Jack in the Box (Satie)

Jack in the Box (sometimes seen as Jack-in-the-Box) is a work written by Erik Satie in 1899 for a pantomime-ballet (Satie called it a "clownerie", and also a "suite anglaise") to a scenario by the illustrator Jules Depaquit. Satie's intention was to score it also for orchestra. He gave it an English title because English phrases were considered fashionable in Parisian society at the time. However, after he wrote the piano score, he lost it some time after 1905. Satie believed it had gone missing on a bus and that it would never be found, but after his death it was found in his squalid apartment (some sources say it was hidden inside a notebook lodged down the back of his decrepit piano), along with the lost score for his marionette opera Genevieve de Brabant. Depaquit's scenario has not survived.

Sergei Diaghilev had approached Satie for ballet music in 1922 and again in 1924, but nothing was forthcoming either time. Satie died in July 1925, and in June 1926, to commemorate the 60th anniversary of his birth, Jack in the Box was produced by Diaghilev's Ballets Russes, with choreography by George Balanchine, settings by André Derain, and the music orchestrated by Satie's friend Darius Milhaud. The ballet received mainly negative comments: French critics called it "banal", while English critics decried it as "pert but hollow."

Jack-in-the-box

A jack-in-the-box is a children's toy that outwardly consists of a box with a crank. When the crank is turned, it plays a melody, often "Pop Goes the Weasel". At the end of the tune there is a "surprise": the lid pops open and a figure, usually a clown or jester, pops out of the box. Some jack-in-the-boxes open at random times when cranked, making the startle even more effective. Many which use "Pop Goes the Weasel" open at the point in the melody where the word "pop" would be if it were sung.

Origin

A theory as to the origin of the jack-in-the-box is that it comes from the 14th century English prelate Sir John Schorne, who is often pictured holding a boot with a devil in it. According to folklore, he once cast the devil into a boot to protect the village of North Marston in Buckinghamshire. In French, a jack-in-the-box is called a "diable en boîte" (literally "boxed devil").

References

External links

Media related to Jack-in-the-box at Wikimedia Commons

Jack in the Box (disambiguation)

Jack in the Box or Jack-in-the-Box may refer to:

See also

List of Marvel Comics characters: J

Jack-in-the-Box

Jack-in-the-Box, Jack Mead, first appears in Weapon X: The Draft - Sauron #1. Born an Australian aborigine mutant with telepathy and radar sense, his powers have a side effect where his body becomes petrified and brittle every time he uses them. He is taken into the Weapon X program, believing it to be a superhero team that could fix his mutant side effect, but he is ripped apart by his recruiter, Sauron, after a joke. He survives, becomes placed in a box, and he is utilized as a mind-reader during the admissions process for captured mutants incarcerated in the "Neverland" concentration camp.

Jackdaw

Jackdaw is a fictional character featured in the Marvel Comics universe. He was created by Dez Skinn, Steve Parkhouse, Paul Neary and John Stokes, and first appeared in The Incredible Hulk Weekly #57 (April 1980).