Gounod's "Faust"

Synopsis

The opening of Edith Wharton’s novel “The Age of Innocence” takes place at New York’s old Academy of Music in the early 1870s, during a performance of Charles Gounod’s “Faust,” a French grand opera based on the classic German play by Goethe. At the time specified in Wharton’s novel, Gounod’s opera was still “new” music, having premiered about a dozen years earlier in Paris on today’s date in 1859.

Gounod’s “Faust” became a worldwide success, and was quickly translated into many languages. In Wharton’s fictional New York performance, for example, the real-life Swedish diva Christine Nilsson sang the role of Marguerite, the pure German maiden seduced and abandoned by Faust. As Wharton puts it: “She sang, of course, ‘m’ama!” and not “he loves me,’ since an unalterable and unquestioned law of the musical world required that the German text of French operas sung by Swedish artists should be translated into Italian for the clearer understanding of English-speaking audiences.”

Nilsson, again singing in Italian, sang Marguerite at the 1883 gala opening night performance of “Faust” at New York’s newly built Metropolitan Opera House. “Faust” was performed so often there that the building was soon dubbed the “Faust-spielhaus,” a pun on Wagner’s German “Festpielhaus” or “Festival Theater” in Bayreuth.

Despite its good tunes, Gounod’s sentimental opera fell out of favor around the time of the First World War, but soon bounced back into the core repertory of opera houses worldwide—only these days, more often than not, it’s sung in French.

Music Played in Today's Program

Charles Gounod (1818 - 1893) Faust Ballet Music St. Martin's Academy; Sir Neville Marriner, cond. Philips 462 125

On This Day

Births

• 1872 - Russian ballet impresario Sergei Diaghilev (Gregorian date: Mar. 31);

• 1873 - German composer Max Reger, in Brand (near Bayreuth);

• 1907 - English composer (of Irish descent) Elizabeth Maconchy, in Broxbourne;

• 1929 - American composer Robert Muczynski, in Chicago;

Premieres

• 1859 - Gounod: opera "Faust," in Paris at the Théâtre-Lyrique;

• 1864 - Gounod: opera "Mireille," in Paris at the Théâtre-Lyrique;

• 1870 - Gomes: opera "Il Guarany" (The Guarani), in Milan at the Teatro alla Scala;

• 1892 - Tchaikovsky: "The Nutcracker" Suite, in St. Petersburg (Julian date: Mar. 7); The first staged performance of the complete "Nutcracker" Ballet occurred later that same year in St. Petersburg on Dec. 6 (Julian)/Dec. 18 (Gregorian);

• 1896 - Dvorák: Cello Concerto in b, Op. 104, at London's Queens Hall by the London Philharmonic conducted by the composer, with Leo Stern as soloist;

• 1910 - Bartók: String Quartet No. 1, Op. 7, in Budapest, by the Waldbauer Quartet;

• 1915 - John Alden Carpenter: "Adventures in a Perambulator," by the Chicago Symphony, Frederick Stock conducting;

• 1919 - Gabriel Fauré's "Fantasie" for piano and Orchestra, at a Société Nationale de Musique concert at the Salle Gaveau in Paris, with Alfred Cortot as the soloist,

• 1944 - Tippett: oratorio, "A Child of Our Time," in London;

• 1972 - George Perle: "Sonata quasi una fantasia" for clarinet and piano, in Buffalo, N.Y.;

• 1991 - John Adams: opera "The Death of Klinghoffer," in Brussels at the Théatre Royal de la Monnaie;

• 1998 - Robert X. Rodriguez: "Sinfonia a la Mariachi," by the San Antonio Symphony, Christopher Wilkins conducting;

Others

• 1931 - American premiere of Alban Berg's opera "Wozzeck" in Philadelphia, with Leopold Stokowski conducting.