thoughts? Are there other sites that do this better?

as has likely been noted on this site, George Balanchine said <<sereNAYD>>.
(anyone listening to the narration of PBS's BALANCHINE (Part 1 and 2) (1984) can hear this on the part of the docu. where the balletmaster recalls making his first ballet he made in America.)

Thanks for reviving this thread. I hadn't read it before and found it amusing since I've never given a thought to how Serenade should be pronounced. I always assumed it was Serenade like lemonade, and I pronounce Agon like Ay-gon.

Arlene Croce - in her essay called "The Spelling of AGON" - suggestst that Balanchine pronounced his Greek/Stravinsky ballet <<ah-GOHN>>

If life gives you lemons, make Serenade?

The dancers at SAB/NYCB say Seren-AHD. Indeed, I've never heard it pronounced any other way.

When I first started reading about the ballet, way before seeing it onstage, I would pronounce it as in "lemonade", but then one day a friend/balletomane pointed at it and corrected me, saying that it was the french pronunciation the right way. I still pronounce it as in english. Not with Agon, which I pronounce as Ah-Gohn-(don't know why, to be honest... )

It's pronounced as Hans has noted...Or earlier posts (Farrell Fan), Seren-ODD...I believe Han's "AHD" is the same as "ODD".

So then I'm assuming that it can be pronounced both ways. I would just say the word as it is usually pronounced in English out of the choreographic work context.
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/serenade
Then, in a couple of occasions I have mentioned the ballet's title with a little variation, as we use the word in Spanish/Italian: Serenata, just as I usually exchange La Bayadere for La Bayadera, in its Spanish form.(Same with bailarina instead of ballerina, etc...)
http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=s...ata&db=luna

Yes, Gina, that is what I meant.

it's true that many? most? all? individuals around NYCB and SAB say: sereNAHD.
i have no idea where or how it began but it has stuck, which doesn't make is 'correct' of course.
the following article by Joan Acocella discusses this by stressing that "sereNAHD" and "HARlehkwinahd" each mix foreign and Americanized pronunciations. her conclusion is that these ballet names, among other words in the ballet world of the USA are best said in plain English, a notion that strikes me as sound (no pun intended):
"You say potahto."
Dance ink. New York. v. 2, no. 1, Apr. 1991, p. 2-5. ill.
Pronunciations of ballet terminology and the biases attached.