A baby cursed at birth.  A fierce battle of good and evil. A true love awoken with a kiss. Sleeping Beauty is one of the world’s  favorite folktales. But one of its most famous renditions tells the story without a single word. Since premiering in 1890, "The Sleeping Beauty" has become one of the most frequently staged  ballets in history. So what makes this piece so beloved? And what exactly does ballet bring  to this— or any other story? At the heart of ballet  are dozens of gestures that dancers painstakingly perfect over thousands of hours of practice. This unique set of gestures  has been used for centuries, each movement rich with meaning  and history. But you don’t need to study them  to understand ballet, any more than you need to study  music to be moved by a song. And just as composers combine notes  and phrases to form pieces of music, choreographers string these gestures  together with new movements to form expressive combinations. Working alongside the orchestra’s  live score, ballerinas precisely perform these  combinations to convey narrative, emotion, and character. In "The Sleeping Beauty’s" opening scene, a flurry of techniques depicts  the fairy court bestowing gifts on baby Princess Aurora. The Fairy of Generosity  delicately walks “en pointe”— meaning on the tips of her toes— in step with the light plucking  of violins. The ballerina moves in perfect harmony  with the music, even mimicing the violins’ trill  with an elegant bourrée. The Fairy of Temperance, bestowing  the gift of strong will on Aurora, is choreographed as if shooting bolts  of electricity from her fingers. She bounds across the stage, spinning with quick chaînés  before decisively jetéing. Some movements are even more literal  than this. The evil fairy Carabosse curses  the princess with a lethal “X,” and the benevolent Lilac Fairy  counters that curse. Of course, the relationship  between music and movement isn’t always this straightforward. While classical ballet gestures  often respond to musical elements, the degree to which the dancers  and orchestra align is another choreographic tool. Some characters and scenes move  in sync to create rhythmic clarity, while others deliberately diverge  from the orchestra. Dancers and musicians maintain  this delicate balance throughout each performance, engaging in a live negotiation  of speed and rhythm. But prior to the performance,  a ballet’s most important relationship is between the choreographer  and the music. Choreographer Marius Petipa  and composer Piotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky worked together on every second  of "The Sleeping Beauty." This is particularly noticeable  in Princess Aurora’s exuberant entrance on her 16th birthday. Tchaikovsky’s enthusiastic music  tumbles forward in fits and starts, even cutting short some musical  phrases to capture her impatience. Petipa choreographs Aurora bouncing  back and forth with “pas de chat”— French for "cat steps"—  as she waits for her party to begin. Once the celebration starts, it’s up to the dancers to deliver on the physical spectacle of performing these gestures with grace. Aurora has the hardest part of all:  her famous Rose Adagio. As four suitors vie for her hand, the Princess performs a dizzying array  of balances, all en pointe. She briefly takes each suitor’s hand,  but then balances unassisted— a breath-taking display  of physical strength and skill. However, it’s not just technique  that carries meaning, but also style and personality. Like an actor delivering their lines, ballerinas can execute their movements to convey a wide range of emotion. Aurora can be elegant and restrained, throwing her arms in independence  from her suitors. Or she can be coy and flirtatious, descending from en pointe with grace and knowing confidence. "The Sleeping Beauty" offers a showcase for so much of what ballet can do. Its graceful spectacle,  dramatic physical vocabulary, and enchanting coordination  of music and movement perfectly reflect the themes  of this fantastical romance. But ballet isn’t just for epic fairytales. Ballets can be non-narrative  emotional journeys, experimental deconstructions of form, or pure demonstrations of skill. The artform is always experimenting  with a centuries old set of rules, making it the perfect medium  for stories old and new.