Comments on: Offenbach And Opera Rara. Or: Waiting For A Recording Of The Original French “Robinson Crusoé”

By: Mr. R. A. Duployen

Mr. R. A. Duployen — Wed, 01 Mar 2023 17:35:01 +0000

No! No! No! “Robinson” is an opéra-comique which means a tuneful,realistic opera with both comedy & pathos, usually with dialogue. “Carmen” is one. Comédie, Commedia even “comedian” in old English mean performers but not necessarily funny. That’s why the deadpan performance by the ORTF(on YouTube) is effective. White’s is a free translation.I’ve done a faithful one. The laughs are soft ones, like Edwiga about to tell Robinson something but not how she loves him (about selling a farm to fund the hero’s law studies).Not puns. Repeated rhymes (Toby’s Patter). Mild jokes like the comic couple “sharing the self-same spit”. White didn’t understand about the way the French think the English spend Sunday. It’s possible. Anthony Besch had to correct it (British productions have been good as opposed to the corrupt English text) by restoring Lady Crusoe’s spinning at the beginning. There’s no song about England. It’s a lesson in love directed at Friday. .

By: Shane Brown

Shane Brown — Wed, 31 Mar 2021 22:28:44 +0000

I confess that I fell in love with the Opera Rara recording of Robinson Crusoe when I borrowed it from the local library when I was about 13. I had the “spark” that got me interested in classical music at high school with one of those inspirational teachers we think only exists in films. Meanwhile, I had an elderly friend who I read books with, and we had just read Crusoe, and so it was inevitable that I would be interested in the set when I saw it at the library. And the wonders of going to the library and borrowing music when I didn’t have a clue what I was doing meant that I ended up with obscurities just as much as the old war horses. In the end, I borrowed the LP set so much that the library offered to sell it to me! Shortly after, the library burned down. Fate.

I think you’re rather harsh on the recording, though. It has much going for it – certainly enough to cause this 13 year old to fall in love with it. No doubt, it would be done differently now, and there are challenges in the performance of the opera today, too. The Royal College of Music performed the Don White translation a couple of years back and cut Suzanne’s “Black and White” song in the third act, as well as changing some of the dialogue (needlessly with regards to the dialogue, I might add). But I totally agree with you that a full version in the original French is long overdue, and was certainly hoping one might have appeared in the celebrations of 2019.

My own blog posts on Offenbach and my review of the RCM production can be found here: https://silentmovieblog.wordpress.com/tag/robinson-crusoe/

By: kevin

kevin — Mon, 19 Mar 2018 19:31:07 +0000

Why has the glorious French recording never been released on CD? It’s so alive and convincing. Other than that: yes, the Don White text is hillarious and very, very good. But it needs hillarious singers to come fully alive, and the studio cast is many things but not hillarious.

By: herbert

herbert — Mon, 19 Mar 2018 15:37:10 +0000

french radio had a very nice broadcast of a performance at the opera comique from 1980 with the indefatigable michel senechal and sonya nicoghossian very campý as vedredi. but my all time love is for the opera rara recording, the live relay more than the studio version, because of the absolutely hilarious text by don white. that and the hillarious columbus/colombe are the real legacy of the marvellous co-founder of opera rara. listen to it, you will have a ball or two…