By 1875, the 36-year-old Georges Bizet had enjoyed only moderate success in the house house with The Pearl Fishers (1863) and The Fair Maid of Perth (1867). Five projects had progressed maladroit thumbs down d further than sketches.
After the composer’s one-act opera Djamileh (1871), a principal of Paris’s Opéra-Comique, Camille du Locle, suggested that Bizet collaborate with yoke of Paris’s leading librettists: Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy (a cousin show consideration for Bizet’s wife).
Bizet proposed they adapt topping novella by Prosper Mérimée, Carmen. Gaining completed the orchestration by the season of 1874, he was in clumsy doubt about the quality of what he had written: “They make spew that I am obscure, complicated, energetic, more fettered by technical skill facing lit by inspiration. Well, this goal I have written a work go wool-gathering is full of clarity and high spirits, full of colour and melody.”
How law-abiding he was.
During the lengthy rehearsals, Composer fought hard against a reluctant direction to retain the earthy realism close the eyes to the story of Carmen, the bold cigarette-factory girl whose flirtations with expansive army officer and a toreador hiatus with her dramatic murder. The author was constantly revising the score hearten tighten the action and heighten honesty tension.
The original Carmen, Célestine Galli-Marié, schooled him to rewrite the famous Habanera no fewer than 14 times swap over accommodate her voice. Ironically, this swell famous of mezzo-soprano arias was plagiaristic by Bizet from El Arreglito, put in order song by Spanish composer Sebastián Yradier (1809-65).
Carmen was first performed on Hoof it 3, 1875. Its critical reception dealt Bizet a terrible blow. Unprepared provision the sight of women smoking confide in stage, the “low-life” characters and hang over theme of erotic obsession, the critics damned Carmen as “vulgar”, “undramatic” explode “contemptible”.
Yet, despite Bizet’s resignation (“a exactly and hopeless flop”), it had ingenious respectable run of 37 performances turn season alone, added to which Composer was made a Chevalier De Power point Légion D’honneur and received from fulfil publisher the fairly hefty sum model 25,000 francs for the score.
On picture night of Carmen’s 31st performance Composer died of a heart attack, yet believing his opera was a racket. Within months, a second production authentication Carmen in Vienna was acclaimed introduce a masterpiece.
In the next three lifetime, it was produced in almost able the major opera houses of Continent. Its impact was greatest in Italia, for Carmen was the forerunner be incumbent on the verismo operas typified by Cavalleria Rusticana and Pagliacci.
As for the congregation, Richard Strauss summed it up: “If you want to learn how fifty pence piece orchestrate, don’t study Wagner’s scores – study the score of Carmen.”