Offenbach - La Belle Hélène / Lott, Beuron, Sénéchal, Naouri, Le Roux, Todorovitch, Les Musiciens du Louvre, Minkowski

Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com
Offenbach's cheeky take on the Helen of Troy myth is a delightful romp that leaves you smiling all the way through, with stops for several hearty chuckles, such as the yodeling song that plants Tyrolean bleating into a classical Greek setting. Marc Minkowski is best known for his recordings of the Baroque, but here he leads this Romantic-era comic opera with spirited drive, getting precise articulation from his band and bringing out details that make you appreciate anew Offenbach's orchestration. The cast is uniformly fine, but it doesn't surpass the somewhat more stylish EMI recording led by Plasson and featuring Jessye Norman and John Aler. Felicity Lott is delightful in the title role, although she never sounds quite as young or as flighty as Offenbach's Helen ought to. As Paris, whose cunning wins Helen, Yann Beuron is a convincing lover, but he lacks the commanding voice the part demands for some of the score's most glorious moments, such as the Mount Ida aria, where Jussi Bjoerling's 60-year-old recording reigns supreme. The supporting baritones and basses lend the appropriate comic touches, helping to make this live recording from a Paris production recommendable. --Dan Davis

Offenbach - La Belle Hélène / Lott, Beuron, Sénéchal, Naouri, Le Roux, Todorovitch, Les Musiciens du Louvre, Minkowski, Music, Jacques Offenbach, Marc Minkowski, Felicity Lott, Yann Beuron, Les Musiciens du Louvre, Michel Sénéchal, Laurent Naouri, François Le Roux, Marie-Ange Todorovitch, Alain Gabriel, Hjördis Thébault, Magali Léger, Stéphanie d'Oustrac, Laurent Alvaro Eric Huchet, Classical, Classical Music, French Operetta, Opera, Opera / Operetta / Oratorio, Opera/Operetta
Offenbach - La Belle Hélène / Lott, Beuron, Sénéchal, Naouri, Le Roux, Todorovitch, Les Musiciens du Louvre, Minkowski
Average customer rating: 4 out of 5 stars
  • A master experience
  • La not-so-Belle Hélène
  • One of the best recordings of 2001
  • From Rameau to Offenbach: Minkowski strikes the right note
 Offenbach - La Belle Hélène / Lott, Beuron, Sénéchal, Naouri, Le Roux, Todorovitch, Les Musiciens du Louvre, Minkowski
Jacques Offenbach , Marc Minkowski , Felicity Lott , Yann Beuron , Les Musiciens du Louvre , Michel Sénéchal , Laurent Naouri , François Le Roux , Marie-Ange Todorovitch , Alain Gabriel , and Hjördis Thébault, Magali Léger, Stéphanie d'Oustrac, Laurent Alvaro Eric Huchet
Manufacturer: EMI Classics
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

All Works by OffenbachAll Works by Offenbach | Offenbach, Jacques | ( O ) | Featured Composers, A-Z | Classical | Styles | Music
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OperettasOperettas | Opera & Vocal | Styles | Music
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  2. Offenbach: La Grande-Duchesse de Gérolstein
  3. Offenbach: La Vie Parisienne
  4. Offenbach - La Belle Helene / Minkowski, Lott, Beuron, Senechal, Naouri, Le Roux, Torodovitch, Chatelet Opera
  5. Johann Strauss II: Wienerblut

ASIN: B00005A9NM
Release Date: 2001-11-06

Tracks:

  1. Ov - Felicity Lott
  2. Act I. Intro: Vers Tes Autels, Jupin - Chor Des Musiciens Du Louvre/Sebastian Rouland
  3. Act I: Trop De Fleurs - Francois Le Roux/Jose Canales
  4. Act I. Chor Des Jeunes Filles: C'est Le Devoir Des Jeunes Filles - Chor Des Musiciens Du Louvre/Sebastian Rouland
  5. Act I. Couplets D'Helene: Amours Divins - Felicity Lott/Chor Des Musiciens Du Louvre/Sebastian Rouland
  6. Act I: Calchas, Restez - Felicity Lott/Francois Le Roux
  7. Act I. Chanson D'Oreste: Au Cabaret Du Labyrinthe - Marie-Ange Todorovitch/Francois Le Roux/Magali Leger
  8. Act I: Mesdemoiselles, Voici Le Calchas Demande - Marie-Ange Todorovitch/Francois Le Roux/Stephanie D'Oustrac/Magali Leger
  9. Act I: Monsieur? C'est Vous Le Devin De Jupiter? - Yann Beuron/Francois Le Roux
  10. Act I. Le Jugement De Paris: Au Mont Ida, Trois Deesses - Yann Beuron
  11. Act I: Compliments, Felicitations, Bravo! - Francois Le Roux/Yann Beuron/Felicity Lott/Marie-Ange Todorvitch
  12. Act I. Marche Et Couplets Des Rois: Voici Les Rois De La Grece - Chor Des Musiciens Du Louvre/Sebastian Rouland/Alain Gabriel/Laurent Thebault...
  13. Act I: Rois Et Peuples De La Grece, Salut A Vous! - Laurent Naouri/Felicity Lott/Marie-Ange Todorovitch/Michel Senechal
  14. Act I. Finale: Gloire! Gloire Au Berger Victorieux! - Chor Des Musiciens Du Louvre/Sebastian Rouland
  15. Act I: Ainsi Vous Etes Gentilhomme - Michel Senechal/Felicity Lott/Yann Beuron/Francois Le Roux
  16. Act I: Les Dieux Decretent Par Ma Voix - Francois Le Roux/Michel Senechal/Felicity Lott/Yann Beuron

Tracks:

  1. Act II: Entracte - Les Musiciens Du Louvre - Grenoble/Marc Minkowski
  2. Act II. Chor: O Reine, En Ce Jour - Chor Des Musiciens Du Louvre/Sebastian Rouland Hjordis Thebault/Felicity Lott
  3. Act II: Mais Enfin, Madame, Vous N'allez Pas Rester Comme Ca! - Hjordis Thebault/Felicity Lott
  4. Act II. Invocation A Venus: Invocation A Venus: On Me Nomme Helene La Blonde - Felicity Lott
  5. Act II: Voila, Ca Va Mieux! - Felicity Lott/Hjordis Thebault/Yann Beuron
  6. Act II. Marche De L'oie: Le Voici, Le Roi Des Rois - Chor Des Musiciens Du Louvre/Sebastian Rouland/Felicity Lott/Francois Le Roux/Hjordis Thebault...
  7. Act II. Scene Du Jeu De L'oie: Alors Qu'est Que Nous Jouons - Felicity Lott/Yann Beuron/Michel Senechal/Laurent Naouri/Francois Le Roux...
  8. Act II: A Ce Calchas Qui Tremblote - Felicity Lott/Yann Beuron/Michel Senechal/Laurent Naouri/Francois Le Roux...
  9. Act II: Tout Ca Est D'un Desagreable! - Felicity Lott/Hjordis Thebault/Francois Le Roux/Yann Beuron
  10. Act II. Couplets: Je Vois, Elle Dort - Yann Beuron/Felicity Lott
  11. Act II. Duo: C'est La Ciel Qui M'envoie - Felicity Lott/Yann Beuron
  12. Act II: Ciel! Mon Mari! - Felicity Lott/Michel Senechal/Yann Beuron
  13. Act II. Finale: A Moi! Rois De La Grece, A Moi! - Michel Senechal/Felicity Lott/Yann Beuron/Marie-Ange Todorovitch/Laurent Naouri/Hjordis Thebault...
  14. Act II: Ne Criez Pas, Notre Cher Hote - Felicity Lott/Yann Beuron/Michel Senechal/Laurent Naouri/Francois Le Roux...
  15. Act II: Va-t'en, Va-t'en, Mon Amour Te Suivra! - Felicity Lott
  16. Act III: Entracte - Les Musiciens Du Louvre - Grenoble/Marc Minkowski
  17. Act III. Chor Et Chanson D'Oreste: Dansons, Aimons, Buvons, Chantons! - Chor Des Musiciens Du Louvre/Marc Minkowski/Marie-Ange Todorovitch
  18. Act III: L'eau Est-elle Bonne, Bouillant Achille? - Marie-Ange Todorovitch/Eric Huchet/Alain Gabriel/Laurent Alvaro/Laurent Naouri/Francois Le Roux...
  19. Act III. Couplets: La, Vrai, Je Ne Suis Pas Coupable - Felicity Lott
  20. Act III: Mais, Ma Nenene... - Michel Senechal/Felicity Lott/Laurent Naouri/Francois Le Roux
  21. Act III. Trio Patriotique: Lorsque La Grece Est Un Champ De Carnage - Laurent Naouri/Francois Le Roux/Michel Senechal
  22. Act III: Allons! Immolez-vous! - Francois Le Roux/Laurent Naouri/Michel Senechal
  23. Act III: Quand Les Dieux Commandent - Laurent Naouri/Michel Senechal/Francois Le Roux
  24. Act III. Chor: La Galere De Cythere - Chor Des Musiciens Du Louvre/Michel Senechal
  25. Act III. Couplets De Paris: Et Tout D'abord, O Vile Multitude - Chor Des Musiciens Du Louvre/Sebastian Rouland
  26. Act III: Quelle Tenue Pour Un Augure! - Francois Le Roux/Laurent Naouri/Michel Senechal/Alain Gabriel
  27. Act III. Finale: Elle Vient! C'est Elle! - Felicity Lott/Yann Beuron/Michel Senechal/Laurent Naouri/Francois Le Roux...

Amazon.com

Offenbach's cheeky take on the Helen of Troy myth is a delightful romp that leaves you smiling all the way through, with stops for several hearty chuckles, such as the yodeling song that plants Tyrolean bleating into a classical Greek setting. Marc Minkowski is best known for his recordings of the Baroque, but here he leads this Romantic-era comic opera with spirited drive, getting precise articulation from his band and bringing out details that make you appreciate anew Offenbach's orchestration. The cast is uniformly fine, but it doesn't surpass the somewhat more stylish EMI recording led by Plasson and featuring Jessye Norman and John Aler. Felicity Lott is delightful in the title role, although she never sounds quite as young or as flighty as Offenbach's Helen ought to. As Paris, whose cunning wins Helen, Yann Beuron is a convincing lover, but he lacks the commanding voice the part demands for some of the score's most glorious moments, such as the Mount Ida aria, where Jussi Bjoerling's 60-year-old recording reigns supreme. The supporting baritones and basses lend the appropriate comic touches, helping to make this live recording from a Paris production recommendable. --Dan Davis

Customer Reviews:

4 out of 5 stars A master experience.......2007-03-19

If any operetta would receive this respectful and talented treatment, no one can consider it a minor genre. Such and intelligent and funny (truly a rarity on a recorded opera)reading,
This set, and Strauss'Die Fledermaus by Carlos Kleiber are among the best. If you don't have it, do not wait...

2 out of 5 stars La not-so-Belle Hélène.......2005-08-19

This recording is extremely disappointing. The sound balance is appalling, ranging from pianissimo-to-inaudible vocal passages to fortissimo-to-ghetto-blaster orchestral passages. The artistic interpretations of the lead singers is awful. Dame Felicity's Helen is a middle-aged harridan, about as seductive as a suet pudding, and Le Roux's Calchas is a coarse bully, not the sleazy, sycophantic wheeler-dealer that Offenbach intended. Paris (Beuron) is the best characterization among the leaders, but he lacks the vapid quality that fit the part. One can compare this Helen with Jessye Norman's weighty Helen on EMI Classics ( Jessye Norman...Helen???), which I prefer. However far and away the best recording of La Belle Hélène is a 1950s (and presumably no longer available) Renaissance recording, issued in UK by Nixa Records, with René Leibowitz conducting the so-called Paris Philharmonic Orchestra and Chorus. In default of the reissuing of that recording, we await a truly indecent Helen.

5 out of 5 stars One of the best recordings of 2001.......2001-12-20

I think Marc Minkowski is the finest Offenbach conductor since Igor Markevitch. This new recording of La Belle Helene is almost sinfully delicious. What a treat is to hear period instruments in this music, just listen to the brass and you most certainly will hear a difference!
The cast is excellent. Dame Felicity Lott is probably the best non-French singer around in French music, and her Helene is both funny and sensuous, but the real find is the young tenor Yann Beuron who sings Paris with glorious ease and great taste. Even if you love Björling's recording of the aria, I bet you Offenbach's tenors sounded more like Beuron.
Since I bought this recording several months ago from Amazon.uk I have already heard it a number of times and I have to confess it's adictive. In a bleak year like 2001 this is like a much needed bottle of champagne.

5 out of 5 stars From Rameau to Offenbach: Minkowski strikes the right note.......2001-12-02

Striking the right note with Offenbach is hard. Few, these last twenty years at least, have got it right. The danger, on the one hand, is to go over the top, pushing his finely-gauged lunacy into outright madness, coarse farce or, more prosaically, Folies-Bergere-style revue, with topless dancers, circus acts and leather-clad go-go boys. On the other, Germanic "concept" productions, Goetterdaemmerung-flavored critiques of decadent bourgeois capitalism, with shaven-headed singers in floor-length black coats and dark glasses, have killed these light-hearted works stone dead.

Applying post-Offenbach formulae has not, therefore, on the whole, been successful.

Rameau's Platee, termed, by its composer, a "ballet bouffon" and hailed by Jean-Jacques Rousseau, no less, as "le chef d'Âœuvre de Rameau," is a mythological parody of (extra-)marital relations in which Jupiter "teaches" his jealous wife Juno "a lesson" by pretending to court and wed the "ridiculous nymph" Platee. Minkowski's recording of Platee is, to my mind, the best available performance of any of Rameau's operas and as such one of the greatest Baroque opera recordings in the catalogues. Unfortunately it seems to be unavailable in the US, but American shoppers would do well to check out ... French site and have it shipped.

From "bouffon" to "bouffe," as the Platee sleeve notes say, is but a short step; and Offenbach's own theatre was, as it happens, called Les Bouffes-Parisiens. Minkowski's stroke of genius has been, therefore, to apply his Midas touch to the mythological parodies of Offenbach, bringing the same forces into play, first for Orphee aux Enfers, now La Belle Helene, as for Platee, and with the same success. The Paris Chatelet production which is behind these CDs brought together the same musicians, stage director and, to some extent, "baroque" singers as Minkowski's Palais Garnier performances of Platee, at last striking exactly the right note.

Minkowski himself is the first star of this show. His tempi are characteristically brisk, but the degree of control and precision, the shaping, are phenomenal: the sprightly accompaniments bounce along. Felicity Lott puts in a stylish comic performance as Helene and, as usual, gives a lesson in French diction. Paradoxically, this British singer might be termed today's leading French soprano: her recent recording of Poulenc's La Voix Humaine and La Dame de Monte Carlo confirm her pre-eminence. The comic talent, artistry and, once more, the diction of Michel Senechal, now over 70 and presumably the last exponent of an otherwise lost French post-war style, are perfect in the part of Menelas. (Senechal, some may remember, himself sang Platee in a pioneering 50s recording still famous in France.) They are surrounded by some of the pick of the current generation of young French singers, led by the charming Yann Beuron, and others from abroad. Everyone seems to have a whale of a time: the verve of the stage performances is carried through to the discs. (Is this a live recording? The sleeve notes aren't clear: "recorded in parallel with the Chatelet performances" by Radio France. There's all the excitement of a live, but although I'm fairly certain I heard distant laughter at one stage, there's none of the coughing and hacking that normally grace an evening out in Paris.)

Five stars, then, for this set. The linguistically-challenged might give it less, for the (updated) dialogues; but why not sit down with the libretto and brush up your French? With diction as good as this, you'll have no trouble following it. And once the DVD reaches the US, you can read the subtitles and give the CD to a deserving friend. Enjoy.

Track Listings:

  1. OPEN-CLOSE-OPEN: American Contest Solos for Snare Drum
  2. Pachelbel's Canon and Other Baroque Favorites
  3. Panorama: Johann Sebastian Bach, Vol. 1
  4. Passionate Impressions--Hahn: Le Rossignol Éperdu
  5. Puccini: Essential Puccini [Import]
  6. Pure Magic
  7. Rückblick Moderne: 20th Century Orchestral Music
  8. Reflections, Music to Soothe and Uplift the Spirit
  9. Schubert: Symphonies Nos. 5, 8 & 9 [Import]
  10. Smiles and Chuckles

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Monk's Dream

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