‘Ballet with song’ in one act by Stravinsky to a libretto by Massin (1920, Paris); for soprano, tenor, bass and chamber orchestra, it adapts works attributed to Pergolesi.
Pulcinella
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Ballet in one act with choreography and libretto by Massine, music by Stravinsky, and designs by Picasso. Premiered 15 May 1920 by the Ballets Russes de Diaghilev at the Paris Opera, with Massine, Karsavina, Tchernicheva, Nemchinova, Idzikowski, Zvereff, and Cecchetti. A commedia dell'arte ballet, the libretto is based on the Neapolitan play The Four Pulcinellas. The unscrupulous Neapolitan lover Pulcinella is involved in a series of amorous adventures with two women, Rosetta and Prudenza, even though he has a mistress, Pimpinella. Jealous rivals appear to kill him, only to discover that his death has been a hoax. In the end, the various sets of lovers are happily reunited. Stravinsky based his score on fragments of unfinished music by the 18th-century Italian composer Pergolesi. Massine revised the ballet for a revival at La Scala, Milan, in 1971 (later revived for the City Center Joffrey Ballet in 1974). Other choreographic treatments of the ballet include those by Lopukhov (Leningrad, 1926), Jooss (Essen, 1932), Woizikowski (London, 1935), Béjart (Liège, 1957), Smuin (American Ballet Theatre, 1968), Balanchine and Robbins (New York City Ballet, 1972), Douglas Dunn (Paris Opera, 1980), Tetley (London Festival Ballet, 1984), Alston (Ballet Rambert, 1987), and Ted Brandsen (West Australia Ballet, 2001).
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This article is about the Commedia character. For Stravinsky's 1920 ballet, see Pulcinella (ballet).
Pulcinella, often called Punch or Punchinello in English, Polichinelle in French, is a classical character that originated in the Commedia dell'arte of the 17th century and became a stock character in Neapolitan puppetry.
His main characteristic, from which he acquired his name, is his extremely long nose, which resembles a beak. In Latin, this was a pullus gallinaceus, which led to the word "Pulliciniello" and "Pulcinella," related to the Italian pulcino or chick.
According to another version, "Pulcinella" derived from the name of Puccio d'Aniello, a peasant of Acerra, who was portrayed in a famous picture attribued to Annibale Carracci, and indeed characterized by a long nose. It has also been suggested that the figure is a caricature of a sufferer of acromegaly.[1]
Ever white dressed and black masked (hence conciliating the opposites of life and death), he stands out thanks to his peculiar voice, the sharp and vibrant qualities of which contribute intense tempo of the show. According to Pierre Louis Duchartre, his traditional temperament is to be mean, vicious, and crafty: his main mode of defense is to pretend to be too stupid to know what's going on, and his secondary mode is to physically beat people.
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The Legacy of Pulcinella
Many regional variants of Pulcinella were developed as the character diffused across Europe. In Germany, Pulcinella came to be known as Kasper. In the Netherlands he is known as Jan Klaassen. In Denmark he is Mester Jakel. in Russia he is known as Petrushka[citation needed] (however, Igor Stravinsky composed two different ballets Pulcinella and Petrushka); in Romania, he is Vasilache; in Hungary he is Vitéz László, and in France Polichinelle, while in England, he inspired the character of Mister Punch of Punch and Judy.
Pulcinella is also the mascot of the Pulcinella Awards, annual awards for excellence in animation, presented at the Cartoons on the Bay Festival in Positano, Italy.
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