“The Harmony of Opposites”: Characterizing Cellini’s Apprentice1

Abstract

When Hector Berlioz revised his opera Benvenuto Cellini in 1838 for performance at the Paris Opéra, he strengthened the characterization of Ascanio, the gifted artist's apprentice. Berlioz's reconciliation of contrasting moods and styles in Ascanio's airs reflects the composer's participation in the new Romantic program for drama and acknowledges late–eighteenth-century operatic traditions. Additionally, Ascanio's airs satirize conventions of grand opéra and symbolize the half-serious nature of this opera's genre as Berlioz gradually conceived it. Contemporaneous perspectives illuminate the air as genre, the enhanced significance of Ascanio's role, and the participation of Rosine Stoltz as first interpreter. For their gracious assistance in facilitating my research requests, I thank the staffs of the Bibliothèque-musée de l'Opéra, Paris; the Département de la musique, Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris; the Archives Nationales, Paris; the Music Division, Library of Congress, Washington D.C.; and the Gabe M. Wiener Music & Arts Library, Columbia University, New York. I acknowledge with gratitude a Fellowship Award in fall 2003 granted by Baruch College of the City University of New York, as well as reassigned time previously awarded by the Committee on Research and Travel, Weissman School of Arts and Sciences, enabling completion of this essay. Translations are mine unless otherwise noted.