GOTHIC OPERA

Now almost totally unknown, Le Loup-garou (The Werewolf) was performed at the Opera Comique when the composer Louise Bertin was aged just twenty-two. Although an anonymous review at the time stated that the work was good “for a woman,” Bertin has all been but forgotten as a composer and the opera performed only a handful of times since.

We performed Le Loup-garou alongside Le dernier sorcier (The Last Sorcerer), written in 1867 by considerably better-known composer and singer Pauline Viardot to a libretto by Ivan Turgenev. Unheard in the UK before now, this opera tells the tale of a bad-tempered sorcerer, the target of teasing by the elves in the forest, and his daughter, who has fallen in love with a young prince.

Performed with chamber orchestra, these two neglected operas are united by their supernatural, fairy-tale like themes and their light-hearted but subtly sinister character.

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