Episode 415. Our Feathered Friends (Stage Edition)
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dressed, for some reason, as a rooster.
As I sat yesterday pondering all my friends, family, and compatriots celebrating Thanksgiving, my thoughts turned to the turkey, the traditional sacrificial creature for this event. And whatever the avian counterpart of a rabbit hole is, that’s where my thoughts turned as I realized that a tribute to our feathered friends in general would make a nice, lightweight, potpourri episode as we once again hurtle into the final preparations for the holiday season. As my list of possible repertoire exploded, I decided to limit myself only to stage works in which a bird is somehow involved: as a character, as a symbol, as a metaphor, perhaps even as all three simultaneously. So, with composers ranging from Rameau to Sondheim, including such forgotten figures as Walter Braunfels, Victor Massé, and Félicien David, I have put together a wonderful program that focuses particularly but not exclusively on the florid French repertoire, performed by such favorites as Reri Grist, James King, Ileana Cotrubas, Fritz Wunderlich, Sylvia Sass, and Mattiwilda Dobbs, bolstered by such relative newcomers to Countermelody as Léïla Ben Sédira, Ninon Vallin, Janine Micheau, Harolyn Blackwell, Emma Calvé, Endrik Wottrich, Liz Callaway, and Flore Wend. In addition, I am particularly thrilled to present a sublime singer whom I’d not yet encountered before yesterday: the British-Swedish songbird Jacqueline Delman, singing Granados!
RECORDINGS HEARD IN THIS EPISODE
Charles Gounod, Michel Carré [after Frédéric Mistral]: O légère hirondelle (Mireille). Léïla Ben Sédira, Orchestra conducted by Maurice Frigara [1932]
Jacques Offenbach, Jules Barbier [after ETA Hoffmann]: Elle a fui, la tourterelle (Les contes d’Hoffmann). Roberta Alexander [live New York 02.I.88]
George Frideric Handel, John Gay: As when the dove laments her love (Acis and Galatea). Jill Gomez, Neville Marriner, Academy of St.-Martin-in-the-Fields [1978]
Jean-Philippe Rameau, Simon-Joseph Pellegrin [after Jean-Baptiste Racine]: Rossignols amoureux (Hippolyte et Aricie). Flore Wend, Orchestral ensemble conducted by Nadia Boulanger [1953]
Stephen Sondheim, book by Hugh Wheeler [after Christopher Bond]: Green Finch and Linnet Bird (Sweeney Todd). Harolyn Blackwell, Paul Gemignani, American Theater Orchestra [live Carnegie Hall 10.VI.1992]
Félicien David, Gabriel de Lurieu [né Joseph Gabriel], Sylvain Saint-Étienne: Charmant oiseau [Couplets de Mysoli] (La Perle du Brésil). Emma Calvé, Darius Lyons, unknown pianist [1908]
Victor Massé, Jules Barbier, Michel Carré: Au bord du chemin [Air du Rossignol] (Les noces de Jeannette). Ninon Vallin, Laurent Halet, Orchestre de l’Opéra-Comique, Paris [1922]
Charles Gounod, Jules Barbier, Michel Carré [after Giovanni Boccaccio]: Si le seigneur Horace veut un sourire… Si je suis belle encore (La Colombe). Janine Micheau, Tony Aubin, Orchestre Radio-Lyrique [live radio concert 05.VI.1947]
Gioachino Rossini, Giovanni Gherardini [after Théodore Baudouin d’Aubigny, Louis-Charles Caigniez]: Di piacer mi balza il cor… Tutto sorridere mi veggo intorno (La gazza ladra). Ileana Cotrubaș, Bruno Bartoletti, Gürzenich-Orchester Köln [live Oper der Stadt Köln 1987]
Otto Nicolai, Salomon Hermann Mosenthal [after William Shakespeare]: Horch, die Lerche singt im Hain (Die lustigen Weiber von Windsor). Fritz Wunderlich, Robert Heger, Orchester der Bayerischen Staatsoper München [1962]
Ruggero Leoncavallo: O, che bel sole di mezz’agosto… Stridono lassù [Ballatella] (Pagliacci) [sung in Hungarian]. Sylvia Sass, Ervin Lukács, Hungarian State Opera Orchestra [1978 telecast]
Richard Strauss, Hugo von Hofmannsthal: Falke, du Wiedergefundener (Die Frau ohne Schatten). James King, Kurt Eichhorn, Münchener Rundfunkorchester [24.VII.1968]
Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, Vladimir Belsky [after Alexander Pushkin; English translation by Edward Agate]: Hymn to the Sun (Le Coq d’or) [sung in English]. Mattiwilda Dobbs, Igor Markevitch, Orchestra of the Royal Opera House Covent Garden [live London 07.I.1954]
Igor Stravinsky, Stepan Mitusov [after Hans Christian Andersen]: First Appearance of the Nightingale (Соловей [The Nightingale]). Reri Grist, Loren Driscoll, Igor Stravinsky, Orchestra of the Opera Society of Washington, DC [1962]
Enrique Granados, Fernando Periquet: La maja y el ruiseñor (Goyescas). Jacqueline Delman, Vilém Tauský, BBC Concert Orchestra [unknown date]
Stephen Schwartz, book by Joseph Stein [after Marcel Pagnol, Jean Giono]: Meadowlark (The Baker’s Wife). Liz Callaway, Alex Rybeck, Ritt Henn, Ron Tierno [live 54 Below August 2021]
Walter Braunfels [libretto by the composer after Aristophanes]: So ist dies alles denn gewesen, wie? (Die Vögel). Endrik Wottrich, Hellen Kwon, Lothar Zagroszek, Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin [1996]
