L’AMOUR Timing Page 1 Ah! quel plaisir d’être soldat 4.45 8 La Dame blanche Adrien Boieldieu; Eugène Scribe 2 Elle est là … À la voix d’un amant fidèle 5.45 9 La Jolie Fille de Perth Georges Bizet, adap. Chris Hazell; Jules-Henri Vernoy de Saint-Georges, Jules Adenis 3 Parle, mon fils. — Un ange, une femme inconnue, à genoux, 9.33 10 priait près de moi La Favorite Gaetano Donizetti; Alphonse Royer, Gustave Vaëz, with additions by Eugène Scribe with Sergey Artamonov bass (Balthazar) 4 Ô blonde Cérès 4.30 12 Les Troyens Hector Berlioz 5 Mes amis, écoutez l’histoire d’un jeune et galant postillon* 3.57 13 Le Postillon de Lonjumeau Adolphe Adam; Adolphe de Leuven, Brunswick [Léon Lhérie] 6 Prendre le dessin d’un bijou … Fantaisie aux divins mensonges 5.32 14 Lakmé Léo Delibes; Edmond Gondinet, Philippe Gille 7 Alors, c’est bien ici la maison du Bailli? … Ô Nature, pleine de grâce 4.52 15 Werther Jules Massenet; Édouard Blau, Paul Milliet, Georges Hartmann 8 Toute mon âme est là … Pourquoi me réveiller 3.05 16 Werther Jules Massenet; Édouard Blau, Paul Milliet, Georges Hartmann 9 Oui, je veux par le monde promener librement 4.45 16 mon humeur vagabonde! Mignon Ambroise Thomas; Jules Barbier, Michel Carré 0 Maintenant, observons … Viens, gentille dame 8.36 17 L’Amour — French Tenor Arias La Dame blanche Adrien Boieldieu; Eugène Scribe Nineteenth-century French opera brims with Like La Dame blanche, Georges Bizet’s ! Au mont Ida, trois déesses (Le Jugement de Pâris) 3.51 18 delightful tenor showpieces, championed in La Jolie Fille de Perth (1867) is based on a La Belle Hélène Jacques Offenbach; Henri Meilhac, Ludovic Halévy the recent past by international artists such story by Sir Walter Scott. Henri Smith as Nicolai Gedda, Alfredo Kraus and Leopold seductively addresses his coquettish lover @ L’amour! … Ah! lève-toi, soleil! 4.38 19 Simoneau. Book-ended chronologically by Catherine in his serenade “À la voix d’un Roméo et Juliette Charles Gounod; Jules Barbier, Michel Carré Adrien Boieldieu’s La Dame blanche (1825) amant fidèle”, a languid and exotic-sounding and Jules Massenet’s Werther (1892), piece scarcely appropriate to the Scottish JUAN DIEGO FLÓREZ tenor the selections here range from the epic setting. Henri becomes convinced of seriousness of Hector Berlioz’s Les Catherine’s infidelity — erroneously — and Troyens to Jacques Offenbach’s ribald she loses her senses, only to be restored to Orchestra e coro* del Teatro Comunale di Bologna La Belle Hélène. reason by a reprise of the serenade. Bizet Roberto Abbado As a sentimental comedy, the tone of composed La Jolie Fille de Perth between Boieldieu’s La Dame blanche falls Les Pêcheurs de perles and Carmen, both C somewhere in between. The happy-go-lucky with more justifiable musical exoticisms. and penniless soldier Georges Brown Despite the intrinsic beauty of the outbids the villainous baritone Gaveston in serenade, the opera as a whole, with its an auction for a mansion inhabited by a curiously misplaced colours, never captured mysterious white lady. In a twist of the public’s imagination. coincidence common in theatre of the time, France long provided a hospitable Georges emerges as the legal heir anyway. environment for foreign composers. And the white lady herself turns out to be a Following a spectacular career in Italy, long-lost love. Georges sings “Ah! quel Gaetano Donizetti set his sights on the plaisir d’être soldat” as his entrance aria in Opéra in Paris with its lucrative royalty the first act, a rosy picture of war replete arrangements. La Favorite (1840) was his with playful martial figures. “Viens, gentille foray into the lavish genre of historical grand dame” is his later invocation to the “ghost”. opera popularised by the German composer Rossini was all the rage at the time, and Meyerbeer. In “Un ange, une femme Boieldieu’s music reveals a clear imprint of inconnue” the novice monk Fernand sings his influence in melodic cut and suave of his obsession with a young woman ornamentation. An evocative incipit on the named Léonor, whom he has seen praying. horn depicts awe at the supposedly The impassioned musical tone betrays a supernatural surroundings. lack of conviction in celibacy, and his 3 superior soon orders him to go forth into the iconoclastic Hector Berlioz. Close Léo Delibes and Jules Massenet empathy and fear by Charlotte. the world. Having discovered that Léonor is conversions of masterpieces from world followed with operatic hits later in the As a celebration of the French tenor the king’s mistress, Fernand returns to the literature into opera proved popular. century. In Lakmé (1883), set in colonial voice, it is fitting that this selection of monastery, but briefly contemplates leaving Gounod’s Roméo et Juliette (1867) India, Delibes skillfully deployed perennial favourites includes “Mes amis, again when a fatal illness drives her to die achieved much greater favour than Bellini’s atmospheric music. The tenor Gérald is not écoutez l’histoire d’un jeune et galant in his arms. looser adaptation in I Capuleti e i only a soldier, but also an artist, and in postillon” from Adolphe Adam’s Le Postillon Unlike Donizetti, the German-born Montecchi, and Roméo’s “Ah! lève-toi, “Prendre le dessin d’un bijou” he voices his de Lonjumeau (1836). The coachman composer Jacques Offenbach rose to fame soleil!” even adheres to some of the aesthetic attraction to the luxuriant milieu of Chapelou celebrates marriage, but in in Paris. His La Belle Hélène (1864) was imagery voiced by Shakespeare’s Romeo the priestess Lakmé’s garden. his rendition of this sparkling aria premiered at the unbuttoned Théâtre des beneath Juliet’s balcony. The musical Like Thomas, Massenet turned to a with high Ds he attracts the attention of Variétés, a venue that attracted the same vocabulary is now much more chromatic famous Goethe novel for operatic material the manager of the Paris Opéra, whose people who went to the Opéra when they than with Boieldieu and Donizetti, the in Werther (1892). With “Ô Nature, pleine coach has broken down nearby. Chapelou wanted lighter fare, even mockery of the orchestra emboldened with more leading de grace” Werther, like Gérald, displays his promptly leaves his wife for a career in Second Empire court of the 1850s and ’60s. countermelodies. sensitivity to his environment. His feeling the capital. He does brilliantly as a tenor Offenbach and his librettists Henri Meilhac Thomas’s Mignon (1866) derives from of repose quickly becomes unsettled as on the stage, and all ends well as, in and Ludovic Halévy concocted a wild and Goethe’s novel Wilhelm Meisters Lehrjahre. he falls madly in love with his best friend’s typical opéra-comique fashion, the two unpredictable plot around Agamemnon, Ajax This is a coming-of-age story, and the wife Charlotte. Emulating a Lied of the kind become reconciled by the end. and Achilles, as well as Paris, who spends cheerfulness of the Act One aria “Oui, je Schumann might have written, Massenet Steven Huebner much of the time pursuing the ravishing veux par le monde” suggests a protagonist later has his protagonist sing of his James McGill Professor (musicology), Hélène, promised to him by Venus after he at the beginning of his journey, not unlike torment in “Pourquoi me réveiller”, McGill University declared the goddess the fairest in a the ambiance of Georges Brown’s a plea met with a combination of Editor, Cambridge Opera Journal contest with Juno and Minerva. “Au mont entrance aria. Ida, trois déesses” recalls the episode, a In shaping the Aeneid into Les Troyens theme familiar to visual artists as the (1863) for the Paris Opéra, which eventually Judgement of Paris. rejected it, Berlioz created many moments Offenbach was frequently called the to provide dramatic relief from the high “king of the Second Empire” for having stakes that govern the actions of Dido and tapped into the zeitgeist, but in this period Aeneas. Numerous marches and ballets in native French composers shone as well, the tradition of grand opera are among especially in their crafting of melodic lines these strategies, as is the short aria around the natural accents of the French “Ô blonde Cérès” that Dido asks the language. The young Bizet belongs to this court poet Iopas to sing in Act Four. It is a group, as do his mentor Charles Gounod, pastoral piece with verbal and musical the distinguished Ambroise Thomas, and images of nature and the wind. 4 L’Amour — Airs pour ténor du répertoire français s’essaya au genre fastueux du grand opéra Junon. “Au mont Ida, trois déesses” historique rendu populaire par le rappelle cet épisode, un sujet connu Le répertoire opératique français du et la musique de Boieldieu est clairement compositeur allemand Meyerbeer. Dans des artistes des beaux-arts comme Le XIXe siècle regorge de charmantes marquée par son influence dans les “Un ange, une femme inconnue”, le moine Jugement de Pâris. pièces virtuoses pour ténor et a été mis coupes mélodiques et l’ornementation novice Fernand chante son obsession pour Offenbach était souvent appelé “le Roi à l’honneur au cours des dernières gracieuse. Une introduction évocatrice au une jeune femme, Léonor, qu’il a vue prier. du Second Empire” pour avoir exploité le décennies par des artistes internationaux cor traduit la grandeur des environs censés La couleur musicale passionnée trahit un zeitgeist (l’esprit du temps) mais à cette tels que Nicolai Gedda, Alfredo Kraus et êtres surnaturels. manque de conviction dans le célibat, et époque, les compositeurs français brillaient Leopold Simoneau.