Tragédie lyrique in a prologue and 5 acts Composer : Marc-Antoine Charpentier Libretto : Thomas Corneille First performed : Académie royale de musique, Paris, 4 December 1693 Lully was dead – and with him his monopoly over opera. https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x44fg5c For more than a decade, only he had been able to compose opera in France. He defined the tragédie … Continue reading 116. Médée (Charpentier)
ARMIDE Tragédie lyrique in prologue and 5 actsComposer : Jean-Baptiste LullyLibretto : Philippe QuinaultFirst performed : Académie royale de musique, théâtre du Palais-Royal, Paris, 15 February 1686 Armide, Lully and Quinault’s final tragédie lyrique, is generally considered their masterpiece. The critics, for once, are right. If you listen to only one Lully, listen to this. We’ve been rather … Continue reading 115. Armide (Lully)
AMADIS (DE GAULE) Opéra in a prologue and 5 acts Composer: Jean-Baptiste Lully Libretto: Philippe Quinault First performed: Théâtre du Palais-Royal, Paris, January 1684 For the first time, French opera leaves the world of the Greek heroes and gods, for mediaeval romance. Amadis, like all good heroes of chivalry, is separated from his parents at … Continue reading 113. Amadis (Lully)
DIDO AND AENEAS Composer: Henry Purcell Libretto: Nahum Tate, after Virgil's Aeneid First performed: 1680s, after Blow's Venus and Adonis Dido and Aeneas is probably the best opera since Monteverdi. Purcell - "the English Orpheus" - and Lully were contemporaries. You can hear the Franco-Italian's influence on the overture (slow-fast-slow in the French style), in … Continue reading 112. Dido and Aeneas (Purcell)
VENUS AND ADONIS First performed: circa 1683 Composer: John Blow Libretto: Unknown, possibly Anne Kingsmill Opera in England began in the court of Charles II, the merry monarch who reopened theatres and restored enjoyment after the gloomy, god-fearing government of Oliver Cromwell. (Lord protect us from Protectors!) There had been masques, of course, since the … Continue reading 111. Venus and Adonis (Blow)
PERSÉE Tragédie lyrique in a prologue and 5 acts Composer : Jean-Baptiste Lully Libretto : Philippe Quinault First performed : Académie royale de musique (1re salle du Palais-Royal), 17 April 1682, conducted by the composer ; Versailles, June 1682 Quinault's libretti remove the imagination of the Greek myths, petrifying them, as if with the Gorgon's head, into bland and … Continue reading 110. Persée (Lully)
PROSERPINE Tragédie lyrique in a prologue and 5 acts Composer: Jean-Baptiste Lully Librettist : Philippe Quinault First performed : Saint-Germain-en-Laye, 3 February 1680; Acadëmie royale de musique (1re salle du Palais-Royal), 16 November 1680, conducted by Lully Persephone, daughter of Demeter, was abducted from the sunny hillside where she and her companions were gathering flowers, and dragged … Continue reading 109. Proserpine (Lully)
