Billy the Kid (ballet)
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| Title | Billy the Kid |
| Choreographer | Eugene Loring |
| Composer | Aaron Copland |
| Librettist | Eugene Loring |
| Premiere date | October 16, 1938 |
| Premiere place | Civic Opera House, Chicago |
| Ballet company | Ballet Caravan |
| Genre | Ballet |
Billy the Kid (ballet) is a two-act ballet created by choreographer Eugene Loring to music by composer Aaron Copland, portraying episodes in the life of the outlaw William H. Bonney. The work premiered in 1938 during a period of artistic engagement with American themes, drawing on frontier imagery, folk song materials, and popular mythmaking about the American West. The ballet became notable for its integration of vernacular tunes, modernist orchestration, and narrative choreography that influenced later dance, film, and music portrayals of the frontier.
Background and Composition
Loring conceived the scenario during the 1930s amid cultural movements that included the Federal Theatre Project, the Group Theatre, and the Federal Art Project, with contemporaries such as Martha Graham, George Balanchine, and Jerome Robbins exploring national subject matter. Composer Aaron Copland, fresh from works like El Salón México and Music for the Theatre, accepted a commission to write a score that fused classical technique with folk materials and frontier ballads. Copland drew on sources including Mexican folk tunes, children's songs, and cowboy ballads, and his approach paralleled contemporaneous efforts by figures like Igor Stravinsky and Dmitri Shostakovich to incorporate vernacular elements into concert music. The collaboration reflected tensions between modernism and populism evident in American cultural institutions such as the Works Progress Administration and journals like The New Masses.
Premiere and Original Production
The ballet premiered on October 16, 1938, by the touring company Ballet Caravan at the Civic Opera House in Chicago. The original production featured set and costume ideas influenced by visual artists active in regionalist movements, recalling painters like Thomas Hart Benton and photographers like Walker Evans. Producer and impresario Lincoln Kirstein, who later co-founded New York City Ballet, supported efforts to create a specifically American dance repertoire, and Ballet Caravan included dancers influenced by training at schools associated with Martha Graham and the School of American Ballet. The premiere occurred amid programming that also showcased scores by contemporaries such as George Gershwin and Samuel Barber.
Synopsis
The ballet dramatizes episodes from the reputed life of outlaw William H. Bonney through episodic scenes that evoke frontier motifs and stock characters from dime novels and Wild West shows. Act I opens with scenes of childhood and frontier life, featuring portrayals of settlers, gunmen, and a romantic interest, drawing dramatic parallels to tableaux from the O.K. Corral mythos and popular representations by figures like Buffalo Bill Cody. Subsequent scenes depict confrontations, an impromptu communal dance, and a depiction of vigilante justice. Act II culminates in capture, trial, and the famous shootout sequence, followed by an evocation of death and memory reminiscent of tableaux used in productions about folk heroes such as Davy Crockett and Jesse James.
Music and Orchestration
Copland scored the ballet for a modest symphony orchestra, employing prominent percussion, brass fanfares, and open fourths and fifths to evoke prairie space, techniques also evident in works like Appalachian Spring and Rodeo. He integrated folk-source melodies, including variants related to cowboy ballads and Mexican tunes similar to those in El Salón México, and used syncopation and jazz-inflected rhythms reminiscent of George Gershwin's theatrical works. Copland's orchestration juxtaposed solo wind passages with strummed string textures and prominent piano and percussion, contributing to the ballet's dramatic pacing and to the later concert suite arrangement frequently performed by orchestras such as the New York Philharmonic and the Boston Symphony Orchestra.
Choreography and Performance History
Eugene Loring's choreography fused classical technique with vernacular gestures—flat-footed stomps, angular arm positions, and character-dance elements that referenced American folk dance and cowboy choreography seen in western films directed by figures like John Ford and choreographed sequences staged for performers such as Fred Astaire. After the 1938 premiere, Ballet Caravan and later companies including the American Ballet Theatre, regional troupes, and university dance programs mounted productions, while touring revivals appeared under different directors influenced by modern dance innovators such as Hanya Holm and José Limón. The ballet has been staged in concert halls, opera houses, and open-air festivals, adapted to varying cast sizes and production scales by companies like the Joffrey Ballet and smaller regional ensembles.
Reception and Critical Assessment
Contemporary reviewers praised Copland's score for its idiomatic American sound and Loring's attempt to craft a distinctive national ballet, comparing the work to ballets by Igor Stravinsky and scenically ambitious American pieces by Agnes de Mille. Critics noted the score's clarity, use of folk material, and dramatic directness, while some commentators criticized aspects of narrative cliché and reliance on mythic stereotyping associated with Wild West iconography represented in media like pulp magazines and Wild West shows. Scholarly reassessment in later decades has emphasized the ballet's role in shaping American musical nationalism and its influence on film music composers such as Elmer Bernstein and Aaron Copland's own later film scores like The Red Pony.
Legacy and Cultural Influence
The ballet contributed to the consolidation of a vernacular-inflected American classical repertoire and influenced choreographers, composers, filmmakers, and designers engaging with frontier themes. Its musical language helped define an "open" American sound adopted by subsequent composers including Leonard Bernstein and John Williams in film contexts, and its dramatization of outlaw mythology informed theatrical treatments and cinematic interpretations of frontier figures like Billy the Kid in films by Arthur Penn and Sam Peckinpah. The work remains a touchstone in discussions of American identity in the arts, taught in conservatories and referenced in exhibitions on cultural regionalism alongside artists such as Grant Wood and writers like Willa Cather.
Category:Ballets by Eugene Loring Category:Compositions by Aaron Copland Category:1938 ballet premieres