La Basoche
Music by André Messager · libretto by Albert Carré · premiered 1890 · at Opéra-Comique
La Basoche is an opéra comique in three acts, with music by André Messager and words by Albert Carré. The opera is set in Paris in 1514 and depicts the complications that arise when the elected "king" of the student guild, the Basoche, is mistaken for King Louis XII of France. The opera was first performed at the Opéra-Comique in Paris in 1890. Productions soon followed in continental Europe, Britain and the US. After that, the piece was revived repeatedly in France and elsewhere well into the 20th century.
Text from the Wikipedia article "La Basoche", licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.
About the Composer
André Charles Prosper Messager (French: [mɛsaʒe]; 30 December 1853 – 24 February 1929) was a French composer, organist, pianist and conductor. His compositions include eight ballets and thirty opéras comiques, opérettes and other stage works, among which his ballet Les Deux Pigeons (1886) and opéra comique Véronique (1898) have had lasting success; Les p'tites Michu (1897) and Monsieur Beaucaire (1919) were also popular internationally. Messager took up the piano as a small child and later studied composition with, among others, Camille Saint-Saëns and Gabriel Fauré. He became a major figure in the musical life of Paris and later London, both as a conductor and a composer. Many of his…
Text from the Wikipedia article "André Messager", licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.
Other Operas by André Messager
- Isoline
- L'amour masqué
- Fortunio (1835)
- François les bas-bleus (1883)
- La Béarnaise (1885)
- La fauvette du temple (1885)
- Béatrice (1914)
- La petite fonctionnaire (1921)