Académie Royale de Musique
The Académie Royale de Musique (Royal Academy of Music) was the music academy of ancien regime France, made up of opera, ballet, and music. It was merged into the Académie des Beaux-Arts in 1816. The Académie has held several theatres as its principal venue since its original inception, the foremost being the Théâtre de l'Académie Royale de Musique (1821–1873) and the Palais Garnier (1875–1990).
History
On 28 June 1669 Louis XIV granted a 12-year privilege to Pierre Perrin to set up the Académie d’Opéra for the performance of operas in French.[1] He was charged with making opera better known to the public not only in Paris but in the other towns and cities of the kingdom of France. With its only financial resources coming from box-office receipts and, unlike the Comédie-Française or the Théâtre-Italien, without a royal subsidy, the Opéra was granted the privilege of putting on "pièces de théâtre en musique", with a ban on anyone else doing the same without gaining authorisation from its owners.
Perrin converted the Bouteille tennis court into a rectangular facility with provisions for stage machinery and scenery changes and a capacity of about 1200 spectators. His first opera Pomone with music by Robert Cambert opened on 3 March 1671 and ran for 146 performances. A second work Les peines et les plaisires de l'amour with a libretto by Gabriel Gilbert and music by Cambert was performed in 1672.[1]
Despite this early success Cambert and two other associates did not hesitate to swindle Perrin, who was imprisoned for debt and forced to concede his privilege on 13 March 1672 to the surintendant of the king's music Jean-Baptiste Lully. The institution was renamed the Académie Royale de Musique and came to be known simply as the Opéra. Within one month Lully had convinced the king to expand the privilege by restricting the French and Italian comedians to using two singers rather than six, and six instrumentalists rather than than twelve.[1] Moreover, Lully and his successors bitterly negotiated the concession of the privilege, in whole or in part, from the entrepreneurs in the provinces: in 1684 Pierre Gautier bought the authorisation to open a music academy in Marseille, then the towns of Lyon, Rouen, Lille and Bordeaux followed suit in the following years.
The ballet of that time was merely an extension of the opera, having yet to evolve into an independent form of theatrical art. Louis XIV, who was a dancer himself and one of the great architects of baroque ballet (the art form which would one day evolve into classical ballet), established the ballet school in 1671 as the Académie Royale de Danse. Until Lully's death in 1687 the school was under the direction of the great dancing master Pierre Beauchamp, the man who set down the five positions of the feet. In 1713 Louis XIV made the Opéra a state institution with a resident company of professional dancers known as the Ballet de l'Opéra.
With the French Revolution and the founding of the Republic, the company was renamed the Théâtre de la République et des Arts and in 1794 moved into the Théâtre de la rue de la Roi which had a capacity of 2800. Napoleon took control of the company in 1802 and with his declaration of the French Empire in 1804 renamed the company the Académie Impériale de Musique. With the Restoration in 1814, the company was renamed to the Académie Royale de Musique. In 1821 the company moved to the Théâtre de l'Académie Royale de Musique, more commonly referred to as the Salle Le Peletier, which had a capacity of 1900 and where it remained until the building was destroyed by fire in 1873.[2] In 1875, the institution occupied a new home, the Palais Garnier.[3] In 1990 the company moved its primary venue to the Opéra-Bastille, although it continued to mount productions, primarily ballet, at the Palais Garnier. Regardless of all these changes in its "official" name , the company and its theatres, were commonly referred to as the Paris Opera (Opéra de Paris) or simply the Opéra.
Principal venues of the Académie
| Official name(s) of the Theatres | Dates of existence | Location | History of the structure | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Salle d'Issy | 1659 | Issy-les-Moulineaux | Demolished. |
| 2 | Salle de la Bouteille | 1671–1672 | Rue Mazarine | Demolished. |
| 3 | Salle du Bel-Air | 1672–1673 | Rue de Vaugirard | Demolished. |
| 4 | Première salle du Palais-Royal | 1673–1764 | Palais-Royal | |
| 5 | Salle des Tuileries | 1764–1770 | Tuileries Palace | Built in 1662 and rebuilt on several occasions. The final building was demolished in 1873. |
| 6 | Deuxième salle du Palais-Royal | 1770–1781 | Palais-Royal | Destroyed by fire in 1781. |
| 7 | Salle des Menus-Plaisirs | 1781 | Rue Bergère | Demolished |
| 8 | Salle de la Porte-Saint-Martin | 1781–1794 | Boulevard Saint-Martin | Constructed in 1781. Destroyed in 1781 as a result of the Paris commune. The theatre was rebuilt on site. |
| 9 | Salle de la rue de Richelieu | 1794–1820 | Rue de Richelieu (until 1815 the street was known as the Rue de la Loi) Located at the Rue Louvois |
Built in 1781. Demolished in 1820. |
| 10 | Salle de la rue Louvois | 1820 | Rue Louvois | Built in 1791. Closed in 1825 and demolished in 1827. |
| 11 | Théâtre national de l'Opéra-Comique | 1820–1821 | Place Boieldieu | Built in 1783. Destroyed in 1839 by fire and rebuilt on site. |
| 12 | Théâtre de l'Académie Royale de Musique (1821–1848) Théâtre de l’Opéra (1848–1852) Théâtre de l’Académie Impérial de Musique (1852–1855) Théâtre Impérial de l’Opéra (1855–1870) Théâtre de l’Opéra (1870–1873) |
1821–1873 | Rue Le Peletier and Rue Grange-Batelière. Today the Hotel Drouot occupies the site where the theatre once stood. |
Constructed from 1820–1821. Destroyed by fire in 1873. |
| 13 | Salle Ventadour | 1874–1875 | Rue Méhul | Built from 1826 to 1829. Closed in 1879 and transformed into a bank. |
| 14 | Opéra Garnier (1989–present) Théâtre National de l'Opéra de Paris (1878–1989) Académie Nationale de Musique - Théâtre de l'Opéra (1875–1978) |
1875–present | Place de l'Opéra | |
| 15 | Opéra Bastille | 1989–present | Place de la Bastille |
References
Sources
- Sadie, Stanley, ed. (1992). The New Grove Dictionary of Opera (4 volumes). London: Macmillan. ISBN 9781561592289.