In “Pétrouchka,” as in “L’Oiseau de Feu,” Stravinsky shows himself a master of the art of writing ballet music. Throughout the four scenes he displays not only a nice sense of dramatic fitness, but a shrewd appreciation of character. Whether his theme is the quasi-pathetic sufferings of Pétrouchka, the dollish coquetry of the Dancer, or the grotesque humours of the Blackamoor, he never fails to be expressive. In the treatment of such a subject as “Pétrouchka” (described by the authors as a series of “burlesque scenes”) his humorous perception is of large assistance. In the trumpet dance, for instance, by which the Blackamoor is first inveigled into the fair one’s toils, or in the slower _pas de fascination_ by which the conquest of him is completed, Stravinsky’s sense of the ludicrous has turned two slender occasions to most diverting account. Conceive a tender, sentimental passage between two grotesque dolls, and in these engaging little melodies you have the exact expression of the absurd situation. Even more ingenious, as a piece of clever orchestration, is a passage at the outset of the opening scene, where the composer succeeds not only in reproducing (with the merest note of burlesque) the peculiar sounds of an antique hurdy-gurdy, but weaves the opposition between two such competing instruments into a most entertaining and harmonious discord. As to the music which hurries the revels of the carnival upon their riotous course, it has the true note of full-blooded vigorous enjoyment--a rhythmic pulsing quality which belongs to the fresh and unsophisticated pleasure of simple folk not too much hampered by conventions. “Pétrouchka,” however, would fall short of its ultimate effect but for the subtle art of its interpreters. Kotchetovsky, as the Blackamoor, wonderfully realises the undisciplined temper and coarse appetites which are all of humanity that this puppet has acquired; and the Dancer, whether played by Karsavina or Nijinska, pirouettes or tiptoes with the exactitude of mechanical action. But to the presentation of Pétrouchka Nijinsky brings more than mere cleverness. There is a touch of _diablerie_ in his impersonation of the luckless puppet which most poignantly conveys the sense of atrophied humanity. It is not merely that from his jerky half-mechanical motions one can deduce the exact anatomy of the doll, a joint here, a loosely hung limb there; he puts the whole character upon a plane above the level of mere grotesquery. Pétrouchka in his hands acquires a significance which places him amongst the centaurs and other half-brute, half-human creatures of mythology. That the ballet is thereby endowed with a meaning, an inwardness, which it might not otherwise possess, must be accounted as a tribute to the dancer’s genius. [Illustration] [Illustration] THAMAR. CHOREOGRAPHIC DRAMA BY LÉON BAKST MUSIC BY BALAKIREV. SCENES AND DANCES BY MICHEL FOKINE. SCENERY AND COSTUMES DESIGNED BY LÉON BAKST.