The new edition of Offenbach’s operetta goes back to the autograph full score for the first time. Now two new productions follow in quick succession in Bielefeld (Germany) and Biel (Switzerland) using the edition used for the first time in 2000.
La Belle Hélène (premiere, Paris, Théâtre des Variétés, 17 December 1864) is a key work in Offenbach’s output and for the genre of operetta as a whole. The first performance in German (Vienna, Theater an der Wien, 17 March 1865) gave the definitive stimulus for the development of Viennese operetta by Suppé, Johann Strauss and Millöcker. Offenbach brought together Ludovic Halévy and Henri Meilhac as authors for the first time for the libretto of La Belle Hélène. And with this, what was possibly the most successful and brilliant writing partnership of French theatre and the operatic stage in the second half of the 19th century was born.
The critical new edition of La Belle Hélène is the first edition of one of the great Offenbach operettas to use a careful textual analysis of the music. For the first time, Offenbach’s autograph full score, which survives almost complete, has been consulted. The result of this critical examination is a version which differs considerably from the one known and trusted until now. This applies particularly to the instrumentation and the musical structure of the individual numbers.
Offenbach’s licence for the Bouffes-Parisiens allowed only a much reduced orchestra, which forced him to almost halve the wind instruments he used. In La Belle Hélène he nevertheless had twenty-four musicians at his disposal. The orchestral writing is exceptionally transparent, but so virtuoso and matched to the musico-dramatic situation that the reduced number of players never seems a drawback. Each instrument is used to the best advantage. This new edition enables the work to be performed for the first time with the orchestral forces for which Offenbach composed it.
Analysis of the autograph full score shows clearly that the Gérard edition of 1865 bears as little resemblance to what was performed at the premiere as the Bote & Bock edition (also 1865) does to the first Vienna performance. The most striking differences relate to the middle of the second act, the “Jeu de l’oie” (Game of the Goose). In this scene the authors use satirical style to get to the heart of the dubious corruption of the upper class in classical Sparta. Calchas, grand soothsayer to Jupiter who is opposed to the bribes of manipulable and manipulating politicians, wants to break into the pot of the Game of the Goose, which is full to overflowing with bets. This is only possible by using loaded dice. Offenbach and his librettists reveal this manipulation openly in an extensive ensemble. Nothing remains of the reputation of a statesmanlike soothsayer. Parallels with the political situation in the Second Empire under Napoleon III are quite obvious. Before the work’s premiere the first half of this ensemble, in which the manipulation of this game of chance is portrayed, was cut. It is more than likely that this was to pre-empt an intervention by the censor.
The end of La Belle Hélène also appears in a new light. From the sources it is apparent that there are at least eight versions of the finale. Three of these versions are documented in full in the autograph full score and are published in this new edition. Only one of the final versions ends with the frivolous happy ending of the Gérard edition, in which the remaining duped Greeks bid a cheerful farewell to Paris and Helen. All other versions end with the Greeks declaring war on the Trojans, an ending which remains true to the classical myth: the abduction of Helen by Paris is the catalyst for the Trojan War. This French setting of the opera, the two Iphigenie settings by Christoph Willibald Gluck and Les Troyens by Hector Berlioz all use the same version of that myth. Offenbach’s La Belle Hélène is the satyric drama to this musico-theatrical classical project which later supplies the foundation of the musical tragedy as an operetta.
Robert Didion †
(translation: Elizabeth Robinson)
from [t]akte 1/2000