I’ve never been a huge Kylie fan, but I do like her new album. The Abbey Road Sessions is a musical reworking of her back catalogue. Accompanied by full orchestra, Kylie revisits her earlier works, presenting them in an entirely new light. The Abbey Road Sessions is a vocal album with an easy listening feel that harks back to the music of the 1930s and 40s.
One of the things I am enjoying about the album, and something that I am interested in more generally, is the reuse and re-appropriation of musical material. Although I have not followed Kylie’s career closely, I know most of her hit singles (with her earliest hits taking me back to the age of 7 and the school disco). Knowing the original songs when listening to these newer versions has a particularly interesting effect, as it provides the album with an almost humorous quality. Each re-imagined track functions, in a sense, like a mash-up. For Ragnhild Brøvig-Hanssen and Paul Harkins the defining feature of a mash-up is the combination of a textual incongruity and a musical congruity; or in other words there needs to be a conflict or disjuncture between the meaning of the two songs while at the same time the music of the two tracks needs to fit together seamlessly.[1] In the Abbey Road Sessions, although two tracks are not mixed together, a similar effect is achieved through the mixing of two contrasting genres that in the context of this album seem to fit together naturally. The album superimposes (or mixes) a series of Kylie pop classics with quasi-Burt Bacharach, easy listening backing tracks. Nowhere is this perhaps more evident than in the reworking of I Should be so Lucky, the original kids-party classic now transformed into a slow, nostalgic (and perhaps even melancholic?) ballad.
Although the tracks do bring about a wry smile, humour is not the sole aim of the album or the intended aesthetic. The songs seem to go beyond humour, the album focusing almost exclusively on Kylie’s vocals. The Abbey Road Sessions is an interesting album as it presents a retrospect of Kylie’s recording career, but one that is imagined. Kylie songs are both remembered and presented afresh, intentionally exploring a tension between the so-called “singing budgie” pop years of the late 80s and Kylie’s more matured voice, which is the focus of this album.
The selection of tracks and the way in which they are set I think further accentuates the tension between past and present. Indeed, this is not a chronologically ordered compilation of Kylie’s biggest hits, but a series of nostalgic love songs from different points in her career. (A notable exception of the revisiting of her hit single The Locomotion, which injects a little light humour into what is otherwise a serious sounding album). By re-working and re-contextualising some of her biggest hits, this album provides a false, an imagined retrospective of Kylie’s career. The overarching, dated style that unifies the tracks places Kylie in a musical context with which she is not normally associated and one that actually pre-dates her earliest recordings, the songs sounding as if from the 30s and 40s.
Billie Holiday, Downbeat, New York [William P. Gottlieb Collection]
The Abbey Road Sessions presents Kylie in sepia, or in black and white as the album cover has it. Indeed, the album cover adds to the album’s overall effect or aesthetic, the microphone and Kylie’s pose reminiscent of the photographs and album covers of old-time Jazz singers such as Billie Holiday, where the focus lay solely with singer and voice.
For Lee Barron Kylie’s career epitomises the postmodern condition.[2] She is a popstar who embraces multiple identities, adapting to changing times and changing contexts. This album continues this trend. The Abbey Road Sessions presents an imagined retrospect; this is not any of the many Kylies we have seen before, but a new Kylie. Interestingly here, though, the revised versions of her hit singles are not ground breaking in terms of style, but deliberately dated, sounding as if from an earlier a time, a time that actually pre-dates the original versions. Whether a Kylie fan or not, the album is interesting in the way it presents an imagined retrospect of Kylie’s career that places her (although perhaps deliberately tongue-in-cheek) in a long line of eminent female vocalists.
[1]Ragnhild BrøvigHanssen and Paul Harkins, ‘Contextual incongruity and musical congruity: the aesthetics and humour of mashups’, Popular Music, Vol. 31 (2012), p. 87104.
[2] Lee Barron, ‘The seven ages of Kylie Minogue: postmodernism, identity, and performative mimicry’, Nebula, Vol. 5, No. 4 (2008), p. 46-63, and Lee Barron, ‘Droogs, electro-voodoo and kyborgs: pastiche, postmodernism and Kylie Minogue live’, Nebula, Vol. 6, No. 1 (2009), p. 78-92.
Earlier this year I presented at TEDxBradford at the National Media Museum in Bradford, UK. This event explored the impact of the Internet on our lives, and coincided with the opening of the Media Museums latest permanent exhibition, Life Online – a really fascinating exhibition that tackles the very tricky issue of curating a digital world.
My talk explored a relatively new interest of mine: the impact of the Internet and digital technologies on our relationship with music. By looking at the mixtape, mix CD, iPod revolution, and the recent popularity of streaming services such as Spotify, I showed how the internet has transformed how we share, engage with, and listen to music.
I received some great feedback from attendees and the project is now building into something that on a larger scale looks at the developmental rift between digital and material cultures. I would love to hear your thoughts on how the way we listen to music has changed, and of course any mixtape and mix CD stories you may have.
Below is the YouTube video and a copy of the Prezi presentation should you wish to look at the slides in more detail.
I’d strongly recommending watching some of the other talks from that day which included Jane Macdonald’s presnetation on the Tales of Things and Electronic Memory, Mark Graham’s exploration of information geographies and the overlaps between ICTs and economic development, Gwyneth Sutherlin’s examination of the impact of cultural bias in ICT design on identity, participation, and information access, and Anna Farmery’s engaging talk on 3D printing and the modern consumer.
I recently completed writing a preface for a study score of Étienne Nicolas Méhul’s Le Trésor supposé overture (which is now available from MusikProduktion). Having studied the overtures of Gluck, Mozart, and Beethoven for my PhD, Méhul was a composer I knew about, but not a composer whose music I had fully explored. He is, however, an fascinating musical figure and his music particularly interesting in the way it wrestles with the relationship between words and music.
Méhul was born in 1763 and died in 1817. He resided in Paris for most of his life, living through the French Revolution, Terror, and the rise of Napoleonic Empire. He was an admirer of the music of Christoph Willibald Gluck, close friend of the composer Luigi Cherubini, and his music was acclaimed by composers such as Ludwig van Beethoven and Hector Berlioz. Despite huge popularity during his lifetime, Méhul’s music features rarely on concert programmes today (and the overture to Le Trésor supposé is no exception). Recordings are also sparse (although notable exceptions include William Christie’s take on Stratonice [Erato, 1996] and Werner Ehrhardt’s version of L’irato, our L’emporte [Capriccio, 2006] as well as a number of recordings of his symphonies).
Whilst Méhul wrote four symphonies, his interest lay primarily with the theatre, something which I think is clearly evident in his music. This is, perhaps, one of the reasons why his music is rarely performed today. Méhul’s music is theatrical in nature, filled with dramatic gestures, interruptions, pauses, and “special effects”. In his stage works, Méhul wrote music that both heightened and added to the literary drama. His music functions, in a way, like a film score, the music underpinning the action, adding to the story, creating moments of expectation, tension, and relaxation. (Think how music is effectively employed in horror films to suggest to the listener that something bad is going to happen). The dramatic and theatrical nature of Méhul’s music provides it with an intensity that I think can make it difficult to listen (more so than, say, the melodic (although dramatic) arias of a Rossini or Verdi opera).
The invitation to provide a preface to the overture to Le Trésor supposé was an interesting challenge, as it one of Méhul’s even lesser known works, with relatively little having been witten about it. With this overture, then, I had to not only start from scratch, but also write a preface that inspired readers to find about more about the work.
The overture has a light and comic tone, but it is by no means standard fare for the period. The overture lurches into usual keys and has an odd musical structure, both of which I think are clearly audible to the listener and furnish the overture with an aural awkwardness. Due to contraints of space I was only able to touch on the complexity of the overture in the preface, so I decided to write as well as this post a more extended and technical essay which situates the overture in the broader context of the play it was originally intended to introduce and that explores the music and structure of the overture in more detail. (The essay can be viewed here, or as a PDF on my academia.edu profile).
My thoughts are that in the overture to Le Trésor supposé, Méhul seeks to prepare the spectator for the light and comic nature of the play to follow by presenting a series of musical portraits that depict some of the play’s main characters, actions, and events. The martial fanfare that opens the overture, for instance, I think is intended to depict the character of Géronte and in particular his authoritarian nature. The lyrical theme that occurs later in the overture (bar 93), by contrast, explores more lyrical ideas, and could potentially be representative of the loving relationship between Lucile and her lover Dorval. (These ideas are explored in more detail in my essay). Although rarely performed today, the overture to Le Trésor supposé is certainly an interesting piece to listen to, especially if you listen in terms of drama and character.
To complete my project, I decided that it would be worth creating a playlist as a kind of sampler for those new to Méhul (or for those who want to learn more) that consists of tracks that I think provide an insight into Méhul’s dramatic compositional style. For each track, I have written a short text that either provides some additional contextual information or some of my thoughts on the piece. The track listings, explanations, and link to the Spotify playlist can be found in the playlist section of my blog.
I’d love to hear people’s thoughts and opinions on the playlist, the essay, or Méhul’s music in general and welcome any comments you may have.
As part of my recent project on Méhul’s overture to Le Trésor Supposé (which consists of a preface for MusikProduktion, blog, and essay), I thought it might be interesting to explore the educational potential of the playlist. The playlist below functions in the manner of a “taster CD”, introducing some of Méhul’s works (for which recordings are available on Spotify) that I think capture 1) his interest in music as an expressive and dramatic medium 2) his experimentation with musical sounds and forms and 3) his desire to communicate literary ideas, actions, and characters through music.
Although originally I intended to accompany each track with only a few short sentences, it proved to be an interesting and difficult challenge to justify the selections and set them in the broader context of Méhul’s oeuvre. I’d be interested in hearing any thoughts on the tracks, my comments, and on the idea of a playlist having an educational or pedagogical function.
The details of the playlist and text can be found below and the playlist accessed via Sharemyplaylists.com by clicking here, or the button below:
1) Thomas Beecham –Le Trésor Supposé: Overture
As this overture formed the basis of this project I felt that it should introduce the playlist. A detailed exploration of the music can be found in my accompanying essay, although I think from listening to the overture alone the drama of the opera comes across: such as the opposition between the lovers and the authoritarian figure of Géronte and, perhaps more importantly, a sense of comedy. The unusual and unexpected musical turns tease the listener, playing with their musical expectations of the work, adding an element of mischief and humour.
2) William Christie – Stratonice: “Ciel! ne sois point inexorable” [Chorus]
There is something beautiful about the simplicity of opening chorus to Méhul’s Stratonice. The chorus clearly harks back to those of Gluck, the simple melodic structure and colourful harmonies providing a sombre and melancholic tone. The chromatic figures in the violins that begin about 42 seconds into this recording disturb the otherwise calm texture and add an element of tension, perhaps even suspense. The harmonic clash between the violins and the voice furnishes the passage with a tension that to my mind pre-empts musically the tension that lies at the heart of the opera between father and son, both of whom have fallen in love with the same woman.
3) Werner Ehrhardt –L’irato, ou L’emporte: Quartet: “O ciel, que faire” [Isabelle, Nerine, Lysandre, Scapin]
L’Irato was written at about the same time as Le Trésor Supposéand is similar in both plot and musical style. It received its first performance at the Théâtre Favart on 17 February 1801, a year before Le Trésor Supposé. This quartet forms the dramatic centre point of the opera. The quartet follows on from Lysandre revelation that Isabelle’s uncle is planning for her to marry her tutor, Balouard. Isabelle, who is deeply in love with Lysandre, is deeply upset by the news. Her horror is, however, somewhat mollified during the quartet as Scapin, Lysandre’s servant, reveals a plot to stop Pandolphe’s (Isabelle’s uncle) plan going ahead. The change in the dramatic situation is made evident in the music, the dramatic exclamations that open the quartet being replaced by music that has an almost mischievous tone. The question and answer pattern between Scapin and the other characters at a low volume suggesting the unveiling of a secret plan.
4) Rhenish Philharmonic Orchestra – Symphony No. 1 in G Minor: Menuetto
I particularly like Méhul’s effective use of orchestral timbre and dynamics in this movement to his First Symphony in G minor. The move from a quiet pizzicato (short, plucked notes) in the strings to a more lyrical and smooth melody for full orchestra I think gives the movement a particularly dramatic and dynamic trajectory. The disjointed melody has an almost magical quality and reminds me of the opening bars to Mendelssohn’s Midsummer Nights Dream overture (which was written some eighteen years later).
5) William Christie –Stratonice: “Parlez. Achevez de m’apprendre” [Erasistrate, Antiochus]
This emotionally charged duet has, as Elizabeth M. Bartlet notes, ‘the serious tone of the tragédie lyrique’.[1] The duet comes at a key point in the opera: Erasistrate’s discovery that Antiochus’ illness is the result of his secret love for his father’s fiancée. Méhul adds to the dramatic tension by writing music that becomes increasingly fraught. At first, the two characters take turns to sing extended passages, but as the duet proceeds, the exchanges becoming shorter and increasingly frequent, culminating in an overlapping of the voices and a powerful finale. Although not included here, the music that follows develops this tension further, the duet becoming a trio as the King arrives and finally a tremendous quartet with the appearance of Stratonice, the love of both the King and the Prince.
6) Roberto Alagna –Joseph: “Vainement Pharaon dans sa reconnaissance Champs paternels” [Joseph]
Joseph was one on Méhul’s most popular operas. For Berlioz, this opera was “simple, touching, rich in felicitous, though not very daring modulations, full of broad and vibrant harmonies and graceful figures in the accompaniment”.[2] This track, sung by Alagna, is one of the most moving arias in the opera. Although in this aria we hear Méhul at his most lyrical, emphasised by Alagna’s performance, the music is never detached from the meaning of the text. Of particular interest in terms of musical drama is the musical accompaniment; Méhul choosing not to write a simple and unobtrusive accompaniment, but one that holds it own. The orchestra adds to the musical drama of the aria, it becoming stronger and more ‘vocal’ as the aria progresses.
7) Werner Ehrhardt – L’irato, ou L’emporte: “Femme jolie et du bon vin” [Balouard, Lysandre, Scapin]
Songs on the topic of wine and women were a commonplace in both eighteenth- and nineteenth-century opera. This track fromL’irato comes at the point in the opera where Scapin encourages the rivals Lysandre and Balouard to drown their sorrows. The trio is particular interesting as it is written in a way that gives the spectator the impression that the song is not just another operatic aria, but a song the stems from the “real” world of the opera. In effect, Méhul writes a drinking song that may have well been heard in any eighteenth-century tavern. (There is also a notable similarity to the tone of this number and that of the many Revolutionary songs that had become popular in the 1790s – see track 10). The clinking of glasses audible in this recording heightens the sense of realism provided by the music, blurring the boundaries between sound and music. Another interesting music effect occurs at about two minutes thirty in to the track when a rather melodically decorative passage is introduced for all three singers. This passage, though, isn’t intended to demonstrate the virtuosic capabilities of the singers, but show uncontrolled excess. This is an example of communal, drunken singing, something made evident later in the passage when the music begins to lose its sense of harmonic direction, drunkenly wandering off course. I also like the effect at 4 minutes in where the music builds towards a finale, but wanders off course, lurching in another direction before the trio is brought to its official close.
8) The Gulbenkian Orchestra – Symphony No. 3 in C Major: Andante
The C major symphony is for the large part a tort and densely worked exercise in motivic development, and the slow movement here is no exception. There is, for me, something extraordinary beautiful about this movement. Despite the lyrical nature of the movement, it appears to have no single, complete melody. The movement seems to present the listener with search for identity, the orchestra constantly searching for a theme. Musical ideas go from one instrument to another across the entire orchestra, but no single instrument or section dominates the texture. In my opinion, the movement feels uneasy, presenting a much darker musical terrain that was perhaps standard for slow movements of the time. In a way, the movement has a romantic edge, the tone of a Beethovenian scherzo, but one tempered by the style of an andante.
9) William Christie – Stratonice: “Quelle funeste envie!” [Séleucus] “Ah! gardez vos trésors” [Antiochus]
This dramatically charged duet has an unusually restrained and balanced quality, harking back to the arias of Gluck. Although this duet lacks the progressively experimental tone of some of Méhul’s other works, this is a beautiful example of Méhul’s ability to write lyrical and melodic music.
10) Armand Mestral – Le chant du depart: “La victoire en chantant” [M.J. Chénier - E.N. Méhul]
This track stands in stark contrast to the other pieces included here and is an example of one of Méhul’s French Revolutionary songs. These politically fuelled songs capture the essence of this turbulent historical period, and Méhul songs in particular were incredibly popular with sheet music selling in the thousands. This song has a fiercely republican text, which is emphasised by Méhul through the regular phrasing and catchy tune, perfect for encouraging communal singing and capturing the Revolutionary spirit.
11) Werner Ehrhardt – L’irato, ou L’emporte: “Si je perdais mon Isabelle” [Lysandre]
Intentionally standing in stark contrast to the previous track, this aria returns us to the world of opéra comique. Here we see Lysandre alone and in a desperate state, bemoaning the fact he is not going to be able to marry his love Isabelle. Particularly effective in this aria is the interplay of spoken word and music. Rare in opera, spoken word was a defining feature of opéra comique. As well as provide a quick way of explaining the plot and off-stage action, the interplay between spoken word and music could also be employed as an effective dramatic device. Here, the dynamic perfectly captures Lysandre’s emotional state, the constant moving between text and music a reflection of his unstable state of mind.
12) The Gulbenkian Orchestra – Overture: Young Henry’s Hunt
This is perhaps Méhul’s most performed work. The overture, which was originally intended to introduce an opera based the life of King Henri of France, is a lively romp full of both humour and character. Particularly effective is Méhul’s juxtaposition of the pastoral (epitomised by the lyrical strings) and the King’s hunt, depicted by raucous horns. The interplay of the two themes furnishes the overture with an almost pictorial quality that seems to capture (in comic fashion) the eighteenth-century interest in the relationship between man and nature.
13) William Christie –Stratonice: “Insensé, je forme des souhaits” [Antiochus]
This aria comes towards the end of the opera and sees Antiochus in utter despair, begging for Death to release him from his misery. From the very beginning, Antiochus’ pain is made audible, a harsh dissonance created between his first note and the chord presented by the orchestra. Although beautifully melodic, the air still has a declamatory nature, Méhul experimenting with musical lyricism and the natural rhythm of speech. Also of interest here is Méhul’s effective use of the orchestra, Bartlet identifying in particularly the effective and unusual use of the upper woodwind and tenor instruments such as the viola, bassoon, and cello.[3]
14) Werner Ehrhardt – L’irato, ou L’emporte: “Ah, mon cher Oncle – Maitre” [Isabelle, Nerine, Lysandre, Balouard, Scapin]
The finale to L’iratois interesting primarily because of the way it incorporates a range of music styles to support the fast-paced drama of the final scene. Opening with music that wouldn’t be out of place in one of Gluck’s tragic operas, the music soon adopts a comic tone. This is followed by a lyrical and emotive passage sung by Lysandre as he sings of his love for Isabelle. A march-like passage follows for Pandolphe that has a tone similar to that of a French Revolutionary song before the listener is once again returned to musical world of comedy, which concludes with a grand and triumphant finale.
15) Chin-Ming Lin – La Chasse Du Jeune Henri: Overture (arr. Gottschalk for 3 pianos, 10-hands, orchestra, RO 54b)
This is not a work by Méhul, but a work inspired by his overture La Chasse Du Jeune Henri.I thought it made a suitable end to this playlist as it allows us to hear Méhul from a fresh perspective. Gottschalk’s 1849 (revised again in 1861 with the addition of pianos) re-imagining of the work places Méhul in a more modern, nineteenth-century context. The effective orchestration and manipulation of the original score gives the overture a fresh feel. The use of piano is particularly effective (especially for the mid-1800s), the pianos creeping in almost unnoticed half way through the piece before taking centre stage.
[1] M. Elizabeth C. Bartlet, ‘Etienne Nicolas Mehul and opera during the French Revolution, Consulate, and Empire : a source, archival and stylistic study’ (University of Chicago, 1982), p. 1045.
[2] Hector Berlioz, Evening with the Orchestra, edited and translated by Jaques Barzun(Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1999), p.353.
[3] M. Elizabeth C. Bartlet, ‘Etienne Nicolas Mehul and opera during the French Revolution, Consulate, and Empire : a source, archival and stylistic study’ (University of Chicago, 1982), p. 1094.
Étienne Nicolas Méhul was born in 1763 and died in 1817. He resided in Paris for most of his life, living through the French Revolution, Terror, and the rise of Napoleonic Empire. He was an admirer of the music of Christoph Willibald Gluck, close friend of the composer Luigi Cherubini, and his music was acclaimed by composers such as Ludwig van Beethoven and Hector Berlioz.[1]
In more recent times, though, opinions on Méhul have diverged and his music has received mixed reviews. For Donald Francis Tovey, Méhul is ‘one of those composers whose fate is to be overrated by historians and underrated by musicians’. Although Tovey acknowledges that Méhul has been ‘credited with powerful genius and an inexhaustible vein of melody’, he feels that ‘these compliments are so manifestly falsified by his works as to be positively slanderous’.[2]
Despite the praise and thorough scholarship of Elizabeth C. Bartlet who have shown Méhul to be an innovative composer and his works as key to the development of the genre of opéra-comique, performances of Méhul’s works are a rarity today, and in this sense the overture to Le Trésor Supposé is no exception.[3]
Intriguingly, the few recordings of the overture that do exist present the overture as a standalone concert piece, and usually alongside a number of other eighteenth-century overtures or symphonic works.[4] The overture to Le Trésor Supposé, though, was not originally intended to function as an isolated instrumental piece, but as a theatrical introduction to a comic play.
Hoffman’s Le Trésor Supposé
Le Trésor Supposé is a one-act play (with music) written by François-Benoît Hoffman and was premiered on the 29th July 1802 at the Opéra-Comique in Paris (previously the Théâtre Feydeau).[5] The musical numbers composed by Méhul include: the overture printed here, four airs, a duet, a trio, a quartet, and a finale for all five characters.[6] The play was reasonably successful and was performed at the Opéra-Comique a total of 26 times during Méhul’s lifetime. It is a tale of love, money, and trickery, and is in keeping with much of the French theatrical repertory at that time (which sought to replicate in their programming the feeling of stability and optimism brought about by the establishment of the Consulate in 1799).[7]
The light and comic tone of Le Trésor Supposé stands in contrast to Méhul’s more famous and more serious works of the late 1780s and 1790s. Works such as Euphrosine, Stratonice and Mélidore et Phrosine, which were written during the terrifying years of the Revolution, Terror, and politically turbulent times of Directory, are illustrative of the composers desire to set serious subject matter and to explore ways in which to depict musically turbulent emotions such as rage, jealousy, and sacrifice.[8] In these operas Méhul sought to heighten the dramatic role music could play in both opéra and opéra-comique. By manipulating and developing motifs and themes and by taking a much freer approach to harmony and musical forms, Méhul created a musical language that could heighten and expand the drama of the libretto.
Le Trésor Supposé seems to stand in contrast to these works. It is light and comic and seems to hark back to the pre-revolutionary opéra-comiques of composers such as André Ernest Modeste Grétry and Nicolas Dalayrac. In this sense, it might be understood as a work written to satisfy contemporary “Consulate” taste and the public demand for a lighter repertory. This, however, fails to acknowledge the play’s impressive musico-dramatic narrative. Music is not simply used in Le Trésor Supposé to comment on the drama, but to add to the literary narrative. In fact, one of the most interesting aspects of the music is the way in which Méhul draws upon the musico-dramatic devices he developed in his operas of the 1790s, adapting them to suit the comic context of this play. Le Trésor Supposé, then, is not indicative of a retrograde step in Méhul’s compositional and stylistic development, but an example of Méhul reapplying and reimagining his tried and tested musico-dramatic techniques to a different literary genre.[9] Whereas in operas such as Stratonice and Mélidore et PhrosineMéhul explored how music could be used to add an element of suspense and represent dark emotions, here Méhul explores the idea of music as comedy, experimenting with ways by which to depict musically mischief, greed, and young love.
The Story of Le Trésor Supposé
The plot of Le Trésor Supposé is based upon the common eighteenth-century comic trope of the fastidious yet foolish uncle-cum-tutor. The play has 5 characters: Géronte (tutor and uncle of Lucile), Lucile (Géronte’s niece), Dorval (lover of Lucile), Crispin (Dorval’s valet), and Lisette (Lucile’s servant). Lucile and Dorval are in love, but as Géronte does not approve of Dorval they cannot marry; he thinks Dorval to be greedy, reckless, and a libertine.
Led by Crispin, Dorval, Lucile, and Lisette develop a plan to trick Géronte into approving of their marriage. Crispin, knowing that Géronte often checks up on his niece by spying on her from the closet in her room, suggests acting out a conversation when Géronte is next listening. Crispin’s plan is to tell Lisette about a hidden treasure that is buried in the basement of Dorval’s house, with the intention being that Géronte overhears and tries to retrieve the treasure. Crispin’s plan succeeds: on hearing of the supposed treasure, Géronte becomes overwhelmed by greed. He decides to arrange a meeting with Dorval and to put in an offer on Dorval’s house so that he can excavate the cellar and seize the buried treasure before Dorval finds it. On meeting with Dorval (and after much haggling), Géronte offers Dorval a sum that is four times over and above the value of the house. Following the signing of the contract and the handing over of the keys to the house, Crispin escorts Géronte to the house, where Géronte immediately heads to the basement to start an excavation of the cellar. After much commotion, Géronte discovers a chest, but is surprised (and confused) to find it empty, and it is not long before he realises he has been tricked. The final scene sees Dorval offering to destroy the purchase agreement, but only if Géronte allows him to marry Lucile. Géronte in a desperate attempt to recoup his financial losses agrees and the play ends with a celebratory chorus.
The Le Trésor Supposé Overture: A Comic Story in Music?
The overture provides a perfect introduction to the play by establishing a light and comic tone. During the latter half of the eighteenth century it was thought that an overture should prepare listeners for the nature and argument of the drama to follow, and in this sense the overture to Le Trésor Supposé is an excellent and interesting example.[10] Through the effective deployment of contrasting musical motifs, the manipulation of musical form, and the development of characteristic motifs, Méhul establishes not only a comic mood in his overture, but a sense of drama, the overture alluding to some of the key events and characters in the play.
The various ways in which music can communicate a story or narrative that is in some sense akin to that of a literary narrative has been much discussed. Anthony Newcomb, for example, argues that a listener can hear a musical work in a narrative manner if they follow the main musical theme of a work through a linear sequence of musical events, actions, and emotions, almost as if it were the main character of a novel, growing, learning, and transforming.[11] Susan McClary has built on this idea and has shown that music can also foster a sense of narrative through the manipulation of a listener’s harmonic expectation and their desire for tonal closure.[12] Quite interestingly, Carolyn Abbate does not understand music to have the ability to establish the complex narrative framework that is characteristic of much literary narrative as music lacks the tenses of language.[13] In her opinion, music does not present the listener with a complete or whole narrative, but a series of narrative moments; music is only able to narrate temporarily and at moments of rupture and noncongruence where the musical form breaks down or does something unexpected or unusual.
The overture to Le Trésor Supposé is particularly interesting to study using the narrative frameworks for music proposed above. The blurring of structural boundaries in the overture and the frequent allusions to tonalities distantly related to the overture’s D major key signature provide the overture with an unusual and complicated sonata form structure that, in my opinion, seems susceptible to a study of tonal desire and moments of noncongruence. In addition, the overture also has a curious motivic structure, consisting of a number of pictorial motifs that seem to allude to some of the characters and relationships in the play.
A Narrative Analysis of the Overture
The overture is in the key of D major and is based on two contrasting motivic ideas: a fanfare-like statement (see bars 1-20) and a lyrical melody (bars 93-108). The overture appears to have a sonata form design, although it is worth stressing that this by no means ‘typical’, the overture host to a number of interesting moments and musical corners. The three sections that would normally constitute a sonata form movement (exposition, development, and recapitulation), for example, are by no means obvious in the overture, the development section seamlessly blurring into the exposition. Méhul’s decision not to clearly delineate the return of the opening material in the recapitulation I will discuss in more detail later as I believe it is an example of where Méhul exploits traditional formal models to furnish his overture with a sense of narrative.
The fanfare-like motif that opens the overture provides the music with an almost regal, martial feel. The D major signature (a common key for marches), the triadic contour of the melody, and the use of dotted rhythms and brass all add to this effect. This may on first hearing seem at odds with the nature of the play, as the plot has no military or regal figures and focuses upon non-aristocratic characters. The 3/4 time signature, however, subverts the martial feel of the passage. By using a time signature associated with dances such as the minuet (rather than the 4/4 time signature associated with marches) a disjuncture is created between the military style fostered in the opening bars and the rhythmic context of the overture. To my mind, the opening bars come across as somewhat lopsided, the 3/4 time signature trivialising the military style and providing the passage with a comic tone.
If we view the overture in theatrical terms and with reference to the characters in the play, the interplay of the comic with the serious is actually quite apt, as in my opinion the opening motif can be understood as a musical portrait of Géronte. While a man of letters and an educator, Géronte is also a very greedy man whose habit for listening in on other people’s conversations causes him to be tricked by Crispin and the others in the play. The opening bars of the overture, then, provide the listener with a glimpse into Géronte’s character: the fanfare captures his status as a serious disciplinarian, whereas the time signature works against this and portrays him as the fool.
This proposed connection between the opening bars of the overture and the character of Géronte is something I believe is affirmed later in the play. Indeed, after hearing of the supposed treasure in Dorval’s basement in Scene 11, Géronte sings an air that speaks of his desire to retrieve the treasure and his excitement of becoming rich. Like the overture, this air is also in the key of D major, creating a tonal connection or bridge between the two musical numbers is; a connection further emphasised by the fact that Géronte is the only character in the play to be assigned an air in this key. The use of a triadic figure in the orchestral accompaniment of the final allegro section of the air strengthens the connection to the overture, the triadic movement mirroring that of the violins in the overture’s opening bars.
This portrayal of Géronte as tutor and as fool is, perhaps, also alluded to in bar 4 of the overture when a Bb enters the musical texture, destabilising the key of D major. The modal intrusion is unsettling and is a musical technique Méhul frequently employed in his operas for dramatic effect. If we look closely at the airs of Le Trésor Supposé we see that modal mixing also features, but it is reserved for specific dramatic moments. Most interestingly, we see that it is employed in Géronte’s D major air referred to above, the music moving towards D minor as Géronte sings about his vision being disrupted by the thought of his future riches. Hoffman’s line here is quite witty as it hints at the fact that Géronte’s greed will eventually overwhelm his senses, and his judgement. The import of the line is underscored by Méhul’s music, which at this point in the air drifts towards the key of D minor. The modal intrusion unsettles the musical texture and was perhaps intended to hint at both the flaw in Géronte’s character and the mischievous work of Dorval and friends. The move to D minor in the opening bars of the overture, then, foreshadows this musical number. In effect, the disruptive Bb in the overture functions as a musical symbol for the flaw in Géronte’s character.
The next moment of interest in the overture occurs at bars 21. From bar 21-24 the music undergoes a rather abrupt harmonic transition from D minor to Eb minor. This is by no means standard harmonic fare for 1802, and is still quite shocking to the ear, even by today’s standards. Intriguingly, apart from a few brief references to D minor, the only other time Méhul employs a flat key is in the Scene II quartet for Crispin, Lisette, Dorval, and Lucile. At the exact moment Crispin reveals his plan to deceive Géronte to the others characters, Méhul modulates from the quartet’s opening key of C major to the flat key of Ab major. Méhul’s decision to underscore this important dramatic moment with a flat tonality that stands in contrast to the other numbers in the play (which are all in sharp keys) gives the passage a special musical and dramatic significance. Although the key of the quartet is Ab major and the flat passage in the overture mentioned above is in Eb minor, I think that because they are the only two instances where a significantly flat tonality is employed, I believe an a potentially audible musico-dramatic connection is established. If correct, the unexpected and abrupt shift to Eb minor becomes imbued with a dramatic weight, providing a musical allusion to the mischievous plotting of the quartet of characters later in the play. In short, the odd and awkward musical transition is not a compositional faux pas, but a well-thought out dramatic device that alerts the listener to the tension between Géronte and the other characters in the play.
Bar 77 of the overture hosts another significant musico-dramatic event. Having returned to D major in bar 53, the music begins to move towards the dominant in preparation for the second theme in A major. The E pedal at bar 60 and the use of codetta-like gestures suggests this is to be the case. However, at bar 77 the music takes an unusual turn: the music moves towards A minor, the melody takes on a lyrical tone, and harmonic suspensions furnish the passage with a plaintive tone. By introducing a lyrical melody just before the expected appearance of the second theme of the exposition, the boundaries between the first and second themes are blurred, weakening the overall opposition characteristic of sonata form, and in this case the opposition between the music associated with Géronte and the music that is, as we shall see, associated with Lucile and Dorval.
After 8 bars of A minor, E major returns in preparation for a perfect cadence in A major at bar 93. The cadence signals the start of the second section or theme. This passage provides a contrast to the music we have heard thus far: it is lyrical in nature and has a folk music feel, which is a result of the pedal on A in the bass and the melody being accompanied in thirds and sixths. This passage likely depicts the character of Lucille. As before, the airs in the play can help us to understand the musical ideas in the overture. Significantly, there is only one air in the play that is in the key of A major: Lucile’s romance. And, like the passage in the overture, this air employs a pedal on A and a melody that is triadic and lilting in nature. It is probable, then, that the overture’s lyrical theme is intended to depict Lucile and, in particular, her love for Dorval.
Interestingly, the lyrical melody of the overture also makes reference to some of the musical ideas from the overture’s opening material. The melody, for example, has a triadic structure and at bar 96 dotted rhythms are introduced, both of which refer the listener back to the opening bars and the music associated with Géronte. The subtle allusions to Géronte’s music perhaps captures in music the familial bond between Lucile and her uncle in the play, highlighting the fact that despite their disagreement these two characters are not in fierce opposition (as may be the case in a tragic play), but actually very fond of one another. The blurring of the first and second sections mentioned above through the use of a pre-emptory lyrical theme at bar 77 I think accentuates this relationship, the anticipatory minor-key melody weakening the contrast between the first and second theme and the potential musico-dramatic opposition between Géronte and Lucile.
At bar 125 of the overture, however, the music appears to adopt a more aggressive tone. The dotted rhythms from the opening return fortissimo, accompanied by an unstable chromatic bass line. The music associated with Dorval and Lucile’s romance is interrupted, and by music associated with the character of Géronte. To my mind, it is as if Géronte has overheard their romance from his secret hiding place in the closet and has burst in to the room to send Dorval home. (Despite familial bonds, then, at this point in the overture Géronte still remains opposed to Lucile’s marriage to Dorval).
After a short codetta passage, the development section begins (bar 156). The harmony becomes increasingly chromatic and fragmented references are made to both the lyrical motif associated with Lucile and the dotted motif associated with Géronte. The juxtaposition of the lyrical and the more militant theme provides a musical representation of the two forces within the play, Géronte pitted against the lovers. The constantly changing harmonies, however, suggests movement and change and are perhaps representative of argument going back and forth in search of a solution.[14]
As noted earlier, the return of the recapitulation is by no means obvious in the overture. Bar 181 could potentially be the start of the recapitulation, but it is not entirely clear as the presentation of the fanfare motif does not appear as it had in bar 1. By omitting the note D from the chord, the return of the material is made modally ambiguous and sounds at first as if the material has returned in F# minor. D major is not clarified until the final beat of bar 182. To complicate matters further, as soon as D major becomes established, the music begins to modulate and at bar 188 a second statement of the fanfare motif is presented, but now a tone lower in the key of C major.
Standard sonata form junctures are once again blurred. The return of the opening material for the recapitulation is undermined, as the recapitulation does not coincide with or bring about a strong sense of a return to the tonic key; in fact, the harmony comes across as muddled and confused. While formally the overture “fails” to provide a model example of a sonata form work, the recapitulation does add to the drama of the overture. The lack of a tonally stable D major in the recapitulation, to my mind, mirrors the final scene of the play, the scene in which Géronte discovers, much to his confusion, that the treasure chest is empty and in which Géronte’s authoritative identity as uncle and tutor is undermined by the other characters.
By contrast, the return of the lyrical, romance theme at bar 223 is much more stable and is presented almost identically to how it was presented in the exposition. The recapitulation seems to convey in musical terms that the manipulation of Géronte has been a success: the lovers’ wishes are fulfilled and no sacrifice has had to be made on their part. Well, perhaps… There is, of course, one significant difference between the presentation of the lyrical theme in the exposition and the lyrical theme in the recapitulation: the theme now appears in the tonic key D major. The fact that the lovers’ music is subjugated into the key associated with Géronte suggests that the reconciliation still requires his approval and the marriage remains is on his terms. In short, the lyrical, lover’s music occurs in D major as a mark of his approval of their marriage and their union as a family. The ending to Méhul’s overture, then, potentially adds an interesting subtext to the drama, suggesting that Géronte’s was not forced into agreeing to their marriage, but actually came round to the idea of his own accord (albeit with some financial encouragement).
Conclusion
Although a relatively short piece, the overture to Le Trésor Supposé is a fascinating work to study in terms of plot, character, and drama as it is filled with interesting and unusual musical effects. In my opinion, the unusual harmonic and formal structure of the overture is not indicative of a weakness in Méhul’s compositional ability, but a result of the overture’s dramatic and theatrical function and Méhul’s desire to furnish the overture to Le Trésor Supposé with a narrative potential that aims to prepare the listener for the comic intrigue to be expounded in the play.
This essay was produced in a shortened version as a preface for a short score of the overture to Etienne Nicolas Méhul’s Le Trésor Supposé (Overture to the play by François-Benoît Hoffman). The score is available from Musikproduktion: http://musikmph.de/musical_scores/composers_sales/scorelist_eng.htm
[1]The most comprehensive work on Méhul remains M. Elizabeth C. Bartlet, Etienne Nicolas Méhul and opera during the French Revolution, Consulate, and Empire: a source, archival and stylistic study (PhD Thesis: University of Chicago, 1982). On Méhul overtures specifically see: Patrick Taïeb, L’ ouverture d’opéra en France de Monsigny à Méhul (Paris: Société française de musicologie, 2007).
[2]Donald Francis Tovey, Essays in Musical Analysis: Supplementary Essays, Glossary, and Index (London: Oxford University Press, 1939), p. 35.
[4] See: Orchestra of Gulbenkian Foundation, Mehul – The Complete Symphonies [Audio CD] (Nimbus Records, 1992) and Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Beethoven, Boccherini, Brahms, Grétry, Méhul: Orchestral Music, conducted by Sir Thomas Beecham[Audio CD] (Naxos, 2000)
[5]It was worth noting that Le Trésor Supposé underwent a number of revisions with two numbers being replaced before the publication of the score. For more information see Bartlet, p. 567-577.
[6]The score designates the play as a ‘comedie en prose, melee de musique’.
[8] On the idea of jealousy in Méhul’s works see David Charlton, ‘Motive and Motif: Méhul before 1791’, Music & Letters, Vol. 57, No. 4 (Oct., 1976), p. 362-369. For an overview of opera in France during the revolution see Winton Dean, ‘Opera under the French Revolution’, Proceedings of the Royal Musical Association, 94th Sess. (1967-1968), p. 77-96.
[9]Le Trésor Supposé is of particularly interest in this respect as it is one of only a few works where Méhul’s compositional sketches are extant. For more information on the sources, see Bartlet, p. 148.
[10] On the dramatic nature and function of the overture in the latter half of the eighteenth century see: Basil Deane, ‘The French Operatic Overture from Grétry to Berlioz’, Proceedings of the Royal Music Association, Vol. 99, No.1 (1972), p. 67-80, Daniel Heartz, ‘Mozart’s Overture to Titus as Dramatic Argument’, Musical Quarterly, Vol. 64, No. 1 (1978), p. 29-49, and Kieran Philip Hulse, ‘The “Dramatic” Overture and the Idea of Tragic Narrative’ (PhD Thesis: King’s College London, 2011).
[11] Susan McClary, Feminine Endings: Music, Gender, and Sexuality (Minnesota: University of Minnesota Press, 1991).
[12] Anthony Newcomb, ‘Once More “Between Absolute and Program Music”: Schumann’s Second Symphony’, 19th-Century Music, Vol. 7 (1984), p. 233-250 and Anthony Newcomb, ‘Schumann and Late-Eighteenth-Century Narrative Strategies’, 19th-Century Music, Vol. 11, No. 2 (1987), p. 164-174.
[13] Carolyn Abbate, Unsung Voices: Opera and Musical Narrative in the Nineteenth Century (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1991).
[14] It is interesting that Méhul chooses to musically explore this dynamic in the overture, as it not a dramatic tension that is given much weight in the play. As with Méhul’s operas of the 1780s and 1790s, music is used here not simply to heighten the drama, but to add to it, Méhul’s music further developing the relationship between Lucile, Dorval, and Géronte.
For a project I undertook a few months ago, I was asked to present a vision for an online virtual graduate school. Increasingly, learning is becoming both multi-modal and blended, and I think there is huge potential for research students to connect, learn, and develop online as well as in person.
Large-scale research projects can be difficult, and at times it can feel as if you are very much on your own, especially in disciplines where you are the sole researcher. Online environments can provide researchers with a place to connect and learn wherever they are located and whenever they want, strengthening a university’s graduate network.
My Prezi presentation explores briefly the potential users and possible content a virtual graduate school might host, as well as some of the perquisites to ensure sustainable development. It would be interesting to get people’s thoughts on this as I am aware of a lot of working going on across the UK to embed digital learning platforms and social media into graduate life.
I recently went to see “Black Swan” and thought it was fantastic. While I can understand that for some the film might be too gory and horrific, in my opinion it is the combination of horror with beauty that makes the film so powerful. Black Swan, to my mind, hosts two contrasting narratives (or stories) that become increasingly entwined as the film progresses. Indeed, the filmtells not only the troubling story of the psychological demise of the ballet dancer Nina Sayers, but also the story of Tchaikovsky’s much loved and beautiful Swan Lake. As the film progresses the two, distinct narratives begin merge, Tchaikovsky’s ballet taking on the dark psychological story of the lead character Nina Sayers, whilst Nina’s story becomes tied to and underpinned by the story and music of Tchaikovsky’s ballet.
What I particularly like about Black Swan is that the film not only transforms Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake, but almost makes the emotional territory explored in the ballet palpable. By transforming the magical fairy tale into a twenty-first century psychological drama, the ballet is provided with a more realistic (perhaps even more emotionally intense) narrative. Indeed, there are no swans here, only real people engaged in situations with which we can identify and understand.
The horrific elements to the film, in my opinion, are important, as they force us to witness, to visually experience, the tormented state of Nina Sayers. Without these I don’t think we could fully appreciate and understand the actions and emotions of the main character. The ending is particularly interesting in this respect, as it fills the spectator with a whole of host of conflicting and contrasting emotions. Indeed, at the very moment we witness Nina fulfil her dreams of executing the perfect portrayal of both black and white swan in the production of Swan Lake, we also see Nina at her most vulnerable and psychologically unstable state. As she performs the final scene to Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake, thescene in which Odette commits suicide because she has lost her love and her chance at breaking the curse, her death is also confirmed, the wound she previously inflicted on herself in a moment of delusion proving to be fatal.
The final scene of the film, then, brings the two narratives together, Nina’s psychological demise and death occurring at same moment in the ballet where Odette commits suicide. What makes the scene particularly powerful in my mind is that in this climatic scene Tchaikovsky’s music replaces words as beauty and horror are placed side by side. As the horrific circumstances of Nina’s death become apparent, we are simultaneously swept away by the power and beauty of Tchaikovsky’s music. While we are appalled by the end, we enjoy the music, almost waiting the music to go on and the moment to last forever.
In my mind, Black Swan is more than just a film; it is a reinterpretation of Tchaikovsky’s ballet. In fact, since seeing the film I have had an itching to go and see the ballet, whilst the powerful narrative of the film still remains fresh in my mind. I wonder if the film has had a similar effect on other people, and whether it will spark an interest in ballet for those not familiar with genre. For me, it has certainly reinvigorated my interest in the genre.
