Movement Style
This ballet style emphasizes lightness, lift, and ethereal grace.
What is Romantic ballet?
The original ballet portrays Giselle as this type of supernatural, weightless being.
What is an ethereal spirit?
The 1841 Giselle was choreographed by these two men.
Who are Jean Coralli and Jules Perrot?
Despite major stylistic shifts, Ek’s version preserves these two aspects of the original.
What are the structure and musical framework?
This original image of Giselle often shows her in floating, airy positions typical of Romantic style.
What is the “ethereal ballerina” image?
Ek’s version uses these grounded movements, including deep bends and rib contractions.
What are modern/contemporary movements?
Ek’s version emphasizes these raw emotional qualities, unlike the Romantic ideal.
What are psychological intensity and physical groundedness?
Ek keeps the story but intensifies themes like Albrecht’s cruelty and sexual tension, doing this to the narrative’s hidden possibilities.
What is tapping into or fleshing out underlying elements?
This is the city where the original Giselle debuted in 1841.
What is Paris?
Ek’s Giselle often appears with this type of posture; curved inward and grounded.
What is a contracted, huddled posture?
The original Giselle’s first entrance includes this traveling jump sequence around the stage.
What is a grand jeté en manège?
Floor rolls, huddled shapes, and broken lines give Ek’s version this non-Romantic aesthetic.
What is a raw, earthly, or visceral aesthetic?
Both versions keep this crucial transformation: Giselle becomes one of these moonlit spirits.
What is a wili?
This element of Ek’s choreography diverges from classical ballet’s seamless flow, emphasizing fragmentation.
What are broken or disrupted body lines?
Moonlight in Act II symbolizes this shift in Giselle’s existence across both versions.
What is her transformation into a wili
Ek replaces the grand jeté en manège with these jumps.
What are attitude leaps?
Compared to the original, Ek highlights these darker underlying emotional themes, such as Giselle’s psychological breakdown.
What are madness and emotional turmoil?
In Ek’s reinterpretation, this character’s unfaithful love is emphasized as especially cruel.
Who is Albrecht?
Although Ek modifies the movement, he maintains this kind of continuity with the original score.
What is musical phrasing or musical alignment?
These dramatic floor-based movements in Ek’s version contrast sharply with the original’s high-elevation choreography.
What are floor rolls?