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Reviewer: Barry
Brenesal
Rameau was not merely a
composer of extremely inventive harpsichord works, a leading opera composer
of his day, and a renowned theorist on the relationship between harmonies
and acoustics; he was also an inveterate musical tinkerer. Surviving
correspondence we possess includes endless demands for changes from his
librettists while designing new operas—a curious parallel to Giuseppe
Verdi—but also that he regarded a few of his operas as works-in-progress
with every fresh staging.
Les Indes galantes is his most
extensive instance of this. It first saw light of day in August 1735,
roughly 40 years after its genre, the opéra-ballet, was first created. In
many respects it is a typical example, offering a prologue with Roman
deities who provide a central theme, followed by a series of acts—each
self-contained with its own plot, scenery, many dances, and special effects.
Light entertainment was the order of the day, and Rameau, along with his
librettist Louis Fuzelier, was keen to meet this challenge in only his third
work for the stage.
It suffered at first from very
poor box office sales, however. Important changes were made after the first
performance, but audiences remained displeased. When remounted the following
year with further modifications, though, the work was pronounced a great
success, and was performed either per act or complete more than 320 times
during the composer’s life. And, with each new mounting, Rameau modified it. Some changes were minor; others, important enough to remove characters or create new acts. Taken over time, they resulted in more than 15 versions of Les Indes galantes, which have been subsequently condensed by scholars into a shorter series of proto-editions reflecting the composer’s shifting thoughts about his opera with new productions (at the Royal Academy: 1736, 1743, 1751, 1761; in Lyons: 1741, 1749; other productions likely—see Rousset, below). These provided him with opportunities to adjust the opéra-ballet according to both the needs of his latest cast, and his own perceptions of audience tastes. Nor were these alterations a matter of perceived progression on the part of Rameau, as though the 1751 premiere was better than that of 1741. Consider the way the composer swapped out and rearranged the order of his acts at the Royal Academy, over the years: 1735: Les Turc généreux; Les Incas du Pérou; Les Fleurs 1735, post-première: Les Incas du Pérou; Les Turc généreux; Les Fleurs 1736: Les Incas du Pérou; Les Turc généreux; Les Fleurs; Les Sauvages 1743: Les Incas du Pérou; Les Turc généreux; Les Fleurs 1751: Les Incas du Pérou; Les Sauvages; Les Fleurs
1761: Les Incas du Pérou; Les
Turc généreux or Les Fleurs; Les Sauvages
Three of the acts played
musical chairs, swapped out every decade or two. Perhaps he moved them
around to create curiosity in an audience that would not have seen or heard
them for a while. Whatever the reason, there’s no impression of evolution
towards an Ur-text (which would have been anachronistic during Rameau’s
time, in any case).
The premieres above ignore
non-Parisian performances of Les Indes galantes in Lyons, or elsewhere. We
have no idea whether Rameau was involved in these, or not. What we do know,
thanks to surviving manuscripts (and even to pages that were in part glued
over, only to be carefully peeled back in more recent times to see the
composer’s older thoughts) is that Rameau repeatedly returned to this opera
of his for changes that would grow in number until the Royal Academy
management decided it was time to stage this popular work once more. Whether
or not he was a madman (as Voltaire charged) due to his incessant demands
for libretto changes, Rameau was a consummate operatic tinkerer when the
opportunity presented itself, as it did with this, his first opéra-ballet.
The sheer breadth and depth of
changes to the score of Les Indes galantes have invariably led to tinkering
of another sort over the years, from conductors and musicologists who can’t
resist a “grow your own opera” approach to the work based on Rameau’s own
manifold alterations. This might change over coming decades, thanks to the
2016 publication of a new edition of the opera by Rameau scholar Sylvia
Bouissou. It includes a rigorous reconstruc-tion of the 1736 version, with
appendices supplying the complete 1735, 1743, 1751 and 1761 versions. Even
so, the urge to use a specific edition and combine it with anything from
moments to major sections drawn from others is likely to continue proving a
popular option. And after all, who is wrong in doing so, as long as it’s
handled in a responsible fashion? Bouissou herself prefers the original 1735
earthquake in Les Incas du Pérou instead of the simpler 1736 version that
was repeatedly employed in later years, because she finds it far more
distinctive. It was only removed because the orchestra claimed it was “too
difficult” to perform at the time.
What György Vashegyi conducts
on this recording is the previously unpublished 1761 version of Les Indes
galantes, utilizing the Bouissou edition. This doesn’t render any recording
that uses another edition necessarily obsolete. Alternative solutions have
been applied in recent years to the textural problems now apparent in this
work. Christophe Rousset and Les Talens Lyriques opted a few years ago to
employ the so-called Toulouse edition, in a manuscript dated to 1750 and
currently part of the collection of the Toulouse City Library. (The laudable
aim of historical accuracy in their DVD resulted in one of those out-of-sync
affairs whose visuals featured both modern costuming and nudity, and a lot
of wriggling, jumping, and running around—all literally—in place of
dancing.) Hugo Reyne and Nicolas Sceaux in turn prepared their own edition
in 2014, restoring the original orchestration based on sources of 1735
extant in the Paris Opéra’s library, and adding the Les Sauvages act from
1736. Unfortunately, that recording isn’t easily available in the U.S.
(though a fair amount of indifferent singing lessens the annoyance
occasioned by its loss).
Typically, recordings made of
Les Indes galantes from before the 21st century build upon the 1902 edition
of Durand’s venerable Rameau series. It was prepared by Paul Dukas under the
overall supervision of Camille Saint-Saëns, and attempted to locate and
publish both scores and score variants that were known at that time. Dukas
and Saint-Saëns, however, were also editorial pragmatists, and realized that
the best possible contemporary edition of the score must be updated for a
typical modern opera orchestra if modern performances were a goal. Of
competing (Durand, at least in part) sets of the opera that are readily
attainable here, the most “complete” is that of William Christie and Les
Arts Florissants, recorded in 1991. He utilizes Rameau’s 1736 ordering of
the acts, which has the benefit of four acts (plus the prologue) rather than
three, as all other Paris stagings of Les Indes galantes did.
Christie interpolates the1735
prologue, though, which includes a part for L’Amour, or Cupid. And whatever
may be said for concision, and simply “getting on with the good stuff” for
audiences who were bored to tears by Roman gods and personified virtues, its
slightly greater length is more dramatically and musically appropriate.
Dramatically so, because the words, music, and actions of L’Amour
(eliminated from the work in 1736, and from subsequent versions) illustrate
the work’s overarching theme of love under attack, yet ultimately spirited
and triumphant. Its removal from the prologue leaves us with nothing more
than Hébé crying for an offstage L’Amour to send his arrows and counteract
violent Bellona, the Roman goddess of war. Musically, the eliminated
material contains what is arguably the best number in the prologue,
L’Amour’s “Ranimez, vos flambeaux.” Rameau employs divided violins in the
air that engage in vigorous three-part counterpoint, including the soloist
as she displays a militant side to love—one completely divorced from the
composer’s usual bucolic flutes in thirds. Christie (and Paillard, for that
matter, in his mid-1970s recording) appreciated this air’s value.
The singing in this production
is of mixed quality, though generally very good. Véronque Gens provides one
of the three best performances I’ve heard in all performances of this opera.
Unfortunately, as Phani (Les Incas du Pérou), she only has one air, “Viens
Hymen,” which is, however, delivered with a refined control of dynamics.
Jean-Sébastian Bou is solid, and handles his runs and ornaments well (“Il
faut que l’Amour s’envole”), Thomas Dollé is listed in several sources as a
baritone, and so the range is, here; but his tone is richer and deeper then
several successful basses (“Permettez, astre du jour”).
Chantel Santon-Jeffrey’s voice
has evidently stabilized since her performances in Le temple de la Gloire,
released a year ago (Philharmonia Baroque 10). At the time of my review of
that set, I noted that a comparison La Gloire’s air, “Tu vois ta récompense,”
with an earlier recorded performance of hers under van Waas (Ricercar 363)
in 2015, reveals her regularly aspirating through most figures in the
latter, and with a dull, faded chest tone. She still makes an impressively
monumental effect when singing loudly and without much vocal movement (“Régnez,
plaisirs et jeux”), but the other issues remain when she attempts figures or
moves down into her chest register.
Finally, two performers I was
frankly looking forward to hearing very much on this new release gave me
significantly less pleasure than I had anticipated. Rainoud van Mechelen is
a musician I’ve previously admired in works by Mazzocchi, Bertali, Sances,
Clerambault, other Rameau operas and a variety of collection discs. He
possesses a fairly dry high tenor voice, but it’s coupled with a sure sense
of style, imaginative phrasing, and real ease with ornamentation and
figures. Here, he feels slightly pushed at tempos which sometimes appear
expressively inappropriate. Damon in Les Sauvages, for example, is a
Frenchman with a sly, mocking character who openly celebrates a philosophy
of inconstancy. Why should his air “La terre, les cieux, et les mers”
proceed at a swift, passionate clip when he’s facetiously taunting a rival
with his deliberate inversion of classical allusions in Nature?
Katherine Watson is another
artist I’ve greatly admired in a variety of recordings, including Couperin,
Monteverdi, Purcell, and Lully. Of a recording of her performance in
Couperin’s Leçons de ténèbres (paired under Jonathan Cohen’s direction with
Anna Dennis) I wrote that “for sheer splendor of voice and stylishness of
treatment, this version can’t be bettered.” Here, however, she’s only
intermittently fine, as in “Régnez, Amour,” which displays runs handled with
ease, and a bit of welcome plush on the tone. “Fuyez, fuyez, vents orageux,”
by contrast, offers dropped notes, clipped ones, and moments where she
audibly runs out of breath.
It’s not surprising, though,
given the unrelentingly furious tempo of Vashegyi’s accompaniment. Not even
a constant mezza voce to conserve breath helps. Christie in his 1991
recording employs what I’ve regularly heard elsewhere, a moderate tempo that
poses no problems for Miriam Ruggeri. Vashegyi is overall a disciplined and
insightful conductor, one who makes much in particular of the many dances
for which the score of Les Indes galantes is celebrated. But in these
instances where he clearly differs with Mechelen and especially Watson, the
results are subpar, to put it mildly.
Comparisons with earlier
versions of this work must be necessarily asymmetrical, given that not only
do the artists differ between sets, but the scoring and edition employed,
and the music included. Thus if your insist upon the most authentic scoring
in a single accurate edition, Vashegyi will suit your tastes. He offers a
single, complete edition, in excellent balance and overall sound, with
generally fine performances. Alternatively, if you don’t mind an album that
mixes editions for more content (Les Fleurs) even as it attempts to revise
the old Durand scoring, Christie’s 1991 set should be the first to consider.
It also has the advantage of two other singers (alongside Gens) that I
consider essential in their roles: Sandrine Piau as Zaïre (Les Fleurs), and
Jean-Paul Fouchécourt as Dom Carlos (Les Sauvages) and Tacmas (Les Fleurs).
Plus, you get the 1735 prologue, though Christie takes the aforementioned
“Ranimez, vos flambeaux” so quickly that the pair of orchestral parts become
nothing more than background decoration. (This is an instance, and the only one in my opinion, where Paillard’s mid-1970s Les Indes galantes is superior to any of the versions recorded during the last 30 years. Paillard was a fine conductor and a genuine Rameau enthusiast who believed that the composer’s orchestration has to be regularly tweaked for more dramatic effect, and recitatives in some works occasionally interrupted with “amusing” quotes from well-known 19th-century music.) Though both albums by Vashegyi and Christie are flawed, each offers strong value. As for a recording that uses a Bouissou edition (or more than one) with great casting, and conducting that always works with singers, instead of sometimes against them—we’ll just have to wait.
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