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John Lanchbery

John Lanchbery (May 15 1923 - February 27 2003)

The demand for ballets is much greater than the amount of first-class music designed for the art form. The result is that some of the most popular ballets are arrangements of works written for a different purpose. Perhaps the best-known is Grechaninov's arrangement of Chopin's piano music into the ballet "Les Sylphides". Another famous example is "La Boutique Fantasque", an arrangement of Rossini's music, by Respighi in 1919. However the most prolific arranger of music for ballet was John Lanchbery.

The average classical music lover has not heard of Lanchbery but barely a year goes by without a major production of a ballet arranged by him. A simple list gives some idea of his influence:

Ballet title ..................... Original composer ............... year
Designs with strings ........ Tchaikovsky's Piano Trio ......... c 1950
Somnambulism ............... Stan Kenton .......................... ?
House of Birds ................ Mompou ................................ 1955
La Fille Mal Garde ........... Herold ................................... 1960
The Dream ...................... Mendelssohn ......................... 1964
Monotones ...................... Satie .................................... 1966
Don Quixote .................... Minkus ................................. 1966
Tales of Beatrix Potter ..... Lanchbery ............................. 1971
The Tales of Hoffman ....... Offenbach .............................. 1972
A Month in the Country .... Chopin .................................. 1976
Mayerling ........................ Liszt .................................... 1978
The Merry Widow ............ Lehar .................................... 1975
Rosalinda ....................... Strauss II (Die Fledermaus) .... 1978
Le Papillon ..................... Offenbach
Only a few are available on CD.

John Lanchbery was born in London and took violin lessons from the age of eight, when he started composing. A scholarship took him to the Royal Academy of Music. This was interrupted by the second world war. He returned to studies and took part-time work with a music publisher. They suggested that he audition for the post of conductor with the Metropolitan Ballet. He made his debut with them at Edinburgh in 1948. Two years later the orchestra collapsed for lack of funds but by then he had learned his craft. Many composers do re-orchestrations but it takes a special skill made it danceable. Arguably "Don Quixote" was not a satisfactory ballet score until Lanchbery re-arranged it. Working with choreographer Celia Fanca, he wrote "The Eve of St Agnes", one of the first commissioned ballets to be shown on BBC television.

He was taken on by Sadler's Wells company. The first professional ballet choreographed by Kenneth Macmillan's was "Somnambulism" in 1953, orchestrated by Lanchbery. They also did "House of Birds" in 1955. With Frederick Ashton he did "La Fille Mal Gardée" for the Royal Ballet in 1960. This work includes the famous "Clog Dance" used for many years as a theme tune on radio. Other conductors earn revenues for recordings but for Lanchbery this option barely existed. Instead his income was supplemented by the copyright he earned from his orchestral arrangements, used by ballet companies all over the world. He effectively re-wrote "Don Quixote" for Rudolf Nureyev in 1966. He did the same for Natalia Makarova in "La Bayadere" for the American Ballet Theatre in 1980. Boldest of all was Macmillan's "Mayerling" (1978) where Lanchbery took more than 30 pieces by Liszt and made them into epic tragedy.

Lanchbery was the first to convert operas into ballets (Tales of Hoffman, The Merry Widow, Die Fledermaus, Le Papillon). He received honours from Russia and Sweden and an OBE in 1990. He married Sadler's Wells principal Elaine Fifield in 1951. He became an Australian citizen in 2002, making his home in Melbourne where he died on February 27 2003.