The Wooden Prince

The Wooden Prince (Hungarian: A fából faragott királyfi) Op. 13, Sz. 60, is a one-act pantomime ballet composed by Béla Bartók in 1914-1916 (orchestrated 1916-1917) to a scenario by Béla Balázs. It was first performed at the Budapest Opera on 12 May 1917 under the conductor Egisto Tango.

The work

The Wooden Prince has never achieved the fame of Bartók's other ballet, The Miraculous Mandarin (1926), but it was enough of a success at its premiere to prompt the Opera House to stage Bartók's opera, Bluebeard's Castle the following year (it had been waiting for a performance since 1911). Like Bluebeard, The Wooden Prince uses a huge orchestra (it even includes saxophones), though the critic Paul Griffiths believes it sounds like an earlier work in style (Griffiths p. 71). The music shows the influence of Debussy and Richard Strauss, as well as Wagner (the introduction echoes the prelude of Das Rheingold). Bartók used a scenario by the poet Béla Balázs, which had appeared in the influential literary journal Nyugat in 1912.

Instrumentation

This is probably the work in which Bartók uses his largest orchestra:

Woodwinds: 4 flutes (third doubling on piccolo 2, fourth on piccolo 1), 4 oboes (third on English horn 2, fourth on English horn 1), 4 clarinets (third doubling on sopranino clarinet, fourth on bass clarinet), 4 bassoons (third and fourth doubling on contrabassoons), Alto saxophone in E flat, tenor saxophone in B flat (doubling on baritone saxophone in E flat)
Brass: 4 horns, 6 trumpets (4 trumpets and 2 cornets, all in B flat), 3 trombones, tuba
Percussion (timpanist and 5 players): timpani, bass drum, cymbals, snare drum, field drum, triangle, tam-tam, glockenspiel, xylophone, castanets
2 harps, celesta for 4 hands
strings: 16 first and 16 second violins, 12 violas, 10 cellos, 8 double basses

Synopsis

A prince falls in love with a princess, but is stopped from reaching her by a fairy who makes a forest and a stream rise against him. To attract the princess' attention, the prince hangs his cloak on a staff and fixes a crown and locks of his hair to it. The princess catches sight of this "wooden prince" and comes to dance with it. The fairy brings the wooden prince to life and the princess goes away with that instead of the real prince, who falls into despair. The fairy takes pity on him as he sleeps, dresses him in finery and reduces the wooden prince to lifelessness again. The princess returns and is finally united with the human prince.

Recordings

The Wooden Prince (with Cantata Profana) Chicago Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Pierre Boulez (Deutsche Grammophon, 1992)
The Wooden Prince (with Kossuth) Hungarian National Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Zoltán Kocsis (Hungaroton SACD, 2007)
The Wooden Prince Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Marin Alsop (Naxos, 2008)

Sources

Paul Griffiths: Bartók (J.M. Dent, "The Master Musicians", 1984)
Booklet note to the Boulez recording

Béla Bartók

Operas	Bluebeard's Castle

Ballets	The Miraculous Mandarin The Wooden Prince

Concertante	Piano Concerto No. 1 Piano Concerto No. 2 Piano Concerto No. 3 Viola Concerto Violin Concerto No. 1 Violin Concerto No. 2 Rhapsody No. 1 Rhapsody No. 2

Orchestral works	Concerto for Orchestra Dance Suite Divertimento for String Orchestra Kossuth Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta

Chamber music	44 Duos for Two Violins Contrasts Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion Sonata for Solo Violin String Quartet No. 1 String Quartet No. 2 String Quartet No. 3 String Quartet No. 4 String Quartet No. 5 String Quartet No. 6

Choral works	Cantata Profana

Piano compositions	Allegro barbaro Eight Improvisations on Hungarian Peasant Songs Fifteen Hungarian Peasant Songs For Children Mikrokosmos Out of Doors Petite Suite Piano Sonata Rhapsody, Op. 1 Romanian Christmas Carols Romanian Folk Dances Slovak Dance Sonatina Suite, Op. 14 Two Romanian Dances, Op. 8a

Arrangements	Hungarian folksongs for voice and piano

Collaborations	Homage to Paderewski

Named for Bartók	Bartók (crater) Béla Bartók Music High School

Related articles	Hungarian folk music Magyar Rádió Musical cryptogram Neoclassicism Night music Polymodal chromaticism Suite paysanne hongroise Triptych

Lists Compositions Solo piano String quartets

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