Un ballet endiablé

Ce soir, c'est la Nuit de Walpurgis. Je partage donc un ballet tiré du Faust de Charles Gounod. Où la Nuit de Walpurgis est mise en scène au commencement du cinquième acte. Une musique à la fois joyeuse et terrifiante.

"Ah, je ris", etc.

C'est devenu une quasi-tradition dans le temps de l'Halloween, je partage ici un extrait de Faust de Charles Gounod. Le même aria que l'année dernière, mais cette fois-ci interprété par Lisette Oropesa, une cantatrice que j'aime beaucoup(pas seulement parce qu'elle a une voix superbe, mais parce qu'elle est vraiment sympathique). S'il y a un opéra qui joue un peu dans l'horreur et se prête bien à l'Halloween, c'est bien Faust. Je vais essayer de bloguer plus en détails sur le sujet dans mes prochains billets, en 2022 ou peut-être pour 2023. Pour le moment, sachez que l'image plus haut était celle du CD que l'on avait de l'opéra, que j'ai écouté et réécouté sans jamais me lasser. L'image me fascinait quasiment autant que l'opéra.

Elsa Dreisig et l'Air des Bijoux

Je sais que j'ai déjà partagé sur ce blogue et pour l'Halloween l'Air des Bijoux de Faust de Charles Gounod. En 2015, pour être précis. Mais je veux mettre plus de musique pour l'Halloween, d'une aprt, et Faust est un opéra halloweenesque. Et je suis tombé sur cette interprétation de la soprano Elsa Dreisig qui est rien de moins que magnifique. Elle fait une parfaite Marguerite, enfin elle est Marguerite comme je l'imagine. Et pourquoi cet aria pour un billet musical de l'Halloween? Parce que ça a une dimension sinistre. Comme je le disais dans mon billet de 2015: "sachant à quel prix Marguerite paiera les bijoux ultimement, il y a une dimension particulièrement macabre à un air qui dans un premier abord semble éclatant et sensuel." J'ajouterais que parfois le Mal et l'horreur se manifestent d'abord dans la lumière.

J'TE RÉSUME - Gounod/Faust

Puis que c'est la Nuit de Walpurgis aujourd'hui (enfin, ce soir), j'ai pensé partager cette vidéo de l'Opéra et ses Zouz, un canal YouTube que j'ai découvert l'année dernière et que j'aime bien, vidéo qui résume le Faust de Gounod. Quel rapport, me direz-vous? Il y a une scène complète de l'opéra qui se passe cette nuit-là, c'est en fait grâce à l'opéra que je l'ai découverte. Quant à l'opéra lui-même, c'est un de ceux post-Mozart que j'aime le plus, pour ses thèmes sombres et son atmosphère terrifiante. Sa musique fait partie dema musicographie à l'Halloween.

Vous qui faites l'endormie...

Quand l'Halloween approche, j'ai un programme musical assez précis et éclectique. J'écoute notamment le Faust de Gounod. Je n'aime pas tous les opéras du XIXe siècle, mais celui-ci disons qu'il a de la gueule. Et puis la légende de Faust est en soi fascinante. Je partage donc ici ce soir l'un de ses arias. Que j'ai déjà partagé. Mais comme ça fait quasiment une décennie... Enfin, partager des arias de Faust est un peu une tradition sur Vraie Fiction.

L'air des bijoux

Je me suis rendu compte que je n'ai pas blogué sur le Faust de Charles Gounod depuis 2012. Or c'était une partie prenante de mes billets d'Halloween de bloguer sur Faust, pas nécessairement l'opéra que la légende. Cela dit, l'opéra lui même est un de ceux qui se prête vraiment bien à l'Halloween: le diable qui tente un mortel et qui amène toutes sortes de tragédie, dont la perte d'une jeune fille de bonne famille, la mort du frère de celle-ci, le meurtre d'un enfant nouveau-né, la folie d'au moins un personnage, j'en passe et des meilleures. J'ai décidé de télécharger ce soir L'air des bijoux (parodié par Hergé), chanté ici par Renée Fleming. Ca n'a l'air de rien comme ça, mais c'est un aria sur la tentation qui marche. Sachant à quel prix Marguerite paiera les bijoux ultimement, il y a une dimension particulièrement macabre à un air qui dans un premier abord semble éclatant et sensuel.

Elusive black cat

This (very bad) picture was taken yesterday, at the train station after work, as I was waiting for my train to go home. It was of one of the cats that dwell by the train station, in the shrubbery next to the gate or even on the railway. I stopped counting them. This may or may not be the black cat I saw right after the interview that got me the job I now have. I nickname him/her and/or the potentially other black cats Mephisto, sort of Mephistopheles. He is one daredevil: I saw him more than once prowling on the tracks. Yesterday he walked on the railway, then took one of the holes that are behind the gate and lead to the shrubbery right by the station, where he spent a lot of time. I was looking at hi, trying to take a good picture (this one being the less bad I took), then he looked at me, and jumped from the long grass on the bridge, started running on the station just as the train was coming. It was impressive.

Of course, every black cat reminds me of, well, my black cat. Unlike Odin, this one seems very feral, although somewhat chubby. Mephisto may not be scared of humans, as he sees many commuters daily, but he never stops to receive a cuddle. He seems happier hiding in the green herbs, the flowers, the bushes and walking on the rails. I miss being friend with a black cat, heck, any cat would do, but a black cat would be pure bliss. I cannot create a friendship with Mephisto, he cares little about humans, but I do find his presence at the station enjoyable in a soothing. He is such a beautiful, proud feline creature.

Speech of the Devil

I thought about uploading this YouTube video in the weeks coming to Halloween. It is taken from The Seafarer, a play by Irish playwriter Conor McPherson. I have never seen it, I go to the theater way too seldom, but I purchased it and read it. I read more plays than I see them. If only it was to be on stage... But I can enjoy a play just for its text, sometimes more than an actual performance. It is the case with this play, it is so good I wonder if the stage can do it justice.

So I thought to upload the clip around Halloween, but since the play is set at Christmas, I thought it fitted better to upload it closer to Christmastime. It belongs to the tradition of Christmas supernatural stories (A Christmas Carol belongs to it too). Of course, McPherson brings a twist to it: it is set in modern times, with modern characters having to deal with their own demons. In this case, it is a literal demon: Satan himself coming in a human form to claim the soul of Sharky, the protagonist. It's a story with poker, plenty of Irish alcohol, Christmas feasts and Catholic guilt. And a Devil who is as melancholic as he is cruel, as weary as the humans he torments. This monologue, said with the right tone (it is the case here) is powerful and evocative. If there was a hell, it would feel like this.

Premier acte de Faust

C'est l'Halloween très bientôt, je me demandais quoi télécharger ici comme musique et je me suis rappelé d'une semi-tradition que je n'ai pas observé à chaque année, mais assez régulièrement: télécharger un peu du Faust de Gounod. Je vais donc en faire une tradition d'Halloween sur ce blogue. Faust est ici interprété par Roberto Alagna et Méphistophélès par René Pape. C'est une très belle mise en scène.

Halloween donuts

I bought these a few days ago. They were a pound in Sainsbury's (they sell all Halloween desserts for a pound, so it's a bargain). I crave donuts from time to time and those are Halloween donuts, so I had to buy them. Maybe I am a sucker. After all, they are normal, glazed donuts, only with an orange glazing and some chocolate sprinkles.  Their association with Halloween is tenuous at best.

Then again, maybe I am not such a sucker. For one, those donuts are associated to the gluttonous aspect of Hallowen, of which trick or treating is a modern manifestation. Donuts are also associated in The Simpsons's episode Treehouse of Horror IV, where Homer sells his soul to Satan for a donut (you can see a few minutes of the episode here). In a way, he makes a Faustian pact. Now, I can also mention that Anthony Burgess,my favourite author, wrote in a dissertation on Marlowe's Dr Faustus that Faust secretly desires damnation because he wants to experience hell. So every time I eat a donut I think of this episode of The Simpsons, and then of the Faustian pact, and about the appeal of eternal damnation when one is tempted by Satan in folklore...

And I cannot believe that in one post I talked about Marlowe, Anthony Burgess, the legend of Faust, Halloween, The Simpsons in a post about trivial donuts.

Question existentielle (156)

Mon lectorat de longue date doit savoir que je suis fasciné par la légende de Faust, je pose donc cette question existentielle:

-Contre quoi vendriez-vous votre âme au diable?

Walpurgis Night

Tonight we are Walpurgis Night! So Happy Walpurgis Night everyone. This is the lesser known, Germanic, springtime Halloween. I know it mainly through the legend of Faust (Faust and Mephistopheles celebrate a Sabbath on the very night). I blogged about it years ago, when I started Vraie Fiction. I thought I would celebrate it tonight. I didn't know what to upload as a picture, something that looked appropriate. Then I went through some pics dad sent me and saw this picture of the Falls of Val-Jalbert. And I thought it would be ideal.

Why? Because this picture looks eerie and sinister, a bit reminiscent of the old Universal horror movies. Because Val-Jalbert is a ghost town (or ghost village) and well, tonight is a night of ghosts, devils and witches. Okay, it is a far off association, but when I grew up, this is how they "sold" it to the tourists: with ghosts (you could even buy ones at the tourists shop there). And because when my family went there with the neighbouring family one weekend around the Saguenay-Lac-St-Jean, it was in May or June, my brothers and our friends (they are twin brothers) read in the evening Dracula's Guest, which is set on Walpurgis Night. Oh boy we had such a fright! You can find an animated adaptation of the story here. So during the day we visited a ghost town, during the evening (in a cottage in Sainte-Hedwidge), after eating a tourtière (true story), we read a horror story and went on a walk in the evening. I did little to celebrate tonight, but I have this memory which I wanted to share.

Faust et nostalgie

Je vais mettre ici encore du Faust de Gounod et j'en profite pour encore faire une page de nostalgie de ce billet. J'ai trouvé récemment sur Youtube un aria de Faust chanté par Jean-François Lapointe. C'est un baryton assez connu qui a même son nom sur Wikipedia. Un baryton québécois assez connu, ça n'a rien d'extraordinaire, mais celui-ci m'a déjà enseigné la théorie musicale et le solfège alors que j'étais enfant. J'étais déjà un passionné d'opéra à l'époque et quand j'ai appris qu'il était baryton je suis devenu un fan, peut-être son premier. A`l'époque, il était encore un chanteur obscur, même pas une célébrité locale. Ca ne rajeunit personne, je sais.Je l'ai revu plusieurs fois à l'opérette du Carnaval de Chicoutimi et à des concerts de Noël. Il a toujours été très chaleureux avec moi, mais je doute maintenant qu'il se souvienne de son premier fan. Vous trouverez ici une entrevue de lui d'il y a quelques années (anecdote: je crois connaître la journaliste également)

Fait étrange, ma voix est devenue celle d'un baryton. J'ai aussi déjà chanté l'aria que je mets sur le blogue aujourd'hui.

Faust animé

English below... Yes I know I don't do it very often, but that is worth the effort.

Les trésors que l'on trouve sur Youtube. Je cherchais donc une interprétation du Veau d'Or tiré (bien entendu) du Faust de Gounod, je suis tombé sur une animation géniale qui résume en deux minutes l'intrigue complète de l'opéra, avec poésie et efficacité et sans sacrifier l'atmosphère. C'est tiré d'Opéra imaginaire et l'auteure est Hilary Audus. L'interprétation de l'aria est de Nicolai Ghiaurov. Vous trouverez l'animation au bas du billet. Ca me surprend un peu que personne ne fasse des adaptations animées complètes de grands opéras. Certains opéras à grands déploiements, comme Faust, se prêteraient parfaitement à ce médium. Enfin, au moins nous avons ce petit chef d'oeuvre de deux minutes.
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For the opera lovers about my readers, and the others too, I found on Youtube a lovely little animated movie that is simply a two minutes masterpiece. I was looking for an interpretation of Le Veau d'Or from Faust of Gounod. And I found this little gem, which summarises the opera the time that the aria lasts, with efficiency but no shortness poetry and atmosphere. It is beautiful. The animation was made by Hilary Audus from a series called Opéra Imaginaire. The aria is interpreted by Nicolai Ghiaurov. I am surprised they don't make complete operas in cartoon. Some large scale operas such as Faust would work beautifully for the medium. Well, at least we have this two minutes adaptation.

An anecdote about The Phantom of the Opera

I discovered yesterday something quite interesting: one of the versions of one of my favourite silent horror movies, The Phantom of the Opera, has my former opera teacher as the singer in the soundtrack. The Phantom of the Opera, Special Collector's Edition, which is maybe the most easily available high-quality versions of the classic movie in the UK (according to this guy, a Phantom buff), used a score interpreted by I Musici of Montreal, with the voice of Claudine Côté for the songs (mainly Faust arias),which was originally used back in the early 1990s. I loved that version, even though I only knew Claudine by reputation then. You can find more about it here.

With my love of horror stories and my love of operas, I was bound to discover the story. I first came to the Phantom through Gaston Leroux's original novel, rather than any cinematic version, or the Andrew Lloyd Webber's cheesy, marshmallow musical (which I used to like, but not anymore). It is a shame that the musical is now its most famous version, because the novel was a great read and the 1925 silent movie was both a very faithful adaptation and an entertaining, terryfying horror flick. The novel also made me discover Faust.

So yes, I love The Phantom of the Opera, but I wanted this post to be more about Claudine than the Phantom. Getting info about the silent movie made me remember that I once was friend with her, which makes it weird to see her name on Amazon or imdb. Back when she did the soundtrack, she was quite a famous soprano in Québec, having sung with Pavarotti right after she graduated. Now she is criminally underrated. When I started university in Montreal, I was looking for a new singing teacher (well, "new", I had only started a few months earlier) and got Claudine's phone number through a friend (small world, but it is true that she was from Saguenay like myself). She was living close to my flat, she was a respected singer, so she was the obvious choice. It was nice to do something different than literature and it was really a great hobby. Since I knew close to nobody in Montreal, the lessons cured me for any feeling of loneliness. Claudine taught me quite a lot and it is in great parts thanks to her that I still have a pretty good singing voice and a relatively good Italian pronunciation. She was also a great person to talk to, always smiling and enthusiastic. And a cat lover. She loved cats so much, she was adopting half the alley cats in her neighbourhood. She even saved the animals of a pet shop near her place when its building went on fire. So she was a generous person too. (And thinking about it, my wife would love her, as she was also an almost vegetarian for ethical reasons). I still remember her tone of voice when was calling me, always starting the conversation with "Bonjour Guillaume, c'est Claudiiiiiiiine", with the "i" prolonged, I think it was due to her line of work. She had gained an "accent chantant".

So I only have nice memories of her. I never got into contact with her after the three years it took me to do my degree in Montreal. I left for England in 1999 and never managed to get in touch with her after that. It is a shame really, as she was important to my artistic/dilettante life at the time. But hey, I can still listen to her, I can even find her voice here in England. So not all is lost.

The voice of the Devil

What if I was bothering my modest readership with another opera post? I haven't done this in a while. I blogged about it in French here, so a year ago. I love the story of Faust, which I discovered through the opera of Gounod. There are of course many other interpretations of the legend. I have discovered recently Boito's Mefistofele, more especially an aria of the title character which I will show you later.

Anyway, the reason why I am fascinated by Gounod's opera and its subject is because of the perfect way the devil is depicted. He is the instigator of the plot, the one who takes initiatives and put the story in motion, until its tragic ending. And Mephistophélès is always pictured as utterly malevolent, yet charming. Throughout the story, we root for him, not Faust or the forces of virtue, which are pretty much impotent until the end. But the real nature of the devil is revealed through his voice: low, threatening but penetrating, fascinating like the stare of a snake. Mephisto is a seducer. This is what opera does best: it gives an aesthetic reality to abstract concept. The beauty of the devil, temptation, it means nothing unless one can get a concrete manifestation of it. And nothing beats a great bass voice to give shape and presence to these concepts.

I haven't watched/listened to the entirety of Mefistofele yet. I will, because I am growing quite fond of some of its arias. By the way the Devil introduces himself, he is certainly more threatening than in Gounod. Yet, we can feel in the voice the power of fascination he has. I have decided to put here the interpretation of one of my favourite bass-barytone, Samuel Ramey. He made himself famous for singing as Mephistopheles in Boito's and Gounod's works, among other things. He also makes a great Don Giovanni, as you can see/hear here. If you can have the patience of going through the very chatty French presenter, you can hear him here singing Vous qui faites l'endormie, from the Faust of Gounod. Here you can hear him as Satan shows himself to Faust in the same opera. And here are two versions (I couldn't decide which one to put here) where Mefistofele played by Ramey reveals himself to Faust in the opera of Boito. This is a much more dangerous Satan, bitter fallen angel who makes no secret of his ambitions. If you know a bit of Italian like me, you can follow the lyrics in the first video.

La voix du Diable

Un peu plus sur les trésors qu'on trouve sur youtube... Comme c'est l'Halloween très bientôt, j'essaie d'écrire des billets circonstantiels à la saison (des billets de saison, pour ainsi dire). Il y bien des choses que j'aime dans le Faust de Gounod. L'un des mérites de l'opéra est d'avoir parfaitement personnalisé la nature séduisante du Diable, nature révélée dans la voix de Méphistophélès. La menace qu'il représente doit se faire sentir dans la séduction de la voix. Je suis baryton et parfois j'envie les basses. Les personnages autour de Méphistophélès, Faust Marguerite, dans une moindre mesure Valentin, ressentent pour le Diable la fascination hypnotique de la bête face à face avec un prédateur. Je pense notamment au "Vous qui faites l'endormie". On peut l'entendre ici chanté par Samuel Ramey, si on a la patience d'endurer le Français bavard qui présente Ramey au public. Voici une autre interprétation (que j'aime moins), de Bryn Terfel, où Faust est joué par Roberto Alagna:

Walpurgis Night, the Gounod version

As promised, Gounod's Faust, Walpurgis Night scene, partially. Sorry, couldn't find a real opera scene that was decent. The Walpurgis Night in Faust is often different from a production to another, because Gounod composed a couple of ballets to go with it, and these ballets are often cut, completely or partially.

Walpurgis Night

It is Walpurgis Night tonight, the Spring time, less popular version of Halloween. Because it is a much more marinal day, it had kept a lot of it's dark roots, and to some extend has a much more sinister connotation. I associate Walpurgis Night with two things: Faust and Stoker's short story Dracula's Guest. Have a look at the short story here, it's worth a read. A very efficient piece of horror. To read tonight, in the dark, alone. For those who don't want to read it and don,t mind crude animation, here's an animated adaptation of the story, transposed to the early XXth century instead of late XIXth, and with a Dracula who looks more like Murnau's Orlock, but it's enjoyable nevertheless.



I will try to put here a bit of Faust's Walpurgis Night scene, the music of Gounod is beautifully haunting.

Bientôt la Nuit des Walpurgis

Après véréfications sur wikipedia, j'ai eu la confirmation que la Nuit des Walpurgis est pour très bientôt (le 30 avril ou le 1er mai). Comme je suis amateur d'histoires d'épouvante, je m'intéresse à en savoir plus sur cette nuit qui est considérée comme une autre Halloween. C'est une des dates de l'année où les sorcières se réunissaient en sabbat. J'ai deux souvenirs vivaces de la nuit des Walpurgis: la scène onirique dans le Faust de Gounod où Méphistophélès célèbre la soirée sur le mont Hartz, en compagnie de Faust et de sorcières (la fête sera gâchée par le spectre de Marguerite), et la nouvelle Dracula's Guest de Bram Stoker, dans laquelle un Anglais (Jonathan Harker?) se fait surprendre en Autriche par un vampire lors de la Nuit des Walpurgis, et est sauvé in extremis par Dracula. Je vais sans doute lire une histoire d'épouvante pour souligner, je ne sais pas quoi exactement, je verrai. J'écouterai sans doute un peu de Faust également.