Download or read book Meyerbeer s Les Huguenots written by Robert Ignatius Letellier and published by Cambridge Scholars Publishing. This book was released on 2014-06-02 with total page 308 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 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.
Download or read book Meyerbeer s Opera Les Huguenots written by Giacomo Meyerbeer and published by . This book was released on 1860 with total page 40 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Les Huguenots written by Robert Ignatius Letellier and published by Cambridge Scholars Publishing. This book was released on 2008-10-01 with total page 1006 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This huge exploration of faith, tolerance, hatred, extermination, love, loyalty, self-sacrifice and hope in despair, is the first panel of a central diptych on the Reformation, and 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 première of Robert le Diable, Meyerbeer was thought to be resting on his laurels. Instead, he was drudging over a gigantic drama, partly adapted by Scribe from Merimée's Chronique de Charles IX. It was hardly believed possible that the esrlier success could be repeated. Most of the vivid details gleaned from every available document related to the time, were the composer's contribution to Les Huguenots. 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 the night of 24 August 1574. Meyerbeer’s music rises to occasion, and reaches sublime heights of music drama, especially in the fourth and fifth acts, with the Benediction of the Catholic Daggers—one of the most electrical 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. The evocation of Marguerite de Valois’s court at Chenonceaux, the recreation of late Medieval Parisian life with its Gypsy revels and the religionists' riots in the Pré-aux-Clercs, the wedding fete in the Hotel de Nesle, all grow out of the central idea. Meyerbeer was also very successful in his characterizations of individuals: the dreamy idealist Raoul, the passionate and self-sacrificing Valentine, the fanatical and implacable St Bris, the rough stolid Marcel, the elegant and capricious queen, the somewhat flamboyant but always honorable Nevers. All come to life in this score. The opera became enormously popular, its various arias a touchstone of operatic lyricism, and by 1936 had been performed 1120 times in at the Paris Opéra alone. In spite of its overwhelming dramatic power and instrumental riches of the score, the most significant aspect of the work came to regarded the supremacy of the vocal parts. Performances at the Metropolitan Opera in new York during the 1890s were among the the most famous in operatic history. Here performances attained a legendary status, the so-called nuits des sept étoiles (“the Nights of the Seven Stars”), as in 1894 with Nellie Melba, Lillian Nordica, Sofia Scalchi, Jean de Reszke, Edouard de Reszke, Pol Plançon, and Victor Maurel Once again George Sand summed up with incomparable insight the essence of Meyerbeer’s musico-dramatic achievement. “From stone floors that no Protestant knee ever warms, solemn voices seemed to resound, the tones of a calm, secure triumph and the expiring sighs and murmurings of a tranquil end, resigned, confident, without death-rattle or lamentation. It was the voice of Calvinist martyrdom, a martyrdom without ecstasy or delirium, a torment where suffering is stifled by austere pride and august certainty... These imaginary hymns naturally assumed in my mind the form of that fine canticle in your opera, The Huguenots; and, while I dreamt I heard the cries of Catholic indignation and a sharp volley of musketry outside, a tall figure passed before my eyes, one of the noblest dramatic figures, one of the loveliest personifications of the idea of faith that art has ever produced in our time: Meyerbeer's Marcel. And I saw that bronze statue standing clothed in buffalo hide, quickened by the divine fire the composer had brought down upon him. I saw him, Maestro, forgive me my presumption, just as he must have appeared to you when you sought him at the uncompromising and steadfast hour of noon under the glowing arches of some Protestant church, vast and luminous as this one. Though you are a musician, you are more a poet than any of us! In what secret recess of your soul, in what hidden treasury of your mind did you find those clear, pure features, that concept, simple as antiquity, true as history, lucid as conscience, strong as faith? ....” The facsimile edition of the manuscript of this famous work, for so long kept private and then thought lost after the Second World War, enables lovers of opera to examine for themselves the compositional procedure of its great and often misunderstood creator. One can see the extent to which curtailment of the original conception was needed on the eve of the premiere: in the ensembles of both act 1 and 3 Meyerbeer’s complex developments had to be reduced. The ever present problem of censorship also meant that the original idea of depicting Catherine de’ Medici on stage as the instigator of the massacre had to be radically altered and her role substituted by the Comte de Saint Bris. The famous viola d’amore accompaniment to Raoul’s rhapsodic act 1 romance (“Plus blanche que la blanche hermine”) was originally conceived for the cello. The extraordinary Andante amoroso for the central part of the love duet also indicates Meyerbeer’s preparedness to act on a good idea: in this case Adolphe Nourrit’s suggestion that the cantabile be expanded. To see the MS of such a famous opera is both a moving and stimulating experience.
Download or read book The Operas of Giacomo Meyerbeer written by Robert Ignatius Letellier and published by Fairleigh Dickinson Univ Press. This book was released on 2006 with total page 372 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: But these operas are far more than imitations: they show an apprehension of convention and genre that is nothing less than a dismantling of accepted formulas, and a highly original reconstruction of them."--Jacket.
Download or read book Meyerbeer s Opera Les Huguenots Containing the Italian Text with an English Translation and the Music of All the Principal Airs written by Giacomo Meyerbeer and published by . This book was released on 1895 with total page 30 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Les Huguenots written by Giacomo Meyerbeer and published by Alfred Music. This book was released on with total page 508 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Expertly arranged Vocal Score by Giacomo Meyerbeer from the Kalmus Edition series. This is from the Romantic era.
Download or read book Giacomo Meyerbeer written by Richard Arsenty and published by . This book was released on 2013 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 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 (1791â "1864) â " 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'Ã0/00toile 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.
Download or read book Gli Ugonotti Les Huguenots a grand opera the music by G Meyerbeer the libretto tr by M Maggioni As represented at the Royal Italian opera Covent Garden written by Augustin Eugène Scribe and published by . This book was released on 1848 with total page 128 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Diaries of Giacomo Meyerbeer 1791 1839 written by Giacomo Meyerbeer and published by Fairleigh Dickinson Univ Press. This book was released on 1999 with total page 588 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Meyerbeer s Les Huguenots written by Burton D. Fisher and published by Opera Journeys Publishing. This book was released on 2006 with total page 33 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Burton D. Fisher's extremely popular Mini Guides feature Principal Characters in the Opera, Brief Story Synopsis, Story Narrative with Music Highlight Examples, and an insightful and in depth Commentary and Analysis of the opera.
Download or read book Giacomo Meyerbeer written by Robert Ignatius Letellier and published by Cambridge Scholars Publishing. This book was released on 2008-10-01 with total page 610 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 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.
Download or read book The Diaries of Giacomo Meyerbeer 1840 1849 written by Giacomo Meyerbeer and published by Associated University Presse. This book was released on 1999 with total page 454 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Volume 2 covers the 1840s, a period designated as the Prussian Years. From 1846 Meyerbeer's journal becomes a consistent daily record, resulting in one of the most sustained depictions of a contemporary artistic, theatrical, and musical milieu ever kept by a famous composer. Illustrated.
Download or read book Gli Ugonotti written by Eugène Scribe and published by . This book was released on 1849 with total page 118 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Complete Libretti in Eleven Volumes Grand op ra 2 Les Huguenots written by Giacomo Meyerbeer and published by Cambridge Scholars Publishing. This book was released on 2009 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Giacomo Meyerbeer, one of the most important and influential opera composers of the nineteenth century, enjoyed a fame during his lifetime hardly rivalled by any of his contemporaries. This ten volume set provides in one collection all the operatic texts set by Meyerbeer in his career. The texts offer the most complete versions available. Each libretto is translated into modern English by Richard Arsenty; and each work is introduced by Robert Letellier. In this comprehensive edition of Meyerbeer's libretti, the original text and its translation are placed on facing pages for ease of use. The eleventh volume presents the fourth of Meyerbeerâ (TM)s grands opÃ(c)ras, and his final work. By 1860 long-imposed labor had started to tell upon the composerâ (TM)s health: he knew that he must concentrate on the â oenavigator projectâ which he had started twenty years earlier if he intended to finish it. Meyerbeer died on 2 May 1864, the day after the completion of the copying of the full score of this his last opera, Vasco da Gama. Minna Meyerbeer and CÃ(c)sar-Victor Perrin, the director of the OpÃ(c)ra, entrusted the editing of a performing edition to the famous Belgian musicologist François-Joseph FÃ(c)tis, while the libretto was revised by MÃ(c)lesville. The original title of Lâ (TM)Africaine was restored out of deference to public expectation. Much of the music and action was suppressed, in spite of the strain this inflicted on the internal logic of the story. While L'Africaine is not lacking in the grandeur of statement and stirring climaxes for which the composer was so famous, there is a new intimacy, a new intensity of melancholic lyricism. Like its famous predecessors, it is basically an historical work, derived from the period of sixteenth-century Renaissance. The account of Vasco da Gama's voyage of discovery around the Cape of Good Hope and conquest of Calicut (1497-98) is subjected to a fictional treatment that raises many interesting issues. The framework is historical, but most of the characters and course of action are not; in fact the end of the opera, in the suicide of the heroine, suddenly leaves the terra firma of reality, and transports us into the mystical realms of the spirit. It is this mixture of modes that is central to the dramaturgy of L'Africaine, a confusion of history and fairytale, ancient certainties and challenging discoveries, in the creation of a new mythology. There is also originality in formal developments, with the great tenor scene in act 4 providing a new malleability in handling the constraints of shape and genre: recitative, arioso and cabaletta have a fluent integration in trying to explore the text more pointedly. Lâ (TM)Africaine was produced on 28 April 1865, a great posthumous tribute to its famous creators. The Ship Scene, the exotic Indian act, and the Scene of the Manchineel Tree exerted a fascination on audiences, and elicited new praise. The work full of melodic beauty and rapturous lyricism, began a triumphal progress through the world, beginning with the big stages of London and Berlin.
Download or read book Meyerbeer Studies written by Robert Ignatius Letellier and published by Fairleigh Dickinson Univ Press. This book was released on 2005 with total page 252 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "In 1936 Meyerbeer's opera Les Huguenots achieved its 1,120[superscript th] performance at the Paris Opera. This extraordinary record is an indication of the vast fame and influence of its composer who was once a household name, like Verdi or Puccini. Now he is unknown to the ordinary opera lover. These essays represent something of an odyssey to seek out and know the shadowy figure behind so much divided opinion and long neglect. They represent attempts, at various stages over thirty years, to find Meyerbeer and enter the world of his remarkable operatic creations that once so characterized the musical life of European civilization."--Jacket.
Download or read book The Diaries of Giacomo Meyerbeer The years of celebrity 1850 1856 written by Giacomo Meyerbeer and published by Fairleigh Dickinson Univ Press. This book was released on 1999 with total page 500 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Volume 3 covers a time span that preeminently represents the period in the composer's life known as The Years of International Fame (1850-56). Confirmed as the major figure on the operatic scene, and freed from the more onerous duties of his official position, Meyerbeer was able to enjoy his most remarkable period of stability and renown, as the detailed and absorbing diary entries reveal. These years saw the composing, rehearsing, and staging of L'Etoile du Nord (1854), and his personal supervision of major productions in London, Dresden, Stuttgart, and Vienna.
Download or read book An Introduction to the Dramatic Works of Giacomo Meyerbeer Operas Ballets Cantatas Plays written by Robert Ignatius Letellier and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2017-07-05 with total page 270 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Giacomo Meyerbeer (1791-1864) was a great musical dramatist in his own right. The fame of his operas rests on his radical treatment of form, his development of scenic complexes and greater plasticity of structure and melody, his dynamic use of the orchestra, and close attention to all aspects of presentation and production, all of which set new standards in Romantic opera and dramaturgy. This book carries forward the process of rediscovery and reassessment of Meyerbeers art including not just his famous French operas, but also his German and Italian onesplacing them in the context of his entire dramatic oeuvre, including his ballets, oratorios, cantatas and incidental music. From Meyerbeers first stage presentation in 1810 to his great posthumous accolade in 1865, some 24 works mark the unfolding of this life lived for dramatic music. The reputation of the famous four grand operas may well live on in the public consciousness, but the other works remain largely unknown. This book provides an approachable introduction to them. The works have been divided into their generic types for quick reference and helpful association, and placed within the context of the composers life and artistic development. Each section unfolds a brief history of the works origins, an account of the plot, a critical survey of some of its musical characteristics, and a record of its performance history. Robert Letellier examines each work from a dramaturgical view point, including the essentialoften challengingphilosophical and historical elements in the scenarios, and how these concepts were translated musically onto the stage. A series of portraits and stage iconography assist in bringing the works to life.
