Jacques Offenbach - La Vie Parisienne (1976)

CD1
1. Ouverture - Choeur 
2. Act I – L Ciel Est Noir - Choeur Et Quatuor	play
3. Act I – Elles Sont triste - Couplets 
4. Act I – Ce Que Pourtant - Triolet 
5. Act I – Jamiasi - Trio 
6. Act I - Finale 
7. Act II – Entrez, Entrez - Duo 
8. Act II – Dans Cette Ville - Couplets 
9. Act II – Vous Souvient - Rondo 
10. Act II – Pour Decouper - Couplets 		play
11. Act II – Finale

CD2
1. Act III - Il Faut- Choeur 
2. Act III – Donc, Je Puis - Septour 
3. Act III – L’Amour - Duetto 				play
4. Act III – On Va Courir - Couplets 
5. Act III – Votre Habit - Sextuor 
6. Act III – Soupons, Soupons - Finale 
7. Act IV - Bien Bichonnes - Choeur 
8. Act IV – Avant Toute Chose - Couplets 		play
9. Act IV – C’est Ici - Rondo 
10. Act IV – En Avant - Choeur - Duo 
11. Act IV - Finale

Mady Mesple
Régine Crespin
Luis Masson
Michel Trempont
Alan Christophe Benoir
Christiane Chateau
Éliane Lublin
Michel Jarry

Choeur et Orchestre du Capitole de Toulouse
Michel Plasson – conductor

Jacques Offenbach (born Jacob Offenbach; 20 June 1819 – 5 October 1880) was a German-born French composer and cellist of the Romantic era and one of the originators of the operetta form. Of German-Jewish ancestry, he was one of the most influential composers of popular music in Europe in the 19th century, and many of his works remain in the repertory. Offenbach's numerous operettas, such as Orpheus in the Underworld, and La belle Hélène, were extremely popular in both France and the English-speaking world during the 1850s and 1860s. They combined political and cultural satire with witty grand opera parodies. His popularity in France went down during the 1870s after the Second Empire, and he fled France, but during the last years of his life, his popularity rebounded, and several of his operettas are still performed. While his name remains associated most closely with the French operetta and the Second Empire, it is Offenbach's one fully operatic masterpiece, Les contes d'Hoffmann (The Tales of Hoffmann), composed at the end of his career, that has become the most familiar of Offenbach's works in major opera houses.

La vie parisienne (Parisian life) is an opéra bouffe, or operetta, composed by Jacques Offenbach, with a libretto by Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy. This work was Offenbach's first full-length piece to portray contemporary Parisian life, unlike his earlier period pieces and mythological subjects. It became one of Offenbach's most popular operettas. It was first produced in a five-act version at the Théâtre du Palais Royal, Paris on 31 October 1866. The work was revived in four acts (without the original fourth act) on 25 September 1873, at the Théâtre des Variétés, Paris. It was first given in London at the Holborn Theatre on 30 March 1872 in an adaptation by F. C. Burnand. The New York premiere was at the first Booth Theatre, on 12 June 1876.

In the early 90's I was able to buy four of Offenbach's operettas at Tower's Record Annex, which is long gone. Cds were sold for about $1.98. I purchased La Vie Parisienne, La Belle Helene, Orphee aux Enfers and La Perichole, plus numerous other albums of works of other composers. They were all new CDs. Record companies had discovered that the number of Americans who bought classical music had dropped from 11 percent to 6 percent, and so record companies dumped much of their inventory. By 2011 the number of people who listen to classical music has dropped even more. Do I feel bad that American tastes for great music has declined? Yes, but I got a chance to snap up so much great music, including much more when BMG Music and J&R did the same. I have bought two other operettas of Offenbach since then, but these four are, to me, the most melodic and entertaining. All but one of them are from EMI. The other, La Perichole, is from Erato. If you are lucky in these bad times to have a lot of money, buy all four of them. These are wonderful pieces of music. ---William J. Coburg

download: uploaded yandex 4shared mediafire solidfiles mega filecloudio nornar

back