While he was once a bel canto specialist, he is now more devoted to heavier repertory, particularly in the operas of Verdi. Berlioz conceived of the work as a “légende dramatique,” not quite opera and not quite cantata; but if Saturday’s performance is any indication, this Faustdoesn’t work without the theatrics. The composer designated this thrilling hybrid of oratorio and opera a ‘légende dramatique’. He composed La Damnation de Faust, en route, offering the new work to a half-empty house in Paris, December 6, 1846. Berlioz's magnificent exploration of the Faust legend is a unique operatic journey. Its first performance at the Opéra-Comique, Paris, 6 December 1846, did not meet with critical acclaim, perhaps due to its halfway status between opera and cantata; the public was apathetic, and two performances (and a cancelled third) rendered a financial setback for Berlioz: "Nothing in my career as an artist wounded me more deeply than this unexpected indifference", he remembered. The masterpiece of Hector Berlioz, La Damnation de Faust, long popular in the concert room, will be presented as an opera on Friday evening, December 7th. 24 is a work for four solo voices, full seven-part chorus, large children's chorus and orchestra [1] by the French composer Hector Berlioz . “The most dramatic piece that Berlioz ever wrote,” is how conductor John Nelson describes La Damnation de Faust. The first page of the original manuscript of the opera, La Damnation de Faust, by Hector Berlioz (1803 – 1869) The next part of the dramatic legend only required a stage setting to make it operatic. The other guests offer an ironic “Amen,” and Méphistophélès continues with another song about a flea that brings his relatives to infest a whole royal court. On The Damnation of Faust at the Metropolitan Opera. By all means question, even negate Faust’s – and Berlioz’s – Romantic questing, but it really needs doing with greater verve and belief. Originally subtitled “concert opera” and later “legend-opera”. This was a difficult time for Berlioz, as his marriage failed to bring him the happiness he desired. Season Focus 2018-19. It is said that Berlioz never intended for it to be staged. Todestag nimmt Deutsche Grammophon zum Anlass, die herausragende Einspielung von Igor Markevich mit dem Orchestre Lamoureux Paris, dem Choeur Enfants RTF, sowie dem Choeurs Elisabeth Brasseur in einer … Faust's dream scene is ethereal, the final chase before his damnation graphic in the most positive sense of the word. Berlioz: La Damnation de Faust, Op. A few days later, the Teatro dell’Opera’s adventurous production of Berlioz's La Damnation de Faust looked fit for a theatre whose aim is to become a European leader … Last season, she sang Berlioz’s La damnation de Faust with the Boston Symphony under Charles Dutoit. The performance is as scintillating as the music. One would praise his “nice, ingenious musical ideas” but also mock his “obscure musical language”. Les nouvelles productions lyriques à l’Opéra de Paris se suivent, mais ne se ressemblent guère. Based on Goethe’s Faust and first performed in 1846, it is an epic hybrid of oratorio and opera – a ‘légende dramatique’ according to the composer, who recognised that its greatest potential lay in firing the audience’s imagination: “Music has great wings,” he said, “but the walls of a theatre do not allow it to spread them to the full.” His early successes were behind him, and he was struggling both to find inspiration (a failing marriage put strain on his creativity) and to retain his popularity and place in French cultural society. Méphistophélès and Faust arrive at Auerbach’s tavern in Leipzig, where Brander, a student, sings a song about a rat whose high life in a kitchen is ended by a dose of poison. Die Oper „La Damnation de Faust“ zählt zu den bekanntesten Werken des französischen Komponisten Hector Berlioz. DVD-Y20 Berlioz Damnation de Faust 2002 Bruxelles VIDEO. Written between 1860 and 1862, Berlioz’s opera Béatrice et Bénédict, with a libretto by the composer based on Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing, was the composer’s last work. Info for Berlioz: La Damnation de Faust (Remastered). 24, H 111, Pt. Following in the triumphant footsteps of Les Troyens, also recorded at the Auditorium Erasme “The most dramatic piece that Berlioz ever wrote,” is how conductor John Nelson describes La Damnation de Faust. La damnation Faust (1845) dates from Berlioz’s difficult middle-period of composition. Du moins dans l’effet. By the time it was written, the composer had found fame by his masterful trio of works - Symphonie fantastique , Harold in Italy and Romeo and Juliet . Sir Colin Davis, renown Berlioz interpreter, conducts the London Symphony Orchestra (LSO) extremely well. Explore our selection of the best Berlioz works including Symphonie Fantastique, Les Troyens and La Damnation De Faust. And so it was, following the composer’s discovery of Faust Part One in 1828 that Goethe joined Virgil and Shakespeare to form Berlioz's trinity. After reprising her star turn in the title role of Susan Stroman’s take on Lehár’s The Merry Widow at the Met, she joined Nathan Gunn for Trouble in Tahiti at Lyric Opera of Chicago to … The German poet Johann Wolfgang von Goethe’s tragic play about the scholar Faust, who makes a pact with the Devil to exchange his soul for unlimited knowledge and pleasures, has inspired generations of artists from different disciplines, amongst them operas by Arrigo Boito, Charles Gounod and Hector Berlioz. 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