This rarity is being broadcast on France Musique at 16.00 today.
See Operacast for details.
I'll upload it tonight (if everything goes well...) ;)
Wishful thinking! According to the programme this afternoon it only seems to be one aria:
Le Timbre d'Argent : Air d'Hélène : "Le Bonheur est chose légère". A foretaste of what's to come? Let's keep our fingers crossed!
Actually this afternoon is only an extensive presentation and interview of François-Xavier Roth about the forecoming series of representations at the Opéra comique, June 9 to 19.
There will be a broadcast on France Musique July 2 at 20:00. I'll upload it when I've got it.
A commercial CD has been announced.
Be patient!
Yes, you are all right, it was only a discussion about the forthcoming production . What a disappointment!
Even the aria turns out to be one of Saint Saens best known "melodies".
At least this promo whet my appetite for the real thing.
Definitely on this Sunday 2nd July.
Stand by your recorders, chaps!
Someone please have a go. IMHO it's a stunning opera. I was rivetted the whole way through thorugh the première, constantly intrigued by what Saint-Saens conjured up. Listen out for the precursor of Rimsky's Flight of the Bumble Bee! Is that where R-K got the idea?
Sorry I can't record it this time. Mobile Internet is useless in rural Scotland!
(For a moment I read that as Le timbale d'argent - btw shouldn't all those nouns besides "Le" be lowercase, and why aren't they? It's French, not German, fetcsake... - but that's Vasseur's opera-comique, not Saint-Saëns' thing. Also the French title of a lost silent movie from 1921, apparently.)
Hrm. Saint-Saëns 1865 premiered 1877, Rimsky 1900, do the latter's memoirs mention _any_ Saint-Saëns anything, fwiw?...
According to a quick look at I͡Astrebt͡sev's Rimsky biography, Rimsky had a high regard for Saint-Saëns.
The use of capitals is very complicated in French, especially in titles... It should be italicized and be set as Le Timbre d'Argent or Le Timbre d'argent. Even if you are not fluent in French, you'll have a flavor of this complexity checking https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikip%C3%A9dia:Conventions_typographiques#Titres_d.27.C5.93uvres_.28livres.2C_films.2C_etc..29 (https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikip%C3%A9dia:Conventions_typographiques#Titres_d.27.C5.93uvres_.28livres.2C_films.2C_etc..29)
I'll download the opera from France Musique, then upload it. I'll let you know when it's done... :)
To clear all spelling doubts:
https://www.francemusique.fr/emissions/dimanche-l-opera/le-timbre-d-argent-de-saint-saens-nouvelle-production-de-l-opera-comique-35134
Timbre (hammer bell) has nothing to do with timbales (timpani). The French never exaggerate in putting capitals to title words like Americans.
Will also record it.
France Musique: Just testing my different incoming sources: Digital Radio (cable) was interrupted two times already within an hour and internat Radio has drop-outs almost every minute! Are we really in the 21st century? Let's hope it will be better this evening!
I'll record from replay, which I hope won't have drop-outs...
I got it! Broadcast sounds fine to me. I'll do some editing--It's in two parts, Acts 1 and 2 (1h23) and Acts 3 and 4 (1h06). Plus comments and other stuff (in French). Note that this seems to be the version Saint-Saens revised for Brussels in 1914, which should not match the score available on imslp.
I'll upload it tomorrow evening on mediafire. :)
Thanks jdperdrix :-)
Wonderful music, although not very uniform in style. The libretto: ou-la-la! :-)
Uploaded to mediafire.
Available soon on the downloads section.
QuoteNote that this seems to be the version Saint-Saens revised for Brussels in 1914
The Programme maintained that for the Brussels 1914 production Saint-Saens reinstated cuts made in previous productions where theatre managers had insisted on them. Perhaps more precise details will be revealed in the accompanying book when the CDs are released.
I've listened to the broadcast and think it is an undoubted masterpiece of French opera, from the brilliant overture to the magnificent choral finale. I've checked the complexity with 1913 year-vocal score: there are some cuts in the last act, including ballet scene. But I'm not sure this is the same version as was staged in La Monnaie.
The score is available at the BNF and can be downloaded here:
http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k1163812z/f18.image.r=le%20timbre%20d'argent (http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k1163812z/f18.image.r=le%20timbre%20d'argent)
This is the 1913 version which differs significantly from the 1877 version (arrangement by Georges Bizet), available on imslp.
The broadcast is this version with and there are some cuts (ballet music) in the 4th act (I didn't check the first two.)
The arrangement in the download section is whose?
Possibly the composer himself this time? Don't know. Published by Choudens in 1913 or 1914 (BNF says [1913] - (suggesting they have reasons, e.g. stamp perhaps, to be fairly sure of the date of the publication of this reduction), even though the revision itself is given composition dates 1913-14.)
Wait, what do you mean, the arrangement in the download section? The arrangement @ Gallica or the opera revision? The latter is by Saint-Saëns I'm sure since he was alive until 1921, but the former - the vocal score reduction --- _might_ be by Saint-Saëns (rather than Bizet as for the first version of the opera, say) . But color me confuzzled as to what you're asking...
The score at Gallica is copyright 1913. The author of the reduction is not mentioned.
The score at imslp is Bizet's reduction and there is no indication of a date on it.
The opera, as the comments say during the broadcast (which have been cut by me), say it is the Brussels version of 1914, revised by Saint-Saëns. It is this version I've uploaded on mediafire. It seems very close to the 1913 version with a few cuts.
Quote from: eschiss1 on Thursday 06 July 2017, 02:05
Wait, what do you mean, the arrangement in the download section? The arrangement @ Gallica or the opera revision? The latter is by Saint-Saëns I'm sure since he was alive until 1921, but the former - the vocal score reduction --- _might_ be by Saint-Saëns (rather than Bizet as for the first version of the opera, say) . But color me confuzzled as to what you're asking...
I mean the recording in the Download section. Not sure why that's confusing.... But at least you now know what it's like reading many of your posts Eric! ;D :)
Anyway I think jdperdrix has answered. And many thanks to him for this upload!! Now for Ascanio....
When they say "Brussels version of 1914" they mean the version premiered in 1914, but it's the version composed 1913 or 1913-14, the version whose vocal score was published in 1913 and is downloadable from Gallica (with those cuts etc. etc.)- it's not a _third_ version. In opera, apparently, one says a work is from the year it was premiered in, not the work the composition was finished in; this is the linguistic general agreement in the language of opera, I gather. (There must be a better way to say that - ah. "term of art"? Yes. That's it. Sorry- I'm sleepy and slightly senile, I think.)
Wikipedia says about the grand opera version of 1913. May be vocal score from Gallica refers to it along with 4th act ballet (wich could be cut for the 1914 performance).
Only significant differences between this performance and the 1913 score are the cuts in the 4th act. Otherwise a few repeats are omitted. No more can be said to this point!
The Paris performance conducted by François-Xaver Roth will be broadcast on BBC Radio 3 next Thursday (29th) at 2pm.
Here's a review of the performance:
https://bachtrack.com/review-timbre-argent-roth-opera-comique-june-2017 (https://bachtrack.com/review-timbre-argent-roth-opera-comique-june-2017)
I've at long last got around to listening to this opera, courtesy of jperdrix's recording of the broadcast (http://www.unsungcomposers.com/forum/index.php/topic,6546.msg69127.html#msg69127). Despite the extensive cuts in Act 4, which are more than just the ballet, it's an interesting and very enjoyable piece which showcases Saint-Saëns' skills as imaginative orchestrator and fine melodist. What it doesn't do is say much for his early skills as a dramatist, because there are so many instances of inappropriate musical settings of the text. This doesn't matter a jot if one is simply enjoying the music, which is throughout colourful, vigorous, melodic and quite highly charged, but matching it to events on stage makes one realise how often Saint-Saëns' musical choices are downright bizarre in this, his first opera. One has only to listen to the lengthy (slightly too lengthy, actually) Overture to get a flavour of what's to come: is that jaunty, lyrical and very upbeat piece, fun though it is, really an appropriate curtain-raiser for a dark Faustian tale of obsession, temptation, avarice and death? Yet the Overture's material comes from the opera itself...
Disregarding what they're singing about, I found this a really enjoyable listen, and I'm looking forward to Palazzetto Bru Zane's recording being published, but as an opera it's an odd, odd piece of work. By the way, it's well worth reading this blog post (https://saintsaenscomplete.wordpress.com/2018/08/05/le-timbre-dargent/) about Le timbre d'argent by someone who is slowly surveying all of Saint-Saëns' music. It's an amusing but perceptive read.
Quote from: Mark Thomas on Thursday 14 March 2019, 11:59
..... and I'm looking forward to Palazzetto Bru Zane's recording being published....
They are doing this one too? Are they committed to doing all of them?
I have no idea, but I understand that they will at least be releasing a recording of this one.