''Le lazzarone, ou Le bien vient en dormant'' (''The Lad from Naples, or Good comes from Sleeping)'' is an
opéra in two acts with music by
Fromental Halévy to a
libretto
A libretto (Italian for "booklet") is the text used in, or intended for, an extended musical work such as an opera, operetta, masque, oratorio, cantata or Musical theatre, musical. The term ''libretto'' is also sometimes used to refer to the t ...
by
Jules-Henri Vernoy de Saint-Georges. It was premiered on 29 March 1844 at the
Paris Opéra.
At the instruction of
Léon Pillet, the director of the Opéra, the opera was written as a vehicle for his mistress
Rosine Stoltz (who had recently borne him a child). After some severe critical reactions, the opera was not successful and has not been revived.
Performance history
The inappropriate casting of a far-from-splendid 31-year-old portraying a Neapolitan teenager was not appreciated by the Parisian critics. A review in the ''
Revue et gazette musicale
The ' was a weekly musical review founded in 1827 by the Belgian musicologist, teacher and composer François-Joseph Fétis, then working as professor of counterpoint and fugue at the Conservatoire de Paris. It was the first French-language ...
'' sardonically regretted the Opéra's 'dearth of
tenors', and noted that the composer was 'forced to do without a timbre of voice so essential to an opera.'
Hector Berlioz
In Greek mythology, Hector (; grc, Ἕκτωρ, Hektōr, label=none, ) is a character in Homer's Iliad. He was a Trojan prince and the greatest warrior for Troy during the Trojan War. Hector led the Trojans and their allies in the defense o ...
wrote that 'the
orchestration
Orchestration is the study or practice of writing music for an orchestra (or, more loosely, for any musical ensemble, such as a concert band) or of adapting music composed for another medium for an orchestra. Also called "instrumentation", orc ...
is too grandiose, too pompous, too loud and even too slow for this kind of story.' At the premiere, Stoltz particularly annoyed her rival
Julie Dorus-Gras by conspicuously eating
macaroni
Macaroni (, Italian: maccheroni) is dry pasta shaped like narrow tubes.Oxford DictionaryMacaroni/ref> Made with durum wheat, macaroni is commonly cut in short lengths; curved macaroni may be referred to as elbow macaroni. Some home machines ...
onstage during the latter's aria.
The opera also marked the Paris debut of
Lola Montez as an '
Andalusian dancer'. This however proved a disaster; Montez, losing a shoe during one routine, flung it into the boxes.
Théophile Gautier wrote 'Mlle. Montez
..has small feet and shapely legs. Her use of these is quite another matter'.
Roles
Synopsis
:Place: Naples
:Time:
The lazy Beppo is enamoured of the flower seller Baptista. Mirobolante and Corvo, discovering Baptista's birth certificate, find that she is unaware that she is an heiress to a fortune. They woo her assiduously; Beppo, feeling he has no chance against such wealthy suitors, goes to sleep. Baptista however wakes him and says she much prefers him to the other two. Mirobolante and Corvo try to prevent their marriage by asserting that Baptista is a minor; her birth certificate however shows that she is 21 that very day.
[Jordan (1994), p. 121]
References
Notes
Sources
Librettoat
Gallica website
* Jordan, Ruth (1994). ''Fromental Halévy'', London: Kahn and Averill.
*
Walker, Alan (1988). ''Franz Liszt: The Virtuoso Years 1811–1847'' (revised edition). London: Faber and Faber.
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Operas
1844 operas
Operas by Fromental Halévy
Operas set in Naples
French-language operas
Opéras comiques