THE MUSIC OF CINDERELLA AND ITS COMPOSER

Sergei Prokofiev was born in Russia on April 27, 1891. He began studying piano with his mother at age three showing remarkable talent early on. By five he had composed Indian Gallop, and by nine he wrote his first opera, The Giant.

Prokofiev was deeply involved with fantasy and fairy tales all his life. Following the successful production of Romeo and Juliet at the Kirov in Leningrad, the company asked the composer for another ballet. Prokofiev completed the first two acts of Cinderella in a piano score in June of 1941 but he work was laid aside when with World War II and the German invasion on June 22. Two years later, Prokofiev resumed work on Cinderella expecting that it would be performed by the Kirov company. In the end the first performance went not to the Kirov, but to the Bolshoi in Moscow.

Some composers have deliberately downplayed or eliminated the fairy tale elements of Cinderella’s story. Prokofiev did the opposite. “A major role in my work on Cinderella,” he wrote, “was played by the fairy-tale nature of the subject, which faced me as the composer with a number of interesting problems, the mysteriousness of the good godmother fairy, the vivid and poetic breath of nature in the figures of the four fairies of the seasons of the year and their attendants, the fantasy of the twelve dwarfs leaping from the clock at midnight and beating out a tap dance reminding Cinderella to return home, the swift alternation of the countries of the world visited by the prince in search of Cinderella.”

In addition to Cinderella, Romeo and Juliet, other famous works of Prokofiev include Peter and the Wolf. His music was innovative, bringing unusual harmonies, energetic rhythms, and humor to concert halls. He died on March 5, 1953 and is remembered as one of the most admired composers of the twentieth century.