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Today, from the Bond on Vinyl archives, we’re still listening to music from A View To A Kill!
I don’t have too much more to add to this one that wasn’t already said in Bond on Vinyl #58. In A View To A Kill, the scene with Bond and KGB agent Pola Ivanova in a Japanese spa features Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake. While Bond does connect with Soviet intelligence operatives from time to time (The Spy Who Loved Me comes to mind), Swan Lake does seem to fit his typical relationship with Russian women.
The Russian ballet, which first premiered in 1877, was based on German and Russian folk tales and tells the love story of Prince Siegfried (Bond), who, on a hunting trip (spy work), encounters a flock of swans (female characters in every Bond film). The prince falls in love with the Swan Queen, Odette, and swears his allegiance and undying love to her. This doomed romance is also a recurring storyline in Bond films. Whether it be Tracy Bond, Anya Amasova, Vesper Lynd, or Madeleine Swann… the prince never ends up with the swan for too long.
This 1962 pressing of the ballet features longtime Philadelphia Orchestra conductor Eugene Ormandy leading the ballet suite. It also comes with a 28-page booklet with photos and the history of the ballet. This booklet is not kept in a traditional gatefold. Instead, it is bound inside the front cover about 2/3 of the way across for some reason.
118. Eugene Ormandy Conducts The Philadelphia Orchestra / Tchaikovsky – Swan Lake
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