French Opera Research Articles

GENRE-STYLE AND SPIRITUAL-ETHICAL METAMORPHOSIS OF FRENCH MUSICAL THEATER OF THE 17TH-20TH CENTURIES

The purpose of the work is to identify the genre-stylistic and spiritual-meaning specifics of the French musical theater of the New Age and its evolutionary paths in the European culture of the 17th-20th centuries. The historical paths of the development of French musical theater of the 17th–20th centuries reveal its genre and stylistic diversity, represented by the typologies of “lyrical tragedy”, “salvation opera”, Empire opera, “grand” French opera, lyric opera and numerous varieties of samples of experimental musical theater and synthetic genres formations of the 20th century. The timbre-intonational and dramaturgical palette of the mentioned genres is organically inscribed in the stylistic priorities of French culture and music of the New Age Baroque, Classicism, Empire, Romanticism, Biedermeier, etc. At the same time, the mentioned typologies of the French musical theater combine a number of common features, among which we single out the essential role of its cult-mysterious primary basis, the corresponding types of imagery and their leading features, oriented to the cultivation of Christian virtues, the idea of spiritual transformation, the harmonious union of the earthly and sacred worlds. The appeal to educational and didactic, as well as spiritual and ethical factors in French opera (even at the level of biblical thinking of own history) conditions its appeal to large-scale bright spectacular performances with a large number of mass and ballet scenes, the genesis of which went back to the spiritual traditions of the culture of French absolutism in its historical development The specified genre metamorphoses of modern French opera at the level of “genre memory” focused the attention of the listener-spectator first of all on the original manner of conveying the poetic Word, its spiritual and ethical meaning, which went back to the “mysterious mode” of the French musical theater, on a clear fixation of dance-plastic movement-gesture, which collectively retained its significance at all stages of its historical existence.

Encoding Emotion

The paper Encoding Emotion details an experiment conducted on early 18th-century French recitative to determine how composers relate harmony to sung text, if at all. Although the existence of a relationship between harmony and vocal expression is generally agreed upon, it is rarely properly taught to baroque singers, even though harmony is fundamental to the concept of basso continuo. It is also rarely discussed in continuo or singing treatises, either historical or modern, and, if so, never explicitly. The present experiment aims to fill that gap by examining harmony and text in actual written music. To do so, a harmonic analysis was performed on excerpts of secco recitative from French operas and cantatas written by Campra, Clérambault, Jacquet de la Guerre, and Rameau; the significant chords and harmonic passages were then logged in a spreadsheet with their corresponding text. Over two hundred lines of results were then analysed to determine whether patterns could be found associating certain words to chords or harmonic progressions. In the end, the dataset was too small for any general conclusions to be made with certainty, but patterns still emerged. Most notably, the plagal cadence correlated to feelings of love and tenderness, particularly in a sacred or noble context. It was also noted that, though general patterns could not always be identified, some chords or harmonic progressions appeared to have specific meaning for a certain composer. The V of IV, for example, was strongly associated with pleasure in Clérambault's works. Although there is only limited use for these results outside of this study, the identified patterns show that a more extensive dataset would yield enlightening results and give singers access to a remarkably rich tool with which to inform their interpretation.

Facial Expression in Italian and French Opera Acting at the Turn of the 18th and 19th Centuries: Perspective of the Encyclopedic Sources

The expressive qualities of acting in opera – both French and Italian – in the 18th century were highly valued. My analysis will include comments made on this subject by J.J. Rousseau in his famous “Dictionnaire de musique”, followed by other encyclopedists of the late 18th and early 18th/early 19th centuries, especially French. Although it was agreed that correct singing technique was a sine qua non condition for performing an opera role, meeting this condition was only the beginning of a difficult path, the aim of which was to express affect using various stage means. I will show that the facial expression recommended to opera actors aimed primarily at presenting values consistent with bourgeois ethics and aesthetics derived from sentimentalism, in line with the new direction of development of opera theatre in social life, especially in France.

At the Crossroads Between Opera and Oratorio: Biblical Themes and the 19th Century French Opera

"The present study aims to investigate the delicate border between oratorios and operas based on biblical subjects, focusing on French music. A brief analysis of the period prior to the 19th century reveals that the oratorio was not one of the most popular genres in France, allowing the genesis of various genres inspired by biblical subjects. The oratorio enjoyed a brief revival in the 18th century, leading in the 19th century to the composition of biblical operas and the dawn of genres that are at the crossroads between opera and oratorio: mystére, drame sacré, or légende sacrée, represented by works of Jules Massenet. Although traditionally referred to as oratorios, these works allowed for staged representation, due to the dramatic qualities of the librettos, which in turn allowed for the musical discourse to depart from the sobriety of the oratorio and to include certain features that are characteristic for opera. Gradually, biblical subjects began to be tackled in operas as well, as will be seen in the works of Camille Saint-Saëns and Jules Massenet, the two composers on whose works the present study mainly focuses. At the same time, biblical themes can be related to musical orientalism, but also to the fin de siècle decadent aesthetic (through their exploration of such themes as the opposition between sacred and erotic love), serving as mirror for the political, social, and religious context of the Third Republic. Keywords: opera, oratorio, Bible, orientalism, fin de siècle"

The chordal continuo in French Baroque opera: revisiting the evidence

Abstract The appearance some four decades ago of the author’s article ‘The role of the keyboard continuo in French opera 1673–1776’, Early Music, viii/2 (1980), sharply divided opinion. While many readers accepted the evidence that the chordal continuo instruments at the Paris Opéra customarily remained silent during most, if not all, of the dance movements (and, from the mid-1710s, the choruses), others proved sceptical or even hostile to the conclusions drawn. In revisiting the evidence, the present article focuses on the extent of the movements omitted from original continuo parts (around 50 per cent in some cases), and argues that the practice became more pronounced in the early 18th century. Noting that continuo playing was not traditionally associated with dance music in France, the article cites subsequent scholarly writings that draw attention to parallel practices in England and Germany, and reviews how far the findings of the 1980 article have been taken up by performers.

Music, Pantomime & Freedom in Enlightenment France by Hedy Law (review)

Reviewed by: Music, Pantomime & Freedom in Enlightenment France by Hedy Law Annalise Smith Music, Pantomime & Freedom in Enlightenment France. By Hedy Law. Woodbridge, Suffolk: Boydell, 2020. [xvii, 265 p. ISBN 9781783275601 (hardcover), $95; ISBN 978178749374 (e-book), price varies.] Music examples, bibliography, index. Hedy Law's Music, Pantomime & Freedom in Enlightenment France stems from a single question: Why did Jean-Georges Noverre refer to pantomime ballet as "an offspring of liberty?" (p. 4). Law more than answers this question in her monograph, providing the reader with an in-depth exploration of how composers incorporated pantomime ballet into their operatic works in eighteenth-century France, and the various ways in which pantomime was seen to both reflect and cultivate ideas of moral liberty during the Enlightenment. Drawing on a multitude of primary sources, Law [End Page 599] traces pantomime from the early eighteenth century up to the French Revolution, bringing necessary attention to a medium of dance that is often overlooked in discussions of French opera. This exploration allows Law to address some of the best-known composers of eighteenth-century French opera—Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Jean-Philippe Rameau, Christoph Willibald Gluck, Antonio Salieri—while also bringing attention to less well-known works that nevertheless indicate the depth to which pantomime was embedded in eighteenth-century operatic practices. Pantomime is most frequently interpreted as a type of dance in which performers adopt more naturalistic movements in order to express emotion and dramatic action, as opposed to the more decorative steps of traditional ballet. Individual scenes or dances that utilized pantomime appeared at the Opéra de Paris in the 1740s, while fully independent pantomime ballets, often called ballet d'action, emerged in the 1770s (though these works were always performed alongside another work). Law frequently touches on pantomime as a type of dance and its shifting hierarchical relationship with more traditional forms of ballet. A significant portion of her argument and discussion, however, is bound up in pantomime as a style of acting. As Law notes, in the seventeenth century, pantomime was not a genre of performance but a type of performer. Though pantomime was often associated with lower forms of drama in the early eighteenth century, by the middle of the century it had gained traction as a serious genre, one in which the traditions of ancient Rome might be revived. We can thus consider pantomime an element of the dramatic reform taking place throughout Europe at this time, one that was increasingly integral to both spoken plays and opera. The fame of English actor David Garrick stemmed in no small part from his skill at pantomime, with the actor viewed as the inheritor of the Roman tradition. Not coincidentally, his performances in Paris in the mid-1760s served as a model for how French actors, even those at the Opéra, could embrace pantomime as an expressive tool. In the beginning chapters of her monograph, Law addresses how pantomime first manifested in operatic dance. Rousseau's Le devin du village serves as an example of how dance could be used to communicate a complete dramatic idea without relying on sung text to convey the plot (albeit with some reliance on a printed libretto). Yet Law's focus on pantomime as a style of acting means that many of the examples she discusses—particularly in the operas of Gluck and Salieri—are not dance pieces at all but instead relatively short moments of instrumental music in the middle of arias or recitatives in which the performer engages in pantomime acting. Law convincingly argues that these short moments were conceived of by the composer as an opportunity for pantomime, pointing to actions suggested by the lyrics, certain figurations in the music that suggested motions such as sudden pauses or expressive gestures, or even specific directions in the score that directed the actor to move in a certain way. Collectively, these moments highlight the degree to which expressive acting was increasingly seen as a requirement of good drama on the operatic stage. While pantomime embodied a general shift toward naturalistic movement and acting, it was not just this turn in dramatic practice that led some writers to promote it as a "dance...

Giuseppe Verdi's Jérusalem between Adaptation and Self-Borrowing

Giuseppe Verdi's first French opera, Jérusalem (1847), has often been described as a French version of his fourth opera, I lombardi alla prima crociata (1843). It is hardly a straightforward translation, however; the process of adapting the source to the French stage involved substantial rewriting of the libretto, thoroughly recasting the storyline and therefore requiring numerous changes in the music. Thus, Verdi not only provided several entirely new sections for the score of Jérusalem, but also reused material from I lombardi in radically different dramatic settings. The purpose of this article is to review changing attitudes toward Jérusalem through the twentieth century, and to assert that it may be perceived both as a reworking of the earlier opera and as a new work in which Verdi, under unique circumstances, deployed strategies of self-borrowing. The first part addresses the historiography of Jérusalem, tracing changing attitudes of commentators gradually recognizing the importance and worth of the French work, and the second part examines in detail the transfer of selected passages that Verdi borrowed from I lombardi and adapted to vastly changed contexts.

Music and the shape of the dialectic: what Hegel’s discussion of Diderot’s Le Neveu de Rameau shows

This paper discusses the prominence given by Hegel in the Phenomenology of Spirit, to Diderot’s Neveu de Rameau. It locates its cause in the dialogue’s account of the quarrel in contemporary French music, between Italian opéra comique and French opera seria, in particular, Rameau. Hegel makes his account of this section of Diderot’s dialogue his first clearly explicit account of a dialectic operating in culture. The French audiences cannot hear the French style of opera with innocent ears, having once taken pleasure in the Italian operas. And movement forward in music, it is implied, will have to go beyond both styles, to please the current audiences.

Indian Rhythmic Gesture and Tinta in French Operas of the Second Half of the 19th Century and Early 20th Century

"As part of a larger study which compresses three layers of analyses — dramatic, visual, and musical — the present article deals with the rhythmic component of the musical phenomenon in French operas within a half century timeframe, 1862–1923. Orientalism and exoticism were represented through melody, rhythm, timbre, and libretti in operas by F. David, G. Bizet, L. Delibes, J. Massenet, and A. Roussel. The melodic dimension, discussed in a previous study, offered perhaps more opportunities for the evocation of an allegedly oriental sound than rhythm and meter deliver within the operas, while the timbre of various instruments proposes the sensuality of the Orient — an accepted Western stereotype regarding the East. To identify certain rhythmic formulae of Indian inspiration and to understand the concept of tāla, several studies and works of Indian musicians and authors have been consulted, among these Sãrngadeva’s Sangītaratnākara, a thirteenth century treatise considered one of the most important Indian musicological texts. Whether invented or extracted directly from its original source, the article aims to identify composers’ rhythmic gestures. The blend of personal musical language with the Indian tinta reflected in rhythmic patterns create a romantic texture cognoscible to the discussed French exotic operas: David’s opéra-comique Lalla-Roukh, Bizet’s Les Pecheurs de perles, Delibes’ Lakmé, Massenet’s five-act grand-opéra Le Roi du Lahore, and Roussel’s opéra-ballet Padmâvatî. Keywords: Hindu rhythm, ethnomusicology, French opera, orientalism, Indian tinta, timbre "

Bookshelf

Bookshelf Debra Greschner (bio) Parr, Sean M. Vocal Virtuosity: The Origins of the Coloratura Soprano in Nineteenth Century Opera. New York: Oxford University Press, 2021. E-book, xvii, 301 pp., $48.99. ISBN 978-0197542644; Paper, $65.00. ISBN 978-0-1975-4264-4 www.global.oup.com For centuries, audiences have thrilled to the sounds of coloratura. From the earliest appearance of florid passages in medieval liturgy to the roulades of Rossini, melismatic singing has captivated listeners. Over the course of the nineteenth century, however, the use of coloratura changed. The vocal virtuosity that characterized the operas of Bellini and Donizetti is absent from the late operas of Verdi, and composers such as Puccini and Bizet eschewed it completely. Musicologist Sean Parr explores the origins and history of the modern coloratura soprano, including when the Fach was established and how its development was influenced by exponents of French opera. He avers that coloratura was not anachronistic in nineteenth century opera; instead, it was an indicator of new expressive and dramatic directions. Parr also explores the social and cultural significance of coloratura and demonstrates that fioritura had implications well beyond the footlights. The chronicle begins with an overview of changes that occurred at the turn of the nineteenth century. In 1798, Pope Pius VI revoked the ban against women appearing on stage; eight years later, the French emperor forbade castrati. Parr explains that the resulting increase in opportunities for women necessitated changes in voice pedagogy models because the master teacher paradigm that required students to live with their instructors was deemed inappropriate for female singers. This shift solidified the importance of formal music schools, such as the Paris Conservatory. Founded in 1795, the institution was influential in standardizing music education, even publishing a treatise that codified the curriculum of voice pedagogy. The structured approach to technique (which included an emphasis on the whistle register) and the influence of pedagogues Laure Cinti-Damoreau (1801–1863), Gilbert-Louis Duprez (1806–1896), and Manuel Garcia II (1805–1906) enabled sopranos to develop the skills required for melismatic singing. Parr cites pedagogic treatises of the era to demonstrate the widening rift that developed between melismatic and sustained singing styles as evidenced in the writing of Francesco Lamperti (1813–1892) and Julius Stockhausen (1826–1906). There was also a shift along national lines. Parr details how Italian opera began to move away from coloratura, as exemplified in the middle period operas of Giuseppe Verdi. The author postulates that the fioritura serves as an omen of impending doom for the character who sings it; for instance, Gilda's elation in "Caro nome" is artificial and the melismas serve as an ominous warning. The author draws the same parallel for the arias "Sempre libera" (La traviata) and "Merci, jeunes amies" (Les Vêpres siciliennes). The dark subtext of these arias contrasts with the joyful or exuberant mood usually associated with coloratura, and Parr contends the mood reflects Verdi's opinion of melismatic singing. Despite its disappearance from Italian operas, coloratura remained a mainstay in the stage works of French composers. There were several important exponents of the Fach, but the most significant of the era was soprano Caroline Carvalho (1827–1895). Born Marie Félix-Miolan, she created sixteen roles in the span of seventeen years. Five were leading roles in operas by Charles Gounod, including Marguerite in Faust and Juliette in Roméo et Juliette. (She also premiered Gounod's setting of "Ave Maria" based on the first keyboard prelude by J. S. Bach.) Parr proffers a detailed portrait of the noteworthy performer and créatrice. In regard to the latter, Carvalho possessed formidable skills in performing variations as exemplified by her performance of the aria "Carnaval de Venise" (La Reine Topaze) by Massé. Her marriage to Léon Carvalho in 1853 increased her sphere of influence. As an opera director who worked at several theaters, including the Théâtre-Lyrique and Opéra-Comique, Léon exhibited an astute ability to recognize operas with potential. In addition to presenting the premieres of many of Gounod's operas, he oversaw the first performances of Les Pêcheurs de perles by Bizet (1863), Les Troyens by Berlioz...

The Struggling Siren: Speech Therapy and Claude Debussy’s Pelléas et Mélisande

In Claude Debussy’s opera, Pelléas et Mélisande, the audience first encounters Mélisande in the depths of an impassable forest. Discovered by the nobleman Golaud, Mélisande trembles and weeps beside a fountain. She either cannot or will not speak. When her voice finally escapes her body, she cries out to Golaud that he is not to touch her. Taken aback, he asks what has happened to her, and Mélisande utters her first complete sentence: “I do not want to say! I do not want to say!” (“Je ne veux pas le dire! Je ne veux pas le dire!”). Carried along by Debussy’s lush impressionistic harmonies, Mélisande stammers and stutters through this opening scene, in contrast to the clarity and eloquence of Golaud’s lines. Through this vocal exchange, heard publicly for the first time on 30 April 1902, Debussy redefined French opera. Rapidly, critics hailed Pelléas et Mélisande as the first French work to truly oppose and surpass the dominant influence of Richard Wagner’s music dramas.1 Debussy’s pioneering opera elevated the French language to a position where the text could be heard distinctly, while his musical adaptation of Symbolist playwright Maurice Maeterlinck’s words heightened the mystery of the original text. Scholars such as Katherine Bergeron, Jane Fulcher, Jann Pasler, Lydia Goehr, and Marianne Wheeldon among others have examined the multiple meanings of Debussy’s opera, defining it as the arch-French modernist work with its revolutionary treatment of language.2 Building on this scholarship, we offer another layer of evidence for hearing Debussy’s opera and the modes of expression conveyed by the character Mélisande.

Female Singers on the French Stage, 1830–1848 by Kimberly White

Reviewed by: Female Singers on the French Stage, 1830–1848 by Kimberly White Lydia Bechtel Female Singers on the French Stage, 1830–1848. By Kimberly White. (Cambridge Studies in Opera.) Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018. [xi, 239 p. ISBN 9781107101234 (hardcover), $99.99; also available as e-book, ISBN and price vary.] Illustrations, tables, appendix, bibliography, index. Recently, musicological scholarship and pedagog y have gradually shifted away from composer-driven narratives to conversations that include the breadth of artists involved in the music-making process. Kimberly White’s Female Singers on the French Stage, 1830–1848 shadows this change and demonstrates the merits of exploring the contributions of performers and their complete artistic journeys as a more thorough examination of music history. While not focusing on any one singer, White chronicles the trajectory of training, rise to fame, and autumnal decline of French female singers through an exploration of primary-source documents, journals, and serial publications. As White explains in the introduction, this focus “restore[s] women to the historical record” and “expand[s] traditional notions of historical significance to acknowledge their lived experiences” (p. 3). Her book concentrates on a seemingly narrow eighteen-year period, but it is one of great change in French opera and society, which she expertly weaves into her analysis of how female singers lived in the changing systems of the time. White’s greatest strength is her ability to draw information from so many resources (serial novels, correspondence, contracts, journals, reviews, memoirs, and biographies) and to artic ulate how female singers moved through the French operatic world of the mid-nineteenth century. She does this by starting at the earliest stages of a singer’s career, following the initial [End Page 79] discovery of talent, through private training and entry into the Paris Conservatoire. While the presentation of so much information can at times be a dry read, on the whole White synthesizes the information in a narrative style that allows one to methodically follow the musical journeys of these women. For example, in chapter 1, which begins with a discussion of a young woman’s initiation into musical studies, White presents the family origins and professions of female Conservatoire students as well as those of Opéra and Opéra-Comique singers (pp. 13–15). White sifted through countless documents to gather this information, and she presents it in tables and elaborates on it in the text. It is because of this painstaking attention to detail and labor-intensive scholarship that readers are able to appreciate the hard work of these female singers as they see them go from young trainee in the Conservatoire to ingénue at the Opéra. In chapter 2, White skillfully chronicles the progression from novice student to professional debut. The focus on how young singers transitioned to the professional stage ultimately “shows how female artists took an active role in constructing their careers” (p. 39). White offers details on the preparations of the singer for her debut and the inner workings of such events at French opera houses. It is, however, the focus on the singers themselves and how they negotiated the terms of their debuts (usually with some degree of aid from a male protector) that best supports White’s thesis. Another important aspect of the debut process White covers is the creation of an artist’s image. As she reveals, singers like Cornélie Falcon and Emilia Goggi embodied an image of morality, humility, and deference to ensure a successful debut, while Louise Lavoye’s audacious ambition put her at risk for scrutiny by critics. Ultimately, what White demonstrates through her exploration of the debutantes in this chapter is that these women understood how to best prepare and present themselves, thus exerting some personal control over their professional situation—something for which music history does not often give women credit. In chapter 3, White presents one of the book’s strongest musical-historical outlines, in which she analyzes the impact of the July Revolution on the operational functions of French opera houses. Her examination of the new system, which made the houses more entrepreneurial and less reliant on government support, allows for a conversation concerning...

International Networking in Russian Music Theatre around 1800: Sheremetev, Yusupov and Grand Duke Pavel Petrovich

This article investigates the role played by aristocrats in the exchange of repertoire and musical personnel between Russia and Western Europe in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. It discusses the involvement of three significant figures in the political and cultural milieus of the Russian Empire: Count Nikolay Petrovich Sheremetev (1751–1809), Prince Nikolay Borisovich Yusupov (1750–1831) and the Grand Duke Pavel Petrovich Romanov (who ruled as Paul I from 1796 to 1801). The central focus is on Sheremetev, whose correspondence with Marie-François Hivart, a Parisian cellist he met during a grand tour, allows us to reconstruct a clear picture of how French opera was imported and adapted at his estate theatres in the Moscow area. Yusupov and the grand duke likewise established international musical contacts during their European tours of the 1770s and 80s, and exploited them in their private and public theatrical activities in Russia. Yusupov, who was particularly fond of Italian opera, may be regarded as Sheremetev's counterpart in St Petersburg, while Tsarevich Pavel Petrovich channelled the musical contacts he established in Italy to the Russian court and crown theatres.Together, these cases suggest some of the ways in which Russia was entangled in European musical life around 1800, revealing mechanisms of exchange in which grand tours, diplomatic contacts and the personal interests of patrons played a significant part.

Operetta Empire: Music Theater in Early Twentieth-Century Vienna by Micaela Baranello

Reviewed by: Operetta Empire: Music Theater in Early Twentieth-Century Vienna by Micaela Baranello Ruth V. Gross Micaela Baranello, Operetta Empire: Music Theater in Early Twentieth-Century Vienna. Oakland: U California P, 2021. 235 pp. Micaela Baranello has a lot to say about the world of Viennese operetta. Her recent book, The Operetta Empire: Music Theater in Early Twentieth-Century Vienna, provides readers with a detailed analysis of the connections between the “Silver Age” of operetta—a term that came into wide use only after World War II to designate operettas between 1905 and World War II—and the Austro-Hungarian world in which it developed and flourished. Her major focus is the period between 1905, the year that Franz Lehár’s Die lustige Witwe premiered, and the mid-1930s, just before the Anschluss. Operetta has long been considered an art form inferior to its higher-brow relative, opera; Baranello, however, makes a strong case for the operettas of the early twentieth [End Page 178] century as important and, until now, underrated players in the world of musical modernism. They are highly self-reflective works that often reveal aesthetic and social concerns regarding class, race, and gender and uncover truths about the world in which they were created. As such they deserve both scholarly investigation and respect, both of which she offers in this study. Baranello approaches her topic chronologically and lays out a clear historical overview. A quick summary of operetta in nineteenth-century Vienna (the “Golden Age”) provides us with the necessary information to understand how different the compositions of the new century seemed to critics at the time, several of whom she cites. Offenbach’s operettas, modeled on the musical style of the French opera comique, were generally considered the pinnacle of the genre, as they were not only extremely witty but also biting in their political satire. When Johann Strauss II came on the scene, he created a more local context that focused on Austro-Hungarian culture and folk culture and introduced the tradition of dance (particularly waltz) music, emotional peaks reminiscent of opera, and dramatic clichés. By the end of the century, there seemed to be a dearth of Viennese composers who could continue the tradition, but then Franz Lehár, after having composed a few operettas that were less well con- and re-ceived, succeeded in establishing himself and launching a new age of operetta with Die lustige Witwe. Baranello chooses to focus on a few key composers to explain the development and historical focus of the decades before and after World War I. Some of her selections are essential, but others seem a bit arbitrary. Her choice of Lehár’s Die lustige Witwe and Zigeunerliebe, Oscar Straus’s Ein Walzertraum, and Emmerich Kálmán’s operettas with gypsy themes and flair, like Die Czardasfürstin, are of great interest because the discussion centers on operettas that we can still see performed today, and in this way, Baranello’s study also speaks to those of us who may not necessarily be operetta experts, even if we are operetta fans. Her section on Kálmán’s earlier gypsy opera Der Zigeunerprimas—an operetta no longer in current repertory—is also extremely illuminating for its historical context as a forerunner for the more popular Hungarian folk-style operettas still performed. But when the study delves into other operettas that have long been forgotten and are remembered mostly as historical oddities, the book, although providing information about performance practices and performers themselves, sometimes becomes less engaging, for example her discussion of Lehár’s Eva or Kálmán’s Gold gab ich für Eisen. To be sure, these more esoteric artefacts are used to illustrate [End Page 179] important societal concerns in Viennese history—in these two examples specifically labor and working-class issues before World War I in Eva and war propaganda in the Kálmán work. For the operetta scholar or musicologist, these may be significant, but the study bogs down in these moments. Two of Baranello’s longer discussions provide a great deal of insight into important topics for anyone familiar with Viennese operetta. The section...

Economy Hall: The Hidden History of a Free Black Brotherhood

Economy Hall: The Hidden History of a Free Black Brotherhood

The Exotic in Nineteenth-Century French Opera, Part 2: Plots, Characters, and Musical Devices

Nineteenth-century French opera is renowned for its obsession with “the exotic”—that is, with lands and peoples either located far away from “us” Western Europeans or understood as being very different from us. One example: hyper-passionate Spaniards and “Gypsies” in Bizet’s Carmen. Most discussions of the role that the exotic plays in nineteenth-century French opera focus on a few standard-repertory works (mainly serious in nature), rather than looking at a wider range of significant works performed at the time in various theaters, e.g., the Opéra, the Opéra-Comique, and Offenbach’s Bouffes-Parisiens. The present article attempts to survey the repertory broadly. Part 1 examines various “different” (or Other) lands and peoples frequently represented on stage in French operas. Part 2 discusses typical plots and character types found in these operas (sometimes regardless of the particular exotic land that was chosen) and concludes by exploring the musical means that were often employed to impel the drama and to convey the specific qualities of the people or ethnic group being represented (as a community—through chorus and authority figures—and through the feelings and actions of individual characters). These musical means could include special or unusual traits: either all-purpose style markers of the exotic generally (oddities, one might say) or more specific style markers associated with an identifiable people or region (e.g., tunes, rhythms, and other devices understood as signaling one particular region). But the musical means could also include any of the rich fund of devices that opera composers normally used when creating drama and defining character: melodic, harmonic, structural, and so on. This last point is often neglected or misunderstood in discussions of “the exotic in music,” which tend instead to focus primarily on elements that indisputably “point to” (as if semiotically) the specific land or people that the work is seeking to evoke or represent. In both Parts 1 and 2, instances are chosen from works that were often quite successfully performed at the time in French-speaking regions and that, even if little known today, can at least be consulted through recordings or videos. The works come from the standard recognized operatic genres: e.g., five-act grands opéras, three-act opéras-comiques, and short works in bouffe style. Composers whose works are mentioned, or discussed in some detail, include (among others) Adam, Auber, Berlioz, Bizet, Chabrier, Clapisson, Félicien David, Delibes, Flotow, Gomis, Gounod, Halévy, Messager, Meyerbeer, Hippolyte Monpou, Offenbach, Ernest Reyer, Saint-Saëns, Ambroise Thomas, and Verdi (Les vêpres siciliennes, Don Carlos). Examining certain lesser-known works reveals merits that have gone relatively unheralded. As for the better-known works, approaching them in this wide-angled way grants us a richer appreciation of their strengths and their often-enlivening internal contradictions.

Indian Culture and Music as a Source of Inspiration for French Opera Composers

"The current paper strives to discover and reveal the influences of Indian culture and classical Indian music in French operas. At first, the evocation of India was obtained through the subjects of the operas and stunning scenic designs, fulfilling the requirements of exoticism. Gradually, the composers attempted to include in their musical discourses exotic rhythmic and melodic elements, in some instances inspired by Indian classical music, thus aiming to evoke a genuine image of India. At the same time, the use of elements pertaining to Indian music (rāgas, rhythmic patterns, timbres) offered the musicians the possibility to create novel sound discourses. The analysis focuses on several operas, composed between the eighteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth century, following the evolution of Indian representations in several dimensions: dramatic (libretto), visual (scenic representations, dance), and musical (melody, rhythm, timbre). The present paper investigates the way Indian themes influenced the conception of the libretto, and at the same time the visual dimension of the works (setting, costumes), observing how these visual elements were gradually absorbed into the musical discourse (analysis of the melodic structures), through the incorporation of Indian rāgas in works conceived according to the rules of Western music composition. Keywords: exoticism, orientalism, India, French opera, rāga "

The Exotic in Nineteenth-Century French Opera, Part 1: Locales and Peoples

Nineteenth-century French opera is renowned for its obsession with “the exotic”—that is, with lands and peoples either located far away from “us” Western Europeans or understood as being very different from us. One example: hyper-passionate Spaniards and “Gypsies” in Bizet’s Carmen. Most discussions of the role that the exotic plays in nineteenth-century French opera focus on a few standard-repertory works (mainly serious in nature), rather than looking at a wider range of significant works performed at the time in various theaters, including the Opéra, the Opéra-Comique, and Offenbach’s Bouffes-Parisiens. The present article attempts to survey the repertory broadly. Part 1 examines various “different” (or Other) lands and peoples frequently represented on stage in French operas. Part 2 discusses typical plots and character types found in these operas (sometimes regardless of the particular exotic land that was chosen) and concludes by exploring the musical means that were often employed to impel the drama and to convey the specific qualities of the people or ethnic group being represented. These musical means could include special or unusual traits: either all-purpose style markers of the exotic generally or more specific style markers associated with identifiable peoples or regions. But the musical means could also include any of the rich fund of devices that opera composers normally used when creating drama and defining character: melodic, harmonic, structural, and so on. This last point is often neglected or misunderstood in discussions of “the exotic in music,” which tend instead to focus primarily on elements that indisputably “point to” (as if semiotically) the specific land or people that the work is seeking to evoke or represent. In both Parts 1 and 2, instances are chosen from works that were often quite successfully performed at the time in French-speaking regions and that, even if little known today, can at least be consulted through recordings or videos. The works come from the standard recognized operatic genres: five-act grands opéras, three-act opéras-comiques, and short works in bouffe style. The composers involved include (among others) Adam, Auber, Berlioz, Bizet, Chabrier, Cherubini, Clapisson, Félicien David, Delibes, Flotow, Gomis, Gounod, Halévy, Messager, Meyerbeer, Hippolyte Monpou, Offenbach, Ernest Reyer, Saint-Saëns, Ambroise Thomas, and Verdi (Les vêpres siciliennes, Don Carlos). Examining certain lesser-known works reveals merits that have gone relatively unheralded. As for the better-known works, approaching them in this wide-angled way grants us a richer appreciation of their strengths and their often-enlivening internal contradictions.

«Huguenots» by J. Meyerbeer in the context of spiritual-Christian quests of the era of romanticism

The purpose of the article is to identify the poetical and intonational features of J. Meyerbeer’s «Huguenots» in the context of the spiritual quest of romanticism, the evolution of French musical theater in the first half of the 19th century and its mystery component. The methodology of the work is the intonation concept of music from the perspective of intonation-stylistic analysis inherited from B. Asafiev and his followers. The analytical-musicological, genre-style, interdisciplinary, historical and cultural approaches are also essential for this work, revealing the spiritual and moral specifics of the poetics of the French «grand opera» and its mystery primary sources using the example of J. Meyerbeer's «Huguenots». The scientific novelty of the work is determined by its analytical perspective, focused on the consideration of the «Huguenots» by J. Meyerbeer in the context of the spiritual-Christian quests of the romantic era. Conclusions. The poetics of J. Meyerbeer’s opera «Huguenots», which is one of the exemplary examples of «grand» French opera, was formed at the intersection, on the one hand, of creative discoveries in the field of French musical theater of the first half of the 19th century and its vocal and performing stage practice. On the other hand, the named work demonstrates a deep connection with the mysterious traditions of the French spiritual theater, dating back to the Middle Ages, to the spiritual, religious and stylistic attitudes of the musical theater of French classicism («lyric tragedy» by J. B. Lully) and at the same time consonant with the religious quests of romanticism and the moral and ethical positions of French historicism. The essential role of religious confrontation in the Huguenots, which determinesthe intonational and dramatic specificity of the work, right down to the quotations of the Lutheran chant, ultimately focuses on the «collegiality of the highest order», which overcomes confessional barriers, defining the spiritual and moral pathos of the French «grand opera» and its spiritual attitudes.

The private musical memoirs of Dutch nobleman Alexander Michiels van Kessenich (1800–1869)

Abstract The memoirs that the Dutch nobleman Alexander Michiels van Kessenich (1800–1869) published in 1858–1859 offer a unique perspective on nineteenthcentury social music history. They were public in the sense of being printed, but private in the sense that the publication was not for sale. Because of a lack of editorial rigor the text comes across as a highly informal collection of personal musical memories. The unusual format of this publication is mirrored in its content. With his insistence that in their music making members of the aristocracy should avoid mingling with the lower classes and his obvious fondness for contemporary French opera, the musical memoirs of this Dutch nobleman demonstrate that to him, and probably many more like him, the burgeoning ideals of nineteenth-century middle-class music life were simply irrelevant.