Some years after the production of Il Crociato, Meyerbeer had written an opéra comique, entitled Robert le Diable, which was to have been represented at the Ventadour Theatre, specially devoted to that kind of performance. The company, however, at the "Théâtre de l'Opera Comique," was not found competent to execute the difficult music of Robert, and the interesting libretto by M. M. Scribe and Delavigne, was altered and reduced, so as to suit the Académie. The celebrated "pruning knife" was brought out, and vigorously applied. What remained of the dialogue was adapted for recitative, and the character of "Raimbaud" was cut out in the fourth and fifth acts. With all these suppressions, the opera, as newly arranged, to be recited or sung from beginning to end, was still very long, and not particularly intelligible. However, the legend on which Robert le Diable is founded is well suited for musical illustration, and the plot, with a little attention and a careful study of the book, may be understood, in spite of the absence of "Raimbaud," who, in the original piece, is said to have served materially to aid and explain the progress of the drama.
ROBERT LE DIABLE.
If Robert le Diable had been produced at the Opéra Comique, in the form in which it was originally conceived, the many points of resemblance it presents to Der Freischütz would have struck every one. Meyerbeer seems to have determined to write a romantic semi-fantastic legendary opera, like Der Freischütz, and, in doing so, naturally followed in the footsteps of Weber. He certainly treats these legendary subjects with particular felicity, and I fancy there is more spontaneity in the music of Robert le Diable, and Dinorah, than in any other that he has composed; but this does not alter the fact that such subjects were first treated in music, and in a thoroughly congenial manner, by Karl Maria von Weber. Without considering how far Meyerbeer, in Robert le Diable, has borrowed his instrumentation and harmonic combinations from Weber, there can be no doubt about its being a work of much the same class as Der Freischütz; and it would have been looked upon as quite of that class, had it been produced, like Der Freischütz, with spoken dialogue, and with the popular characters more in relief.
Robert le Diable, converted into a grand opera, was produced at the Académie, on the 21st of November, 1831. Dr. Véron, in his "Mémoires d'un Bourgeois de Paris," has given a most interesting account of all the circumstances which attended the rehearsals and first representation of this celebrated work. Dr. Véron had just undertaken the management of the Académie; and to have such an opera as Robert le Diable, with which to mark the commencement of his reign, was a piece of rare good fortune. The libretto, the music, the ballet, were all full of interest, and many of the airs had the advantage (in Paris) of being somewhat in the French style. The applause with which this, the best constructed of all M. Meyerbeer's works, was received, went on increasing from act to act; and, altogether, the success it obtained was immense, and, in some respects, unprecedented.
Nourrit played the part of "Robert," Madame Cinti Damoreau that of "Isabelle." Mademoiselle Dorus and Levasseur were the "Alice" and the "Bertram." In the pas de cinq of the second act, Noblet, Montessu, and Perrot appeared; and in the nuns' scene, the troop of resuscitated virgins was led by the graceful and seductive Taglioni. All the scenery was admirably painted, especially that of the moonlight tableau in the third act. The costumes were rich and brilliant, the mise en scène, generally, was remarkable for its completeness; in short, every one connected with the "getting up" of the opera from Habeneck, the musical conductor, to the property-men, gas-fitters and carpenters, whose names history has not preserved, did their utmost to ensure its success.
In 1832, Robert le Diable was brought out at the King's Theatre, with the principal parts sustained, as in Paris, by Nourrit, Levasseur, and Madame Damoreau. The part of "Alice" appears to have been given to Mademoiselle de Méric. This opera met with no success at the King's Theatre, and was scarcely better received at Covent Garden, where an English version was performed, with such alterations in Meyerbeer's music as will easily be conceived by those who remember how the works of Rossini, and, indeed, all foreign composers, were treated at this time, on the English stage.
ROBERT LE DIABLE.
In 1832, and, indeed, many years afterwards, when Robert and Les Huguenots had been efficiently represented in London by German companies, Meyerbeer's music was still most severely handled by some of our best musical critics. At present there is perhaps an inclination to go to the other extreme; but, at all events, full justice has now been rendered to M. Meyerbeer's musical genius. Let us hear what Lord Mount Edgcumbe (whose opinion I do not regard as one of authority, but only as an interesting index to that of the connoisseurs of the old school), has to say of the first, and, on the whole, the most celebrated of Meyerbeer's operas. He entertains the greatest admiration for Don Giovanni, Fidelio, Der Freischütz, and Euryanthe; but neither the subject, nor even the music of Robert le Diable, pleases him in the least. "Never," he says, "did I see a more disagreeable or disgusting performance. The sight of the resurrection of a whole convent of nuns, who rise from their graves, and begin dancing, like so many bacchants, is revolting; and a sacred service in a church, accompanied by an organ on the stage, not very decorous. Neither does the music of Meyerbeer compensate for a fable, which is a tissue of nonsense and improbability. Of course, I was not tempted to hear it again in its original form, and it did credit to the taste of the English public, that it was not endured at the Opera House, and was acted only a very few nights."
Meyerbeer's second grand opera, Les Huguenots, was produced at the Académie Royale on the 26th of January, 1836, after twenty-eight full rehearsals, occasioning a delay which cost the composer a fine of thirty thousand francs. The expense of getting up the Huguenots (in scenery, dresses, properties, &c.), amounted to one hundred and sixty thousand francs.
LES HUGUENOTS.