(b Metz, 5 Aug 1811; d Paris, 12 Feb 1896). French opera composer. He studied with Le Sueur at the Paris Conservatoire, winning the Prix de Rome in 1832. He then devoted himself to writing for the stage. Though his early opéras comiques marked a modest improvement on Auber's in melodic invention, sentiment and delicacy of orchestration, they followed contemporary taste in their dependence on virtuoso coloratura soprano roles and in the absurdity of their librettos; Le caïd (1849) and Le songe d′une nuit d′été (1850) were successful, leading to a professorship at the Conservatoire (1856). Thomas won still higher acclaim with the sentimental Mignon (1866) and Hamlet (1868), in emulation of Gounod's Faust and Romeo et Juliette respectively. Despite their conventionality, these works contain effective vocal characterization and appealing atmospheric writing. Mignon received over 1000 performances at the Opéra-Comique between 1866 and 1894, becoming one of the most successful operas in history. His critical and popular reputation clinched, Thomas succeeded Auber as director of the Conservatoire (1871), instituting reforms while remaining essentially conservative. He was troubled by the growing influence of Wagner and showed little sympathy for the work of younger French composers (except Massenet). His reputation, once comparable with Verdi's, was eclipsed within a few years of his greatest triumphs.
Thomas, Ambroise (äNbrwäz' tōmä'), 1811-96, French operatic composer, studied at the Paris Conservatory, receiving the Prix de Rome in 1832. He later taught composition there and became its director in 1871. Thomas wrote cantatas, a number of ballets, and 20 operas, of which Le Caïd (1849, a satire on Italian opera), Mignon (1866), and Hamlet (1868) were the most successful.
One of leading opera composers of nineteenth century France, Ambroise Thomas was a successor to Meyerbeer, Auber, and Offenbach. He was responsible for Mignon, one of the most popular operas ever written, and the hauntingly beautiful Hamlet.
Born into a musical family, Thomas entered the Paris Conservatory in 1828. He won the Prix de Rome for a cantata he wrote there, and studied in Italy and Germany for several years. Returning to Paris in 1835, he turned his attention to composing for the stage. As with much light opera of the period, their wild plot turns and characterizations today seem ludicrous; Le Songe d'une nuit d'été (A Midsummer Night's Dream), for example, includes in its "cast" of characters William Shakespeare (who is drunk for a major part of the action), Queen Elizabeth (as a seductive muse), and Sir John Falstaff. Few of these early operatic works remain in the modern repertory, even in France, apart from some choruses and the very Rossinian overture to his 1851 opera Raymond.
Thomas assumed a professorship at the Paris Conservatory in 1856, but ceased composing following the failure of Le roman d'Elvire (The Story of Elvira) in 1860. Then, in 1866, newly inspired and with a fresher, simpler approach to both melody and plot, he re-emerged with Mignon; it was an immediate hit, going on to receive over 1,000 performances at the Opéra-Comique alone between 1866 and 1894.
Thomas next offered the public his adaptation of Hamlet (1868), hailed at the Opéra-Comique as a masterpiece of even greater proportions than Mignon; even Verdi abandoned his own intention of composing a Hamlet in deference to Thomas. Though the score contains a great deal of exceptionally beautiful music -- not to mention the first use of a saxophone in an opera -- Hamlet has not weathered the test of time as well as Mignon; this is largely due to its libretto, which is regarded as a severe corruption of its source -- among other major alterations, Thomas's Hamlet had a happy ending!
Astonishingly, in the midst of this period of fierce activity, Thomas found time and strength to volunteer for service in the Franco-Prussian War of 1870. Afterwards he became director of the Paris Conservatory; in this post, which he held for the remainder of his life, he proved at first to be an innovative music educator. In later years, however, he came to display resentment toward a new generation of composers, including Fauré and Debussy -- as his last opera, Françoise de Rimini (1882), failed to find success -- and became a far more rigid, conservative figure.
Thomas was not entirely eclipsed in his own time, however: in 1894, following the thousandth performance of Mignon, he became the first composer ever to be awarded the Grand Croix of the Legion of Honor.
In 1943, nearly 50 years after his death, the English film producer-directors Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger used a portion of Mignon as a key plot device in their epic film The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp, knowing that audiences would recognize and appreciate it. Both Mignon and Hamlet are represented in the CD catalog, and EMI has even released a version of Hamlet with both the original (i.e. happy) ending and the revised "unhappy" ending (written for the Covent Garden premiere).
His parents were music teachers and prepared him to become a musician. By age 10 he was already an excellent pianist and violinist. In 1828, he entered the Paris Conservatoire, where he studied with Jean-François Le Sueur while at the same time continuing his piano studies privately with the famous virtuoso pianist Frédéric Kalkbrenner. In 1832, his cantata Hermann et Ketty won the Conservatory's prestigious composition prize, the Grand Prix de Rome, which allowed him to travel to and study in that city for three years. He took with him a love for Mozart and Beethoven but once in Rome became an ardent admirer of the Italian cantilena and melodic tradition. It was during his Italian sojourn that he wrote all of his chamber music--a piano trio, a string quintet and a string quartet, all of which reflect his new style of writing.
Career
His first opera, La double échelle (1837), was produced at the Opéra Comique and was a success, receiving 247 performances before it left the stage. Le caïd (1849), his first undisputed triumph, glittered with Rossini-inspired score and achieved over 400 performances before the turn of the century. For the next quarter of a century Thomas's productivity was incessant, and most of his operatic works belonging to this period enjoyed a great, if ephemeral, popularity. They are hampered by their libretti, but a few of them are occasionally revived as historic curiosities or recorded as vehicles for bel canto singers: Le songe d'une nuit d'été (1850; loosely adapted from Shakespeare), Psyché (1857). Some of his overtures appear on concert programs: the overture to Raymond (1851), for instance, receives the occasional revival.
To his theatrical successes, Thomas added administrative achievements. In 1856 he acquired a professorship at the Conservatoire, where he taught, among others, Massenet, one of the few French composers of the younger generation whose music interested him. He succeeded Auber as director of the Conservatoire in 1871, retaining his post until his death. Baffled by the musical unconventionalities of César Franck and certain other Conservatoire colleagues, he nevertheless was rather well liked as a man, even by those who found his output old-fashioned.
Success
With Mignon (premiered at the Opéra Comique in 1866), Thomas achieved his first great acclaim outside, as well as within, France. Goethe's tale had provided inspiration for a highly sentimentalized libretto; Marie Galli-Marié (1840–1905), it was said [1], "had modelled her conception of the part upon the well-known picture by Ary Scheffer" (illustration). Mignon was a success all over Europe, to audiences that had embraced Charles Gounod's indirectly Goethe-inspired sentimental Faust (1859); and in Paris Mignon received more than a thousand performances by 1894, thereby becoming one of the most successful operas in French history [2]. It turns up occasionally today, more often in the form of extracts for concert or in recordings than in complete stagings. One of its arias, "Connais-tu le pays", was for generations among the most famous operatic excerpts by any composer.
Thomas turned to Shakespeare again for his Hamlet (Paris Opera, 1868), with a libretto by the seasoned team of Jules Barbier and Michel Carré. This opera has a strong, dramatic libretto although it closes with a traditional (and somewhat surprising) happy ending. It enjoyed a long vogue, and like Mignon it continues to have a certain following.
His last opera, Françoise de Rimini (Paris Opéra, 1882) based on a passage from Dante's Inferno, failed to stay in the repertoire. Seven years later La tempête, a ballet (and yet another treatment of a Shakespeare play), was produced at the Opéra, again with very little effect.
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