Overview

During the course of the 17th century, the dramatic arts reached a pinnacle of development in France; but despite the volumes devoted to the literature and theatre of the ancien régime, historians have largely neglected the importance of music and dance. This study defines the musical practices of comedy, tragicomedy, tragedy, and mythological and non-mythological pastoral drama, from the arrival of the first repertory companies in Paris until the establishment of the Comédie-Française. The dynamic interaction of the performing arts in primarily spoken theatre, cross-fertilized by ballet de cour and imported Italian opera, gave rise to a set of musical conventions that later informed the pastorale en musique and early French pastoral opera. The performance history of four comédies-ballets by Molière, Lully, and Charpentier leads to a discussion of the musical and balletic performance practices of Molière's theatre and the interconnections between Molière's last comédie-ballet, Le Malade imaginaire, and Lully's first opera, Les Festes de l'Amour et de Bacchus.

Full Product Details

Author:   John S. Powell (Associate Professor of Music History, School of Music, Associate Professor of Music History, School of Music, University of Tulsa, USA)
Publisher:   Oxford University Press
Imprint:   Oxford University Press
Dimensions:   Width: 16.40cm , Height: 3.60cm , Length: 24.20cm
Weight:   1.008kg
ISBN:  

9780198165996

ISBN 10:   0198165994
Pages:   598
Publication Date:   07 September 2000
Audience:   Professional and scholarly ,  Professional & Vocational
Format:   Hardback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   To order  
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Table of Contents

Preface Part I: Music and Public Theatre in Paris Musical Theatre before French Opera 1: The Primacy of the Hôtel de Bourgogne (1600-1628) 2: The Rise of the Théâtre du Marais (1629-1658) 3: The Golden Age of French Theatre (1658-1669) Musical Theatre and the Opera Privilege 4: Competition with the Académie Royale d'Opéra (1669-1673) 5: The Reorganization of Public Theatre (1673-1680) Part II: The Place and Function of Music and Dance in French Plays Comedy, Tragicomedy, and Comédie-Ballet 6: Correlations between French Plays and Ballets 7: Music, Dance, and the Performance-within-the-Play 8: The Fusion of Comedy and Ballet; L'Amour malade aud Les Fâcheux The Dramatic Pastorale and Pastorale en Musique 9: The Italian Pastorale in France 10: Music and the Early French Pastorale 11: From Pastoral Comedy to Pastorale en Musique The Mythological Machine-Play and Pastoral Opera 12: Music in the Early Mythic Pastorale 13: The Musical World of the Mythological Machine-Play 14: The Beginnings of French Opera Part III: Music and the Theatre of Molière Molière's Comédies-Ballets on the Public Stage 15: The Public Reception of a Court Success: La Princesse d'Elide 16: Comic Vision and Revision in Le Mariage forcé and Le Sicilien 17: Le Malade imaginaire and Its Revisions 18: Musical Practices in Molière's Theatre Epilogue: Appropriation, Parody, and the Birth of Opera: Lully's Les Festes de l'Amour et de Bacchus and Molière's Le Malade imaginaire. Appendix A. Secular Plays with Music, 1600-1680 Appendix B. Index of Sung Lyrics Appendix C. Dramatic Extracts from Plays Bibliography Index

Reviews

John S. Powell's Music and Theater in France, 1600-1680, the most recent installment of Oxford's Monographs on Music, presents a significant new contribution to this small bibliography. Powell's impressive 582-page book, ... offers the first major work in English to thoroughly investigate these rich and momentous topics, all of which contributed significantly to the development of French opera...it must be emphasized that there is a large amount of new information that Powell has unearthed or brought to light through his research...Music and Theater in France 1600-1680 presents us with a new major work. It lays out...the fullest discussion of the interactions of music and theater in seventeenth-century France...It furthermore brings forward important issues in the English language for the first time. John S. Powell and Oxford Monographs in Music are to be commended for their excellent scholarship and publishing. --Current Musicology<br>

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