The ballet Verklungene Feste: Tanzvisionen aus zwei Jahrhunderten for which the music from the divertimento was written was the idea of Clemens Krauss, the director of the Munich opera (1937–43). Originally, he had envisaged the 1923 Dance Suite (also known as the Couperin Suite) to be the first half with Strauss's Josephslegende being the second half. The choreographers Pia and Pino Mlakar had already choreographed the Dance Suite for a performance in 1936 and were given the task of creating a new version of Josephslegende. However, they suggested using Feuillet's (1700) to reconstruct the choreography of the time of Couperin. Krauss wrote to Strauss "Mlakar has found the original choreography by famous dance masters from Couperin's time and wants to make use of it for the Couperin Suite. Now a question: would you be so kind as to expand the Couperin suite with two new dances should the need arise?"quoted in Heisler, p. 175. In the end, Strauss wrote several new dances and incidental music for the ballet.
