Georges Bizet - Carmen Suite - Collectors Mine

"Interpreters"
Maya Plisetskaya, Nikolai Fadeyechev, Sergei Radchenko, Alexander Lavrenyuk, Natalya Kasatkina

"Carmen" was first set as a ballet by the famed Russian choreographer Petipa in 1845. It was based on the Mérimée novella and premiered in Madrid some thirty years before Bizet's opera was first heard. Subsequent versions followed in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, some using and some discarding Bizet's music. In 1949, Roland Petit created a successful vehicle for himself and his wife Zizi Jeanmarie using the Bizet score.