LULLY, Jean Baptiste 1632-1687

Proserpine. Tragedie. [LWV 58]. [Copyist manuscript full score]. Paris, ca. 1680-90

Folio. Full contemporary dark brown calf with raised bands on spine in compartments gilt, titling gilt, decorative tooling gilt to edges of boards, marbled endpapers. Watermark of grapes and letters in an oval incorporating a heart (see Heawood 2205-2207).

Act I: ff. 1-83 recto (verso blank)
Act II: ff. 84-109
Act III: ff. 110-138
Act IV: ff. 139 (recto blank, verso notated)-177
Act V: ff. 178 (recto blank, verso notated)-207

207 leaves (=414 pp.) in total. Notated in black ink on 12-stave rastrum-ruled paper.

Binding worn, rubbed, and bumped with minor loss to head and tail of spine; joints partially split. Occasional small stains and showthrough; several leaves slightly browned; minor loss to blank upper corner of f. 126.

Schneider p. 332 (citing 4 other manuscript copies in France and one in the U.S., at the Library of Congress). First printed edition 1680 (RISM L3014).

Proserpine, in a prologue and five acts to a libretto by Philippe Quinault, was first performed for Louis XIV at court in Saint-Germain-en-Laye on 3 February 1680 and first performed in Paris at the Opéra on 15 November of that same year, with performances continuing until March of 1681.

"Lully and his librettist, Philippe Quinault, invented a new genre, the tragedie en musique (which came to be called tragedie lyrique around the mid-18th century). It shares certain superficial characteristics with French spoken tragedy of the time, notably its five-act structure and heroic (i.e. noble), characters, usually from ancient mythology, who work out their problems in conversations with their confidants." The New Grove Dictionary of Opera Vol. 3, p. 84.

"Lully favoured the duo above all other small ensembles in his tragedies lyriques. ... What P.-M. Masson (in L'Opéra de Rameau) has called the 'divergent duo' expresses the opposing sentiments of two people. It is extremely rare in French opera before Rameau. Proserpine includes a duo, 'Ma douleur mortelle' (in Act 4 scene iv), which highlights the conflict between Pluto and Proserpine and is as close as Lully ever came to writing an operatic 'divergent duo.'" The New Grove Vol. 11, p. 323.

A fine manuscript copy in an attractive hand.

Item #39594

Price: $3,800.00  other currencies