II
In New Orleans during the first half of the nineteenth century opera flourished with a brilliance unknown elsewhere in America. The Louisiana city was, as we have pointed out, an American Paris, and the best operatic artists of the French capital appeared there in works selected from the current Parisian répertoire. The opera house was the centre of social, artistic, and musical New Orleans. It was an institution with a tradition and an atmosphere. The brilliant and cultured Creole society lent to it the glamour which only society can give, but it was not dependent upon social support in the same sense as the successive New York opera houses were dependent on such support. It was a popular institution; it was an integral part of the life of the city; it was a source at once of pride and pleasure to the humblest citizen. And to a certain extent it remains so still.
The father of opera in New Orleans, as we have already pointed out, was John Davis, who built the Théâtre d'Orléans in 1816. This theatre was remodeled in 1845 and was destroyed by fire in 1866. Its glory, however, had departed several years previous to the latter date and had passed over to the New French Opera House, erected by the New Orleans Opera-House Association in 1859. The moving spirit in the new enterprise was M. Boudousquie, who became its manager. M. Parlange tried a season of opera at the Théâtre d'Orléans in 1859-60, but without success, and the old house then fell into disuse. Its history, however, had been a brilliant one. For over forty years it had maintained a standard of artistic excellence unsurpassed in America and not far below that of the best European opera houses. Its ensembles, both vocal and instrumental, were exceptionally good—notably so, indeed, in a period when operatic stars were too conspicuously in the ascendant. True, its repertory was never remarkable either for its novelty or for its eclecticism. But that was a fault only too common to opera houses both here and abroad during the first half of the nineteenth century. The list of operas presented at the Théâtre d'Orléans between 1825 and 1860 would be too long to quote here, but it may be mentioned that during that time New Orleans heard the following operas for the first time: Le Barbier de Séville, La Maette de Portici, Fra Diavolo, Robert le Diable, L'Éclair (Halévy), Sémiramide, Les Huguenots, La Sonnambula, Zanetta (Auber), Lucia di Lammermoor, La Esmeralda (Prévost), Beatrice di Tenda, Il Furioso, L'Elisir d'Amore, Norma, Guillaume Tell, La Favorita, La Fille du Régiment, La Juive, Lucrecia Borgia, I Puritani (in Italian), Belisario (in Italian), La Reine de Chypre, Der Freischütz, Les Martyrs, Charles VI (Halévy), Jérusalem (Verdi), Le Prophète, Le Caïd (Thomas), Les Deux Foscari, Les Montenégrins (Limmander), La Gazza Ladra, Tancredi, Othello (Rossini), Moses (Rossini), Don Giovanni, Marguérite d'Anjou (Meyerbeer), La Vestale (Spontini), L'Étoile du Nord, Il Trovatore, Ernani, Jaguarita (Halévy), Martha and Rigoletto. Of these Il Furioso, L'Elisir d'Amore, Les Martyrs and Le Prophète were given for the first time in America.
M. Boudousquie opened the New Orleans Opera House with a brilliant company which included Mathieu (tenor), Melchisedes (baritone), Genebrel (basso), and Feitlinger (soprano). He presented Le Pardon de Ploërmel for the first time in New Orleans and put on a number of operas already familiar to the city, including Rigoletto, with the novice Patti in the rôle of Gilda. The war naturally killed all operatic activities for the time being. Subsequently the New Orleans Opera House was reopened with a strolling company managed by the Alhaiza brothers. In 1866 a splendid company gathered together by the Alhaizas in France was drowned on the voyage to America in the wreck of the Evening Star. A surviving brother opened with an Italian troupe, and since then the New Orleans Opera House has continued its functions, with occasional interruptions, per varios casus per tot discrimina rerum. Italian, German and English companies have been heard there from time to time, but on the whole it has remained a thoroughly French house directed by French managers and presenting opera in the French tongue. Its principal artists have been selected from among the best on the contemporary French stage and have included many singers of world-wide reputation. For years it has been the custom of the house to change its singers every season, and on that account it would be impossible to enumerate here the list of distinguished artists who have appeared on its boards. Mention may be made, however, of such well-known names as Devoyed, Durnestre, Ambre, Tournie, Levelli, Pical, Michat, Orlius, Etelka Gerster, Fursch-Madi, Paulin, Baux, Mounier, Deo, Feodor, Albers and Maurice Renaud. The following operas have been given in New Orleans for the first time from 1866 to 1914, inclusive: Crispino e la Comare, Faust, Un Ballo in Maschera, Petrella's Ione, Linda di Chamouni, L'Africaine, Gounod's Romeo et Juliette, Donizetti's Don Sebastian, Der fliegende Holländer, Lohengrin (in Italian), Fidelio (in Italian), Tannhäuser (in Italian), Aïda, Carmen, Mefistofele (in Italian), Paul et Virginie, Mireille (in Italian), Les Petits Mousquetaires (first time in America), Planquette's Rip Van Winkle, Gounod's Le Tribut de Zamora (first time in America), Thomas's Le Songe d'une nuit d'eté, Lalo's Le roi d'Ys (first time in America), Le Cid, Sigurd (first time in America), Cavalleria rusticana (in English), Hérodiade (first time in America), Samson et Dalila (first time in America), Lakmé, Esclarmonde (first time in America), Manon, Les Pécheurs de Perles, Werther (first time in America), Salvayre's Richard III (first time in America), Die Walküre (in German), Siegfried (in German), Tristan und Isolde (in German), Die Götterdämmerung (in German), La Navarraise, Benvenuto Cellini, I Pagliacci, La Reine de Saba (first time in America), Reyer's Salammbo (first time in America), Godard's La Vivandière, La Vie de Bohême, La Giaconda, Cendrillon (first time in America), Messaline, Verdi's Otello (in English), Tosca (in English), Parsifal (in German), Siberia (first time in America), L'Amico Fritz, Cilea's Adrienne Lecouvreur (first time in America), Madam Butterfly (in English), Fedora (in Italian), Louise, Le Jongleur de Notre Dame, Hänsel und Gretel, Thaïs, L'Attaque du Moulin, Leroux's Le Chemineau (first time in America), Don Quichotte (first time in America), Quo Vadis, Sappho, Saint-Saëns' Phryne, and Bizet's L'Arlésienne (first time in America).