Program Notes

Melchior Grimm, author of the Correspondance littéraire, philosophique et critique (letters written twice a month and dispatched to various German courts, keeping the European aristocracy abreast of current cultural developments in Paris), wrote that the success of the opéras-comiques performed in the theaters of the fairs of St. Germain and St. Laurent “had the good effect ... of turning away the public from the heavy monotony of French opera.” In fact, the public not only deserted the Académie royale de musique, as the Paris Opera was then called, but it also deserted the other two royally subsidized theaters, the Comédie italienne and the Comédie française. In February 1762, the government gave in to the grievances of its theater directors and, no doubt also thinking “if you can’t beat them, join them,” banned the theaters of the fairs, but integrated their five best performers into the troupe of the Comédie italienne.

It is interesting to note that the only opéra-comique that the not-very-musically-inclined King Louix XV enjoyed was On ne s’avise jamais de tout by Monsigny and Sedaine (1761). It may not have been purely coincidental that the five actors integrated into the troupe of the Comédie italienne were the original performers of that work at the theaters of the fairs. The success of this early period of opéras-comiques was essentially due to three composers, Duni, Philidor and Monsigny, and to their librettists, chiefly Michel-Jean Sedaine. Their continued success at the Comédie italienne eclipsed the Italian repertoire. By 1780, the Italian troupe of the Comédie italienne had been disbanded, and the Comédie italienne had effectively become the Opéra Comique.

Monsigny’s first opéra-comique performed at the Comédie italienne after the merger was Le Roi et le fermier to a libretto by Sedaine that had been rejected by Philidor. Sedaine based his libretto on an English play by Robert Dodsley (1704-1764), The King and the Miller of Mansfield (1737), translated into French by Claude-Pierre Patu (1729-1757) and published in 1756. The choice of an English model was not unusual for Sedaine.

He was very familiar with Patu’s published translations of English plays and had already used Patu’s translation of Charles Coffey’s ballad opera, The Devil to Pay, or The Wives Metapmorhos’d (1731), for his libretto of the opéra-comique, Le Diable à quatre, set to music by Philidor and Laruette in 1756. He also was a familiar of several salons of the Paris aristocracy, which at that time was swept up by a fashion for all things English. In 1745–46, Pierre-Antoine de La Place (1707- 1793) had published his translations of Shakespeare’s plays. Articles adversely comparing the plays of Corneille to those of Shakespeare, published in the Journal encyclopédique of October 1760, prompted Voltaire, a former Anglophile himself, to come to the defense of French classical theater.

Actually, this fad for all things English had a political dimension. It was a reaction to the government’s opposition to Britain in the Seven Years’ War (1756-1763). With the two treaties of Versailles (1756 and 1757), France had renounced its two-century long policy of opposition to the Habsburg monarchy and had signed an alliance with Austria, which was further strengthened later by the wedding of the grand-son of Louis XV, the future King Louis XVI, with Marie- Antoinette, daughter of the Austrian Empress Maria-Theresa.

This change of alliances was very unpopular throughout the nation, particularly among the intelligentsia grouped around the encyclopaedists. They considered the British monarchical system more liberal than France’s absolute monarchy. They also sought to undermine the influence of the Roman Catholic Church in matters of state, because they believed the Church encouraged the alliance of the two Catholic realms, thereby embroiling France in a disastrous war that would cost it most of its Indian colonies, Canada, the Mississippi Valley, New Orleans and several Caribbean islands.

Conscious of the potentially subversive nature of his libretto for Le Roi et le fermier, Sedaine tried in its preface to justify himself: “Led by the scene and by the location where it is taking place, and by the original text in English which I have used extensively, I had placed in my farmer’s mouth hard truths about all courts, and of all times, but a few persons, maybe as overzealous as I would have been in their stead, have sought to find them offensive. They had this scene changed, and it is performed as modified.” Nevertheless, the dialogue in Act III, scene x between the King and Richard, wherein the latter puts in doubt the King’s assertion that, “A king, who is good, has faithful friends and trustworthy ministers,” can be read as a sly criticism of Louis XV’s reliance on his ministers who were considered responsible for the change in foreign policy and its disas- trous consequences.

Sedaine’s libretto is innovative not only for its political implications but also for the way in which it enables the music to be integrated with the drama. In the last scene of Act I a storm arises, interrupting the duo of Richard and Jenny and forcing them to take shelter. The storm serves as a musical interlude between the acts and is heard subsiding during the opening duo of Act II. Sedaine provides opportunities for Monsigny to reveal the inner life of his characters through music: Richard sings in his opening ariette (Act I, scene i) in an agitated mood, but Sedaine withholds until scene iv the cause of his agitation and follows that revelation with an ariette for Richard marked “amoroso” in the score. Such musical depiction of a character through his emotions was a novel approach in opéra-comique. Sedaine, working closely with the composer, provided opportunities for the music to enhance the dramatic content. Examples include the finale of Act II, where Lurewel and the courtier are arrested by the gamekeepers (foreshadowing the trio that ends Act I of Mozart’s Abduction from the Seraglio) and the septet in Act III, when the identity of the King is revealed. Another lovely touch is the trio of women in Act III, each singing a different song while spinning or sewing.

The music of Monsigny is every bit as imaginative as Sedaine’s libretto. The overture (a Presto in E-flat major followed by an Andante Allegretto in C-minor) leads immediately to Richard’s opening ariette, “Je ne sais à quoi me résoudre,” an Allegro also in E- flat major. In so doing, Monsigny structurally links the two-movement overture to Richard’s ariette, forming a three-part por- trait of the main character. For his ariettes, Monsigny uses a variety of forms for expressive effect. Jenny’s ariette, “Ce que je dis est la vérité même,” is in a very strict da capo form to underline the sincerity of the young woman. The jealousy of Richard in his ari- etta, “D’elle même, et sans effort,” is expressed in a rondeau form, while the naiveté and simplicity of Betsy in her ariette, “Il regardait mon bouquet,” is expressed in a modified strophic form. Furthermore, Monsigny devises complex structures when a character narrates an action in an arietta, and he uses the orchestra to illustrate it with telling motifs, such as in Jenny’s ariette, “Le Milord m’offre des richesses.” The role of nature (the darkness of the night, the storm, the inhospitable forest) as depicted by the music is a new musico-dramatic effect that will culminate in the scene in the Wolf’s Glen in Weber’s Der Freischutz (1821).

Sedaine was very conscious that he was breaking away from the old opéra-comique librettos in writing this particular one and was so appreciative of Monsigny’s willing- ness to follow him in this new path that he paid him a compliment in his preface, writing: “Never has a good or bad work had so much difficulty in reaching the stage ... I had to find a great artist, a capable musician, who would have some confidence in me: that is, a friend who would be willing to take the risk of setting a new genre in music.”

At the first performance of Le Roi et le fermier on November 22, 1762, the public was surprised by the many novelties of the work, and its reception was mixed. However, at subsequent performances, audience appreciation grew rapidly, leading a contemporary chronicler to write that: “It has had more than 200 performances, and the Comedians assure that it has brought more than twenty thousand francs to MM. Sedaine and Monsigny.” A year later, it was performed in French in Vienna. Count Durazzo (1717-1794), the director of the imperial theaters of Vienna, wrote to Simon Favard (1710-1792), an opéra-comique librettist and director at the Comédie italienne: “Never has an opéra-comique met greater success in this country.” In 1776, it was performed in St. Petersburg before the empress Catherine II and her entourage by the troupe of the cadets of the military school. On August 1, 1780, Le Roi et le fermier was the first spectacle performed by Marie-Antoinette and her chosen entourage. Marie-Antoinette played the role of Jenny. The Comte d’Artois (future King Charles X) played Rustaut. The public was restricted to the King and the royal princes and princesses without members of their retinue. Marie-Antoinette performed in her theater irregularly between 1780 and 1783. She played once more and for the last time on August 19, 1785. Luckily, the sets for Le Roi et le fermier have survived the destruction of time and will be used, after necessary restorations, for Opera Lafayette’s performances in the royal theater of Versailles.

The French Revolution brought a change in public taste and Monsigny’s works were less frequently performed. However in 1797, the artists of the Opéra Comique, knowing that Monsigny was in ill health and destitute, offered him a pension of 2,400 livres. In reporting this matter, Le Journal de Paris of August 15, 1798, described Monsigny as “The citoyen Monsigny, distinguished musician, author of Le Roi et le fermier and of many other lovely works, etc.” Eight years later the work was revived at the Opéra Comique. Such was its success that it brought the impoverished Monsigny a much needed additional 2,000 francs pension.

Perhaps the composers Etienne Nicolas Mehul (1763-1817) and Paul Dukas (1865- 1935) have best expressed the qualities of Monsigny’s music. The former expressed it in a telling comparison: “There is between his [Monsigny’s] songs and the verses of the good La Fontaine striking similarities. Their works display an equal degree of naturalness, grace, naiveté and sometimes voluntary carelessness which is so surprising that it must for that very reason be preferred to a cold correctness.” The latter wrote in La Revue Hebdomadaire of July 22, 1893, “Monsigny was a man of an exceptionally impressionable and emotive nature, at least among the musicians. Of all the composers of our country, he is probably the first who had the gift of true, human emotion, of communicative expression and of the right feeling ... The frail melodies of Monsigny are no doubt nothing more than melodies, but of such moving inspiration, of such sincere accent, of such natural and charming shape that one freely ignores their feeble harmonic support and one forgives this instinctive musician, who dreamt them up, his unaffected artistry, in favor of the pleasure that he provides us.”

—Nizam Peter Kettaneh