The Bibliothèque-Musée de l'Opéra National de Paris () is a library and museum of the

Paris Opera The Paris Opera ( ) is the primary opera and ballet company of France. It was founded in 1669 by Louis XIV as the , and shortly thereafter was placed under the leadership of Jean-Baptiste Lully and officially renamed the , but continued to be kn ...

and is located in the 9th arrondissement at 8 rue Scribe,

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

France France, officially the French Republic, is a country located primarily in Western Europe. Overseas France, Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the Atlantic Ocean#North Atlan ...

. It is no longer managed by the Opera, but instead is part of the Music Department of the National Library of France (

Bibliothèque nationale de France The (; BnF) is the national library of France, located in Paris on two main sites, ''Richelieu'' and ''François-Mitterrand''. It is the national repository of all that is published in France. Some of its extensive collections, including bo ...

or BnF). The Paris Opera Library-Museum is open daily; an admission fee is charged.

Emperor's Pavilion

The Library-Museum is housed in the

Palais Garnier The (, Garnier Palace), also known as (, Garnier Opera), is a historic 1,979-seatBeauvert 1996, p. 102. opera house at the Place de l'Opéra in the 9th arrondissement of Paris, France. It was built for the Paris Opera from 1861 to 1875 at the ...

in the Rotonde de l'Empereur, a

pavilion In architecture, ''pavilion'' has several meanings; * It may be a subsidiary building that is either positioned separately or as an attachment to a main building. Often it is associated with pleasure. In palaces and traditional mansions of Asia ...

on the west side of the theatre, which was originally designed to be the private entrance for

Emperor Napoleon III Napoleon III (Charles-Louis Napoléon Bonaparte; 20 April 18089 January 1873) was President of France from 1848 to 1852 and then Emperor of the French from 1852 until his deposition in 1870. He was the first president, second emperor, and last ...

. Thus, the Emperor's could directly enter in the building and avoid any assassination attempt. The library is located near the intersection of the rue Scribe with the rue Auber, streets which are named after the

librettist A libretto (From the Italian word , ) is the text used in, or intended for, an extended musical work such as an opera, operetta, masque, oratorio, cantata or musical. The term ''libretto'' is also sometimes used to refer to the text of major ...

Eugène Scribe Augustin Eugène Scribe (; 24 December 179120 February 1861) was a French dramatist and librettist. He is known for writing "well-made plays" ("pièces bien faites"), a mainstay of popular theatre for over 100 years, and as the librettist of man ...

and the composer

Daniel Auber Daniel-François-Esprit Auber (; 29 January 178212 May 1871) was a French composer and director of the Paris Conservatoire. Born into an artistic family, Auber was at first an amateur composer before he took up writing operas professionally whe ...

, both of whom had works performed by the Paris Opera., originally at the Paris Opera website. Retrieved 3 August 2011. After the Emperor's death in 1873 and the proclamation of the

French Third Republic The French Third Republic (, sometimes written as ) was the system of government adopted in France from 4 September 1870, when the Second French Empire collapsed during the Franco-Prussian War, until 10 July 1940, after the Fall of France durin ...

in 1870, President Mac-Mahon refused to use this Pavilion as a private space for the head of state.

Charles Nuitter Charles is a masculine given name predominantly found in English and French speaking countries. It is from the French form ''Charles'' of the Proto-Germanic name (in runic alphabet) or ''*karilaz'' (in Latin alphabet), whose meaning was ...

succeeded in compelling Charles Garnier to transform the pavilion into a space for the conservation of the Opera's books and archives.

The archives and the library

From the time of the creation of the Paris Opera in 1861 until the middle of the 19th century there was no official entity in charge of the preservation and management of archival materials produced by the activities of the Opera and its associated theatre. The creation of an archives service and a library was integrated into the project entrusted to the architect Charles Garnier for the construction of a new opera house to replace the Opera's former theatre, the

Salle Le Peletier The Salle Le Peletier or Lepeletier (sometimes referred to as the Salle de la rue Le Peletier or the Opéra Le Peletier) was the home of the Paris Opera from 1821 until the building was destroyed by fire in 1873. The theatre was designed and con ...

. Thus the current Paris Opera Library-Museum traces its origin to two former services of the Opera, the archives and the library, each created in 1866., originally at the BnF website. Retrieved 3 August 2011. At that time, the Opera director became an entrepreneur. Expenses exceeded the receipts, and the government needed a strong man to run the establishment but was afraid that the archives would be sold to generate money. Around 1863

had begun cataloging the Opera's archives, and on 15 May 1866, he became the official

archivist An archivist is an information professional who assesses, collects, organizes, preserves, maintains control over, and provides access to records and archives determined to have long-term value. The records maintained by an archivist can cons ...

. He also published several books on the history of the company.

Théodore Lajarte Théodore Lajarte (10 July 1826 – 20 June 1890) was a French musicologist, librarian, and composer.Huebner 1992. Early years Lajarte was born in Bordeaux. His full name has been given as Théodore Édouard Dufaure de Lajarte. He studied at t ...

was appointed librarian in 1873 and embarked on the systematic organization of the Opera's scores and instrumental parts. In 1876 he first published his two-volume inventory of the library's holdings covering the period from 1671 to 1876. The archives and the library were soon merged, and in 1881 augmented with a

museum A museum is an institution dedicated to displaying or Preservation (library and archive), preserving culturally or scientifically significant objects. Many museums have exhibitions of these objects on public display, and some have private colle ...

open to the public. In 1899, Nuitter was succeeded by his assistant

Charles Malherbe Charles Théodore Malherbe (; 21 April 1853 – 5 October 1911) was a French violinist, musicologist, composer and music editor. Life and career Malherbe was born in Paris, son of Pierre Joseph Malherbe (1819–1890) and Zoé Caroline Mozin (183 ...

.Lebeau 2001. At first, the Opera Library-Museum was attached to the State Secretariat of the Fine Arts (Secrétariat d'État aux Beaux-Arts), but in 1935, it became part of the National Library and in 1942 became a part of the newly established National Library's Music Department. Much of the library is little changed from its original appearance in the 19th century. Access to the library may be difficult at times (the entrance is through the main foyer of the opera house), and it is advisable to call ahead to confirm the hours when it is open.Simeone 2000, p. 238. Today, the Library conserves around 600,000 documents related to the history of the Opéra and the

Opéra-Comique The Opéra-Comique () is a Paris opera company which was founded around 1714 by some of the popular Théâtre de la foire, theatres of the Parisian fairs. In 1762 the company was merged with – and for a time took the name of – its chief riva ...

, including about 100,000 books, 250,000 autograph letters, 16,000 scores, 30,000 libretti, 100,000 photographs, and 30,000 prints.

The museum

The modern museum has five rooms which display three centuries of the Paris Opera's history through paintings, costumes, drawings of

scenery Theatrical scenery is that which is used as a setting for a theatrical production. Scenery may be just about anything, from a single chair to an elaborately re-created street, no matter how large or how small, whether the item was custom-made or ...

, and scale models of set designs. Altogether, the museum conserves 8 500 objects. At the top of the stairs which lead to the museum is a bronze by the sculptor which depicts the dancer Alexandre Kalioujny in mid-leap during a performance of

Michel Fokine Michael Fokine ( – 22 August 1942) was a Russian choreographer and dancer. Career Early years Fokine was born in Saint Petersburg to a prosperous merchant and at the age of 9 was accepted into the Saint Petersburg Imperial Ballet Sch ...

's ballet which is based on the

Polovtsian Dances The Polovtsian Dances, or Polovetsian Dances (), form an exotic scene at the end of act 2 of Alexander Borodin's opera '' Prince Igor''. The opera remained unfinished when the composer died in 1887, although he had worked on it for more than a d ...

Borodin Alexander Porfiryevich Borodin (12 November 183327 February 1887) was a Russian Romantic composer and chemist of Georgian–Russian parentage. He was one of the prominent 19th-century composers known as " The Five", a group dedicated to prod ...

's ''

Prince Igor ''Prince Igor'' (, ) is an opera in four acts with a prologue, written and composed by Alexander Borodin. The composer adapted the libretto from the early Russian epic '' The Lay of Igor's Host'', which recounts the campaign of the 12th-centur ...

''.This information was translated from the corresponding article in the French Wikipédia
version 23 avril 2011 à 19:27
. Visitors are also able to see shelves of books and scores, which are protected by grilles. These materials include fifteen thousand scores and thirty thousand librettos and are accessible to the public on days when the museum is not open for tours. The museum's collections are too extensive to be displayed all at one time, as they consist of approximately 8,500 objects, including 2,500 models of sets, 500 set design drawings, and 3,000 pieces of costume jewelry. The Library-Museum has organized more than 25 exhibitions since 1992, in collaboration with the BnF and others. Some of the items in the collection have also been displayed at the

Musée d'Orsay The Musée d'Orsay ( , , ) () is a museum in Paris, France, on the Rive Gauche, Left Bank of the Seine. It is housed in the former Gare d'Orsay, a Beaux-Arts architecture, Beaux-Arts railway station built from 1898 to 1900. The museum holds mai ...

Notes

Bibliography

* Cooper, Jeffrey (1992). "Nuitter ruinet Charles-Louis-Etienne" in Sadie 1992, vol. 3, pp. 635–636. Also a
Oxford Music Online
(subscription required). * Gressel, Valérie (2002). ''Charles Nuitter : des scènes parisiennes à la Bibliothèque de l'Opéra''. Hildesheim, New York: Olms. . * Huebner, Steven (1992). "Lajarte, Théodore (Edouard Dufaure de)" in Sadie 1992, vol. 2, p. 1081. Also available a
Oxford Music Online
(subscription required). * Lajarte, Théodore de (1878). ''Bibliothèque musicale du Théâtre de l'Opéra'', volume 1 671–1791 Paris: Librairie des Bibliophiles
View
at

Google Books Google Books (previously known as Google Book Search, Google Print, and by its code-name Project Ocean) is a service from Google that searches the full text of books and magazines that Google has scanned, converted to text using optical charac ...

. * Lajarte, Théodore de (1878). ''Bibliothèque musicale du Théâtre de l'Opéra'', volume 2 793–1876 Paris: Librairie des Bibliophiles
View
at

. * Lebeau, Elisabeth (2001). "Malherbe, Charles (Théodore)" in Sadie 2001. Also available a
Oxford Music Online
(subscription required). * Nuitter, Charles (1875). ''Le nouvel Opéra'' (with 59 engravings). Paris: Hachette. Copie
12
an
3
at

. * Nuitter, Charles (1878). ''Histoire et description du nouvel Opéra''. Paris: Plon
View
at Gallica. * Nuitter, Charles; Thoinan, Ernest (1886). ''Les origines de l'Opéra français'' (in French). Paris: E. Plon, Nourrit et Cie. Copie
1
an
2
at

. *

Sadie, Stanley Stanley John Sadie (; 30 October 1930 – 21 March 2005) was a British musicologist, music critic, and editor. He was editor of the sixth edition of the ''Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians'' (1980), which was published as the first edition ...

, editor (1992). ''

The New Grove Dictionary of Opera ''The New Grove Dictionary of Opera'' is an encyclopedia of opera. It is the largest work on opera in English, and in its printed form, amounts to 5,448 pages in four volumes. The dictionary was first published in 1992 by Macmillan Reference, L ...

'' (4 volumes). London: Macmillan. . *

(2001). ''

The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians ''The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians'' is an encyclopedic dictionary of music and musicians. Along with the German-language '' Die Musik in Geschichte und Gegenwart'', it is one of the largest reference works on the history and t ...

'', 2nd edition. London: Macmillan. (hardcover). (eBook). * Simeone, Nigel (2000). ''Paris – A Musical Gazetteer''. New Haven: Yale University Press. .

External links

Website
at the BnF *

Virtual tour of the Bibliothèque-Musée de l'Opéra National de Paris
provided by

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