A Midsummer Night's Dream
Choreography · George Balanchine (1962)
music by Felix Mendelssohn (Overture, Op. 21, and incidental music, Op. 61, supplemented with the overtures to Athalie, Op. 74, and Die schone Melusine, Op. 32; Die erste Walpurgisnacht, Op. 60; the first three movements of Symphony No. 9 for Strings; and the overture to Son and Stranger, Op. 89 - all also by Mendelssohn, arranged into the ballet score by Balanchine himself)
In an enchanted forest outside Athens, the fairy king Oberon punishes his queen Titania for refusing to give up a changeling boy by having Puck enchant her with a love potion, while the same potion sows chaos among two pairs of mortal lovers before Puck sorts out the confusion and a triple wedding is proclaimed. Act II abandons the story for a formal wedding celebration - a suite of courtly and virtuosic dances for the newlyweds and an unrelated principal couple - before a brief return to the forest, where Oberon and Titania are reconciled and Puck sweeps the stage clean.