Orphée et Eurydice – ‘J’ai perdu mon Eurydice’ (Juan Diego Flórez, The Royal Opera)

Royal Opera House Published on September 24, 2015
Juan Diego Flórez in The Royal Opera’s production of Gluck’s Orphée et Eurydice. Thola okuningi ku
The Italian Orfeo ed Euridice was the first of Gluck’s great ‘reform’ operas. Kuyo, he and his librettist Ranieri de’ Calzabigi sought to move away from the complicated plots and ornate music of opera seria, in favour of a ‘noble simplicity’, lapho umculo ushayela indaba njalo. The opera’s premiere at the Vienna Burgtheater on 5 October 1762 was a great success – so much so that Gluck himself revised the opera for the French premiere at the Paris Opéra on 2 August 1774 as Orphée et Eurydice. Kude, enkudlwana futhi okukhulu; Gluck ukunyakaza enwetshiwe, added new ones and revised the orchestration to suit the forces of the Opéra. Wabuye recast indima ka Orpheus kusukela alto castrato kuya Haute-contre of opera French, a tenor eliphezulu kakhulu. The opera remains Gluck’s most popular work, futhi mlando emlandweni operatic.