The composer Ludwig Minkus represents one of music’s biggest mysteries. Who was he? Hardly anything is known about him, and yet he occupied an influential position in the theatres of the Imperial ballet in late nineteenth-century Russia. He has been recognised as a predecessor of Tchaikovsky, but as a musician is commonly held to have been so feeble as to be beneath contempt.

Yet despite the scorn heaped on him, and his consequent obscurity, Minkus is far from being forgotten. Since the early 1960s his name has slowly begun to re-surface. Two works, Don Quixote (1869) and La Bayadère (1877), have been presented in their entirety for the first time to new audiences all over the world. The musical and dramatic power of both ballets has taken people by surprise. The stories have a very real human appeal, the choreography attracts the admiration of balletomanes, and the music, with its rhythm, verve, and beauty of melody, holds attention and engages the heart wherever it is heard.

This introduction seeks to discover something more behind the blank façade of Minkus’s life and work. What do we actually know about him as a man and as an artist? Are we able to apprehend his oeuvre as a whole, and how much can we establish from the available material? What is the nature of the music he created for those few works that have survived the years, and that have come to the fore again recently to delight those who have ears to hear?

This study includes iconography from the life and times of the composer, many musical examples from his works, and a comprehensive bibliography and discography.

Daniel-François-Esprit Auber (1782–1871), the most amiable French composer of the 19th century, came to his abilities late in life. After a stalled commercial career, he studied with Cherubini. His first works were not a success, but La Bergère Châteleine (1820), written at the age of 38, established him as an operatic composer. He then met the librettist Eugène Scribe (1791–1861), with whom he developed a working partnership, one of the most successful in musical history, that lasted until Scribe’s death. After Le Maçon (1825) and La Muette de Portici (1828), Auber’s life was filled with success. In 1829 he was appointed a member of the Institut, in 1839 Director of Concerts at Court, in 1842 Director of the Conservatoire, in 1852 Musical Director of the Imperial Chapel, and in 1861 Grand Officer of the Légion d’Honneur.

Auber’s famous historical grand opera La Muette de Portici (also known by its hero’s name as Masaniello) is a key work in operatic history. Auber himself experienced four French Revolutions (1789, 1830, 1848, 1870). The latter (The Commune) hastened the end of his life. He died on 12 May 1871, at the advanced old age of 89, and in the pitiful conditions of civil strife, after a long and painful illness which worsened during the Siege of Paris. He had refused to leave the city he had always loved despite the dangers and privation, even after his house had been set on fire by the petroleurs et petroleuses. By some irony a mark had been placed against the house of the composer of Masaniello, the very voice of Romantic liberty!

Auber’s overtures were once known everywhere, a staple of the light Classical repertoire. The influence of his gracious melodies and dance rhythms on piano and instrumental music, and on the genre of Romantic comic opera, especially in Germany, was overwhelming. The operas themselves, apart from Fra Diavolo (1830), have virtually passed out of the repertoire, since Auber’s elegant and restrained art now has little appeal for the world of music, attuned as it is to the meatier substance of verismo, Wagnerian transcendentalism, and 20th-century experimentalism.

La Muette de Portici, an opera in five acts, with libretto by Eugène Scribe and Germain Delavigne, was premiered at the Académie Royale de Musique (Salle de la rue Le Peletier) on 29 February 1828. The setting is Naples in 1647, against the historical background of the revolt led by the fisherman Tommaso Aniello (Masaniello) against Spanish rule.

This work, of crucial importance for the genre of grand-opéra, or grandiose historical music drama, was one of the most successful of the 19th century, and became enveloped in a revolutionary mystique. This reputation took fire following a performance in Brussels on 25 August 1830 which sparked the uprising for Belgian independence from the Netherlands, and was further sustained by the events of 1848 when stagings of the opera caused tumult and demonstrations in several opera houses.

La Muette de Portici is the first grand-opéra with all the typical characteristics of the genre: five short acts, most of which culminate in a dramatic and decorative tableau; ballets loosely connected with the action (in acts 1 and 3); stage sensation and mass groupings, with lavish use of décor, costumes and machinery (the wedding procession, the busy marketplace and popular uprising, the eruption of Vesuvius), characteristic situations and their appropriate type of aria. There is a group of important leading roles, powerful and functional choruses, and a much expanded reliance on the orchestra.

The music responds to, and reflects, the vivid and imposing scenic effects (based on historical and pictorial research by the great stage designers and painters Pierre-Luc-Charles Cicéri and Louis-Jacques-Mandé Daguerre). The music is also remarkable for its melodic abundance, the excitement of its ensembles, the verve of its dances, and the power and variety of the choruses.

The contrast between the two heroines—Fenella, a mute peasant who expresses herself in gesture and dance in free-form balletic sequence; and Elvire, a glamorous princess who uses the full range of Italianate vocal genres and styles—makes a series of innate dramatic and symbolic points about power and powerlessness, authenticity of emotion, and the nature of commitment. The two tenor roles have a similarly strong, if less vivid, contrast. The prince, Alphonse, comes across as weak and vacillating, whereas Masaniello, the fisherman, is a natural leader, a man among men, whose devotion to his people, to freedom, as well as to his pathetic broken sister, mark him out as hero.

The roles were created by Adolphe Nourrit (Masaniello); Alexis Dupont (Alphonse); Laure Cinti-Damoreau (Elvire); Henri-Bernard Dabadie (Pietro) and Prévot (Borella); with Pouilley, Jean-Etienne-Auguste Massol, Ferdinand Prévot and Mlle Lorotte. The dancer Lise Noblet realized the role of Fenella. The opera was one of the greatest successes at the Paris Opéra, the 100th performance taking place on the 23 April 1840, the 500th on 14 June 1880. It was also successful in other countries, especially Germany. The work was translated into German, Hungarian, English, Italian, Czech, Dutch, Danish, Polish, Norwegian, Swedish, Croatian and Russian.

This edition reproduces the vocal score published by E. Troupenas (c. 1828).

Daniel-François-Esprit Auber (1782–1871) was long considered one of the most typically French, as well as one of the most successful, opera composers of the nineteenth century. Although musically gifted, he initially chose commerce as a career, but soon realized that his future lay in music. He studied under Cherubini, and it was not long before his opéra-comique La Bergère Châteleine (1820), written at the age of 38, established him as an operatic composer. Perhaps the greatest turning point in Auber’s life was his meeting with the librettist Eugène Scribe (1791–1861), with whom he developed a long and illustrious working partnership that only ended with Scribe’s death. Success followed success; works such as Le Maçon (1825) and La Muette de Portici (1828) brought Auber public fame and official recognition. In 1829 he was appointed a member of the Institut, in 1839 Director of Concerts at Court, in 1842 Director of the Conservatoire, in 1852 Musical Director of the Imperial Chapel, and in 1861 Grand Officer of the Légion d’Honneur. Auber seems to have been fated to live in revolutionary times; during his long life no less than four revolutions took place in France (1789, 1830, 1848, 1870). He died on 12 May 1871 as a result of a long illness aggravated by the privations and dangers of the Siege of Paris.

Auber’s overtures were once instantly recognizable, favourites of the light Classical repertoire. His gracious melodies and dance rhythms had a huge influence, both on piano and instrumental music, and on the genre of Romantic comic opera, especially in Germany. Musical tastes and fashions have changed, and contemporary audiences are more accustomed to the heavier fare of verismo, high Wagnerian ideology, and twentieth-century experimentalism. The operas themselves, apart from Fra Diavolo (1830), are seldom performed, yet Auber’s elegant, delicate and restrained art remains as appealing to the discerning listener as ever it was.

Les Diamants de la couronne (1841) is a piece of really refined, almost surreal, fantasy. In many respects, it represents something of a distillation of the art of Scribe and Auber, a synthesis in some ways of the more earthy comedy of Fra Diavolo and the almost spiritual sophistication of Le Domino noir. Both plot and music carry the natural instincts of both creators to their extreme attainment. Berlioz singled out its musical beauty in his critique of the work. The narrative, with its story of royal counterfeiting, romance fulfilment and social restitution, combines several recurrent motifs that preoccupied Scribe, with the exotic Iberian setting opening up the Mediterranean sphere so stimulating to the artistic imagination of both librettist and composer. Catarina, heiress to the crown of Portugal, has a copy of the crown jewels made so that she can sell off the originals to pay off the national debt. The young queen's ploy works, the nation is saved. The music is very brilliant for the principal character who, by turns queen, brigand, and prima donna, sings variations of the greatest virtuosity and in the best of vocal styles.

This edition reproduces the vocal score published in London by Boosey and Co. (c. 1880), the Royal Edition, edited by Arthur Sullivan and Josiah Pittman (with Italian and English words).

Cesare Pugni (1802–70) made his debut as a composer at La Scala in 1826 with the opera Elerz e Zulmida. In the 1840s he worked closely with the choreographer Jules Perrot (1810–92) in Paris and in London, creating some of the most renowned ballets of the 19th century, a number of which still find their place in some modern repertories. Pugni later followed Perrot to St Petersburg, and became official composer of the Imperial Russian theatres. Some of his earlier ballets were transferred to St Petersburg, and he also composed many new works for that city.

Along with Perrot, Pugni also worked with Arthur Saint-Léon (1821–70), Paolo Taglioni (1808–84), Marius Petipa (1818–1910), and some of the greatest dancers of the century. His most famous collaboration, with Marius Petipa, lasted until the composer’s death on 26 January 1870. Pugni was extremely prolific, composing more than 300 ballets, a dozen operas, over 40 masses, other polyphonic works and a few symphonies. He was very popular with the public, who were delighted by his direct uncomplicated style, with its attractive melodies and infectious rhythms.

Ondine, choreographed and danced by Perrot and Fanny Cerrito, was premiered at Her Majesty’s Theatre in 1845. It is a variant on the famous water nymph story Undine by Friedrich de la Motte Fouqué. The ballet became famous for the conception of the generic scene type of the Pas de l’Ombre, where the nymph sees her own shadow in the moonlight for the first time and tries to catch it. The ballet was praised for its magnificent décor and for Pugni’s score: “. . . the musical accompaniment which describes the rise and fall of the waves is eminently characteristic and beautiful: the very ripple of the flow, and the rushing sound of the ebb over the pebbly strand, are heard and fully satisfy the ear”.

Esmeralda, choreographed by Perrot and premiered with Perrot, Carlotta Grisi and Saint-Léon in the principal roles, was first performed at Her Majesty’s Theatre in London in 1844. The ballet is based on the story of Victor Hugo’s Notre-Dame de Paris. It was reasonably successful, and Grisi was pronounced the perfect personification of the gypsy girl Esmeralda. The ballet later became immensely popular in Russia; Fanny Elssler enjoyed one of her biggest triumphs in the title role. Pugni’s music successfully evokes an atmosphere of Medieval Paris, the changing moods of the story, and the delicate vulnerability of the heroine. For Petipa’s production of 1888, Riccardo Drigo was asked to compose several new numbers, including the Esmeralda Pas de Deux and the Diana and Acteon Pas de Deux, which became very popular in their own right.

The Pas de quatre was a divertissement choreographed by Perrot for four of the leading ballerinas of the time, and premiered at Her Majesty’s Theatre in 1845. Created by Marie Taglioni, Carlotta Grisi, Fanny Cerrito and Lucile Grahn, this plotless ballet epitomizes the Romantic cult of the ballerina. Pugni’s variations were exquisitely tailored to the character and particular skills of each of the illustrious protagonists. There were four performances of the Pas de quatre with the original dancers, and there have been many revivals, starting in 1847 (when the part created by Grahn was given to Carolina Rosati), and continuing through to later reconstructions in the 20th century.

Catarina, ou La Fille du bandit was choreographed by Perrot, with the principal roles created by Lucile Grahn, Perrot and Louis Gosselin. It was first performed at Her Majesty’s Theatre in 1846. The plot revolves around the love of the painter Salvator Rosa for Catarina, a bandit chief. The ballet grew in popularity due to the fascination and humanity of the unconventional characters from an original story based on the artist’s life, and the incomparable elegance of its mass movements. Founded on the contrast between feminine grace and military precision, this work was one of the greatest triumphs of both Lucile Grahn and Fanny Elssler.

Théolinda, ou Le Lutin de la vallée, an opera-ballet in 2 acts and 3 scenes, with choreography by Arthur Saint-Léon, and music by Eugène Gautier, was first performed in Paris at the Théâtre Lyrique in 1853. Later Saint-Léon reworked the piece as Théolinda l’Orpheline for the Bolshoi Theatre of Moscow in 1862, with the score arranged by Pugni. Saint-Léon chose the new young star Marfa Muravieva to create the title role. The work was revived in 1865 with Praskovia Lebedeva, again with Lebedeva in 1866, and once more, in 1870, this time with Ekaterina Vazem. Pugni’s adaptation of the music became popular in Russia, and was published in Saint-Petersburg by Stellowsky.

Alexander Konstantinovich Glazunov (1865–1936), the Russian composer, is principally associated with his first ballet Raymonda, the apex of his cooperation with the great choreographer Marius Petipa, then in the last years of his illustrious career. Raymonda is still performed in Russia and intermittently in the West. Glazunov, a precocious musical talent from his childhood, was regarded as the inheritor of the Russian nationalist ideals. However, he soon turned to absolute forms of music, rather than the thematically inspired tone paintings so typical of the Mighty Handful. His symphonic compositions are nonetheless full of Russian folk allusion. His emotional world seems to have been centred in the atmosphere of the classical Russian ballet. The movements in his abstract orchestral scores seem to reflect a glamorous, glittering world. He was the composer of four masterful dance compositions: Scènes de Ballet, Op. 52 (1894), Raymonda, Op. 57 (1898), Les Ruses d’Amour, Op. 61 (1900), and The Seasons, Op. 67 (1900). All became major works in the sunset of the Imperial Ballet, and remain landmarks in the history of theatre music for the dance. Glazunov appears to have been a warm and genial man, a firm friend and modest about his considerable accomplishments. As a teacher he in turn exercised considerable influence on the younger generation through his composition classes at the St Petersburg Conservatory, where he also became director. His life was outwardly uneventful, but single-minded in pursuit of his musical ideals. He was full of honours when he died in Paris on 21 March 1936.

The suite Scènes de Ballet, Opus 52 in 8 movements, was written in 1894, and published the following year, dedicated to the orchestra of the Russian Opera, St Petersburg. It was first performed at a concert of the Imperial Music Society in 1895, with the composer conducting from the manuscript score. Each section of this work is structured with great confidence, developed with a magisterial certainty, and defined in its own ideal musical character (Introduction, Marionnettes, Mazurka, Scherzo, Pas d’action, Danse orientale, Valse, Polonaise), and shows the composer’s instinctive feel for the dance and its various genres.

In Raymonda, a romance tale of the Crusades, Glazunov provided a very considerable ballet score, conceived on the broadest scale for an extended scenario. Some of the scenes, and some of the melodies and tone colours of this ballet pay homage to the Tchaikovskian tradition. The story serves as the pretext for a series of divertissements, almost too profuse, intended to show off the virtuosity and special gifts of the famous soloists. Glazunov was inspired to compose agreeable music, always easy to listen to, sometimes rather bland in its melodic facility, but always showing the composer’s great mastery of form, harmony and orchestration. It misses the nobility of inner expressiveness and melodic urgency inherent in Tchaikovsky’s music. The act 2 finale especially achieves elegance of form and harmonic audacity, and reveals a firm contrapuntal technique. This work has always been able to stimulate the acting abilities of the great ballerinas. In Russia, where it is still danced, there was a revitalizing revival and production in 1900 directed by the choreographer Gorsky at the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow. After the October Revolution it was often staged, both at the Kirov in Leningrad and at the Bolshoi.

The Seasons has no story as such, and unfolds in four scenes as an evocation of the yearly phases of the natural world. Each is represented by a number of episodes, some amorous, others idyllic, but all dominated by the natural cycle of winter sleep, spring awakening, summer blossoming, and autumn harvest, moving towards sleep again. This was Glazunov’s third ballet, the most important and successful of his works for the dance. As a pupil of Rimky-Korsakov, and heir to the Mighty Handful, he was by then the author of a very considerable body of compositions. The Seasons belongs to the pre-Diaghilev tradition of Russian ballet that found its culmination in Tchaikovsky’s three masterpieces in the genre. Glazunov shared something of Tchaikovsky’s passion for clarity and elegance, and an insistence on the primacy of melody. The fourth scene (Autumn) is best known for its fervent and rhapsodic bacchanale, a display of orchestral pyro-technics. The music is inventive, fresh, attractive, and beautifully scored throughout.

Writing in 1891, the critic Eduard Hanslick observed: "There is no need to found Meyerbeer societies, or to build a special Meyerbeer theater. All the public are his admirers, and the whole of Europe his Bayreuth." How things were to change in the twentieth century. Many opera lovers today have never heard of Meyerbeer. His life and work have been largely forgotten. There is little knowledge about his operas, let alone a perception of his operatic oeuvre as an integral artistic sequence. This book endeavors to redress some of this ignorance. It offers a presentation and reading of his stage works, the complete Meyerbeer operas, considered chronologically in terms of the unfolding of the composer's life and artistic concerns.

Cesare Pugni (1802–70) made his debut as a composer at La Scala in 1826 with the opera Elerz e Zulmida. In the 1840s he worked closely with the choreographer Jules Perrot (1810–92) in Paris and in London, creating some of the most renowned ballets of the 19th century, a number of which still find their place in some modern repertories. Pugni later followed Perrot to St Petersburg, and became official composer of the Imperial Russian theatres. Some of his earlier ballets were transferred to St Petersburg, and he also composed many new ballets for that city. Along with Perrot, Pugni also worked with Arthur Saint-Leon (1821–70), Paolo Taglioni (1808–84), Marius Petipa (1818–1910), and some of the greatest dancers of the century. His most famous collaboration, with Marius Petipa, lasted until his death on 26 January 1870.

Pugni was extremely prolific, composing more than 300 ballets, a dozen operas, over 40 masses, other polyphonic works and a few symphonies. He was very popular with the public, who were delighted by his direct uncomplicated style, with its attractive melodies and infectious rhythms. Esmeralda, choreographed by Perrot and premiered with Perrot, Carlotta Grisi and Saint-Leon in the principal roles, was first performed at Her Majesty’s Theatre in London in 1844. The ballet is based on the story of Victor Hugo’s Notre-Dame de Paris (1831). It was reasonably successful, and Grisi was pronounced the perfect personification of the gypsy girl Esmeralda. The ballet later became immensely popular in Russia; Fanny Elssler enjoyed one of her biggest triumphs in the title role. Pugni’s music successfully evokes an atmosphere of Medieval Paris, the changing moods of the story, and the delicate vulnerability of the heroine. For Petipa’s production of 1888, Riccardo Drigo was asked to compose several new numbers, including the Esmeralda Pas de Deux and the Diana and Acteon Pas de Deux, which became very popular in their own right.

Arthur Saint-Léon (1821–1870) had married the famous dancer Fanny Cerrito (1817–1909) in 1845. They were to be separated five years later and divorced in 1851, but in the meantime worked well together. Saint-Léon was not only a choreographer and a dancer, but also a violinist, a virtuoso in the tradition of Paganini. In Le Violon du diable he devised the role of the violinist Urbain for himself. The ballet was a revival and elaboration of an earlier version called Tartini il violinista (Venice, La Fenice on 29 February 1848). Urbain, a young violinist, is deeply in love with the beautiful Hélène de Vardeck, but she prefers her suitor Saint-Ybars. The sinister Doctor Matheus offers Urbain the power to play his violin so irresistibly as to win the heart of his beloved. At the Paris première on 19 January1849, subject and choreography were attributed exclusively to Saint-Léon, and the music exclusively to Pugni. The ballet was well received. The music in particular was praised. The dancing of Saint-Léon and Cerrito was also deeply admired: “In the pas de deux with her husband, all Cerrito’s gestures were of the greatest tenderness. It would be difficult to find more grace, freshness, lightness, or elevation”.

Giacomo Meyerbeer remains an enigma. Until the First World War he was one of the most famous of all composers. this Reader hopes to reflect something of the immense fame, prestige and love in which this composer was once held, the voices of doubt and dismissal that began to be heard even in his lifetime, and the enduring witness to his fame and worth evinced by those who have continued to believe in him in the face of the encroaching collective disparagement. Since the centenary of his death in 1964, there has been growing rediscovery of his life and re-evaluation of his art. While the revival of his work is not universal, at least a slow but steady process of recovery and exploration has begun.

The forty contributions chosen for this Reader follow a chronological course, from the days of Meyerbeer’s international acclaim after the premieres of his first two French operas, through the critical discussion of his art that began to take place during the mid-years of the nineteenth century, to the growing hostility induced by the advent of Wagner and his ideological following. The line of enquiry then leads into the dark days after the First World War when critical hostility was at its peak, on to the more reflective mood emerging during the 1950s, to the period of reassessment heralded by the centenary of his death in 1964. Finally, it surveys the critical rediscovery that was initiated by the bicentenary of his birth in 1991, a process that is still developing apace.

The Reader also presents a series of portraits of the composer, and some images from his operas, an icongraphical commentary running parallel to the texts.

Excelsior, an extraordinary spectacular ballet in 6 parts and 11 scenes by Luigi Manzotti, with music by Romualdo Marenco, was premiered on 11 January 1881 at La Scala Milan. This unique and remarkable allegorical work depicts the rise of human civilization, and the stormy progress of technical development. This scenario is envisioned as an embittered struggle between the Spirits of Light and Darkness, and their more human personifications as Civilization (or Progress) and Obscurantism. The invention of the steam ship, the iron bridge, electricity, telegraphy, the building of the Suez Canal and the Mont Cenis Tunnel see the Spirit of Darkness admitting defeat. A Grand Festival of the nations of the world in harmony is celebrated with an apotheosis of light and peace.

The ballet enjoyed immense popularity and was constantly revived all over Europe. After its Vienna premiere in 1885, it remained in the repertory for 29 years, receiving 329 performances. Modern revivals have been by Ugo dell’Ara for the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino in 1967, at La Scala di Milano in 1974, the Spoleto Festival of Two Worlds in 1990, and at the Teatro Degli Arcimboldi Milano in 2002.

Sport premiered at La Scala, Milan on 10 February 1897. This was the third and last of Manzotti’s grand positivist trilogy which started with, and found its apotheosis in, Excelsior. As modern and spectacular as the other two, Sport was intended as a celebration of every kind of athletic activity, especially in the enthusiastic aftermath of the first modern Olympic Games in Athens on 11 April 1896. Although the scenario concerned the eternal triangle, it was only an excuse for displays of skill by soloists and stupendous ensembles for the corps de ballet, whose costumes were very daring for that period. Sport has been seen as the ancestor of the precision manoeuvres of the Hoffmann Girls, and even as an influence on Fokine’s geometric groupings and on the styles of Golejzovsky, Nijinska, Balanchine and Lifar. The popularity of the work was enormous (46 performances in the first season), and was equally successful when revived in 1905 and 1906 under the direction of Achille Copini.

Romualdo Marenco (1841–1907) was involved with music from an early age, and began his professional life as violinist and second bassoonist at the Teatro Andea Doria in Genoa. His career as a composer was also launched at this theatre with the music for the ballet Lo sbarco di Garibaldi a Marsala. For a while he became principal violinist in various orchestras before being appointed deputy concert leader and director of ballet music at La Scala Milan, a position he held for seven seasons. Marenco worked with dance masters like Ferdinando and Giovanni Pratesi. But most significantly it was during this period that he met the famous choreographer Luigi Manzotti. He began a musical collaboration with Manzotti that was to bring them both great fame.

Luigi Manzotti (1835–1905) was very successful in Rome as a mime artist, and choreographed his first ballet in 1858 (Le Morte di Masaniello). Even in his early works his special gifts for spectacular effects became apparent, as in Cleopatra and Pietro Micca. He went to Milan in 1872, where he found his true metier in collaboration with Romualdo Marenco. Manzotti surpassed his Roman successes, first with Sieba, ossia La spada di Wodan (Turin 1878), but most famously with the positivist trilogy Excelsior (Milan 1881), Amor (Milan 1886) and Sport (Milan 1897).

Manzotti was the master of the ballo grande which used historical and allegorical subjects treated with great seriousness for their deeper social and symbolic significance, and employing huge casts and elaborate mise en scène to create an overwhelming spectacle. His ballets were devised as a series of related episodes expressed in mime with simple but effectively devised large ensembles by dancers, and processions with trained supernumeraries.

Marenco’s music has been dismissed as a medley of polkas and military band music, yet it was spread all over the world by the success of Excelsior: always carefully moulded to the choreographic action, it is well-written, with melodic verve, formal invention, and an overwhelming sense of rhythmic dynamism. The music is fast-moving and vivacious, rarely sentimental, and often induces a torrential sense of exhilaration.

The enduring success of Excelsior, the only full-length Italian ballet to survive from the 19th century, is a tribute to Manzotti’s artistic vision and Marenco’s musical imagination.

Cesare Pugni was born in Genoa on 31 May 1802, and studied in Milan from 1815 to 1822, with Antonio Rollo and Bonifazio Asioli. He became a cymbalist in the theatre orchestra, and on the death of Vincenzo Lavigna, was appointed musical director. He later moved to Paris where he became director of the Paganini Institute and met the great choreographers of the time. He started an artistic collaboration that was to prove one of the most productive in the history of ballet—working closely with Jules Perrot (1810–1892), first in Paris, then in London. Here Pugni presented some of the most renowned ballets of the 19th century, such as Esmeralda (1844) and the Pas de Quatre (1845), which still find their place in some modern repertories. He also worked with Arthur Saint-Léon (1821–1870), Paolo Taglioni (1808–1884), Marius Petipa (1818–1910), and some of the greatest dancers of the century. Pugni followed Perrot to Russia and became official composer of the Imperial theatres in St Petersburg where he composed new ballets, notably Doch’ Faraona (Pharaoh’s Daughter) (1862) and Koniok Gorbunok (The Little Humpbacked Horse) (1862). His most famous collaboration, with Marius Petipa, dominated these years, lasting until the composer’s death on 26 January 1870. Pugni is remarkable for his enormous output of some 300 ballets (either original compositions or in arrangements).

Arthur Saint-Leon, famous for Coppélia with Leo Delibes (1870), created The Little Humpbacked Horse to the music of Cesare Pugni for the Imperial Ballet (today the Maryinsky Ballet). The story of Koniok Gorbunok is based on the popular fairy-tale by Petr Yershov (1834), and tells of the spectacular deeds of Ivanushka with the help of the magical Little Humpbacked Horse. The scenario is notable for its humour as well as its fantasy. The ballet is of particular interest as being the first to be based on themes from Russian folklore, a particular interest of Saint-Léon, who chose the subject and the source, and devised the scenario himself. The first performance was on 13 December 1864 at the Imperial Bolshoi Kamenny Theatre in St. Petersburg. The Emperor Alexander II attended the première, a great and enduring success. Marius Petipa revived the ballet in 1895 as The Tsar-Maiden for the dancer Pierina Legnani. The work lived on for many years in the repertory of the Imperial Ballet (given in St Petersburg over 200 times), a success continued in Soviet times at the Kirov Ballet, and also the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow in a version by Alexander Gorsky (1901).

Alexander Radunsky choreographed his own version of this ballet to a score by Rodion Shchedrin for the Bolshoi Ballet in 1960, a version of which was filmed with Maya Plisetskaya as the Tsar-Maiden and Vladimir Vasiliev as Ivanushka. In 2009 Alexei Ratmansky choreographed a new version for the Maryinsky Ballet, also using Shchedrin’s score. A reconstruction of Saint-Leon’s original was filmed in 1989 for Russian television with graduates from the Vaganova Academy of Russian Ballet in the lead roles. The film included narrated sections and illustrations from a popular 1964 Russian edition of Yershov’s book.

Daniel-François-Esprit Auber (1782–1871) was long considered one of the most typically French as well as one of the most successful of the opera composers of the 19th century. Although musically gifted, he initially chose commerce as a career, but soon realized that his future lay in music. He studied under Cherubini, and it was not long before his opéra-comique La Bergère Châteleine (1820), written at the age of 38, established him as an operatic composer. Perhaps the greatest turning point in Auber’s life was his meeting with the librettist Eugène Scribe (1791–1861), with whom he developed a long and illustrious working partnership that only ended with Scribe’s death. Success followed success; works such as Le Maçon (1825) and La Muette de Portici (1828) brought Auber public fame and official recognition. In 1829 he was appointed a member of the Institut, in 1839 Director of Concerts at Court, in 1842 Director of the Conservatoire, in 1852 Musical Director of the Imperial Chapel, and in 1861 Grand Officer of the Légion d’Honneur.

Auber seems to have been fated to live in revolutionary times; during his long life no less than four revolutions took place in France (1789, 1830, 1848, 1870). Auber’s famous historical grand opera La Muette de Portici (also known by its hero’s name as Masaniello) is perhaps unsurprisingly based on revolution, depicting the 1647 Neapolitan uprising against Spanish rule. It is a key work in operatic history, and has a revolutionary history itself: it was a performance of this work in Brussels in 1830 that helped spark the revolution that led to the separation of Belgium from Holland. It was a revolution that hastened Auber’s death at the old age of 89. He died on 12 May 1871 as a result of a long illness aggravated by the privations and dangers of the Siege of Paris. He had refused to leave the city he had always loved, even after his house had been set on fire by the petroleurs et petroleuses. In a twist of fate, a mark had been placed on the house of the composer of Masaniello, the very voice of Romantic liberty!

Auber’s overtures were once instantly recognizable, favourites of the light Classical repertoire. His gracious melodies and dance rhythms had a huge influence, both on piano and instrumental music, and on the genre of Romantic comic opera, especially in Germany. Musical tastes and fashions have changed, and contemporary audiences are more accustomed to the heavier fare of verismo, Wagnerian transcendentalism, and twentieth-century experimentalism. The operas themselves, apart from Fra Diavolo (1830), are seldom performed, yet Auber’s elegant, delicate and restrained art remains as appealing to the discerning listener as ever it was.

Le Premier Jour de bonheur, an opéra-comique in three acts, was first performed at the Opéra-Comique (Deuxième Salle Favart) on 15 February 1868. It was the 86-year-old Auber’s second-last opera. Eugène Scribe had died in 1861, and Auber chose Adolphe-Philippe Dennery (actually Adolphe Philippe) and Eugène Cormon (Pierre-Etienne Piestre) as his collaborators for his last two operas. The subject of Le Premier Jour de bonheur was borrowed from a comedy by Souques called Le Chevalier de Canolle given at the Odéon on 17 May 1816.

For Gaston de Mailleprés, an officer serving in the French army during the colonial wars with Britain, every happy event is marred by some misfortune. He has fallen in love, but with an unknown woman whom he saw twice in London before the wars, as her carriage went by. An English girl, Hélène, and her craven fiancée Sir John Littlepool arrive, having been apprehended as spies while on their way to the English garrison at Madras. Gaston recognizes in Hélène his mysterious lady; she is in fact the daughter of the governor of Madras. Gaston releases Hélène, but keeps Littlepool as a hostage. In act 2 Gaston comes to Madras under a flag of truce to see Hélène, but is taken prisoner, and condemned to be shot the next day in reprisal for Sir John’s predicament. Hélène takes pity on him and confesses her love for him. Gaston’s joy at this helps him to forget his despair over his imminent fate. In the last act the impressionable Sir John, released from captivity, relinquishes all claims to Hélène, now believing that Hélène has chosen Gaston simply to save his life, and is reconciled to their union. Gaston’s first day of happiness has at last arrived.

The libretto was constructed with skill, but the givens of the situation lack enough power and simplicity to sustain interest. The score contains lovely pieces. The overture presents an overall contrast between the Indian elements of the story (the graceful Ballad of the Djinns) and the French colonial ones (a bellicose march full of military swagger and dance themes from the act 2 ball).

Le Premier Jour de bonheur was the only significant work of the last decade of Auber’s life, and indeed his last great success. The cast was very accomplished, consisting of: Joseph-Amédée-Victor Capoul (Gaston de Mailleprés); Marie Cabel (Hélène); Charles-Louis Sainte-Foy (Littlepool); Mlle Marie-Rose (Djelma); Léon Melchissédec (De Mailly, a French officer); Victor Prilleux (Bergerac, a French officer); and Bernard (the governor of Madras). Between 1867–70 there were 167 performances in Paris. The work was given in German, Italian and Hungarian.

The famous operetta composer Franz von Suppé (1819-1895) was of Italian and Belgian descent, and was born a subject of the Habsburg Empire in Dalmatia. His musical gift was evident from an early age, but he first studied philosophy in Padua and then law in Vienna, before he later enrolled in the Vienna Conservatory under Sechter and Seyfried. He became a conductor in theatres at Pressburg and Baden, then in Vienna at the Theater an der Wien (until 1862), at the Carl Theater (until 1865), and subsequently at the Leopoldstadt Theater. During the same time, he wrote light operas and other types of theatre music. After 1860, he consciously imitated the popular style of the Parisian operetta, and achieved great success with Die schöne Galathee (1865), effectively adapting the spoof of Antiquity that had brought Offenbach such fame (in Orphée aux enfers and La Belle Hélène).

Suppé established the Viennese operetta as a genre in its own right, full of charm and gaiety, using a brisker style with vigorous popular rhythms. He wrote some 30 operettas, and 180 stage works in all. Almost all of them were produced in Vienna, with a few other premières in Prague, Berlin and Hamburg.

Suppé’s sense of boldly defined melody, impulsive rhythmic verve and brilliant orchestral technique found preeminent expression in his overtures, many of which became celebrated all over the world. Poet and Peasant; Light Cavalry; Pique Dame; Morning, Noon and Night in Vienna; and Boccaccio still retain a place in the light repertory of the concert hall. His most enduringly famous operetta remains Boccaccio (1879), based on episodes from the life of the famous medieval Italian writer. Fatinitza (1876), using a libretto adapted from Eugène Scribe, also became extremely popular.

This collection brings together many of the celebrated overtures to operettas and plays that became Suppé’s hallmark as a composer. Also included are some of the shorter orchestral introductions that the composer provided for some of his later stage works (such as Der Teufel auf Erden, Fatinitza, Donna Juanita, Die Afrikareise, Die Jagd nach dem Glück, and Des Matrosen Heimkehr).

Aloysius Ludwig Minkus (1826–1917), famous for his ballets Don Quixote (1869) and La Bayadère (1877), was born in Bohemia, and grew up in the dance capital Vienna. He hoped to establish a reputation as a violinist and composer, and by 1853 had emigrated to St Petersburg where he became the conductor and solo violinist of the private orchestra of Prince Nikolai Yusupov. In 1861 he was appointed violin soloist and, a year later, conductor of the Moscow Bolshoi Orchestra. He began a happy collaboration with the great French choreographer Arthur Saint-Léon (1821–1870), who was a real friend and inspiration to Minkus, and more than anyone else, helped to launch his career as a theatrical composer, producing five works in association with him in St Petersburg and Paris.

Minkus’s first ballet, the three-act Plamya lyubvi, ili Salamandra (The Flame of Love, or the Salamander, also called Fiammetta), was given its premiere on 13 February 1864 at the Bolshoi Kamenny Theater in St Petersburg (with Marfa Muravyeva in the leading role). The scenario and the choreography were by Saint-Léon, the most important dance master of the day in both Paris and Russia. Saint-Léon’s influence secured this work production in the French capital, and it was perhaps for this occasion that Minkus accompanied Saint-Léon to Paris to mount the work at the Académie Royale de Musique. Reduced to two acts, and re-christened Néméa, ou l’Amour vengé (with a scenario adapted by Henri Meilhac & Ludovic Halévy), the ballet was performed at the Paris Opéra on 11 July 1864, with considerable success (again with Marfa Muravyeva, and with Eugénie Fiocre as Cupid). It remained in the repertoire for seven years, attaining 53 performances by 1871. Théophile Gautier remarked on the atmospheric quality of Minkus’s music, its “haunting, dreamy quality.” Roqueplan singled out Saint-Léon's choreography for its “imagination and originality, his ability to handle masses.” Some of the Airs de Ballet were almost immediately published by Henri Hegel (1865), and are reproduced here.

By now Minkus was becoming known internationally. So when five years later the Paris Opéra ordered a new grand ballet from Saint-Léon to a libretto by Charles Nuitter, Saint-Léon involved Minkus in the project, securing for him a hand in the composition of the first and fourth scenes of this new work, La Source. The other two scenes were entrusted to the young Léo Delibes, thirty at the time, who had drawn favourable attention to himself in the preparation of the ballet music for the première of Meyerbeer’s posthumous L’Africaine in 1865. The first performance of La Source on 12 November 1866 was great success for Delibes, whose bold and colourful composition was praised at the expense of Minkus’s subtler contribution. Saint-Léon immediately began planning another work with Nuitter and Delibes, and one which would crown the young French’s composer’s success with triumph, Coppélia.

Saint-Léon nevertheless continued to work with Minkus, despite his busy engagements in Paris. The choreographer’s greatest ballet for Russia was his work with Cesare Pugni, Koniok-Gorbunok (The Little Humpbacked Horse) (1864), based on a Russian fairytale. He now tapped into the same folk material in a new work with Minkus, Zolotaya rybka (The Golden Fish), based on Alexander Pushkin’s Legend of the fisher and the little fish. On 20 November 1866, for the celebration of the Tsarevitch’s wedding, Saint-Léon oversaw the production of a one-act version of this new ballet, Le Poisson doré, at the Bolshoi Kamenny Theater in St Petersburg. The work was then developed as a three-act ballet for the same theater a year later (8 October 1867). Minkus’s music was very well received. As with La Source, it was carefully adapted in form and mood to the scenario, remarkable for its panache and beautiful writing for solo instruments (violin, flute, cello, cornet), and for reflecting the nature of the fairytale scenario in the appropriation of national folk styles (Polish, Kazak, Cossack). The score was considered worthy of full publication in piano reduction by the St Petersburg house of Stellowsky (c. 1870), and is reproduced here. The last collaboration between Minkus and Saint-Léon followed two years after that, a partial arrangement of La Source, given in St Petersburg as Liliya (Le Lys) in 1869.

ARSC Awards for Excellence, 2014: Best Historical Research in Classical Music (Certificate of Merit).

This book presents a discography of recordings made from the works of Giacomo Meyerbeer (1791–1864) – from the inception of recording techniques in 1889 until the dominance of the long-playing record in 1955. It is a testimony to the once-universal fame of the composer and the esteem in which in his works were held. During that period some nearly 2000 artists (at least 1065 of them singers) recorded arias and ensembles from all six of the French operas of Meyerbeer's maturity (Robert le Diable, Les Huguenots, Le Prophète, L'Étoile du Nord, Dinorah, L'Africaine), as well as selections from other works, orchestral pieces, and a variety of arrangements for band and other instruments. Covering more than 150 different pieces, the whole of this recorded legacy makes Meyerbeer one of the most popular classical composers of any age.

Many of the legendary names of this Golden Age of Song were devoted to Meyerbeer's compositions (like Aumonier, Amato, Gilion, Rethberg, Lazzari, Barrientos, Delmas, Slezak, Belhomme, Branzell, Lehmann, Hempel, Escalais, Ancona, De Lucia, De Angelis, De Cisneros, Tamagno, Rothier, Pertile, Ruffo, Siems, Kurz, Caruso, Chaliapin). This discography is integral to the history of opera, the nature of lyric recording, and the story of song and vocal technique. It is divided into chapters listing the works recorded, the singers, orchestras, bands and other musicians who recorded pieces from the operas (with details of the labels, places, dates, matrix and record numbers), as well as providing anthologies of modern transfers of the some of the old 78 records to modern media (LP, CD, MP3), and also listing a bibliography devoted to vintage records and singers from the early days of recording.

Daniel-François-Esprit Auber (1782–1871), the most amiable French composer of the 19th century, came to his abilities late in life. After a stalled commercial career, he studied with Cherubini. His first works were not a success, but La Bergère Châteleine (1820), written at the age of 38, established him as an operatic composer. He then met the librettist Eugène Scribe (1791–1861), with whom he developed a working partnership, one of the most successful in musical history, that lasted until Scribe’s death. After Le Maçon (1825) and La Muette de Portici (1828), Auber’s life was filled with success. In 1829 he was appointed a member of the Institut, in 1839 Director of Concerts at Court, in 1842 Director of the Conservatoire, in 1852 Musical Director of the Imperial Chapel, and in 1861 Grand Officer of the Légion d’Honneur.

Auber’s famous historical grand opera La Muette de Portici (also known by its hero’s name as Masaniello) is a key work in operatic history, and helped to inspire the 1830 revolution in Brussels that led to the separation of Belgium from Holland. Auber himself experienced four French Revolutions (1789, 1830, 1848, 1870). The latter (the Commune) hastened the end of his life. He died on 12 May 1871, at the advanced old age of 89, and in the pitiful conditions of civil strife, after a long and painful illness which worsened during the Siege of Paris. He had refused to leave the city he had always loved despite the dangers and privation, even after his house had been set on fire by the petroleurs et petroleuses. By some irony a mark had been placed against the house of the composer of Masaniello, the very voice of Romantic liberty!

Auber’s overtures were once known everywhere, a staple of the light Classical repertoire. The influence of his gracious melodies and dance rhythms on piano and instrumental music, and on the genre of Romantic comic opera, especially in Germany, was overwhelming. The operas themselves, apart from Fra Diavolo (1830), have virtually passed out of the repertoire, since Auber’s elegant and restrained art now has little appeal for the world of music, attuned as it is to the meatier substance of verismo, high Wagnerian ideology, and twentieth-century experimentalism.

Le Cheval de bronze was premiered at the Opéra-Comique on 23 March 1835. It was described as an opéra-féerique in three acts. The librettist, Scribe, derived the plot from the tale “Les Sept Fils du Calender” in The Arabian Nights. The scene is set in Shantung province in China in legendary times. The magical Bronze Horse of the title, which has appeared mysteriously on a nearby hill, will transport any man who climbs onto its back to the planet Venus, where a group of female sirens, led by the lovely Princess Stella, live. If the traveller in space can resist the sirens’ advances, he can return to earth with the lady of his choice; if not, he is whisked back alone, and turned to stone if he speaks of his experiences.

The witty libretto, that with its exotic subject perfectly captured the taste of the time, offers differentiated characterizations, much situational comedy, and some eroticism in the Venus scenes. The score is among Auber’s best achievements, brimming over with invention: fantasy and comedy are captured perfectly, while the big love duets allow the expression of genuine feeling to break through the burlesque situations. The exotic and fairytale tone is achieved without obvious musical chinoiserie, being rather transmuted into instrumental and harmonic richness, especially in the big ensembles. This is one of the most precisely and carefully controlled of all the composer’s scores. The sense of detail and care is everywhere apparent, as in the short but beautifully crafted entr’actes to acts 2 and 3. The ensembles in act 1, especially the brilliant quintet, and the act 2 finale are remarkable. The thematic integration is extraordinary, and in some instances achieves a genuine use of Leitmotif.

The overture presents all the essential elements of the story in powerful symbolic summary. It is dominated by the central image of the Bronze Horse, the agent of magical adventure and transformation. The enterprising Péki, as the heroine and a redemptrix figure, shares something of the Horse’s dynamism. The most obvious motif of the Bronze Horse and its magic power comes from Péki’s act 1 ballad in which she explains the mysterious presence of the mythical creature on its high promontory: “Là-bas, sur ce rocher sauvage”.

The roles were created by Auguste Féréol (Tsing-Sing), Louis-Benoît-Alphonse Révial (Prince Yang), Jean-Francois Inchindi [Hinnekindt] (Tchin-Kao), Étienne-Bernard-Auguste Thénard (Yanko), Félicité Pradher (Péki), Sophie Ponchard (Tao-Jin), Marie Casimir (Princess Stella), and Mlle Fargueil (Lo Mangli). The opera was initially a hit, with 84 performances in the first year, and over the next few years was staged in numerous countries from London (Covent Garden 1835) to Russia (St Petersburg 1837) and the United States (New York 1837), but then sank into an undeserved obscurity. The work was revived in expanded form at the Opéra on 21 September 1857, and famously by Engelbert Humperdinck at Karlsruhe, in his own arrangement (10 November 1889). It was performed in concert in Vienna (1953), Berne (1969) and Paris (1979).

This edition reproduces the vocal score published in Paris by E. Troupenas (1835).

The manuscripts scores contained in this collection further extend knowledge about Meyerbeer’s non-operatic compositions—instrumental, choral and occasional. These totally unknown works by a great operatic master range from a substantial cantata in the style of a dramatic monologue (for tenor solo with chorus and brass orchestra), through a brassy celebratory processional march, to a brief unaccompanied chorus of welcome. All the pieces are linked by their association with the various German Royal families with whom the composer had some association. All the were written, as it were, ‘by Royal Command’, for regal occasions—either based on texts by a king for that monarch (King Ludwig I of Bavaria), for a Court festivity ordered by the ruler (King Friedrich Wilhelm IV of Prussia), or to celebrate the formal visit of a royal head of state to the nation (Queen Victoria and Prince Albert to Prussia).

A synthesis of old and new, with implications of the dramatic monologue, is characteristic of Der Bayerischer Schützen-Marsch, a cantata for four soloists and brass instruments to a text by King Ludwig I of Bavaria (January 1814) commemorating the struggle against Napoleon, which Meyerbeer set for the king. It was performed in the presence of the monarch on 18 March 1831, just eight months before the spectacular success of Robert le Diable, and forms a type of prelude to the composer’s French period. In spite of the choral and military nature of this work, the essentially lyrical and confessional mode of the words make up a psychological drama born of a frustrated yearning for action in a struggle against tyranny for the restoration of freedom and peace.

On the 28 February 1843 at the Berliner Schloss, immediately after taking up his new position as Generalmusikdirektor, Meyerbeer prepared an occasional piece, a masque for a ball at Court for some three thousand guests. Called Die Hoffest zu Ferrara, the text was by the poet Ernst Raupach, The masque was a paraphrase of elements taken from Torquato Tasso’s Gerusalemme liberata (1581), a Renaissance epic celebrating the First Crusade. Members of the Royal family appeared in costume as guests from the House of D’Este of Ferrara, forming part of a series of tableaux vivants presenting scenes from famous epic:

Meyerbeer composed music for all the scenes, some for soloists, some for chorus. Most is known from contemporary newspaper reports, because the score is lost. Herminia’s Romance was the only piece to be published; the processional march has survived in manuscript. The masque is interesting for focussing on a particular and recurrent features of Meyerbeer’s style—the pastoral topos, exemplified in the Chorus of Shepherds, and the military mode in the Festmarsch for the entry of the guests. This “military” overtone is so often identifiable, characterized by strutting dotted rhythms and relentless propulsion. On 25 August 1842 he completed the first of his four Fackeltänze, the ceremonial polonaises written for the special torch-lit rituals attendant on the public betrothal of a member of the Prussian Royal family.

On 9 August 1845 Meyerbeer travelled to Cologne to direct the Court concert held by King Friedrich Wilhelm IV of Prussia for the reception of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert who were paying a state visit to Prussia. One of the duties incumbent upon Meyerbeer as general director of the royal music, was the provision of pieces required for state occasions involving the king. Just such a piece was the brief choral work written to welcome the Queen of England to Prussian territory. The short four-part choral work with allusion the British anthem, has never been published, and deserves to be better known.

Opéra-comique, like grand opéra, a specifically French genre of opera, emerged from the political changes and intellectual discussion that played a recurrent role in determining the nature of artistic expression and production in Paris from the late 17th until the mid-18th centuries.

Opéra-comique is distinguished by its use of spoken dialogue to link the arias and sung parts, and its more restrained use of recitatives. It emerged out of the popular entertainments, called opéras-comiques en vaudevilles, that were a feature of the theatres held at the seasonal Parisian fairs of St Germain and St Laurent, and of the Comédie-Italienne. The similarity of the entertainments provided by the Comédie-Italienne and the fairs resulted in their amalgamation on 3 February 1756, when they established a theatre for their joint productions, the Hôtel Bourgogne. Their type of entertainment, combining existing popular tunes with spoken sections, lent its generic name to this house, which, regardless of its changing venue, would become known as the Opéra-Comique.

The genre of opéra-comique exercised a powerful popular appeal because of its unique fusion of fixed musical form with fluid improvised dialogue. The well-known airs of the day, invariably strophic, came to be the genre’s staple medium of artistic expression—the couplets. But opéra-comique was not necessarily comic or light in nature. Indeed, the most famous example, Bizet’s Carmen (1875), is a tragedy. The genre, with its unique mixture of comedy and drama, its captivating musical fluency, its handling of serious and Romantic themes—expertly crafted by its most famous librettist Augustin-Eugène Scribe (1791-1861)—became universally popular in the masterpieces of its heyday between 1820 and 1870: Adrien Boieldieu’s La Dame blanche (1825), Daniel-François-Esprit Auber’s Fra Diavolo (1830) and Le Domino noir (1837), Ferdinand Hérold’s Zampa (1831) and Le Pré aux clercs (1832), Fromental Halévy’s L’Éclair (1835) and Ambroise Thomas’s Mignon (1866).

The history of the opéra-comique between 1762 and 1915 reflects the political and cultural life of France—from the last days of the ancien régime, through the tumult of the Revolution and Napoleonic era, the July Monarchy and Second Empire, to the shattering defeat of France by Prussia in 1870. After this, apart from isolated works (by Bizet, Delibes, Offenbach, Massenet), new works by the younger generation of musicians now tended to be French adaptations of the Wagnerian aesthetic and the record of success is very thin. Hardly any native French works in this imitative mode premiered at the Opéra-Comique between 1870 and 1915 have survived—apart from Debussy’s unique Pelléas et Mélisande (1902).

This study serves as a sourcebook for this very French genre, with details of forgotten composers, their operas—performance dates, plot summaries, the singers who created them, the names of important numbers in the works (from libretti and scores that are either now to be found only in the Paris libraries, or are lost completely), often with contemporary observations about the reception of particular works, the effectiveness of their dramaturgy and music. It provides a resource for operatic culture and convention, from the late 18th to the early 20th centuries. The record of the fortunes of the Opéra-Comique provides a way into the changing culture and aesthetic values of an age.

Daniel-François-Esprit Auber (1782–1871), the most amiable French composer of the 19th century, came to his abilities late in life. After a stalled commercial career, he studied with Cherubini. His first works were not a success, but La Bergère Châteleine, written at the age of 38, established him as an operatic composer. He then met the librettist Eugène Scribe (1791–1861), with whom he developed a long and illustrious working partnership that only ended with Scribe’s death. Success followed success; works such as Le Maçon (1825) and La Muette de Portici (1828) brought Auber public fame and official recognition. In 1829 he was appointed a member of the Institut, in 1839 Director of Concerts at Court, in 1842 Director of the Conservatoire, in 1852 Musical Director of the Imperial Chapel, and in 1861 Grand Officer of the Légion d’Honneur.

Auber’s famous historical grand opera La Muette de Portici is a key work in operatic history, and helped to inspire the 1830 revolution in Brussels that led to the separation of Belgium from Holland. Auber died on 12 May 1871, at the advanced age of 89, and in the pitiful conditions of civil strife, after a long and painful illness which worsened during the Siege of Paris.

Auber’s overtures were once known everywhere, a staple of the light Classical repertoire. The influence of his gracious melodies and dance rhythms on piano and instrumental music, and on the genre of Romantic comic opera, especially in Germany, was overwhelming.

Le Concert à la cour, ou La Débutante, an opéra-comique en un acte, with libretto by Eugène Scribe and Mélesville, was first performed at the Opéra-Comique on 3 June 1824. It enjoyed considerable success, with the number of performances in Paris totalling 246.

The story is set in Stuttgart at the Court of Württemberg in the early-nineteenth century.

Adèle, a young soprano, has come to the court at Stuttgart to obtain a position as a singer and finds her old friend Victor there as painter to the court. Despite the efforts of Kapellmeister Ascanio to reject her in an audition, the Prince arranges for her public debut. Ascanio tries to ruin it by conducting the accompanying orchestra in erratic tempos, but Victor accompanies her in another aria, which secures the approval of the Court.

Le Concert à la cour presents a succinct one-act distillation of several aspects of the composer’s art. The elegance and finesse of his style are amply in evidence, as are his delight in the overture form, the innate naturalness of his response to the couplets (the fundamental cell of the opéra-comique genre), as well as his deft handling of the larger concerted forms, like the trio and extended ensemble.

The opera enjoyed considerable success across Europe, and even reached Rio de Janeiro in 1846.

This edition reproduces the full orchestral score published in Paris by Frère Editeurs (1825).

Daniel-François-Esprit Auber (1782–1871) was long considered one of the most typically French as well as one of the most successful of the opera composers of the 19th century. Although musically gifted, he initially chose commerce as a career, but soon realized that his future lay in music. He studied under Cherubini, and it was not long before his opéra-comique La Bergère Châteleine (1820), written at the age of 38, established him as an operatic composer. Perhaps the greatest turning point in Auber’s life was his meeting with the librettist Eugène Scribe (1791–1861), with whom he developed a long and illustrious working partnership that only ended with Scribe’s death. Success followed success; works such as Le Maçon (1825) and La Muette de Portici (1828) brought Auber public fame and official recognition. In 1829 he was appointed a member of the Institut, in 1839 Director of Concerts at Court, in 1842 Director of the Conservatoire, in 1852 Musical Director of the Imperial Chapel, and in 1861 Grand Officer of the Légion d’Honneur.

Auber seems to have been fated to live in revolutionary times; during his long life no less than four revolutions took place in France (1789, 1830, 1848, 1870). Auber’s famous historical grand opera La Muette de Portici (also known by its hero’s name as Masaniello) is perhaps unsurprisingly based on revolution, depicting the 1647 Neapolitan uprising against Spanish rule. It is a key work in operatic history, and has a revolutionary history itself: it was a performance of this work in Brussels in 1830 that helped spark the revolution that led to the separation of Belgium from Holland. It was a revolution that hastened Auber’s death at the old age of 89. He died on 12 May 1871 as a result of a long illness aggravated by the privations and dangers of the Siege of Paris. He had refused to leave the city he had always loved, even after his house had been set on fire by the petroleurs et petroleuses. In a twist of fate, a mark had been placed on the house of the composer of Masaniello, the very voice of Romantic liberty!

Auber’s overtures were once instantly recognizable, favourites of the light Classical repertoire. His gracious melodies and dance rhythms had a huge influence, both on piano and instrumental music, and on the genre of Romantic comic opera, especially in Germany. Musical tastes and fashions have changed, and contemporary audiences are more accustomed to the heavier fare of verismo, Wagnerian transcendentalism, and twentieth-century experimentalism. The operas themselves, apart from Fra Diavolo (1830), are seldom performed, yet Auber’s elegant, delicate and restrained art remains as appealing to the discerning listener as ever it was.

Zerline, an opera in three acts with libretto by Eugène Scribe, was first performed at the Académie nationale de musique (Salle de la rue Le Peletier) on 16 May 1851. The scene is set in Palermo, during the Restoration. The Prince of Roccanera, married to the sister of the King, has a supposed niece, Gemma. She is really his daughter by Zerline, an orange-seller. The latter was abducted by pirates, and having returned to Palermo after many trials, now meets her daughter, assuming the role of her aunt. She learns that Gemma loves a young naval officer, Rodolphe, but that the Prince’s wife wishes Gemma to marry the King’s cousin, much against the girl’s wishes. In the third act, Zerline, already alerted to an intrigue compromising to the two young lovers, is able to safeguard their integrity and bring about their union.

The action is better suited to a vaudeville than an opera, and the scenario has little innate interest. The role of Zerline was devised especially for the great contralto Marietta Alboni (1823–94), the first role she created. The B-flat major overture immediately establishes the family nature of the drama, with its parable of past sins, social disparity and all-conquering maternal love.

There is allusion to the Sicilian setting in the two opening choruses of act 1 which are dominated by barcarolle rhythms in establishing the couleur locale. Alboni’s magnificent talent added great value to the light music written by Auber for this slight canvas. The work consequently contains many pieces of a purely virtuoso nature. Among them are the grand air d’entrée “Ô Palerme! ô Sicile!”, the thematically central canzonetta “Achetez mes belles oranges”, and the duet for soprano and contralto “Quel trouble en mon âme” in act 1. It is as though the Italian setting of the story and the Italian origins of the prima donna caused Auber to look to his early love for Rossini, and his enduring attachment to Italian musical forms and local colour (as in Fiorella, La Muette de Portici, Fra Diavolo, Actéon, La Sirène, Zanetta and Haydée).

The vocal part of Zerline is a conscious re-creation of the old Rossini mode, and her various solos are written in the style of the virtuoso contralto of the opera seria, obviously with a contemporary Gallic fleetness all Auber’s own. The Grand Air demonstrates all the features.

The original cast was: Merly (Roccanera); Mlle Marietta Alboni (Zerline); Mlle Maria-Dolorès-Bénédicta-Joséphine Nau (Gemma); Aimès (Rodolphe); Mlle Dameron (the Princess of Roccanera); and Lyons (the Marquis of Bettura). The work was only performed 14 times in Paris, with no reprise. It was translated into Italian, and produced in Brussels (in French) and London (in Italian).

The English novel written between 1700 and 1740 remains a comparatively neglected area. In addition to Daniel Defoe, whose "Robinson Crusoe" and "Moll Flanders" are landmarks in the history of English fiction, many other authors were at work. These included such women as Penelope Aubin, Jane Barker, Mary Davys, and Eliza Haywood, who made a considerable contribution to widening the range of emotional responses in fiction. These authors, and many others, continued writing in the genres inherited from the previous century, such as criminal biographies, the Utopian novel, the science fictional voyage, and the epistolary novel. This annotated bibliography includes entries for these works and for critical materials pertinent to them.

The volume first seeks to establish the existing studies of the era, along with anthologies. It then provides entries for a wide-ranging selection of works which cover fictional, theoretical, historical, political, and cultural topics, to provide a comprehensive background to the unfolding and understanding of prose fiction in the early 18th century. This is followed by an alphabetical listing of novels, their editions, and any critical material available on each. The next section provides a chronological record of significant and enduring works of fiction composed or translated in this period. The volume concludes with extensive indexes.

This collection presents music from three of the most important scores of the Golden Age of ballet in Paris from 1830–1870. The Romantic ballet had been inaugurated by Meyerbeer’s opera Robert le Diable (21 November 1831) with its ghostly Ballet of the Nuns, risen from their graves and dancing in the moonlight, led by their spectral Abbess; a role created by Marie Taglioni (1804–1884) to her father’s choreography. La Sylphide (1832), inspired by this situation, was the first fully fledged Romantic ballet. Its graceful and atmospheric score was written by the first violinist at the Opéra, Jean Schneitzhoeffer. The story, devised by the great tenor Adolphe Nourrit, similarly introduces spirits and elemental beings, which dominated ballet scenarios for the following decades. Filippo Taglioni’s creation provided the fullest realization of the Romantic ideal, especially in the leading character of the story, and its perfect incarnation in the original interpreter, Marie Taglioni, whose stage personality seemed to be made for the part of the Sylphide. The ballet became the source of theatrically romantic fantasies centred around the hopeless and fatal love between a human being and a supernatural creature. It was performed in Paris until 1860, when the work was abandoned. Only in the late 20th century was Taglioni’s original version revived in a literal reconstruction by Pierre Lacotte at the Paris Opéra on 7 June 1972.

Giselle is a central work in the ballet repertory all over the world. It is regarded as the absolute masterpiece of Romantic dance theatre; a wonderful synthesis of style, technique, and dramatic feeling, with an exceptional score. The ballet was devised in 1841 as a result of the collaboration of some of the major talents in literature, choreography and music in the Paris of the time. The author, critic and poet Théophile Gautier, overwhelmed by the art of the ballerina Carlotta Grisi (1819–1899), discovered what he felt would be the perfect theme for her while reading a translation of Heinrich Heine’s book on German legend and folklore, D’Allemagne. Here he found the legend of the wilis—maidens who die before their wedding day and who come out of their graves at night in bridal dress to dance until dawn. Should any man be caught in the wood while the wilis are about their rituals, he is doomed to dance on and on until he drops dead from exhaustion. The choreography was created by Jean Coralli and Jules Perrot. The first act is on a realistic level, with an evocation of a medieval rusticity and emotional-sentimental intrigue, while the second act conjures up the supernatural, an ethereal world of magic symbolism. Both public and the critics greeted the work as a triumph. The score was praised for its “elegance, the freshness and clarity of the melodies, the vigour and novelty of the harmonic combinations, and the vivacity that pervades the musical texture from start to finish”. The ballet has come down the years in a more-or-less unbroken tradition. Perrot emphasized his own special creative imprint in the productions he supervised in London (1842) and St Petersburg (1856). In Russia he collaborated with Marius Petipa who made his own reconstruction of the ballet in 1884. This version became the model for all later revivals in Russia, as well as for Mikhail Fokine’s production for the Ballet Russes in Paris (1910).

Byron’s famous narrative poem The Corsair inspired several ballets, with Joseph Mazilier’s proving the most important (1856). Jules-Henri Vernoy de Saint-Georges’s scenario was of a superior quality. Mazilier was maître de ballet at the Paris Opéra between 1853 and 1859, the years of his fullest creativity. The solo parts were infused with an intense dramatic expressiveness, and there was a splendid mise-en-scène. But the great success of the work was due primarily to the quality of the chief performers: the ballerina Carolina Rosati (1826–1905) and the mime Domenico Segarelli (1820–1860). The spectacular shipwreck finale was a sensational feat engineered by the chief mechanist of the Opéra, Victor Sacré, and his crowning glory. Adam’s score—consistently rich in melodic inspiration, engaging in the set dances, imaginative in the many extended mime sequences, and more richly symphonic than ever before in his work—reached a height of inspiration in this last music he ever wrote for the stage. Mazilier’s ballet gained a world-wide popularity, and became a favourite of the leading ballerinas for decades. Marius Petipa produced his own version in St Petersburg in 1868, with additional music by Cesare Pugni and Léo Delibes. In 1899 Petipa revived the ballet again, for the Maryinsky Theatre in St Petersburg, this time completely re-choreographing it for Pierina Legnani, with additional music by Riccardo Drigo. Performances in the USSR and contemporary Russia derive from this version. Drigo’s music for the spectacular pas de deux in act 2 is still performed all over the world as an independent piece.

The overtures of Daniel-François-Esprit Auber (1782–1871), once as popular as those of Gioacchino Rossini and Franz von Suppé, were formerly known everywhere, a staple of the light Classical repertoire. The influence of Auber’s melodies and dance rhythms on piano and instrumental music, and on the genre of Romantic comic opera, especially in Germany, was overwhelming. The operas themselves, apart from Fra Diavolo (1830), have virtually passed out of the repertoire, but some of their overtures live on vicariously, and sound brilliant and charming when given the chance—The Bronze Horse, Masaniello, The Crown Diamonds, Fra Diavolo, The Black Domino. The freshness of the melody, the incision of the orchestral colours, and the rhythmic vitality are still capable of generating a visceral excitement.

Auber, the most amiable French composer of the 19th century, came to his abilities late in life. After a stalled commercial career, he studied with Cherubini. His first operas were not a success, but La Bergère Châteleine (1820), written at the age of 38, established him as an operatic composer. It was at this time that he met the librettist Eugène Scribe (1791–1861), with whom he established a working partnership, one of the most successful in musical history, that lasted until Scribe’s death. After Le Maçon (1825) and La Muette de Portici (1828), Auber’s life was filled with success. In 1829 he was appointed a member of the Institut, in 1839 Director of Concerts at Court, in 1842 Director of the Conservatoire, in 1852 Musical Director of the Imperial Chapel, and in 1861 Grand Officer of the Légion d’Honneur.

Auber’s famous historical grand opera La Muette de Portici (Masaniello) is a key work in operatic history, and helped to inspire the revolution in Brussels that led to the separation of Belgium from Holland. Auber himself experienced four French Revolutions (1789, 1830, 1848, 1870). The latter (The Commune) hastened the end of his life. He died on 12 May 1871, at the advanced old age of 89, and in the pitiful conditions of civil strife, after a long and painful illness which worsened during the Siege of Paris. He refused to leave the city he had always loved despite the dangers and privation, even after his house had been set on fire by the petroleurs et petroleuses. By some irony a mark had been placed against the house of the composer of La Muette de Portici, the very voice of Romantic liberty!

Auber’s elegant and restrained art now has little appeal for the world of music, attuned as it is to meatier substance of verismo, high Wagnerian ideology, and twentieth-century experimentalism. But he was once a household name, and his pared style, fleet rhythms and restrained emotion were a byword of taste. This collection brings together 40 of Auber’s overtures, from his first great success with La Bergère Châtelaine, to his last opera, written at the age of 87, Rêve d’Amour, and including the concert overture he wrote in 1862 for the London Exhibition. Auber adopted the Rossinian adaptation of the overture genre, a sonata form with foreshortened development (or a sequential passage for transition back to the recapitulation). His handling of this basic structure remained consistent throughout his career, and followed three or four differing approaches, but always invested with his characteristic verve, rhythmic élan, clarity of texture, and brilliance of orchestration. In all, the overtures, especially when viewed as a corpus, present a journey through the creative life of composer dedicated to musical drama, who always remained the perfect exemplar of a certain French style and elegance—even in his serious works.

In 1868 the choreographer Marius Petipa planned his ballet Don Quixote for the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow, and the Austrian composer Ludwig Minkus was invited to compose the music. The plot of Don Quixote was based on the adventures of Quiteria (known as Kitri in the ballet) and Basilio, which Petipa had developed from the second part of Miguel de Cervantes's novel (1605). The ballet was an enormous success, both in Moscow (14/26 December 1869) and in St Petersburg where it was represented at the Bolshoi Theatre on 9/21 November 1871 in an expanded version as Don Quichotte—with revised scenario and choreography that took cognizance of the more sophisticated expectations of the Imperial capital. Changes were made to the story, with a new fifth act in three scenes, for which Minkus wrote additional music. Don Quixote no longer regarded Kitri simply as his protégée, but now actually mistakes her for Dulcinea, and she appears as such in his Dream Scene. Provision was made for one ballerina to perform the double virtuoso role of Kitri and Dulcinea. The big classical scene for Don Quixote's dream was rewritten. Greater emphasis was now placed on this episode, where Kitri/Dulcinea was surrounded by a large corps de ballet and seventy-two children dressed as cupids. Alexandra Vergina was partnered by Basilio (Lev Ivanov), and supported by Pavel Gerdt in the last scene. The cast also included Timofei Stukolkine (Don Quixote), Nicholas Goltz (Gamache), and Alexei Bogdanov (Lorenzo).

Don Quixote became established in the repertory, and its continued life on the Russian stage bears testimony to the appeal of its exuberance, “the life-asserting and life-loving nature of its dances” (Natalia Roslavleva). Generations of Russian ballet-masters and dancers preserved these dances in essence, and the ballet is still part of the Russian repertory, given today in all Russian and Siberian companies, in the Moscow version of Alexander Gorsky, in three acts and seven or eight scenes.

Petipa’s version of Don Quixote, with its life-affirming music by Minkus, has during the 20th century spread throughout the world, not least because of the work of Rudolf Nureyev who made a film version of the Australian Ballet production in 1971 that became very famous. It co-starred Robert Helpmann and Lucette Aldous, and made world history in being the first ballet to be produced with full film technique, so providing wider scope for imaginative handling of the famous story. Don Quixote has become the standard ballet version of the Cervantes tale, and one of the most popular pieces of the international repertory. Much of its emotional fervour is captured in the celebrated virtuoso Grand Pas de Deux for the wedding of Kitri and Basilio in the last scene. This piece, with a spectrum of feeling enshrined in its rapturous melodies and irresistible rhythmic élan, has assumed a life of its own as a concert piece in countless renditions wherever ballet is performed.

The piano score of the St Petersburg version was published as Don Quichotte (St Petersburg: Theodore Stellowsky, c. 1882). This version is reproduced here.

Daniel-François-Esprit Auber (1782–1871) was long considered one of the most typically French as well as one of the most successful of the opera composers of the 19th century. Although musically gifted, he initially chose commerce as a career, but soon realized that his future lay in music. He studied under Cherubini, and it was not long before his opéra-comique La Bergère Châteleine (1820), written at the age of 38, established him as an operatic composer. Perhaps the greatest turning point in Auber’s life was his meeting with the librettist Eugène Scribe (1791–1861), with whom he developed a long and illustrious working partnership that only ended with Scribe’s death. Success followed success; works such as Le Maçon (1825) and La Muette de Portici (1828) brought Auber public fame and official recognition. In 1829 he was appointed a member of the Institut, in 1839 Director of Concerts at Court, in 1842 Director of the Conservatoire, in 1852 Musical Director of the Imperial Chapel, and in 1861 Grand Officer of the Légion d’Honneur.

Auber seems to have been fated to live in revolutionary times; during his long life no less than four revolutions took place in France (1789, 1830, 1848, 1870). Auber’s famous historical grand opera La Muette de Portici (also known by its hero’s name as Masaniello) is perhaps unsurprisingly based on revolution, depicting the 1647 Neapolitan uprising against Spanish rule. It is a key work in operatic history, and has a revolutionary history itself: it was a performance of this work in Brussels in 1830 that helped spark the revolution that led to the separation of Belgium from Holland. It was a revolution that hastened Auber’s death at the old age of 89. He died on 12 May 1871 as a result of a long illness aggravated by the privations and dangers of the Siege of Paris. He had refused to leave the city he had always loved, even after his house had been set on fire by the petroleurs et petroleuses. In a twist of fate, a mark had been placed on the house of the composer of Masaniello, the very voice of Romantic liberty!

Auber’s overtures were once instantly recognizable, favourites of the light Classical repertoire. His gracious melodies and dance rhythms had a huge influence, both on piano and instrumental music, and on the genre of Romantic comic opera, especially in Germany. Musical tastes and fashions have changed, and contemporary audiences are more accustomed to the heavier fare of verismo, Wagnerian transcendentalism, and twentieth-century experimentalism. The operas themselves, apart from Fra Diavolo (1830), are seldom performed, yet Auber’s elegant, delicate and restrained art remains as appealing to the discerning listener as ever it was.

L’Enfant prodigue, an opéra in five acts, with libretto by Eugène Scribe, was first performed at the Académie nationale de musique (Salle de la rue Le Peletier) on 6 December 1850. The story is derived from the famous parable in St Luke’s Gospel (ch. 15). The scene is set in Old Testament times, in Ancient Israel and Egypt.

Azaël, the only son of Reuben, a poor Israelite, leaves the paternal home and his betrothed Jephtèle to go and sample the pleasures promised by the great city of Memphis. He ruins himself in gambling and is seduced by the courtesan Nephté and the dancer Lia. Rejected and destitute, he is rescued from the Nile in act 4 by the leader of a caravan, and is reduced to tending a flock of sheep. In the final act the prodigal son comes to his senses, and returns home to throw himself into his loving father’s arms.

Scribe produced a libretto without dramatic action, which, however, provided good static situations for the composer. The orchestral details are full of subtle interest and charm. The overture is the longest Auber wrote (466 bars). It is divided into three main sections, focusing attention on the tragic aspects of the story. The music unfolds the programme of the action, rehearsing the scenario in symbolic transmutation. The fleshpots of Egypt are conjured up and then in ecstatic mood the music captures the pathos of the return of the penitent sinner and his welcome back into his family. The theme of prodigality has been transposed into one of restitution. Auber achieves a symbolically effective and sonorous introduction to this operatic recounting of the Biblical parable.

The essence of the story is enshrined in Scribe’s dignified paraphrase of the brief Gospel passage “Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you; I am no longer worthy to be called your son; treat me as one of your hired servants” (Luke 15:18–19): “Oui, j’irai vers mon père”. This is the key moment of decision and soul-searching in the opera, and carries the story’s emotional burden and spiritual implication. The work is dominated by the figure of the patriarch Reuben, with his act 1 aria “Toi qui versas la lumière”, and in act 2 the romance (“Il est un enfant d’Israël”), with its recitative of biblical simplicity. The final air of recognition (“Mon fils, c’est toi”) is possibly the most touching piece in the whole work: indeed, it attains a veritable grandeur.

A special aspect of the opera is the dance sequence in act 2—No. 10 Scène, containing 5 Airs de ballet, as part of the celebrations of the sacred bull Apis. The music is very light, gracious and delicate, full of buoyancy and chamber-like textures.

L’Enfant prodigue was produced only once, with no reprise, a total of 44 performances. The original cast was: Jean-Étienne-Auguste Massol; Gustave-Hippolyte Roger; Mlle Pauline-Eulalie Dameron; Louis-Henri Obin; Fleury; Koenig, Guignot, Ferdinand Prévôt; Molinier; Mme Laborde; Mlle Marie-Adolphine Petit-Brière; and Mlle Adèle Plunkett. The opera was translated into English, Italian and German and produced in Brussels, London, Graz, Vienna, Munich, Florence and New York until 1875.

Daniel-François-Esprit Auber (1782-1871), the composer of La Muette de Portici (1828) and Fra Diavolo (1830), was once regarded as one of the great figures of music, a staple of the operatic repertoire in France, and indeed around the world. It is now almost impossible to understand the extent of his once universal fame, his influence on contemporary composers. His operas were in the theatre repertories of the world until the 1920s, and innumerable arrangements of them were published and sold everywhere. The ubiquity of his overtures—Masaniello, Fra Diavolo, The Bronze Horse, The Black Domino, The Crown Diamonds—once as popular as those of Rossini and Suppé, and the influence of his melodies and dance rhythms on piano and instrumental music, and on Romantic comic opera, was overwhelming.

In his operas Auber avoided any excess in dramatic expression; all emotion and expressiveness, any vivid depiction of local milieu, were realized within his discreetly nuanced tones, always stamped with a Parisian elegance. His operas were loved in his native France until the years before the First World War, with Fra Diavolo and Le Domino noir last performed at the Opéra-Comique in 1909. Auber’s career was a record of this success and appreciation. His appointment to the Institute (1829) was followed by other prestigious posts: as Director of Concerts at Court (1839), director of the Paris Conservatoire (1842), Musical Director of the Imperial Chapel (1852), and Grand Officer of the Légion d’Honneur (1861). During his lifetime, six biographies appeared contemporaneously, with another six appearing posthumously in the period up to 1914.

In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, however, reactions to Wagner, Impressionism and the Neo-Classicism of the Ballet Russe resulted in a growing lack of interest in the ancient traditions of opéra-comique, with its charming plots, melodic directness and rhythmic élan. Boieldieu, Hérold, Adam and Auber were relegated to the dustbin of history. Only in Germany did the genre continue to flourish; Auber’s most enduring work is still performed there. His death in pitiful conditions during the Siege of Paris (1871), in the city he always loved, marked the end of an era. Auber now occupies a shadowy niche in the general consciousness as the name of the metro station nearest the Palais Garnier, and remains unknown and neglected (apart of course from Fra Diavolo), although his impact on the nineteenth-century operatic theatre was just as great as Rossini’s.

The time has surely come for Auber’s life and work, especially in association with his life-long collaborator Eugène Scribe (1791-1861)—master dramatist and supreme librettist, a determining force in the history of opera—to be reassessed. Perhaps then the world will begin to hear more of Auber’s elegant gracious, life-affirming music, written to Scribe’s words. The aim of the present study is to offer an overview of the life and work of Auber by close examination of his forty operas, with consideration of origins, casting, plot, analysis of dramaturgy and musical style, and reception history. This is presented in the context of Auber's relationship to the dominant genres of early nineteenth century French culture, opéra comique and grand opéra. The three evolving periods of Auber's unique involvement with opéra comique are of principal concern.

This analysis of the operas is made in the context of Auber's crucial working relationship with Scribe, who provided 38 of his libretti. Their cooperation is unique and of great importance on several literary, musical and cultural levels. The nature of their interaction and personal friendship is assessed by a translation of the extant correspondence between them, some 80 letters that have not appeared in English before. The presentation of each opera is illustrated by musical examples from all the scores, prints from the complete works of Scribe and other theatrical memorabilia. The study also contains bibliographies of Auber’s works and their contemporary arrangements, studies of Auber’s and Scribe’s life and work, their artistic and historical milieux, and a discography.

Whether one approaches the Bible from a perspective of faith, culture or literature, the power of the writing, the human situations, language and genres that make up the Scriptures speak potently across the ages. From whatever angle, the texts have a revelatory power that shines a light on the human condition, our sense of purpose, place in the world, and even our destiny. Born out of the common reflection on the history of single nation with a sense of divine election, the Bible has spoken, and continues to speak to all people in various circumstances, in words of such power that seem divinely inspired.

This second volume looks at a more narrative view of the history of Ancient Israel, in stories written in the late Old Testament to reflect on the tribulations of the people in captivity, either after the Assyrian Deportation of 722 BC, the Babylonian Captivity (597 BC), during Persian rule (538-323 BC), or under the grave existential threat posed by the Greek Seleucid Syrians (167–163 BC). God’s ways are sought amidst defeat and confusion, amidst fear and hope: his power to save out of suffering implored. The stories of Daniel, Jonah, Ruth, Esther, Tobit, Judith and the Maccabees remain parables of faith in God's providence, his redemptive love.

This study encourages reading the texts themselves, developing a sharper perception of language, imagery, genre and style. The book, thus, provides an overall picture of the literary types employed, locates the sacred books in a chronological and thematic context, exploring the texts through the specific passages provided, always looking to find the theological keys critical to understanding these particular books and their enduring message across the ages.

A particularly interesting aspect of this study is its collection of iconography, offering a cross-section of artistic responses to the power of the biblical discourse through the centuries. While Gustave Doré's famous etchings form the axis of the centrefolds, many other painters are included from different periods.

This book explores the revelation of God’s love in the mystery of the covenant, and shows how this potent theological concept has inspired artists through the ages to reflect on the nature of divine interaction with mankind.

It traces the development of the covenantal relationship between God and the Jewish people as given in the Hebrew Scriptures, and examines the Christian concept of the New Covenant, portrayed by Gospel writers and those of the early Church in the New Testament. Alongside this, the book matches a variety of artistic work in which these texts are made visible. The reference to over 300 works of art is a mere sample, and will inspire readers to research this hugely rich resource both for their own interest and for use in teaching about the Christian faith and its important Jewish roots.

Learning in the contemporary world often lifts the emphasis from mere words to illustration, and this book shows clearly that, throughout history, the Christian world has sought to use art to aid understanding of biblical texts. Art continues to be used hand-in-hand with the Scriptures in present-day classrooms, as well as in group and individual study.

This volume provides a basis for the exploration of God’s love in his covenantal relationship with the People of God, ancient and modern, and will serve to inspire an investigation of the huge range of artistic interpretation which is available through twenty-first century technology.

The Restoration was a period surprisingly rich in fiction, and the period between 1660 and 1700 witnessed the decline of the epic and the birth of the English novel. Literature of the period became increasingly secular in response to advancements in science, philosophy, and exploration. With growing recognition of the power of print, literary works became increasingly targeted to the masses, rather than just to the educated members of the upper class. John Bunyan's classic tale of salvation, DEGREESIThe Pilgrim's Progress DEGREESR, became one of the most widely read works of the last few centuries and has been translated into scores of languages around the world. In recent years, the writings of Aphra Behn have elicited a growing critical response and have led scholars to reassess the place of women in early modern England.

But with the exception of Bunyan and Behn, the English novel written between 1660 and 1700 remains a comparatively neglected area. Nonetheless, many other authors produced works of fiction in genres such as the criminal biography, the Utopian novel, the scientific voyage to another world, and the heroic romance. This reference book establishes a list of novels that appeared between 1660 and 1700 and provides a comprehensive annotated bibliography of critical and scholarly studies. The first part of the book presents overviews of existing bibliographies, anthologies, and general contextual works on the early English novel. The second part of the book includes alphabetically arranged sections for individual authors of the period, listing editions and scholarly studies of particular works. A chronology lists the novels according to year of publication, and detailed indexes conclude the volume.

On 29 February 1836, Les Huguenots, a grand opera by Giacomo Meyerbeer (1791–1864), with words by Eugène Scribe (1791–1861) and Émile Deschamps (1791–1871), was performed for the first time, at the Paris Opéra. It was to be one of the most successful productions ever staged at the Opéra, with 1,126 performances in Paris over the next hundred years, and, in the process, breaking all box office records. It became Meyerbeer’s most popular work, with thousands of stagings throughout the world.

Les Huguenots is a huge exploration of faith, tolerance, hatred, extermination, love, loyalty, self-sacrifice and hope in despair. It is the first panel in a central diptych on the Reformation, at the heart of the wider tetralogy of Meyerbeer’s grand operas, where issues of power, religion and love are examined in a variety of modes. For five years after the sensational premiere of Robert le Diable, Meyerbeer worked on this gigantic drama, partly adapted by Scribe from Prosper Mérimée’s Chronique de Charles IX.

Meyerbeer matches the text in drama, splendour and ceremony: it combines theatricalism with profound depths of feeling. Its gorgeous colouring, intense passion, consistency of dramatic treatment, and careful delineation of character secured for this work vast fame and influence. It was an epoch-making opera, an enduring monument to Meyerbeer’s fame.

The music for this sombre tapestry of the Saint Bartholomew Massacre springs from the core of the vivid action, and creates a panoramic alternation of moods, that capture the tragedy of religious intolerance and personal anguish in one of the most fraught events in history, when some 30,000 French Protestants were murdered during 24 August 1574. Meyerbeer’s music rises to the occasion, and reaches sublime heights of music drama, especially in the fourth and fifth acts, with the Blessing of the Daggers (one of the most electric scenes in all opera), the more powerful Love Duet, and the Trio of Martyrdom in the last moments of the opera. Spectacle was incorporated in the plot, in Meyerbeer’s concern to conjure up the couleur locale of those heroic times.

In spite of the overwhelming dramatic power and the instrumental riches of the score, the most significant aspect of the work came to be regarded as the supremacy of the seven principal vocal parts. Performances of Les Huguenots at the Metropolitan Opera in New York during the 1890s were among the most famous in operatic history.

Daniel-François-Esprit Auber (1782–1871), the most amiable French composer of the 19th century, came to his abilities late in life. After a stalled commercial career, he studied with Cherubini. His first works were not a success, but La Bergère Châteleine (1820), written at the age of 38, established him as an operatic composer. He then met the librettist Eugène Scribe (1791–1861), with whom he developed a working partnership, one of the most successful in musical history, that lasted until Scribe’s death. After Le Maçon (1825) and La Muette de Portici (1828), Auber’s life was filled with success. In 1829 he was appointed a member of the Institut, in 1839 Director of Concerts at Court, in 1842 Director of the Conservatoire, in 1852 Musical Director of the Imperial Chapel, and in 1861 Grand Officer of the Légion d’Honneur.

Auber’s famous historical grand opera La Muette de Portici (also known by its hero’s name as Masaniello) is a key work in operatic history, and helped to inspire the 1830 revolution in Brussels that led to the separation of Belgium from Holland. Auber himself experienced four French Revolutions (1789, 1830, 1848, 1870). The latter (the Commune) hastened the end of his life. He died on 12 May 1871, at the advanced old age of 89, and in the pitiful conditions of civil strife, after a long and painful illness which worsened during the Siege of Paris. He had refused to leave the city he had always loved despite the dangers and privation, even after his house had been set on fire by the petroleurs et petroleuses. By some irony a mark had been placed against the house of the composer of Masaniello, the very voice of Romantic liberty!

Auber’s overtures were once known everywhere, a staple of the light Classical repertoire. The influence of his gracious melodies and dance rhythms on piano and instrumental music, and on the genre of Romantic comic opera, especially in Germany, was overwhelming. The operas themselves, apart from Fra Diavolo (1830), have virtually passed out of the repertoire, since Auber’s elegant and restrained art now has little appeal for the world of music, attuned as it is to the meatier substance of verismo, high Wagnerian ideology, and twentieth-century experimentalism.

Le Lac des fées, an opéra in five acts, with libretto by Eugène Scribe and Mélesville (Anne-Honoré-Joseph Duveyrier), was premiered at the Académie nationale de musique (Salle de la rue Le Peletier) on 1 April 1839.

The story is derived from the tale “Der geraubte Schleier” from Johann Karl August Musäus’s Volksmärchen der Deutschen (1782–86). Musäus’s collection of fairy tales was also the basis of Wenzel Reisinger’s scenario for Tchaikovsky’s ballet Swan Lake (1877).

The opera is set in the Harz Mountains and Cologne, in the fifteenth century. Albert, a young student, has fallen in love with a fairy, Zélia: she has been forced to live on earth because Albert has stolen her veil. At the last moment, however, she regains her veil from Marguerite, and disappears to her fairy sisters. To welcome her back, the Fairy Queen allows Zélia a wish: but she chooses to renounce immortality, and returns to Albert on the earth.

Despite its five acts, the opera is not overtly concerned with the great historical themes usually associated with grand-opéra, but exemplifies Scribe’s third type of opera libretto (after opéra-comique and grand-opéra), derived from exotic or legendary material. However, the literary source is remarkable for its depiction of the rebellion of the people and students against the feudal lord Rodolphe—themes that have a strong affinity with the historical and political concerns of Auber’s earlier compositions, La Muette de Portici and Gustave III, and this thematic affinity is also evident in the musical aspects of the work.

Much time in Le Lac des fées is taken in elaborating the central depiction of popular festivity. Indeed, the requirements of grand-opéra are realized with an original twist in the big act 3 depiction of the medieval Epiphany celebrations, with its attempt at recreating the variety of genre and mood. The composer handled this legendary and supernatural subject with a certain poetic grace and inspiration. The dramatic highpoints of the score provide impressive examples of Auber’s art. Remarkable pieces include: the overture; the cavatina for Albert “Gentille fée”; Rodolphe’s grand air “Avec addresse”; the Scene of the Fairies; Zélia’s scene of despair in act 1 and her complaint “C’en est donc fait”; the extensive duet for Zélia and Albert in act 3, and Albert’s mad scene in act 4. Of special note are the graceful and effective fairy choruses. There is also a very Romantic sense of tonal painting, with the moonlit serenity of the fairy lake conveyed in mellifluous orchestral detail.

Richard Wagner arrived in Paris in 1839, and perhaps saw one of the last of the stagings. The influence of the final transformation scene must have affected him deeply—both as stagecraft and music. The original cast was: Gilbert Duprez; Mlle Maria-Dolorès-Bénédicta-Joséphine Nau; Nicholas-Prosper Levasseur; Louis-Émile Wartel; Ferdinand Prévôt and Alexis Dupont; Molinier; Rosine Stoltz; and Mlle Elian Barthélémy.

Despite the cast of exceptional quality, Le Lac des fées was not a success in Paris, where it was performed 30 times, with no reprise. On the other hand, the German version of the work enjoyed great popularity; the opera was also translated into English and Polish, and produced in a number of European countries and in New York between 1839 and 1847, with revivals in Karlsruhe and Stuttgart in 1865 and 1871.

Whether one approaches the Bible from a perspective of faith, culture or literature, the power of the writing, the human situations, language and genres that make up the Scriptures speak potently across the ages. From whatever angle, the texts have a revelatory power that shines a light on the human condition, our sense of purpose, place in the world, and even our destiny. Born out of the common reflection on the history of single nation with a sense of divine election, the Bible has spoken, and continues to speak to all people in various circumstances, in words of such power that seem divinely inspired.

This volume provides an opportunity for studying those special areas of Scripture known as the Prophets and the Wisdom Books. Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Daniel spoke to Ancient Israel from the situation of their national story shaped by the Covenant with God, especially before, during and after the sorrow of their Exile in Babylon (587–38 BC). The Wisdom Books of the Bible reflect on the ontology of the human condition under any circumstance: how to live wisely and sensibly by looking at the world of nature and the human heart to discern the purpose of life. The approach adopted here, building on a fundamental understanding of the Old Testament, searches for deeper understanding of both approaches and genres. This study enables a thematic overview of the subject, a way into some of the critical issues endemic to grasping both traditions, and by implication, some of the fundamental approaches used in biblical scholarship.

This study encourages reading the texts themselves, developing a sharper perception of language, imagery, genre and style. The book, thus, provides an overall picture of the literary types employed, locates the sacred books in a chronological and thematic context, exploring the texts through the specific passages provided, always looking to find the theological keyscritical to understanding these particular books and their enduring message across the ages.

A particularly interesting aspect of this study is its collection of iconography, offering a cross-section of artistic responses to the power of the biblical discourse through the centuries. While Gustave Doré's famous etchings form the axis of the centrefolds, many other painters are included from different periods.

Daniel-François-Esprit Auber (1782–1871), the most amiable French composer of the 19th century, came to his abilities late in life. After a stalled commercial career, he studied with Cherubini. His first works were not a success, but La Bergère Châteleine (1820), written at the age of 38, established him as an operatic composer. He then met the librettist Eugène Scribe (1791–1861), with whom he developed a working partnership, one of the most successful in musical history, that lasted until Scribe’s death. After Le Maçon (1825) and La Muette de Portici (1828), Auber’s life was filled with success. In 1829 he was appointed a member of the Institut, in 1839 Director of Concerts at Court, in 1842 Director of the Conservatoire, in 1852 Musical Director of the Imperial Chapel, and in 1861 Grand Officer of the Légion d’Honneur.

Auber’s famous historical grand opera La Muette de Portici (also known by its hero’s name as Masaniello) is a key work in operatic history, and helped to inspire the 1830 revolution in Brussels that led to the separation of Belgium from Holland. Auber himself experienced four French Revolutions (1789, 1830, 1848, 1870). The latter (the Commune) hastened the end of his life. He died on 12 May 1871, at the advanced old age of 89, and in the pitiful conditions of civil strife, after a long and painful illness which worsened during the Siege of Paris. He had refused to leave the city he had always loved despite the dangers and privation, even after his house had been set on fire by the petroleurs et petroleuses. By some irony a mark had been placed against the house of the composer of Masaniello, the very voice of Romantic liberty!

Auber’s overtures were once known everywhere, a staple of the light Classical repertoire. The influence of his gracious melodies and dance rhythms on piano and instrumental music, and on the genre of Romantic comic opera, especially in Germany, was overwhelming. The operas themselves, apart from Fra Diavolo (1830), have virtually passed out of the repertoire, since Auber’s elegant and restrained art now has little appeal for the world of music, attuned as it is to the meatier substance of verismo, high Wagnerian ideology, and twentieth-century experimentalism.

Rêve d’amour, an opéra-comique in three acts, with libretto by Adolphe-Philippe Dennery (Adolphe Philippe) and Eugène Cormon (Pierre-Etienne Piestre), was first performed at the Opéra-Comique (Deuxième Salle Favart) on 20 December 1869. It was Auber’s last work.

The story is set in the French countryside, in the 18th century. It concerns the peasant farmer Marcel and the vicissitudes of his love for both his cousin Denise and the wealthy heiress Henriette. The latter is in turn, however, loved by the gallant Chevalier. To prove himself, Marcel leaves and becomes a successful soldier. He is eventually united with Denise, while Henriette marries the Chevalier.

The scenario is without great interest, but the score is of musical worth. The short binary overture is charming and full of fresh ideas. It neatly juxtaposes the two male protagonists, and the overall thematic pull between the dream of love and the glory of soldierly prowess. It is a lovely pastorale that reaches its climax in a mood of great playfulness.

Act 2 takes one into the heart of the pastoral experience explored in this opera. It opens with a charming scene of Colin-Maillard (blindman’s buff) and a Villanelle, while the extended finale—a lovely waltz followed by Marcel’s embracing of the soldier’s life—counterposes the archetypal polarity of the pastoral and military traditions of the opéra-comique. The military solution to the hero’s emotional dilemma is also the determining action in Auber’s earlier works La Fiancée and Le Philtre.

For the premiere stage set one of the charming scenes of Lancret was reproduced, complemented by costumes and décor modelled on those of Watteau. The Balançoire and the Colin-Maillard were ingeniously re-created by the stage designers to sustain the illusion of this last pastoral dream of love.

The cast consisted of: Joseph-Amédée-Victor Capoul (Marcel); Mlle Marguerite-Marie-Sophie Priola (Henriette); Mlle Maria-Dolorès-Bénédicta-Joséphine Nau (Denise); Mlle Caroline Girard (Marion); Charles-Louis Sainte-Foy (Andoche, a peasant); Victor Prilleux (Bertrand, a farmer); Pierre Gailhard (Le chevalier de Bois-Joli); and Julien (Thomas, a peasant). The opera was in the repertoire 1869–70, and numbered 27 performances. Performances were interrupted in 1870 by the outbreak of the Franco-Prussian War, and never resumed.

This volume brings together a collection of the orchestral works of the composer Giacomo Meyerbeer. He is remembered as one of the great figures of 19th-century opera—a master of brilliant vocalism, impassioned drama and vivid orchestral power and colour. His operas are noted for their precise construction and urgent propulsion, and never linger for long in music for its own sake. Nevertheless, the orchestral passages are integral to the dramatic logic: brief thematically pertinent preludes and precise introductions to the individual acts, always providing a sense of colour and purpose. The operas are also famous for their ballets as an integral aspect of the dramaturgy of the grand French style, but even here the music is kept within strict temporal control. Some of these dance sequences (like the Ballet of the Nuns in Robert le Diable and the Skaters’ Ballet in Le Prophète became very famous in themselves: the former was of seminal influence on the development of the Romantic Ballet, both in musical and conceptual terms; the latter is known universally as the ballet of winter joy, Les Patineurs). Other orchestral episodes from the operas also enjoyed great independent popularity—like the resplendent Coronation March in Le Prophète and the exotic Marche Indienne in L’Africaine. The former continues to be Meyerbeer’s most widely known composition. All these works have been gathered together in this volume to constitute orchestral suites from the French operas—both grand and the smaller opéras comiques. The two latter works L’Étoile du Nord and Dinorah each has an extended overture. Meyerbeer’s most substantial orchestral work, however, is the incidental music he wrote for his brother, Michael Beer’s tragedy Struensee (1846). The overture is Meyerbeer’s crowing achievement in orchestral writing, and the rest of the incidental music is enthralling in its drama, passion and pathos. The composer was also asked to write instrumental music for other public occasions, most especially for the weddings of the Prussian Royal Family. He provided four stirring Fackeltänze for the torchlight procession held at the Hohenzollern nuptial celebrations, superb works in processional polonaise style, full of grandezza, dramatic gesture and affecting lyricism. In 1861 Meyerbeer was asked to compose the music for the royal procession of King Wilhelm I of Prussia at the ancient capital of Königsberg. The result was another Coronation March, this one of more formal and stately character, that reaches its climax most appropriately in the Prussian national anthem “Ich bin ein Preusser”. In 1862 Meyerbeer was commissioned to write music for the opening of the London Exhibition in the Crystal Palace. His Overture in March Style is in the form of a Baroque suite, and provides a series of four variants on the march genre, culminating in a fantasia on “Rule Britannia”. This grandiose festive piece is full variety, surprises and subtle orchestral colours. Like all this composer’s work, this fine composition is waiting to be rediscovered.

The cantatas of Giacomo Meyerbeer (1791–1864), spanning his middle and late life, were written in response to royal and civic commissions to celebrate dynastic events and to praise the deeds of famous men. Their festive nature is indicated in the titles: festival song, festival greeting, festival hymn, homage.

Like a continuation of the 18th-century tradition of patronage, the more famous Meyerbeer became, the more his services were required by public authorities. Although a burden to him, and a distraction from his dramatic vocation, the composer understood the importance of these works for his life and public perception—especially in Germany, where his Jewishness was always a source of comment. His special relationship with the Prussian Royal Family was one of the most significant features of his life—as it was for Felix Mendelssohn.

Meyerbeer’s cantatas can be divided into Royal commissions and civic/national ones. There are royal birthdays (the Duke of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, the Grand Duchess of Baden), weddings (Princess Louise of Prussia), marriage anniversaries (King Friedrich Wilhelm IV and Prince Karl of Prussia), coronations (King Wilhelm I) and state visits (Queen Victoria). These are parallelled by commemoration of historical events and personages—the invention of printing (1436) by Johannes Gutenberg (1397–1468), commemoration of the Prussian national hero Frederick the Great (1712–1786), the unveiling of the monumental equestrian statue of the famous king by the great sculptor Christian Daniel Rauch (1777–1857), and the commemoration of the centenary of the birth of the illustrious dramatic poet and chronicler of idealism and freedom, Friedrich Schiller (1759–1805).

In all of these works, Meyerbeer’s powers of lyric beauty, dramatic perception, orchestral colour and drama, and sense of pomp and circumstance, are amply in evidence. They reveal a side to this great operatic composer that has been completely forgotten, and now awaits discovery.

This collection, including both published vocal and full scores, contains the unpublished cantata written for Ernst I, Duke of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha (b.1784, ruled 1806–1844), the father of Prince Albert the Prince Consort of Queen Victoria.

Operetta developed in the second half of the 19th century from the French opéra-comique and the more lighthearted German Singspiel. As the century progressed, the serious concerns of mainstream opera were sustained and intensified, leaving a gap between opéra-comique and vaudeville that necessitated a new type of stage work. Jacques Offenbach, son of a Cologne synagogue cantor, established himself in Paris with his series of opéras-bouffes. The popular success of this individual new form of entertainment light, humorous, satirical and also sentimental led to the emergence of operetta as a separate genre, an art form with its own special flavour and concerns, and no longer simply a "little opera". Attempts to emulate Offenbach's success in France and abroad generated other national schools of operetta and helped to establish the genre internationally, in Spain, in England, and especially in Austria Hungary. Here it inspired works by Franz von Suppé and Johann Strauss II (the Golden Age), and later Franz Lehár and Emmerich Kálmán (the Silver Age). Viennese operetta flourished conterminously with the Habsburg Empire and the mystique of Vienna, but, after the First World War, an artistically vibrant Berlin assumed this leading position (with Paul Lincke, Leon Jessel and Edouard Künnecke). As popular musical tastes diverged more and more during the interwar years, with the advent of new influences—like those of cabaret, the revue, jazz, modern dance music and the cinema, as well as changing social mores—the operetta genre took on new guises. This was especially manifested in the musical comedy of London's West End and New York's Broadway, with their imitators generating a success that opened a new golden age for the reinvented genre, especially after the Second World War.

This source book presents an overview of the operetta genre in all its forms. The second volume provides a survey of the national schools of Germany, Spain, England, America, the Slavonic countries (especially Russia), Hungary, Italy and Greece. The principal composers are considered in chronological sequence, with biographical material and a list of stage works, selected synopses and some commentary. This volume also contains a discography and an index covering both volumes (general entries, singers and theatres).

Robert le Diable by Giacomo Meyerbeer is regarded as a musical milestone, a definitive statement in the 19th-century development of French grand opéra from the tragédie lyrique of Lully, Rameau, Gluck and Spontini. The libretto by Eugène Scribe and Germain Delavigne was derived from the medieval legend of “Robert the Devil”. First performed on 21 November 1831 at the Paris Opéra, the work brought Meyerbeer international celebrity.

Robert le Diable remains a legend in the annals of opera. The fascinating story reveals a complex imagery and symbolism that touches on the deepest intuitions of human experience and personal development, and exercises an archetypal unconscious appeal akin to the nature of fairy tales. The musical language, richly melodic and theatrically powerful, looks back to Rossini and the traditions of bel canto, and yet forges a new formal pliancy and dramatic urgency. The harmony and orchestration, the melodramatic plot, and overwhelming stage effects (especially the famous act 3 Ballet of the Nuns, a touchstone of dark Romanticism) confirmed Meyerbeer as the leading opera composer of his age. His style fuses German counterpoint, Italian melody, French grandeur, and unprecedented orchestral riches in a unique and overwhelming artistic blend.

Robert became one of the greatest successes in the history of opera. In the first two years of its history it was given in 69 different theatres, and was performed 754 times at the Paris Opéra until 1893. This huge success was reflected in more than 160 transcriptions, arrangements, paraphrases and fantasias for the orchestra, military band, dance band, piano and other solo instruments written between 1832 and 1955. After many years of neglect, there is a resurgence of interest in this work with its fascinating appeal.

This book is devoted to the story of this exceptional opera. It traces the origins, the première, the performance history, and also considers the special characteristics of both the libretto and the music. One of the most intriguing aspects of Robert le Diable was the nature of the iconography generated by its most famous scenes. Artists and illustrators responded in many different ways to the Gambling Scene, the Scene at the Cross, the Cloister Scene for the legendary Ballet of the Nuns, and the great trio in act 5. All of these are examined in terms of the the many different pictorial and plastic responses they inspired over some 60 years.

Operetta developed in the second half of the 19th century from the French opéra-comique and the more lighthearted German Singspiel. As the century progressed, the serious concerns of mainstream opera were sustained and intensified, leaving a gap between opéra-comique and vaudeville that necessitated a new type of stage work. Jacques Offenbach, son of a Cologne synagogue cantor, established himself in Paris with his series of opéras-bouffes. The popular success of this individual new form of entertainment light, humorous, satirical and also sentimental led to the emergence of operetta as a separate genre, an art form with its own special flavour and concerns, and no longer simply a "little opera". Attempts to emulate Offenbach's success in France and abroad generated other national schools of operetta and helped to establish the genre internationally, in Spain, in England, and especially in Austria Hungary. Here it inspired works by Franz von Suppé and Johann Strauss II (the Golden Age), and later Franz Lehár and Emmerich Kálmán (the Silver Age). Viennese operetta flourished conterminously with the Habsburg Empire and the mystique of Vienna, but, after the First World War, an artistically vibrant Berlin assumed this leading position (with Paul Lincke, Leon Jessel and Edouard Künnecke). As popular musical tastes diverged more and more during the interwar years, with the advent of new influences—like those of cabaret, the revue, jazz, modern dance music and the cinema, as well as changing social mores—the operetta genre took on new guises. This was especially manifested in the musical comedy of London's West End and New York's Broadway, with their imitators generating a success that opened a new golden age for the reinvented genre, especially after the Second World War.

This source book presents an overview of the operetta genre in all its forms. The first volume provides an introduction, a representative chronology of the genre from 1840 to 2013, and a survey of the national schools of France and Austria-Hungary. The principal composers are considered in chronological sequence, with biographical material and a list of stage works, selected synopses and some commentary.

This Guide has resulted from years of research on the papers and music of Giacomo Meyerbeer, and aims to provide a bibliographical aid and point of reference for further research. The first part presents the private papers connected to the composer and his principal librettist, Eugène Scribe—both archival and printed, with working papers and correspondence, as found in Berlin, Paris and some of the famous libraries of the world. The body of Part 2 draws together all the known resources on Meyerbeer's life and historical reputation—from full scale biographies and entries in reference books, through critical discussions to website resources to records of symposia. The third part provides material about his background with its unique mixture of Jewish and Prussian elements, the powerful role of the city of Berlin in his life and work. The fourth part lists bibliographic material for Meyerbeer's music, looking at his operas, grouped as German, Italian and French, with each individual entry providing a record of the scores available, both modern and historical, the various arrangements made from the operas during the heyday of their popularity, reviews of modern performances, discography, and bibliography of studies and publications pertinent to the wider cultural and historical contexts of the works.

The next two sections constitute an extended record of material pertinent to the contemporaries of Meyerbeer. In the fifth section are select bibliographies of composers, authors, artists, performers, politicians, those who played some part in the composer's life, or anyone of significance in his wider contemporary circumstances. This is continued in the sixth part where the cultural and aesthetic elements of the composer's milieu, or life in the theatre during seventy years of the nineteenth century, are listed. The seventh part adds a bibliography of social and historical background, where the incidental issues of Judaism in nineteenth-century Europe, and the wider political, historical and geographical circumstances of Meyerbeer's life, his relentless travelling, and closely recorded experiences in Germany, France, Italy, Belgium, England, and Austria. The eighth section provides a thematic key to this extensive material.

Part 9 provides an extended tripartite series of lists of the published scores, arrangements and some special studies of Meyerbeer over the period 1820 to 2005—in alphabetical, chronological and thematic ordering. The last two sections furnish the modern equivalent of this record of Meyerbeer and his compositions, showing in Part 11 the list of performances of his operas since the Second World War, and in Part 12, listing the recordings of the operas, both commercial and private, for the same period. The thirteenth and last section is iconographical, pictures that represent an interesting survey of the popular response to Meyerbeer in the 19th century.

Determination meets dance in this memoir by the history-making ballerina.

In this instant New York Times bestseller, Misty Copeland makes history, telling the story of her journey to become the first African-American principal ballerina at the prestigious American Ballet Theatre. But when she first placed her hands on the barre at an after-school community center, no one expected the undersized, underprivileged, and anxious thirteen-year-old to become one of America’s most groundbreaking dancers . A true prodigy, she was attempting in months roles that take most dancers years to master. But when Misty became caught between the control and comfort she found in the world of ballet and the harsh realities of her own life, she had to choose to embrace both her identity and her dreams, and find the courage to be one of a kind.

With an insider’s passion, Misty opens a window into the life of an artist who lives life center stage, from behind the scenes at her first classes to her triumphant roles in some of the world’s most iconic ballets. A sensational memoir as “sensitive” and “clear-eyed” (The Washington Post) as her dancing, Life in Motion is a story of passion, identity and grace for anyone who has dared to dream of a different life.

With no fewer than nine members and a unique stage image based on grotesque masks and boiler suits, Slipknot retained a mystique that was unprecedented in the metal world, never allowing their faces to become known – so that the focus would remain on their music.

The first edition of this book published in 2001 followed the band from their inception in Des Moines, Iowa in the mid-1990s through to the release of their second album: an updated edition followed in 2003.

It’s now a decade since the first volume appeared, and in that time Slipknot have evolved into a completely different band from the one that first emerged into the limelight in 1999. Everyone knows their faces now.

The band’s music is darker, deeper and more adult after four studio albums, three DVDs and a live release.

Most strikingly, the sudden death of their bass player Paul Gray in 2010 has changed the face and the attitude of the group, although their commercial profile is, if anything, greater than it was before.

Slipknot: All Hope Is Gone explores this unlikely and tragic evolution, with new chapters covering the band’s career to date – and it also asks what their future will be.

"Miss Grant has made more information available in one book than we have ever had before. Teacher's organizations would do well to consider the use of Miss Grant's Technical Manual as an official textbook." — Dance Magazine
Teacher recommended, Gail Grant's Technical Manual has long been one of the most popular and effective ballet reference guides. Completely revised and updated, this third edition is virtually a new work and should be owned by every student, dance teacher, choreographer, and ballet enthusiast — even those who purchased the second edition. Extensive revision, expansion, and the inclusion of more than 300 new terms have added immeasurably to the value of this concise, definitive manual.
Moving from "abstract ballet" and "adage, adagio" to "working leg" and "wrapped position," the book fully describes and defines over 1,100 ballet steps (saul de chat, jeté enveloppé, failli, entrechat six, etc.), movements and poses (arabesque, épaulement, attitude, en arrière, retiré, à terre, dégagé, etc.), and other expressions and concepts. For each, first a phonetic transcription is provided, then a literal translation, and finally an explanation of how the step is performed, the pose captured, or the movement executed, of how the concept fits in with actual ballet dancing, or of the purpose or function of the idea. A pronunciation guide, cross-references to alternate names for similar steps and positions that vary from the Russian to the French or Italian schools, and a bibliography are all invaluable aids.
But the most important supplement is the 15-page pictorial section, drawn by the author, who is both a successful ballet teacher and dancer. Keyed to the dictionary (and vice-versa), these diagrams show clearly the exact foot, leg, arm, and body positions for the proper execution of many of the more common ballet steps and movements. This essential and easy reference is a must for every teacher, aspiring dancer, and ballet class.

(Piano Method). Since the first release of this classic Schirmer edition over 100 years ago, almost anyone who has taken piano lessons for more than two years has played from The Virtuoso Pianist . Millions of copies have been sold of these progressive exercises which guide a player's technique, building finger independence and strength. This was the first American edition released of this music, and remains a classic at a remarkably affordable price.

Make a career out of your voice? Easy.

Voice acting is like acting, but just using your voice! It's a unique career where the actor's voice can be heard worldwide-in commercials, on audiobooks, in animated movies, documentaries, online videos, telephone systems and much, much more. The point is to bring the written word to life with the human voice.

With step-by-step explanations and an abundance of examples, Voice Acting For Dummies is the ultimate reference for budding voice actors on auditioning, recording, producing voice-overs, and promoting themselves as a voice actor.

Creating a voice acting demo Finding your signature voice Interpreting scripts Using audio editing software Promoting your voice acting talents

If you're an aspiring voice actor or an actor or singer considering a career transition, Voice Acting For Dummies has everything you need to let your voice talents soar.

THE INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER

The extraordinary memoir of a peasant boy raised in rural Maoist China who was plucked from his village to study ballet and went on to become one of the greatest dancers of his generation. 

From a desperately poor village in northeast China, at age eleven, Li Cunxin was chosen by Madame Mao's cultural delegates to be taken from his rural home and brought to Beijing, where he would study ballet. In 1979, the young dancer arrived in Texas as part of a cultural exchange, only to fall in love with America-and with an American woman. Two years later, through a series of events worthy of the most exciting cloak-and-dagger fiction, he defected to the United States, where he quickly became known as one of the greatest ballet dancers in the world. This is his story, told in his own inimitable voice.

THE BASIS FOR A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE


From the Trade Paperback edition.

(Piano Solo Songbook). 100 pop and classical standards that every piano player should master, including: Air on the G String * Bridge over Troubled Water * Canon in D * Clair de Lune * Fields of Gold * Fur Elise * I Dreamed a Dream * I Will Always Love You * Imagine * Lullaby of Birdland * Memory * Misty * Moon River * On My Own * Over the Rainbow * The Shadow of Your Smile * Smile * Stardust * Summertime * Sunrise, Sunset * Time After Time * Unexpected Song * The Way You Look Tonight * We've Only Just Begun * What a Wonderful World * Yesterday * You Raise Me Up * Your Song * and more!

Although the stars of Russian ballet Anna Pavlova and Tamara Karsavina possessed a national manner of dancing, there was no truly Russian school of dancing until the 1930s. The development of this school was largely due to Mme. Vaganova (1879–1951), not only a great dancer but also the teacher of Galina Ulanova and many others and an unsurpassed theoretician.
The principles of Vaganova's system are presented in this well-known book. Mme. Vaganova's aim of creating a personal approach to the Russian dance was based on the critical assimilation of the experience of her contemporaries. Her ability to choose the best of what had been accomplished in the various ballet traditions (French, Italian, and Russian) and combine these into a unified teaching practice in itself amounted to a new school of dance. She firmly believed that the teaching process should be a planned exercise, ever changing with innovations in the dance. She sought from her pupils emotional expressiveness, strictness of form, a resolute, energetic manner of performance, and the understanding of the underlying coordination of movements.
Her book discusses all basic principles of ballet, grouping movements by fundamental types. Chapters cover battements, rotary movements of the legs, the arms, poses of the classical dance, connecting and auxiliary movements, jumps, beats, point work, and turns as well as material for a sample lesson. Diagrams show clearly the exact foot, leg, arm, and body positions for the proper execution of many steps and movements. The result is a fundamental theory of dance that offers dancers, teachers, and ballet lovers information often difficult to locate in other books.
118 illustrations.

(Guitar Collection). A top-notch resource for every guitarist, this 111-song collection assembles songs in all musical genres and guitar styles. Contains everything from pop/rock hits to jazz standards, Motown masterpieces to movie classics, traditional tunes, country favorites, Broadway blockbusters and beyond! Features note-for-note transcriptions (Evil Ways * Give It Away * Photograph), riffs (All Right Now * Deuce * Iron Man * Start Me Up), and arrangements for easy guitar (Change the World * Crazy * Jump * Roxanne), chord melody (The Christmas Song * Stella by Starlight * Yesterdays), fingerstyle (Come Sail Away * Linus & Lucy * My Funny Valentine), classical (Lagrima * Minuet * Pavane), and more!

(Piano/Vocal/Guitar Artist Songbook). Dubbed the "new prince of romantic music" by the All Music Guide , David Foster-protege Josh Groban is a bonafide superstar, thanks mainly to this sophomore CD, which produced the blockbuster "You Raise Me Up." Our songbook features all 15 songs from the album, English translations for the foreign language songs, and a color section with great photos of Josh.

(Vocal Collection). This series is an excellent resource for the college singer or the advanced high school singer. Each volume has 30 selections: 10 songs in English, 4 songs in French, 6 songs in German, 4 songs in Italian, 2 songs in Spanish, 2 carefully chosen beginning opera arias, 1 oratorio aria and 1 Gilbert & Sullivan operetta aria. There is a different song for each voice type, with songs in appropriate keys. Includes composer biographies and historical notes for each song, as well as song text translations. This ebook edition also includes piano accompaniments and diction lessons for the songs in French, German, Italian and Spanish.

Power and grace define Misty Copeland—an influential ballet dancer who has broken through difficult barriers to become the first female African-American to be promoted to principal dancer at the American Ballet Theatre. Misty has proven adversity can be conquered by reaching higher and working harder to define what is humanly possible, regardless of the path one chooses to follow their dreams. In Misty’s own words, “Finding your power doesn’t have to be scary. Instead, it makes you feel in control, strong, and proud.” Through the stunning black-and-white photography of Richard Corman and Misty’s own words, her inspiring message of hope, strength, and focus speaks to young girls and women. In the introduction, Cindy Bradley, Misty’s ballet teacher who discovered and encouraged Misty to develop her talent and follow her heart, gives context to the obstacles and challenges that helped Misty find her power and achieve success. “Misty Copeland is the embodiment of the American dream.” – Bill Whitaker, 60 MINUTES

(Easy Piano Songbook). Play 50 of your favorite songs in the easiest of arrangements! Enjoy pop hits, Broadway showstoppers, movie themes, jazz standards, folk tunes, and classical melodies presented simply, with lyrics. You'll find something for everyone! Songs include: Auld Lang Syne * Beyond the Sea * Castle on a Cloud * Do-Re-Mi * Happy Birthday to You * Hey Jude * Let It Go * Linus and Lucy * Moon River * Ode to Joy * Over the Rainbow * Puff the Magic Dragon * Smile * Star Wars (Main Theme) * Tomorrow * When I Fall in Love * Yesterday * and more.

Rudolf Nureyev had it all: beauty, genius, charm, passion, and sex appeal. No other dancer of our time has generated the same excitement, for both men and women, on or off the stage. With Nureyev: The Life, Julie Kavanagh shows how his intense drive and passion for dance propelled him from a poor, Tatar-peasant background to the most sophisticated circles of London, Paris, and New York. His dramatic defection to the West in l961 created a Cold War crisis and made him an instant celebrity, but this was just the beginning. Nureyev spent the rest of his life breaking barriers: reinventing male technique, “crashing the gates” of modern dance, iconoclastically updating the most hallowed classics, and making dance history by partnering England’ s prima ballerina assoluta, Margot Fonteyn--a woman twice his age. He danced for almost all the major choreographers--Frederick Ashton, George Balanchine, Kenneth MacMillan, Jerome Robbins, Maurice Béjart, Roland Petit--his main motive, he claimed, for having left the Kirov. But Nureyev also made it his mission to stage Russia’s full-length masterpieces in the West. His highly personal productions of Swan Lake, The Nutcracker, Raymonda, Romeo and Juliet, and La Bayadère are the mainstays of the Paris Opéra Ballet repertory to this day. An inspirational director and teacher, Nureyev was a Diaghilev-like mentor to young protégés across the globe--from Karen Kain and Monica Mason (now directors themselves), to Sylvie Guillem, Elisabeth Platel, Laurent Hilaire and Kenneth Greve.

Sex, as much as dance, was a driving force for Nureyev. From his first secret liaison in Russia to his tempestuous relationship with the great Danish dancer Erik Bruhn, we see not only Nureyev’s notorious homosexual history unfold, but also learn of his profound effect on women--whether a Sixties wild child or Jackie Kennedy and Lee Radziwill or the aging Marlene Dietrich. Among the first victims of AIDS, Nureyev was diagnosed HIV positive in 1984 but defied the disease for nearly a decade, dancing, directing the Paris Opéra Ballet, choreographing, and even beginning a new career as a conductor. Still making plans for the future, Nureyev finally succumbed and died in January l993.

Drawing on previously undisclosed letters, diaries, home-movie footage, interviews with Nureyev’s inner circle, and her own dance background, Julie Kavanagh gives the most intimate, revealing, and dramatic picture we have ever had of this dazzling, complex figure.

NOTE: This edition does not include photos.

(Guitar Solo). 11 classical standards arranged in notes and tab for solo guitar. Includes: Canon in D * Clair De Lune * The Entertainer * Fur Elise * Greensleeves * Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring * Maple Leaf Rag * Minuet in G * Moonlight Sonata (First Movement) * Prelude No. 1 * Rondeau.

The clear writing style, vivid analogies, and illustrations that show movement come alive are among many features that make Ballet: Beyond the Basics a proven, indispensible guide. The rich historical tradition of ballet is foundational to Hammonds approach to helping intermediate ballet studentsthose who are familiar with basic ballet terminology, understand correct body placement, and can easily perform elementary techniques expand their technical development and artistic growth. Although written to encourage students and teachers who deal with the most challenging phase of ballet training, experienced dancers seeking to refresh their knowledge and enhance their level of achievement can benefit from Hammonds reliable, timeless advice.

(Easy Piano Songbook). A great collection of 50 must-know classics for all pianists, including: Arabesque, Op. 100, No. 2 * Ave Maria * Can Can * Canon in D * Clair de Lune * Eine Kleine Nachtmusik * Fur Elise * Hallelujah Chorus * Hungarian Dance No. 5 * La Fille Aux Cheveux De Lin (The Girl with the Flaxen Hair) * Largo from Symphony No. 9 ("New World") * Meditation * Minuet in G * Ode to Joy * Pavane Pour Une Infante Defunte * Pomp and Circumstance * Sonata No. 11 in a Major, K 331, Third Movement ("Rondo Alla Turca") * The Surprise Symphony * Waltz in a Minor * William Tell Overture * and more. Each arrangement is simple and streamlined, yet still captures the essence of the tune!

Classical ballet was perhaps the most visible symbol of aristocratic culture and its isolation from the rest of Russian society under the tsars. In the wake of the October Revolution, ballet, like all of the arts, fell under the auspices of the Soviet authorities. In light of these events, many feared that the imperial ballet troupes would be disbanded. Instead, the Soviets attempted to mold the former imperial ballet to suit their revolutionary cultural agenda and employ it to reeducate the masses. As Christina Ezrahi’s groundbreaking study reveals, they were far from successful in this ambitious effort to gain complete control over art.

Swans of the Kremlin offers a fascinating glimpse at the collision of art and politics during the volatile first fifty years of the Soviet period. Ezrahi shows how the producers and performers of Russia’s two major troupes, the Mariinsky (later Kirov) and the Bolshoi, quietly but effectively resisted Soviet cultural hegemony during this period. Despite all controls put on them, they managed to maintain the classical forms and traditions of their rich artistic past and to further develop their art form. These aesthetic and professional standards proved to be the power behind the ballet’s worldwide appeal. The troupes soon became the showpiece of Soviet cultural achievement, as they captivated Western audiences during the Cold War period.

Based on her extensive research into official archives, and personal interviews with many of the artists and staff, Ezrahi presents the first-ever account of the inner workings of these famed ballet troupes during the Soviet era. She follows their struggles in the postrevolutionary period, their peak during the golden age of the 1950s and 1960s, and concludes with their monumental productions staged to celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of the revolution in 1968.

The unique style of Cuban ballet is galvanizing the world of dance in the United States, Europe, Latin America, and beyond. This beautifully illustrated book explores the history of Cuban ballet by focusing on the life and career of the indomitable Alicia Alonso. It also spotlights many of the young dancers who are changing the face of ballet with their superb technique, impeccable work ethic, and spectacular performances: Lorena Feijoo, Lorna Feijoo, Joan Boada, Taras Domitro, Jose Manuel Carreo, Rolando Sarabia, and Carlos Acosta to name but a few. While focusing on the artistry and spirit of Cuban dancers, both within and out of Cuba, Octavio Roca deftly explores the political realities artists face in Cuba and why so many need to leave their beloved home to reach their full potential, taking their grace, beauty, strength, and style with them. Cuba's loss has become the worlds gain. A widely respected authority on the arts, Roca has served on the juries of dozens of international festivals and performing arts competitions, including the International Ballet Festival in Havana, his native city. Octavio Roca studied at Emory University and Georgetown University, has taught philosophy at the University of Miami and Barry University, and is now chair of the Arts and Philosophy Department at Miami Dade College. He lives in Miami Beach.

Often called the Picasso, Stravinsky, or Frank Lloyd Wright of the dance world, Martha Graham revolutionized ballet stages across the globe. Using newly discovered archival sources, award-winning choreographer and dance historian Mark Franko reframes Graham's most famous creations, those from the World War II era, by restoring their rich historical and personal context. Graham matured as an artist during the global crisis of fascism, the conflict of World War II, and the post-war period that ushered in the Cold War. Franko focuses on four of her most powerful works, American Document (1938), Appalachian Spring (1944), Night Journey (1948), and Voyage (1953), tracing their connections to Graham's intense feelings of anti-fascism and her fascination with psychoanalysis. Moreover, Franko explores Graham's intense personal and professional bond with dancer and choreographer Erick Hawkins. The author traces the impact of their constantly changing feelings about each other and about their work, and how Graham wove together strands of love, passion, politics, and myth to create a unique and iconically American school of choreography and dance.

“A glimpse into the fragile psyche of a dancer.” —The Washington Post

Jenifer Ringer, a principal dancer with the New York City Ballet, was thrust into the headlines after her weight was commented on by a New York Times critic, and her response ignited a public dialogue about dance and weight.

Ballet aficionados and aspiring performers of all ages will want to join Ringer behind the scenes as she shares her journey from student to star and candidly discusses both her struggle with an eating disorder and the media storm that erupted after the Times review. An unusually upbeat account of life on the stage, Dancing Through It is also a coming-of-age story and an inspiring memoir of faith and of triumph over the body issues that torment all too many women and men.

(Easy Piano Personality). Easy piano arrangements of all 17 tracks from the 2011 album release by this Korean classical/pop crossover star are featured in this songbook. Includes his most prominent hit "River Flows in You" plus: Chaconne * Destiny of Love * Fairy Tale * Indigo * Kiss the Rain * Love Me * Poem * Sky * Wait There * and more.