Britten: The Prince of the Pagodas, Bartok: The MIraculous Mandarin / Oliver Knussen, Franz Welser-Möst / EMI Classics 2x Audio CD 2011

UPC 5099994982923

The Prince of the Pagodas is a ballet created for The Royal Ballet by choreographer John Cranko with music commissioned from Benjamin Britten. Its premiere took place on 1 January 1957 at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, London, conducted by Britten.

In February 1957 a recording of a slightly cut version of the score was made by Decca with Britten conducting the Orchestra of the Royal Opera House.

The ballet was revived at the same venue on 7 December 1989 in a new production by Kenneth MacMillan, achieving acclaim for Darcey Bussell's work in a principal role. Another production, set in Japan, was created by David Bintley for the National Ballet of Japan and premiered by that company on 30 October 2011; this was adopted by Birmingham Royal Ballet and danced in 2014 at The Lowry, Salford.

The Miraculous Mandarin (Hungarian: A csodálatos mandarin, pronounced [ˈɒ ˈt͡ʃodaːlɒtoʃ ˈmɒndɒrin]; German: Der wunderbare Mandarin) Op. 19, Sz. 73 (BB 82), is a one act pantomime ballet composed by Béla Bartók between 1918–1924, and based on the 1916 story by Melchior Lengyel. Premiered on 27 November 1926 conducted by Eugen Szenkar at the Cologne Opera, Germany, it caused a scandal and was subsequently banned on moral grounds. Although more successful at its Prague premiere, it was generally performed during the rest of Bartók's life in the form of a concert suite, which preserves about two-thirds of the original pantomime's music.