Amadis, opera in 4 acts

• Date: ca. 1895
• Composer: Jules Massenet
• Period: Post-Romantic (1870-1909)

Review

Music is often inspired by plays, poetry, legend, or historical events or characters, but less frequently by the visual arts. Pictures at an Exhibition is perhaps the most famous composition based on a painting, but Amadis, though inspired by an entire school, rather than a single painting, is also among this tiny group.

Massenet was of the chamelon school, it seems--he was equally comfortable in solidly domestic Werther, exotic Le Roi de Lahore, Esclarmonde, morality tale Griseldis, erotic Cleopatre, or verismo La Navarraise, Therese styles. Amadis is written in the Pre-Raphaelite style, and the libretto even describes the title character as appearing as in a Burne- Jones painting. The opera has the wispy, ethereal feel of the artist's work, and draws on the same British legends that inspired so many of the Pre-Raphaelite school.

It opens with a creative device, a prolog in which a hunter watches the princess Elisene flee with her two infant sons, begging for and receiving the protection of the fairies before she dies of exhaustion. This prolog is entirely spoken, with actors portraying the hunter, princess, and children.

In the subsequent action, the children, Amadis and Galaor, who have been separated and reared without knowing the other's identity, are rivals for the princess Floriane, who is in love with Amadis from stories she has heard of him. In the tourney which awards Floriane in marriage, Galaor defeats Amadis. The two later meet again in a duel, and Amadis fatally wounds Galaor, and then finds that he has killed his brother. Galaor nonetheless blesses the union of Floriane and Amadis as he dies.

Amadis is a trouser role, sung by a mezzo, and Galaor is sung by a baritone. Their music is written so that Amadis' blends with Floriane's delicate soprano and Galaor's sounds alien to it. Most of the music is written in the delicate style that Amadis and Floriane exemplify, both lush and pure, expressing a romantic yearning that is almost sexless. ~ Anne Feeney, Rovi

Albums with Complete Performances of the Work

Title	Date
Massenet: Amadis

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