 | Members of Yale Opera in a staging rehearsal for the Yale Opera's performance of Charles Gounod's "Le medecin malgre lui." Left to right: Caleb Stokes as Lucas, Liam Moran as Geronte, Sarah Jane McMahon as Lucinde and Michael Scarcelle as Valere. |
French opera will be celebrated on campus during a two-day international conference tracing the evolution of opera
in France and featuring a presentation of Charles Gounod's operatic work "Le médecin malgré lui," based on a comedy
by Molière.
The events, sponsored by the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, the French department and the School of Music, will take place Friday and Saturday, April 16 and 17.
The conference, titled "French Opera from Gounod to the Ballets Russes," will explore the development and importance of the opera in France from the end of the 19th century to the first half of the 20th century. It will feature talks by prominent musicologists and experts in the field of French opera from France, England and the United States. Their presentations will highlight the contributions and work of such composers as Gounod, Massenet, Honegger, Ravel, Debussy and Alfred Bruneau, as well as of American diva Sybil Sanderson, among others.
Chairing the sessions will be Edwin Duval, professor and chair of Yale's French department; Vincent Giroud, curator of modern books at the Beinecke Library; and James Hepokoski, professor of music history and director of graduate studies in the music department at Yale.
Sessions will run 2-5 p.m. on Friday and 9:30 a.m.-5 p.m. on Saturday. All sessions will take place in Rooms 38 and 39 of the Beinecke Library. Some of the discussion will take place in French.
The conference is free and open to the public, but advance registration is suggested due to limited space. For information, send e-mail to beinecke.conferences@yale.edu or visit the website at www.library.yale.edu/beinecke/blexhib.htm.
Students in the Yale Opera Program at the School of Music will perform "Le médecin malgré lui" -- variously translated
as "A Doctor in Spite of Himself," "The Frantic Physician," "The Mock Doctor" and "Quack" -- both Friday and Saturday at 8 p.m. in Sprague Memorial Hall, 470 College St.
The opera, which premiered in Paris in 1858, will be performed in a version commissioned by choreographer Serge Diaghilev for a Ballets Russes revival in 1923, with sung recitatives composed by Erik Satie in place of the spoken dialogue. The Yale performance is believed to be the first North American production of this work.
The opera will be sung in French with English supertitles and will be performed with a full orchestra. Noted flutist and School of Music faculty member Ransom Wilson will conduct, with stage direction by Mark Verzatt. Verzatt, who began directing operas following a career as a ballet and stage dancer, directed this year's Yale Opera production of Puccini's "Gianni Schichi and Suor Angelica," and in 2002 directed a Yale Opera production of various opera scenes.
Tickets are $12 and $8; $5 for students. For more information, contact the School of Music box office at (203) 432-4158.
On Friday at 5:15 p.m., there will be a pre-performance presentation by Jacques Guicharnaud, professor emeritus of French at Yale, along with conference presenters Steven Huebner of McGill University and Robert Orledge of the University of Liverpool. It will take place in Rm. 102 of Linsly-Chittenden Hall, 63 High St.
The Beinecke Library owns the original manuscripts for both the Gounod opera and the Satie additions. The Gounod manuscript, a component of the Frederick R. Koch Collection, came to Yale in 1996. The Satie manuscript was acquired with library funds shortly afterwards.
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