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Il Pleut, Il Pleut, Bergère
(, ''It's raining, it's raining, shepherdess'') is a French song taken from the ''opéra comique'' in one act '' Laure et Pétrarque'', written in 1780 by Fabre d'Églantine. The music was written by Louis-Victor Simon. The shepherdess to whom the song refers is the French queen Marie Antoinette who loved to play the shepherdess in the Hameau de la reine of the Palace of Versailles. The rain and the storm coming could be an allusion to the troubles that led to the French Revolution. It was sung for the creation of the National Guard after Bastille Day. Some years later, d'Églantine hummed it on his way to the guillotine. The first title of the song was ''Le Retour aux champs'' ("Back to the fields") before getting its current title in 1787. It is also known as ''The Storm''. In the final of the first act of the opera Barbe-Bleue (1866), Jacques Offenbach plays the first notes of the song while Barbe-Bleue shows the shepherdess Boulotte as his next wife. Edmond Rostand i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Il Pleut, Il Pleut, Bergère
(, ''It's raining, it's raining, shepherdess'') is a French song taken from the ''opéra comique'' in one act '' Laure et Pétrarque'', written in 1780 by Fabre d'Églantine. The music was written by Louis-Victor Simon. The shepherdess to whom the song refers is the French queen Marie Antoinette who loved to play the shepherdess in the Hameau de la reine of the Palace of Versailles. The rain and the storm coming could be an allusion to the troubles that led to the French Revolution. It was sung for the creation of the National Guard after Bastille Day. Some years later, d'Églantine hummed it on his way to the guillotine. The first title of the song was ''Le Retour aux champs'' ("Back to the fields") before getting its current title in 1787. It is also known as ''The Storm''. In the final of the first act of the opera Barbe-Bleue (1866), Jacques Offenbach plays the first notes of the song while Barbe-Bleue shows the shepherdess Boulotte as his next wife. Edmond Rostand i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Guillotine
A guillotine is an apparatus designed for efficiently carrying out executions by beheading. The device consists of a tall, upright frame with a weighted and angled blade suspended at the top. The condemned person is secured with stocks at the bottom of the frame, positioning the neck directly below the blade. The blade is then released, swiftly and forcefully decapitating the victim with a single, clean pass so that the head falls into a basket or other receptacle below. The guillotine is best known for its use in France, particularly during the French Revolution, where the revolution's supporters celebrated it as the people's avenger and the revolution's opponents vilified it as the pre-eminent symbol of the violence of the Reign of Terror. While the name "guillotine" itself dates from this period, similar devices had been in use elsewhere in Europe over several centuries. The use of an oblique blade and the stocks set this type of guillotine apart from others. The display o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Folk Songs
Folk music is a music genre that includes traditional folk music and the contemporary genre that evolved from the former during the 20th-century folk revival. Some types of folk music may be called world music. Traditional folk music has been defined in several ways: as music transmitted orally, music with unknown composers, music that is played on traditional instruments, music about cultural or national identity, music that changes between generations (folk process), music associated with a people's folklore, or music performed by custom over a long period of time. It has been contrasted with commercial and classical styles. The term originated in the 19th century, but folk music extends beyond that. Starting in the mid-20th century, a new form of popular folk music evolved from traditional folk music. This process and period is called the (second) folk revival and reached a zenith in the 1960s. This form of music is sometimes called contemporary folk music or folk reviva ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
French Songs
A (, , french: chanson française, link=no, ; ) is generally any lyric-driven French song, though it most often refers to the secular polyphonic French songs of late medieval and Renaissance music. The genre had origins in the monophonic songs of troubadours and trouvères, though the only polyphonic precedents were 16 works by Adam de la Halle and one by Jehan de Lescurel. Not until the '' ars nova'' composer Guillaume de Machaut did any composer write a significant number of polyphonic chansons. A broad term, the word "chanson" literally means "song" in French and can thus less commonly refers to a variety of (usually secular) French genres throughout history. This includes the songs of chansonnier, ''chanson de geste'' and Grand chant; court songs of the late Renaissance and early Baroque music periods, ''air de cour''; popular songs from the 17th to 19th century, ''bergerette'', ''brunette'', ''chanson pour boire'', ''pastourelle'', and vaudeville; art song of the rom ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jacques Ibert
Jacques François Antoine Marie Ibert (15 August 1890 – 5 February 1962) was a French composer of classical music. Having studied music from an early age, he studied at the Paris Conservatoire and won its top prize, the Prix de Rome at his first attempt, despite studies interrupted by his service in World War I. Ibert pursued a successful composing career, writing (sometimes in collaboration with other composers) seven operas, five ballets, incidental music for plays and films, works for piano solo, choral works, and chamber music. He is probably best remembered for his orchestral works including ''Divertissement'' (1930) and ''Escales'' (1922). As a composer, Ibert did not attach himself to any of the prevalent genres of music of his time, and has been described as an eclectic. This is seen even in his best-known pieces: ''Divertissement'' for small orchestra is lighthearted, even frivolous, and ''Escales'' (1922) is a ripely romantic work for large orchestra. In tandem with h ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Arthur Honegger
Arthur Honegger (; 10 March 1892 – 27 November 1955) was a Swiss composer who was born in France and lived a large part of his life in Paris. A member of Les Six, his best known work is probably ''Antigone'', composed between 1924 and 1927 to the French libretto by Jean Cocteau based on the tragedy ''Antigone'' by Sophocles. It premiered on 28 December 1927 at the Théâtre Royal de la Monnaie with sets designed by Pablo Picasso and costumes by Coco Chanel. However, his most frequently performed work is probably the orchestral work ''Pacific 231'', which was inspired by the sound of a steam locomotive. Biography Born Oscar-Arthur Honegger (the first name was never used) to Swiss parents in Le Havre, France, he initially studied harmony with Robert-Charles Martin (to whom he dedicated his first published work and violin in Le Havre. After studying for two years at the Zurich Conservatory, he enrolled in the Paris Conservatoire from 1911 to 1918, studying with both Charl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
L'Aiglon
''L'Aiglon'' is a play in six acts by Edmond Rostand based on the life of Napoleon II, who was the son of Emperor Napoleon I and his second wife, Empress Marie Louise. The title of the play comes from a nickname for Napoleon II, the French word for "eaglet" (a young eagle). The title role was created by Sarah Bernhardt in the play's premiere on 15 March 1900 at the Théà tre Sarah Bernhardt. Fashion designer Jacques Doucet designed her famous white costume. In October of the same year, the play (in an English translation by Louis N. Parker) premiered at New York's Knickerbocker Theatre, with Maude Adams in the title role. Its first performance in London was at His Majesty's Theatre in 1901, with Bernhardt again playing the leading role. Rostand had written ''L'Aiglon'' specifically for Bernhardt, and it became one of her signature roles. Clemence Dane made an English translation which was broadcast by the BBC on National Radio in 15 November 1936 and regionally the f ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Edmond Rostand
Edmond Eugène Alexis Rostand (, , ; 1 April 1868 – 2 December 1918) was a French poet and dramatist. He is associated with neo-romanticism and is known best for his 1897 play ''Cyrano de Bergerac''. Rostand's romantic plays contrasted with the naturalistic theatre popular during the late nineteenth century. Another of Rostand's works, ''Les Romanesques'' (1894), was adapted to the 1960 musical comedy ''The Fantasticks''. Early life Rostand was born in Marseille, France, into a wealthy and cultured Provençal family. His father was an economist, a poet who translated and edited the works of Catullus, and a member of the Marseille Academy and the Institut de France. Rostand studied literature, history, and philosophy at the Collège Stanislas in Paris, France. Career When Rostand was twenty years old, his first play, a one-act comedy, ''Le Gant rouge'', was performed at the Cluny Theatre, 24 August 1888, but it was almost unnoticed. [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jacques Offenbach
Jacques Offenbach (, also , , ; 20 June 18195 October 1880) was a German-born French composer, cellist and impresario of the Romantic period. He is remembered for his nearly 100 operettas of the 1850s to the 1870s, and his uncompleted opera ''The Tales of Hoffmann''. He was a powerful influence on later composers of the operetta genre, particularly Johann Strauss Jr. and Arthur Sullivan. His best-known works were continually revived during the 20th century, and many of his operettas continue to be staged in the 21st. ''The Tales of Hoffmann'' remains part of the standard opera repertory. Born in Cologne, the son of a synagogue cantor, Offenbach showed early musical talent. At the age of 14, he was accepted as a student at the Paris Conservatoire but found academic study unfulfilling and left after a year. From 1835 to 1855 he earned his living as a cellist, achieving international fame, and as a conductor. His ambition, however, was to compose comic pieces for the musical the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Barbe-bleue (opera)
''Barbe-bleue'' (, ''Bluebeard'') is an opéra bouffe, or operetta, in three acts (four scenes) by Jacques Offenbach to a French libretto by Henri Meilhac and Ludovic HalévyLamb A. Barbe-bleue. In: ''The New Grove Dictionary of Opera''. Macmillan, London and New York, 1997. based on Charles Perrault's 1697 story. Performance history The work was composed while Offenbach was travelling during 1865, in Vienna, Brussels and Cologne, conducting his works in those cities. Other distractions during the period were the marriage on 9 August in Étretat of his eldest daughter Berthe to Charles Comte (for which he composed a mass) and problems with gout (which he encouraged the press to report). It was first performed at the Théâtre des Variétés, Paris on 5 February 1866, playing for five months. Following the great success of the creators' ''Belle Hélène'', the roles were close relations of the composer's antique operetta: Dupuis (Paris) another seducer, in Barbe-Bleue, Kopp (Mà ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bastille Day
Bastille Day is the common name given in English-speaking countries to the national day of France, which is celebrated on 14 July each year. In French, it is formally called the (; "French National Celebration"); legally it is known as (; "the 14th of July"). The French National Day is the anniversary of the Storming of the Bastille on 14 July 1789, a major event of the French Revolution, as well as the Fête de la Fédération that celebrated the unity of the French people on 14 July 1790. Celebrations are held throughout France. One that has been reported as "the oldest and largest military parade in Europe" is held on 14 July on the Champs-Élysées in Paris in front of the President of the Republic, along with other French officials and foreign guests. History In 1789, tensions rose in France between reformist and conservative factions as the country struggled to resolve an economic crisis. In May, the Estates General legislative assembly was revived, but members of th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Opéra Comique
''Opéra comique'' (; plural: ''opéras comiques'') is a genre of French opera that contains spoken dialogue and arias. It emerged from the popular '' opéras comiques en vaudevilles'' of the Fair Theatres of St Germain and St Laurent (and to a lesser extent the Comédie-Italienne),M. Elizabeth C. Bartlet and Richard Langham Smith"Opéra comique" '' Grove Music Online''. Oxford Music Online. 19 November 2009 which combined existing popular tunes with spoken sections. Associated with the Paris theatre of the same name, ''opéra comique'' is not necessarily comical or shallow in nature; '' Carmen'', perhaps the most famous ''opéra comique'', is a tragedy. Use of the term The term ''opéra comique'' is complex in meaning and cannot simply be translated as "comic opera". The genre originated in the early 18th century with humorous and satirical plays performed at the theatres of the Paris fairs which contained songs ('' vaudevilles''), with new words set to already existing music. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
