Opera in Paris from the Empire to the Commune

488 Pages·2018·13.873 MB·English

by  Mark Everist

Opera in Paris from the Empire
to the Commune
Studies in the history of French nineteenth-century stage music have blossomed in the
last decade, encouraging a revision of the view of the primacy of Austro-German music
during the period and rebalancing the scholarly field away from instrumental music
(key to the Austro-German hegemony) and towards music for the stage. This change of
emphasis is having an impact on the world of opera production, with new productions of
works not heard since the nineteenth century taking their place in the modern repertory.
This awakening of enthusiasm has come at something of a price. Selling French opera
as little more than an important precursor to Verdi or Wagner has entailed a focus on
works produced exclusively for the Paris Opéra at the expense of the vast range of other
types of stage music produced in the capital: opéra comique, opérette, comédie-vaudeville
and mélodrame, for example. The first part of this book therefore seeks to reintroduce
a number of norms to the study of stage music in Paris: to re- establish contexts and
conventions that still remain obscure. The second and third parts acknowledge Paris as
an importer and exporter of opera, and its focus moves towards the music of its clos-
est neighbours, the Italian-speaking states, and of its most problematic partners, the
German-speaking states, especially the music of Weber and Wagner.
Prefaced by an introduction that develops the volume’s overriding intellectual
drivers of cultural exchange, genre and institution, this collection brings together
twelve of the author’s previously published articles and essays, fully updated for this
volume and translated into English for the first time.
Mark Everist is Professor of Music at the University of Southampton. His research
focuses on the music of Western Europe in the period 1150–1330, opera in France in
the nineteenth century, Mozart, reception theory and historiography. He is the au-
thor of Polyphonic Music in Thirteenth-Century France (1989), French Motets in the
Thirteenth Century (1994), Music Drama at the Paris Odéon, 1824–1828 (2002), Gia-
como Meyerbeer and Music Drama in Nineteenth-Century Paris (2005) and Mozart’s
Ghosts: Haunting the Halls of Musical Culture (2013) as well as the editor of three
volumes of the Magnus Liber Organi for Editions de l’Oiseau-Lyre (2001–2003). In
addition, he has published over 80 articles in peer-reviewed journals and collections
of essays. The recipient of the Solie (2010) and Slim (2011) awards of the American
Musicological Society, he was elected a fellow of the Academia Europaea in 2012.
Everist was president of the Royal Musical Association from 2011–2017 and was
elected a corresponding member of the American Musicological Society in 2014.
His monograph Discovering Medieval Song: Latin Poetry and Music in the Conduc-
tus was published with Cambridge University Press in 2018, as was The Cambridge
History of Medieval Music, co-edited with Thomas Kelly. A monograph on the re-
ception of Gluck in the nineteenth century has just been completed.

Opera in Paris from the Empire
to the Commune
Mark Everist
First published 2019
by Routledge
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© 2019 Mark Everist
The right of Mark Everist to be identified as author of this work has
been asserted by them in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the
Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
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British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British
Library
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
A catalog record has been requested for this book
ISBN: 978-1-138-06516-1 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-315-15993-5 (ebk)
Typeset in Times New Roman
by codeMantra
Contents
List of examples vii
List of figures ix
List of tables x
Acknowledgements xii
Ouverture: power, licence and technology 1
1 The music of power: Parisian opera and the politics of
genre, 1806–1864 9
2 Grand opéra – petit opéra: Parisian opera and ballet
from the Restoration to the Second Empire 53
3 Jacques Offenbach: the music of the past and the image
of the present 104
4 The operas of François-Auguste Gevaert:
the tour d’horizon 131
5 Between Opéra-Comique and Opéra-National: Scribe,
Vaëz and Boisselot c1850 165
Premier entr’acte: les ultramontains 221
6 Beethoven and Rossini: opera and concert at the end of
the Restoration 224
7 ‘Il n’y a qu’un Paris au monde, et j’y reviendrai planter
mon drapeau!’: Rossini’s second grand opéra 242
8 A transalpine comedy: L’elisir d’amore and
cultural transfer 287
9 Partners in rhyme: Alphonse Royer, Gustave Vaëz, and
foreign opera in Paris during the July Monarchy 310
vi Contents
Second entr’acte: la musique allemande 329
10 Castil-Blaze and the reception of Weber in Paris,
1824–1857 331
11 Gluck, politics and the Second Empire press 355
12 Wagner and Paris: the case of Rienzi (1869) 370
Strette: Censors and others 411
Bibliography 415
Index 439
Examples
4.1 Gevaert, Georgette, end of no. 5, Morceau d’ensemble
‘Attaquons’ 139
4.2 Gevaert, Le billet de Marguerite, extract from no. 5, act i
finale ‘Partir! Qu’ai-je entendu?’ 140
4.3 Gevaert, Le billet de Marguerite, extract from no. 8bis,
Mélodrame 142
4.4 Gevaert, Le billet de Marguerite, extract from act iii entr’acte 144
4.5 Gevaert, Les lavandières de Santarem, act i introduction,
chœur des femmes ‘Joyeuse lavandière’ 147
4.6 Gevaert, Le château trompette, no. 13bis, Musique de scène 157
4.7 Gevaert, Les lavandières de Santarem, no. 2bis, Musique de scène 158
5.1 Boisselot/Scribe, Ne touchez pas à la reine!, air, no. 6,
Larghetto ‘Toi qui séduis mon cœur’, first draft of Allegro
fieramente. F-Pn MS 4397 171
5.2 Boisselot/Scribe, Ne touchez pas à la reine!, air, no. 6,
Larghetto ‘Toi  qui séduis mon cœur’, second draft of
Allegro fieramente. F-Pn MS 4397  172
5.3 Boisselot/Scribe, Ne touchez pas à la reine!, air, no. 6,
Larghetto ‘Toi qui séduis mon cœur’, final draft of Allegro
fieramente. F-Pn MS 4397 and published score, pp. 81–82 174
5.4 Boisselot/Scribe, Ne touchez pas à la reine!, air, no. 6,
Larghetto ‘Toi qui séduis mon cœur’, Boisselot’s monstre
and Scribe’s final version. F-Pn n.a.f. 22545, fols 125v 176
5.5 Boisselot/Scribe, Ne touchez pas à la reine!, air, no. 9, Allegro
moderato ‘Ciel de feu, beau ciel des Espagnes’, bars 1–7,
original version with two alternative vocal lines. F-Pn MS 4397 178
5.6a Boisselot/Scribe, Ne touchez pas à la reine!, air, no. 9,
Allegro moderato ‘Ciel de feu, beau ciel des Espagnes’,
original setting of final four lines. F-Pn MS 4397
(transposed from A major to G major to facilitate
comparison with Example 5.6b and with original
crossings- through retained) 180
viii Examples
5.6b Boisselot/Scribe, Ne touchez pas à la reine!, air, no. 9,
Allegro moderato ‘Ciel de feu, beau ciel des Espagnes’,
definitive setting of final four lines (published version) 184
5.7 Boisselot, Mosquita la sorcière, no. 10 act ii finale,
Maestoso ‘Sa jalouse fureur’ (published version) p. 185 201
5.8 Verdi, Il proscritto (Ernani), no. 5 finale primo, bars 231–247 204
5.9 Verdi, Il proscritto (Ernani), no. 11 congiura, bars 106–109 208
5.10 Verdi, Il proscritto (Ernani), no. 11 congiura, bars 126–131 209
5.11 Boisselot, Mosquita la sorcière, no. 10 act ii finale,
Maestoso ‘Sa jalouse fureur’ [page 186, bar 5 to
page 187, bar 9] 211
6.1 Beethoven, Symphonie 6, 1: 5–16 234
6.2 Beethoven, Symphonie 6, 1: 289–300 235
6.3 Rossini, Ouverture de Guillaume Tell, 176–184 235
6.4 Rossini, Ouverture de Guillaume Tell, 209–217 236
8.1 Auber, Le philtre, no. 11: [Récit +] Duo (Guillaume,
Jolicœur) ‘De désespoir je reste anéanti’ – ‘Si l’honneur a
pour toi des charmes’, opening 307
8.2 Donizetti, L’elisir d’amore, no. 11: Scena e duetto
(Nemorino, Belcore) ‘La donna è un animale’ – ‘Venti
scudi’, opening 308
11.1 ARMIDE / DRAME HÉROIQUE / Mis en Musique /
PAR / MR LE CHEVALIER GLUCK / Représenté
pour la premiere [sic] fois, par l’Academie [sic] / Royale
de Musique, le 23 Septembre 1777 / […] / A PARIS /
AU BUREAU DU JOURNAL DE MUSIQUE, Rue
Montmartre, / vis-à-vis celle des vieux Augustins / à
l’Opéra, Et aux Adresses ordinaires de Musique. / A.P.D.R., 22 363
Figures
6.1 Salle du Conservatoire c1821 231
6.2 Salle du Conservatoire c1841 232
6.3 Orchestral layout of Société des Concerts du Conservatoire,
1828–40 (after Donna Di Grazia, ‘Rejected Traditions:
Ensemble Placement in Nineteenth-Century Paris’,
19th-Century Music 22 (1998), 196) 233
7.1 Antoine Etex, Rossini (L’illustration, 13 June 1846).
Bibliothèque nationale de France 278
7.2 THEATRE DE L’OPERA / Bustes dans le Foyer / Côté
de la Rue en commençant à gauche’ F-Po Estampes:
Salles, Opéra Le Peletier (23 February 1872). Bibliothèque
nationale de France 280
8.1 Relationships between music, libretti and source texts for
Le comte Ory and Le philtre 296