Announced as an October 4th release on B-Records, the label that gave us Saint-Saëns' Ascanio:
https://www.jpc.de/jpcng/classic/detail/-/art/erlanger-la-sorciere/hnum/11965616 (3 CDs)
Is this the first opera recording of d'Erlanger? I know there is an excerpt from this work Tess.
jpc somehow mixed up the two Erlangers. La Sorciere is by Camille Erlanger as you see on the cd cover. His opera L'aube rouge was given in Wexford in 2023.
I don't know if any of Frederic d'Erlanger's operas has been produced or staged in recent time.
Oh dear. Thanks for the correction, Mathias. My fault for not noticing.
Here's an excerpt from the set:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RQQLqM_L-Wg&list=OLAK5uy_mWK7zowZ8trs1SbICEcKWQlXFMdxLOQwQ
Thanks for this! Anything similar to late Massenet has me all ears. I was rather surprised to see more on-line than in the vinyl or CD listings. Are these videos appearing on YT radio broadcasts ? I really like the writing of the YT excerpt (1953??) of his opera Aphrodite with the piano score attached. Interestingly there are a fair number of book scores of Erlanger available. But thanks again for someone I completely missed.
Yes - an exciting release for sure.
The set is now available (but I've not listened to my copy yet). As britishcomposer mentioned in an earlier post, another Erlanger opera, L'Aube Rouge, was performed as part of the Wexford Festival Opera season last year and I've uploaded a recording of RTE's live broadcast in our Downloads Board here (https://www.unsungcomposers.com/forum/index.php/topic,9589.0.html).
Thanks, Mark.
La sorcière is now out - and it's in a very 'perfumed', very French late-romantic idiom. Dating from 1912, this will appeal to opera lovers who favour the sort of luscious writing found in, say, Erlanger's contemporary Charpentier (e.g. in Louise), although it lacks the memorable 'big number' of that work (e.g. 'Depuis le jour'). Nevertheless, a really exciting find, very well sung and performed here.
This release features a substantial book which holds the three CDs and contains background material on the operatic trends of the period, plus a thorough analysis of the music and a French-English libretto. Just one criticism: the orange print used (sparingly) is nevertheless difficult to read with comfort.
NB US Amazon is giving a November 1 release date.
Pickiness: fairly sure internal nouns (eg Depuis le jour, La sorcière) use lowercase with a few exceptions.
I learned Italian in university but my teachers never clearly told me that. After these years I figured out this bit of Roman Language spelling rule in titles and can never stand things like Andante Sostenuto ever since (which I always prefer before the "conversion"!)
tuatara: Erm...??? Italian what now? That is French. Different languages...
I know that's French. In my experience in mainstream Roman Languages this is a common rule.
Eric's right, I think. Probably my German influencing things (capitals on nouns).
Anyway: à la musique - j'ai corrigé le titre de l'opéra.
My copy arrived too and I've only delved into the first act as yet and while it's obviously very well-crafted, nothing has really leapt out at me yet. Perhaps it will take time. As Alan says, the booklet - well, book really - is very thorough. Alongside a couple of good essays, there are about a dozen pages of musical analysis with excerpts from the score. It's similar to the packages put together by Bru Zane, but the in-depth analysis is something I've not seen before. It helps identify the motifs Erlanger uses, but as Alan also points out, you'll be looking in vain for the big tune. Nevertheless, it's great to have another rare French opera from this era. Perhaps we might dare hope for some more Erlanger - or Bruneau or Aubert or Dupont's rather fine Antar?
While I'm glad to have the chance to hear such a rarity, it's easy to see why it's not survived in the repertoire. Having said which, there's always something to delight the ear even if it's not 100% memorable. This is what happens at the beginning of Act 3 (CD2) when Enrique meets Zoraya. Terrific hokum, superbly sung here by Jean-François Borras and Andreea Soare! The idiom? Somewhere between Massenet (on steroids), Florent Schmitt (La tragédie de Salomé) and Richard Strauss (Salome - almost)! The atmosphere's very powerful, but where's the killer memorable phrase? Mind you, the finale's a knockout.
The use of "tunes" in opera is worthy of a large book. My own feeling is that the very late Romantic idiom 1900-1918 was rather poor soil for separable tunes leaving aside Italian opera, and even Puccini had some difficulty doing that in his more harmonically advanced scores such as La Fanciulla. A big tune didn't really save Charpentier's Louise from never entering the standard repertoire either, just hovering at the far edge. And the even more obvious example is Die Tote Stadt (with Marietta's Lied and Pierrot's Tanzlied) that was regularly and widely mocked and hammered for 75 years. [ e.g. https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1985-09-12-ca-21188-story.html ] It's the Late Romantic style itself which is somewhat difficult for regular classical music fans who have different expectations (Mendelssohn, Bruckner, Brahms) when they hear the word Romantic and a tune or two is unlikely to make it more immediately palatable.
Speaking only for myself, my expectation for these very late Romantic works is more along the lines of a long floating wallow. I don't want something to jolt me out of that: poor orchestral craftsmanship, lack of idiomatic vocal writing (looking at you Respighi), and last and least, some tune thrown in to liven things up unless being generated organically from the operatic narrative.
Puccini, however, seemed to be able to lob in the odd killer aria right to the end. What's the most sung tenor aria? Nessun dorma, probably. And Turandot was left unfinished - in 1924! Clever old Giacomo: he was always thinking about the commercial value of a 3-minute star turn...
True, but I do think Maury's post is perceptive in general and there's no doubt that even Puccini couldn't always come up with the goods - witness Fanciulla, as he says. From what I've heard so far of Erlanger it's all lusciously melodius but tunes themselves are few and far between.
As he got older Puccini became adept at absorbing trends in the wider musical scene while remaining totally himself - a remarkable feat. But, yes, the percentage of hummable tunes from his pen dropped considerably over time. Nevertheless he was always mindful of the need to plant a 78-era record side's worth of memorable singing somewhere in his later operas.
I imagine that Erlanger was trying to achieve something different...
I think I could have been a bit clearer. The issue starting really in widespread fashion in the 20th C is that the music listener is hearing both new and older styles at the same time. In the past people only heard new music. Music listening is sort of a set of negotiated expectations between composer and listener, but these expectations vary by style (including national variants) and genre. Because we all listen to or at least hear multiple styles every day, it is easy to start judging and comparing styles with each other. In the past listeners just heard one style mostly and learned how to listen to it (manage their expectations) if they didn't outright reject it. So that was the logic behind my statement that when I listen to these very late Romantic works I don't expect to hear separable tunes. Rather I want a floating, soaring or liquid flow which either maintains my interest or not as such. If I want tunes I go to different styles.
I think you have a point. In general the French tradition was probably more advanced than the Italian at the turn of the 19th/20th centuries; there's no contemporary equivalent of Debussy, d'Indy or Dukas in Italy, for example - although changes were certainly to follow, even in Italy.
By the way: in opera the changes started much earlier than we might imagine, mainly through the innovations of Wagner, turning what was regarded as primarily an entertainment into a cosmic drama.
This may be of interest:
<<Camille Erlanger belongs to the "belle époque" of opera composers such as Alfred Bruneau, Xavier Leroux, Georges Hüe and Henry Février. They all knew the ins and outs of writing for the theater, and dramatic music was a major part of their catalog. Yet none of them made a lasting impression on the operatic landscape of their time, even though the quality of their music deserves to occupy a significant place in the theater repertoire...
Erlanger's musical style is characterized by dense writing, abundant conductive motifs and opulent orchestration. His harmonic language does not shy away from sometimes surprising audacities that can lead briefly to the frontiers of tonality. An outstanding orchestrator, he possesses an obvious gift for musical scenery, and knows how to set it in a striking manner in just a few measures. Lyrical outpourings and voluptuous melodic outbursts are rarely part of his vocabulary. His qualities as a dramatist crystallize around his remarkable sense of sound design. Through the singularity of a melodic design or harmonic sequence, he succeeds in creating a remarkably effective musical framework, with an evocative force that enables him to characterize his figures, their personalities and their states of mind. At the time, this highly theatrical yet unconventional approach seems to have disconcerted both lovers of traditional lyric art rooted in the Gounod-Massenet tradition, and those who championed the "new art" of opera represented by composers such as Debussy, d'Indy and Dukas.>> (my emphasis)
https://www.iemj.org/en/camille-erlanger-1863-1919/
In other words, Erlanger is a member of an 'in-between' generation which was soon overtaken and replaced by more revolutionary figures.
Mr Howe , sorry I overlooked your cogent reply. Yes the late 19th C harmonic development can be considered neo-Tristanesque as it is hard to imagine it occurring in such intensive fashion without that impetus. As for your last sentence, ironically the "revolutionary" music has mostly faded from concert halls.
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I just received the Erlanger La sorcière CD issue and played the first CD tonight.
Just WOW. A fantastic arresting opening. The short overture/prelude is quite original and the back and forth of solo singer with chorus pulls one into the opera very effectively. Erlanger's orchestral scoring is sophisticated and wonderful. It also has enough dramatic bite to keep the opera moving. The vocal writing is more along the lines of late Massenet which is fine. I would say your bolded sentence applies more to the orchestral writing than the vocals which are quite lyrical overall even in dramatic passages. The one exception are the melting solo violin cameos which are as lyrically romantic as can be. Overall if the first CD is representative this is just a fantastic opera in the late Massenet French style. The recording sonics are top notch. Another door that I thought closed with Massenet's death is now opened with Erlanger. The one quibble with the book format of the CD issue are the stiff CD pockets which will scratch the CD surfaces, Fortunately the pockets are just big enough for me to place the CD in a soft plastic non-scratching slipcover. I hope that more Erlanger operas and related music will be issued. A big thumbs up for this one.
Update: Having heard the rest of the opera my opinion above is not changed. Outstanding opera and recording.
Here for the record is a list of Erlanger's 12 (13?) operas from several sources. There is some inconsistency in opinion about Saint Julien as to whether it is an opera or a "lyric drama". The recording I saw seemed to be only one CD which would indicate a rather short operatic score if it is one. Is that correct? One interesting coincidence is that both Erlanger and Massenet composed an opera about Bacchus in 1909.
La Légende de Saint-Julien l'Hospitalier, légende dramatique in three acts and seven tableaux, after the story by Gustave Flaubert, (1888)
· Kermaria, drame lyrique in three acts, libretto by Pierre-Barthélemy Gheusi, Opéra-Comique 8 February 1897
· Faublas, libretto by Pierre-Barthélemy Gheusi, 1897
· Le Juif polonais, after a novel by Erckmann-Chatrian, Opéra-Comique, 11 April 1900
· Le Fils de l'étoile, drame musical in five acts, libretto by Catulle Mendès, 20 April 1904, Palais Garnier
· La Glu, drame lyrique after the novel by Jean Richepin
· Aphrodite, drame musical in five acts and seven tableaux after the novel by Pierre Louÿs, adaptation by Louis de Gramont, 23 (or 27 ?) March 1906, Opéra-Comique
· Bacchus triomphant, 11 September 1909, Bordeaux
· L'aube rouge, 29 December 1911, Rouen
· Hannele Mattern, rêve lyrique in five acts (1911), libretto by Jean Thorel and Louis-Ferdinand de Gramont (1854–1912) after the drama Hanneles Himmelfahrt by Gerhart Hauptmann, 28 January 1950, Strasbourg (Opéra du Rhin)
· La Sorcière, 18 December 1912, Paris
· Le Barbier de Deauville, 1917
· La Forfaiture, 1921, posthumous premiere Paris after 1915 film The Cheat
Ooo, forfaiture is one of those false cognates and did not mean what I thought it meant.