Les Deux Pigeons (ballet)

Les Deux pigeons is a ballet originally choreographed in two acts by Louis Mérante to music by André Messager. The libretto by Mérante and Henri de Régnier is based on the fable The Two Pigeons by Jean de La Fontaine. The work was first performed at the Paris Opéra on 18 October 1886. The premiere cast included Rosita Mauri as Gourouli and Marie Sanlaville as Pépio.

Frederick Ashton later created a new ballet to Messager's music under the title The Two Pigeons.

The score is dedicated to Camille Saint-Saëns, whose influence helped gain Messager the commission for the ballet, following three ballets which the younger composer had written for the Folies Bergère, Fleur d’oranger, Vins de France and Odeurs et Parfums. Les Deux pigeons was first performed on the same evening as a performance of La Favorite.

Messager introduced the ballet to London in 1906, with choreography by François Ambroisiny and a shortened score by Messager himself, who also conducted. He used this shortened version when the piece was revived at the Paris Opéra in 1912, and it was published as a final version. A one-act version was choreographed by Albert Aveline at the Opéra in 1919 and it was not until 1942 that the role of Pépio was finally danced by a man.

The discovery of the shortened score used at Covent Garden prompted Frederick Ashton to make his own version of the ballet, set in Paris at the time of the music's composition. As the 1912 version didn't provide a return to the opening scene at the end, John Lanchbery constructed a closing reconciliation scene from earlier music and a passage from Messager's operetta Véronique, as well as revising the orchestration in favour of a richer sound.

Ashton's version in two acts was premiered on 14 February 1961 at the Royal Opera House Covent Garden, with Lynn Seymour and Christopher Gable. As well as being performed regularly by the Royal Ballet touring company, the ballet has also been staged by several other dance companies around the world, including CAPAB and Australian Ballet.

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