The Salle du Bel-Air or Salle du Jeu de Paume de Béquet (Hall of the Béquet Tennis Court), also spelled Becquet, was a 1672

theatre Theatre or theater is a collaborative form of performing art that uses live performers, usually actors or actresses, to present the experience of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place, often a stage. The perform ...

located in Paris, France. Originally an indoor tennis court (''

jeu de paume ''Jeu de paume'' (, ; originally spelled ; ), nowadays known as real tennis, (US) court tennis or (in France) ''courte paume'', is a ball-and-court game that originated in France. It was an indoor precursor of tennis played without racquets, a ...

'') it was converted by the Italian designer Carlo Vigarani into a theatre which was used by

Jean-Baptiste Lully Jean-Baptiste Lully ( , , ; born Giovanni Battista Lulli, ; – 22 March 1687) was an Italian-born French composer, guitarist, violinist, and dancer who is considered a master of the French Baroque music style. Best known for his operas, he ...

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 ...

from 15 November 1672 to 1 February 1673. It was located in the

Rue de Vaugirard The Rue de Vaugirard (Street of Vaugirard) is the longest street inside Paris's former city walls, at . It spans the 6th arrondissement of Paris, 6th and 15th arrondissement of Paris, 15th arrondissements. The Senate (France), Senate, housed in th ...

, just west of the city moat (''fossé'') and the Rue des Fossés Monsieur-le-Prince (now the

Rue Monsieur-le-Prince Rue Monsieur-le-Prince is a street of Paris, located in the 6th arrondissement. It is named after the Prince of Condé, whose palace bordered it. From 1793 to 1805 the street was called ''Rue de la Liberté''. The street features in the title of ...

). Today the site of the former theatre extends into the Rue de Médicis, just south of no. 15 (or 13 bis) Rue de Vaugirard.

History

Pierre Perrin Pierre Perrin (c.1620 – 24 April 1675) was a French poet and librettist. Perrin, sometimes known as L'Abbé Perrin although he never belonged to the clergy, was born in Lyon. He founded the Académie d'Opéra, which later was renamed the Acad ...

, a poet and librettist, was given a monopoly to found an Academy of Opera in Music and French Verse on 28 June 1669. Perrin had already associated himself with Alexandre de Rieux, Marquis de Sourdéac, and the marquis's own associate François Bersac de Fondant, who styled himself Sieur de Champeron. Sourdéac and Champeron hired singers and took a lease on the Jeu de Paume de Béquet. The conversion to a theatre was well advanced (an ''amphithéâtre'', boxes, and stage machinery had already been installed), when they were evicted for their failure to obtain proper authorisation from the police. Seeking new premises, they leased the

Jeu de Paume de la Bouteille ''Jeu'' is a 2006 animated short by Georges Schwizgebel. Described as a film about the frenetic pace of modern life, ''Jeu'' is set to the scherzo of Prokofiev's Concerto for Piano No. 2, Opus 16. The film has received 12 international awards, inc ...

, which became the first theatre of the Paris Opera. The composer

Jean Baptiste Lully Jean-Baptiste Lully ( , , ; born Giovanni Battista Lulli, ; – 22 March 1687) was an Italian-born French composer, guitarist, violinist, and dancer who is considered a master of the French Baroque music style. Best known for his operas, ...

persuaded Perrin to sell him his monopoly to perform opera, but this was disputed, and a royal decree in March 1672 transferred the monopoly to Lully. Unable to use the Salle de la Bouteille, since Sourdéac and Champeron still held the lease, Lully requested permission to use the Great Hall in the

Louvre Palace The Louvre Palace (french: link=no, Palais du Louvre, ), often referred to simply as the Louvre, is an iconic French palace located on the Rive Droite, Right Bank of the Seine in Paris, occupying a vast expanse of land between the Tuileries Ga ...

on 3 June 1672. However, King

Louis XIV , house = Bourbon , father = Louis XIII , mother = Anne of Austria , birth_date = , birth_place = Château de Saint-Germain-en-Laye, Saint-Germain-en-Laye, France , death_date = , death_place = Palace of Vers ...

denied that request, since the Louvre, as a royal palace, was not considered appropriate for performances that would be open to the public. As a result, on 12 August 1672, Lully acquired a lease on the Béquet. On the same day Sourdéac and Champeron's right to give performances at the Bouteille was revoked. This measure was particularly punitive, since their five-year lease of the Bouteille did not end for another three years. On 23 August 1672, Lully hired the Italian stage designer Carlo Vigarani to remodel the theatre and to create the scenery for the first production, Lully's ''Les fêtes de l'Amour et de Bacchus'', which opened on 11 November 1672. This was followed by his first ''

tragédie lyrique This is a glossary list of opera genres, giving alternative names. "Opera" is an Italian word (short for "opera in musica"); it was not at first ''commonly'' used in Italy (or in other countries) to refer to the genre of particular works. Most c ...

'', ''

Cadmus et Hermione ''Cadmus et Hermione'' is a ''tragédie en musique'' in a prologue and five acts by Jean-Baptiste Lully. The French-language libretto is by Philippe Quinault, after Ovid's ''Metamorphoses''. It was first performed on 27 April 1673 by the Paris Op ...

'', on 27 April 1673. The theatre was equipped with stage machinery, but Lully regarded it as temporary. After

Molière Jean-Baptiste Poquelin (, ; 15 January 1622 (baptised) – 17 February 1673), known by his stage name Molière (, , ), was a French playwright, actor, and poet, widely regarded as one of the greatest writers in the French language and world ...

died on 17 February 1673, Lully convinced

King Louis XIV Louis XIV (Louis Dieudonné; 5 September 16381 September 1715), also known as Louis the Great () or the Sun King (), was List of French monarchs, King of France from 14 May 1643 until his death in 1715. His reign of 72 years and 110 days is the Li ...

to allow him to use Molière's theatre at the Palais-Royal free of charge.Harris-Warrick 1992, p. 856.

Notes

Bibliography

* Clarke, Jan (1998). ''The Guénégaud Theatre in Paris (1673–1680). Volume One: Founding, Design and Production''. Lewiston, New York:

Edwin Mellen Press The Edwin Mellen Press or Mellen Press is an international Independent business, independent company and Academic publisher, academic publishing house with editorial offices in Lewiston (town), New York, Lewiston, New York, and Lampeter, Lampete ...

. . * Clarke, Jan (2007). ''The Guénégaud Theatre in Paris (1673–1680). Volume Three: The Demise of the Machine Play''. Lewiston, NY:

. . * Harris-Warrick, Rebecca (1992). "Paris. 2. 1669–1725", vol. 3, pp. 856–858, in ''

The New Grove Dictionary of Opera ''The New Grove Dictionary of Opera'' is an encyclopedia of opera, considered to be one of the best general reference sources on the subject. It is the largest work on opera in English, and in its printed form, amounts to 5,448 pages in four volu ...

'', 4 volumes, edited by

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

. London:

Macmillan MacMillan, Macmillan, McMillen or McMillan may refer to: People * McMillan (surname) * Clan MacMillan, a Highland Scottish clan * Harold Macmillan, British statesman and politician * James MacMillan, Scottish composer * William Duncan MacMillan ...

. . * Johnson, Victoria (2008). ''Backstage at the Revolution: How the Royal Paris Opera Survived the End of the Old Regime''. Chicago:

University of Chicago Press The University of Chicago Press is the largest and one of the oldest university presses in the United States. It is operated by the University of Chicago and publishes a wide variety of academic titles, including ''The Chicago Manual of Style'', ...

. . * La Salle, Albert de (1875). ''Les Treize Salles de l'Opéra''. Paris: Librairie Sartorius
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Notice bibliographique
at the BnF. * Nuitter, Charles; Thoinan, Ernest (1886). ''Les Origines de l'Opéra français'' (in French). Paris: E. Plon, Nourrit et Cie. Copie
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. * Wild, Nicole ( 989. ''Dictionnaire des théâtres parisiens au XIXe siècle: les théâtres et la musique''. Paris: Aux Amateurs de livres. . (paperback)
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. {{authority control Buildings and structures in the 6th arrondissement of Paris Theatres completed in 1672 Former theatres in Paris Opera houses in Paris 17th century in Paris