Le désert

Last updated • 3 min readFrom Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia

Le désert is an "ode-symphonie" in three parts by the French composer Félicien David with words by fellow Saint-Simonien Auguste Colin, written after the composer's stay in Egypt and the Holy Land. [1]

Contents

The work was first performed to great acclaim at the Paris Conservatoire on 8 December 1844, conducted by Théophile Tilmant, and taken up at the Théâtre-Italien and by Berlioz. [2] At its premiere the work was played alongside two other Saint-Simonien works also by David; Chant du Soir and Le Sommeil de Paris. [3] David had needed to borrow 1,200 francs to pay for the orchestra and hall. [4] David's friends and colleagues Charles Duveyrier (half brother of Mélesville) and Barthélemy Prosper Enfantin took it upon themselves to challenge a contract David had innocently signed with Escudier which had given the publisher the rights to all David's works for ever, for only 1,200 francs. [3] Le désert was successful from its premiere and influenced the conception of works based around the orient by many other French composers. David later wrote other works in similar vein, such as his operas La perle du Brésil and Lalla-Roukh . [1]

The work is scored for speaker, tenor solo, male chorus and orchestra. It consists of several vocal and orchestral movements, each introduced by a recitation. The different sections of the ode move from the song of the desert, arrival of a caravan, storm in the desert, calm after the storm and the caravan continuing its journey, the star of Venus, a hymn to the night, dances, sunrise, the song of the muezzin, departure of the caravan and song to Allah.

Le désert was planned to be staged as an opera at the Théâtre Lyrique to accompany La sonnambula in 1867, but these plans did not come to fruition. However, Pasdeloup in his short-lived tenure at the Théâtre Lyrique presented seven well-received concert performances in 1869–70, as well as concerts of David's symphonic ode Christophe Colomb. [5]

Verdi used the melody of the ‘chant du muezzin’ in his ballet music for the Paris premiere of Otello in 1894. Budden also finds the influence of the dawn movement of Le désert – which Verdi had heard in Milan in 1845 – in the prologue of Attila (1846). [6] Parts of Bizet's Les pecheurs de perles , also show the influence of Le désert, for instance in the Act 1 finale (« O dieu Brahma ») and Act 2 « De mon amie ». [7]

Offenbach wrote music for a 'parodie' of the work entitled Citrouillard au désert, first performed at the house of the Countess Bertin de Vaux at the end of February 1846. A simple bourgeois is bored in the desert, and diverted by several choruses and dances. At the break of dawn a long crescendo leads to the tune 'Au clair de la lune'. The work was also performed at the Opéra-Comique on 27 March 1846. [8]

David's work is mentioned in chapter XV of Jules Verne's 1886 novel Robur the Conqueror . [9] André Gide was fond of this "likeable" piece as a teenager, as reported in his memoir Si le grain ne meurt , chapter 6. Henri Vieuxtemps made a transcription of the tenor aria "Hymne à la nuit" as La Nuit for viola and piano.

Section listing

Première partie
  1. Chœur: Allah! Allah!
  2. Marche de la caravane
  3. La tempête au désert; La caravane reprend sa marche
Deuxième partie
  1. Hymne à la nuit
  2. Fantaisie arabe; Danse des Almées
  3. La liberté au désert
  4. La rêverie du soir
Troisième partie
  1. Le lever du soleil
  2. Chant du muezzin
  3. Le départ de la caravane

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Gaspare Spontini</span> Italian composer and conductor

Gaspare Luigi Pacifico Spontini was an Italian opera composer and conductor from the classical era.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Étienne Méhul</span> French composer

Étienne Nicolas Méhul was a French composer of the late classical and early romantic periods. He was known as "the most important opera composer in France during the Revolution". He was also the first composer to be called a "Romantic". He is known particularly for his operas, written in keeping with the reforms introduced by Christoph Willibald Gluck and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.

<i>Les Troyens</i> Opera by Hector Berlioz

Les Troyens is a French grand opera in five acts, running for about five hours, by Hector Berlioz. The libretto was written by Berlioz himself from Virgil's epic poem the Aeneid; the score was composed between 1856 and 1858. Les Troyens is Berlioz's most ambitious work, the summation of his entire artistic career, but he did not live to see it performed in its entirety. Under the title Les Troyens à Carthage, the last three acts were premièred with many cuts by Léon Carvalho's company, the Théâtre Lyrique, at their theatre on the Place du Châtelet in Paris on 4 November 1863, with 21 repeat performances. The reduced versions run for about three hours. After decades of neglect, today the opera is considered by some music critics as one of the finest ever written.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ernest Reyer</span> French opera composer and music critic

Louis Étienne Ernest Reyer was a French opera composer and music critic.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Félicien David</span> French composer (1810–1876)

Félicien-César David was a French composer.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Joseph Méry</span> French writer, journalist, novelist, poet, playwright and librettist

Joseph Méry was a French writer, journalist, novelist, poet, playwright and librettist.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Véronique Gens</span> French operatic soprano (born 1966)

Véronique Gens is a French operatic soprano. She has spent much of her career recording and performing Baroque music.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Eugène Ketterer</span> French pianist and composer

Eugène Ketterer was a prolific French composer and pianist who was known for his numerous salon arrangements of contemporary opera arias.

Jules Bastin was a Belgian operatic bass who excelled in both serious and comic roles, and left several recordings.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Théâtre Lyrique</span> Former opera company in Paris

The Théâtre Lyrique was one of four opera companies performing in Paris during the middle of the 19th century. The company was founded in 1847 as the Opéra-National by the French composer Adolphe Adam and renamed Théâtre Lyrique in 1852. It used four different theatres in succession, the Cirque Olympique, the Théâtre Historique, the Salle du Théâtre-Lyrique, and the Salle de l'Athénée, until it ceased operations in 1872.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rosine Bloch</span> French opera singer

Rosine Bloch was a French operatic mezzo-soprano of Jewish descent who had a successful stage career in Europe between 1865 and 1891. She not only possessed a beautiful, warm, and lyrical voice but was also a remarkably beautiful woman physically. Although most of her career was spent performing at the Opéra in Paris, she also appeared in stages in Belgium, Monaco, and England.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Salle Ventadour</span> Opera house, offices (after 1878) in rue Méhul, arrondissement of Paris

The Salle Ventadour, a former Parisian theatre in the rue Neuve-Ventadour, now the rue Méhul, was built between 1826 and 1829 for the Opéra-Comique, to designs by Jacques-Marie Huvé, a prominent architect. The original theatre had a capacity of 1,106, but was subsequently taken over by the Théâtre-Italien and expanded to a capacity of 1,295 in 1841, thereafter becoming perhaps most noteworthy as the theatre in which the majority of the operas of the Italian composer Giuseppe Verdi were first performed in France. When the Théâtre-Italien company went out of business in 1878, the theatre was converted to offices.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Marie Sasse</span> Belgian operatic soprano

Marie Constance Sasse [Sax, Saxe, Sass] was a Belgian operatic soprano. "Her voice was powerful, flexible, and appealing", and she was one of the leading sopranos at the Paris Opéra from 1860 to 1870. She created the roles of Elisabeth in the Paris premiere of Wagner's Tannhäuser, Sélika in the world premiere of Meyerbeer's L'Africaine, and Elisabeth de Valois in the world premiere of Verdi's Don Carlos.

Jean Giraudeau, was an artist and French tenor, and later theatre director, particularly associated with the Opéra-Comique in Paris, and described in Grove as having a “lyrical voice” as well as being “a superb character actor”. He left a wide selection of recordings from both his operatic and concert repertoire, and created roles in several contemporary operas.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Désiré Magnus</span> Belgian pianist, teacher and composer (1828–1883)

Désiré Magnus was a Belgian concert pianist, teacher and composer of salon music who published under the pseudonym D. Magnus.

<i>Les Heures persanes</i>

Les Heures persanes, Op. 65, is one of the most famous works of the French composer Charles Koechlin.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pauline Guéymard-Lauters</span>

Pauline Guéymard-Lauters was a major opera singer in Paris in the 19th century, creating important soprano/mezzo-soprano roles at the Paris Opera. Her vocal range has been described as “a soprano of wide extension”.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Oscar Comettant</span>

Oscar Comettant was a 19th-century French composer, musicologist and traveller.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lydie Pace</span>

Lydie Lamine, also known as Lydie Pace, is a Central African singer. She has won several awards during her career, including the Prix de Chant Lyrique.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Charles-Amable Battaille</span> French operatic bass (1822–1872)

Charles-Amable Battaille was a French operatic bass. Appreciated both for his voice and his acting skills, he premiered the main bass roles for the works represented at the Opéra-Comique between 1848 and 1857, and is especially notable as the first singer of the role of Peter the Great in Meyerbeer's L'Étoile du nord (1854).

References

  1. 1 2 Macdonald H. Félicien David. In : The New Grove Dictionary of Opera. Macmillan, London and New York, 1997.
  2. Macdonald H, ed. Selected letters of Berlioz (translated by Roger Nichols). Faber & Faber, London and Boston, 1995.
  3. 1 2 Locke, Ralph P. Music, Musicians and Saint-Simonians. The University of Chicago Press, Chicago and London, 1986, p209-210.
  4. Barzun J. Berlioz and his century – an introduction to the age of romanticism. Meridian Books, New York, 1956.
  5. Walsh T J. Second Empire Opera: The Théâtre Lyrique Paris 1851–1870. John Calder (Publishers Ltd), London, 1981.
  6. Budden J. Verdi (the Master Musicians). JM Dent and Sons Ltd, London & Melbourne, 1985.
  7. Lacombe H. The Keys to French Opera in the Nineteenth Century. University of California Press, Berkeley, 2001.
  8. Yon, Jean-Claude. Jacques Offenbach. Éditions Gallimard, Paris, 2000.
  9. Wikisource text of Robur the Conqueror