The Jardin Des Femmes As Scenic Convention in French Opera and Ballet
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THE JARDIN DES FEMMES AS SCENIC CONVENTION IN FRENCH OPERA AND BALLET by HELENA KOPCHICK SPENCER A DISSERTATION Presented to the School of Music and Dance and the Graduate School of the University of Oregon in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy March 2014 DISSERTATION APPROVAL PAGE Student: Helena Kopchick Spencer Title: The Jardin des Femmes as Scenic Convention in French Opera and Ballet This dissertation has been accepted and approved in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Doctor of Philosophy degree in the School of Music and Dance by: Marian Smith Chairperson Lori Kruckenberg Core Member Roger Mathew Grant Core Member Fabienne Moore Institutional Representative and Kimberly Andrews Espy Vice President for Research and Innovation; Dean of the Graduate School Original approval signatures are on file with the University of Oregon Graduate School. Degree awarded March 2014 ii © 2014 Helena Kopchick Spencer iii DISSERTATION ABSTRACT Helena Kopchick Spencer Doctor of Philosophy School of Music and Dance March 2014 Title: The Jardin des Femmes as Scenic Convention in French Opera and Ballet Much scholarship on French grand opera has understandably focused on the monumentality of the genre—its sweeping historical panoramas, public spectacles, and large onstage chorus. This focus is reinforced, for example, by Anselm Gerhard, who associates the chorus with the Parisian crowd in its diversity, autonomy, and even violence, and by Marian Smith, who contrasts grand opera’s magnificent urban and indoor settings with the bucolic countryside locales of ballet-pantomime. Yet this emphasis on the “grandness” of grand opera has obscured the dramaturgical significance of private gardens within French opera of the July Monarchy era. While Queen Marguerite’s garden in Act II of Meyerbeer’s Les Huguenots (1836) has long been acknowledged as a forbidden, feminine realm, the prevalence of the jardin des femmes as a scenic convention in nineteenth-century French opera remains unexplored. Using the canonic example of Les Huguenots as a starting point, this study examines additional garden scenes from Donizetti’s La Favorite (1840) and Halévy’s La Reine de Chypre (1841) to demonstrate the typical use of the garden as a scenic frame for clandestine encounters, sexual transgression, and homosocial intimacy. Two further case studies, Auber’s Le Cheval de Bronze (1835) and Adam’s Giselle (1841), illustrate the presence of the jardin des femmes convention in opera-comique and ballet-pantomime, iv respectively, thus testifying to a shared scenic vocabulary among multiple Parisian music theater genres of the 1830s and ’40s. My principal argument is that these garden settings are represented as feminine spaces – and the women of these scenes as ecomorphic beings – through a complex of textual, visual, and musical cues. Drawing on feminist critiques of the metaphoric transcoding of woman, space, and landscape, I posit that certain repeated musico-visual images encourage a mode of looking and listening that conflates admiration of idyllic garden scenery with admiration of the female body. The collusion of gender, sexuality, and nature has been analyzed by Allanbrook, Hunter, and DeNora in Mozart’s buffa operas and by Senici in nineteenth-century Italian opera, but this study is the first to argue a similar case for nineteenth-century French opera and ballet. v CURRICULUM VITAE NAME OF AUTHOR: Helena Kopchick Spencer GRADUATE AND UNDERGRADUATE SCHOOLS ATTENDED: University of Oregon, Eugene, Oregon Cleveland Institute of Music, Cleveland, Ohio Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan DEGREES AWARDED: Doctor of Philosophy, Musicology, 2014, University of Oregon Master of Music, Bassoon Performance, 2006, University of Oregon Bachelor of Music, Bassoon Performance, 2005, Cleveland Institute of Music AREAS OF SPECIAL INTEREST: Nineteenth-Century Opera and Ballet Francophone Music Criticism Marian Devotional Music in Tudor England Scandinavian Music and Theater PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE: Adjunct Instructor, Department of Music, Willamette University, 2007–present Third Bassoon/Contrabassoon, Eugene Symphony Orchestra, 2013–present Principal Bassoon, Oregon Mozart Players, 2007–present Principal Bassoon, Salem Chamber Orchestra, 2007–present Second Bassoon, Eugene Opera Orchestra, 2005–present Graduate Teaching Fellow in Musicology, University of Oregon, 2009–2013 Graduate Teaching Fellow in Bassoon, University of Oregon, 2005–2009 GRANTS, AWARDS, AND HONORS: Membership and Professional Development Grant, American Musicological Society, 2011 and 2013. Travel Grant for Annual Meeting of the Francophone Music Criticism Network at University of London in Paris, Humanities and Arts Research Centre, Royal Holloway, University of London, 2012. vi Excellence in Teaching Award (Academic/Classroom Teaching), School of Music and Dance, University of Oregon, 2012. Graduate Research Award, School of Music and Dance, University of Oregon, 2007 and 2012. Travel Grant for Annual Meeting of the American Musicological Society, Center for the Study of Women in Society, University of Oregon, 2011. Travel Grant for International Grieg Society Conference, Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 2009. Travel Grant for Sommerkurs i Bergen, Friends of Scandinavian Studies, University of Oregon, 2008. Travel Grant for International Grieg Society Conference, United States Embassy in Norway, 2007. Dean’s Award for Academic Excellence, Cleveland Institute of Music, 2005. PUBLICATIONS: Spencer, Helena Kopchick. “Sylphiden and the Danish Cultural Canon.” In La Sylphide—Paris 1832 and Beyond, edited by Marian Smith, 105–139. Alton, Hampshire: Dance Books, 2012. Kopchick, Helena. “Erik Satie.” In Musicians and Composers of the Twentieth Century, edited by Alfred Cramer, volume 4, 1275–1278. Pasadena: Salem Press, 2009. Kopchick, Helena. “Encountering the Supernatural Other in Three Musical Settings of Henrik Ibsen’s Spillemænd.” Studia Musicologica Norvegica 33 (2007): 33–41. vii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS In spring 2005, when I decided to attend the University of Oregon for a Masters degree in bassoon performance, faculty members at Case Western Reserve University were optimistic that I might yet convert to musicology. CWRU Collegium director Debra Nagy told me about Marc Vanscheeuwijck, Baroque cellist and musicologist on the University of Oregon faculty; and Stephen Hefling gave me the name of another UO musicologist: Marian Smith. That name from Professor Hefling proved to be something of a prophecy, because I never could have imagined a more tireless or invested advisor than Professor Smith. She has enthusiastically supported this dissertation project from its very earliest inklings (as a conference paper entitled “Water, Women, and Song”), generously and patiently shepherded me through episodes of writers’ block with long brainstorming sessions, and always asked the questions that pushed me toward greater clarity in my writing. For all of this and much more, I am eternally grateful. Many thanks are also due to my other committee members – Lori Kruckenberg, Roger Grant, and Fabienne Moore – whose invaluable suggestions have helped to shape the existing project, as well as presage its future directions. I am thankful to Professor Kruckenberg for our discussions of the hortus conclusus, women’s communities, and siren imagery in medieval thought. Likewise, I am deeply appreciative of Professor Moore’s expertise on the pastoral and eighteenth-century French literature, as well as Professor Grant’s insights on Enlightenment-era philosophy, theories of time, and cultural studies. A fifth, original committee member was Anne Dhu McLucas, the loss of whom is immeasurable. Special thanks to Professor Grant for joining my committee in fall 2012—the inclusion of his brilliant perspective was a singular blessing amid tragedy. viii A Graduate Research Award from the University of Oregon School of Music and Dance supported my archival research at the Bibliothèque-Musée de l’Opéra and the Département des Arts du Spectacle of the Bibliothèque Nationale in summer 2012; additional funding from the Humanities and Arts Research Centre of Royal Holloway, University of London supported my attendance at the annual meeting of the Francophone Music Criticism Network that July. Throughout my time in Paris, the librarians and staff of the Bibliothèque Nationale very graciously assisted me and patiently endured my fledgling spoken French. I am also thankful to my French tutor Robert Alminana, who co-translated the French texts that appear in this dissertation. Finally, I would like to thank my support system of family, friends, UO faculty, and fellow musicians. Steve Vacchi, Marc Vanscheeuwijck, and Margret Gries have been particularly helpful resources as I have tried to navigate a double life in musicology and performance. I am also fortunate to have many trusted colleagues and friends who have read and commented on various abstracts, papers, and chapter drafts over the past few years; among them are Jonathan Kregor, Eric Schneeman, Thérèse Hurley, members of the THEME Colloquium at the UO School of Music and Dance, and above all Andrew Pokorny. Equally valuable has been the encouragement I have received from my friends in the Francophone Music Criticism Network, especially Alicia Levin, Mia Tootill, and Virginia Whealton. Most of all, I am thankful for my endlessly supportive husband Clark Spencer, who has selflessly postponed his own degree progress by taking