Les fêtes de Polymnie

"Les fêtes de Polymnie" ("The Festivals of Polyhymnia") is an "opéra-ballet" in three "entrées" and a prologue by Jean-Philippe Rameau. The work was first performed on 12 October, 1745 at the Opéra, Paris, and is set to a libretto by Louis de Cahusac. The piece was written to celebrate the French victory at the Battle of Fontenoy in the War of the Austrian Succession. ["Viking" p.839]

The prologue, "Le temple de Mémoire" ("The Temple of Memory"), describes the victory of Fontenoy in allegorical fashion. The first "entrée" is entitled "La fable" ("Legend") and depicts the marriage of Hercules and Hebe, the goddess of youth. The second "entrée", "L'histoire" ("History"), tells the story of the Hellenistic king of Syria Seleucus, who gives up his fiancée Stratonice when he learns his son Antiochus is passionately in love with her (this tale was also the subject of a later 18th century French opera, Méhul's "Stratonice"). The third and final "entrée" is called "La féerie" ("Fairy tale") and is set in the Middle East. Through her love for him, Argélie redeems Zimès from the power of the evil fairy Alcine.

Neither Cuthbert Girdlestone [Girdlestone p.445] nor Graham Sadler (in the "Viking Opera Guide" ["Viking" p.840] ) consider this among Rameau's finest works, though both remark on the originality of its overture, which breaks the traditional Lullian mould common to French overtures up until that time.

Roles

References

ources

*Cuthbert Girdlestone "Jean-Philippe Rameau: His Life and Work" (Dover paperback edition, 1969)
*"The New Grove French Baroque Masters" ed. Graham Sadler (Grove/Macmillan, 1988)
*"The Viking Opera Guide" ed. Amanda Holden (Viking, 1993)