AUBER: Les Diamants de la Couronne.(Review)

AUBER: Les Diamants de la Couronne

[] Raphanel, Morner; Einhorn, Ploteau, Arapian, Medioni Choeurs Cori Spezzati, Orchestre de Picardie, Colomer. Notes and French libretto. Mandala 5003/05 (3) (Harmonia Mundi, dist.)

Think of Daniel-Francois Esprit Auber (1782-1871) as the Garry Marshall of French opera. Auber's operas are diverting, formulaic and decidedly insubstantial, just like Runaway Bride, Pretty Woman, Flamingo Kid and other films by the American director. Auber's operas were big hits in their day -- again, like Marshall's movies -- demonstrating that our appetite for disposable entertainment is nothing new (although the fact that Auber's name is no longer a household word says a lot for the salutary effects of posterity). History books inform us that the scenic extravagances of La Muette de Portici (1828) ushered in the age of Grand Opera, but that does not necessarily mean that the music stands the test of time.

Les Diamants de la Couronne, given its premiere in Paris in 1841, proved to be among Auber's greatest successes. The libretto, by Jules Vernoy de Saint-Georges and the composer's favorite collaborator, Eugene Scribe, takes place in Brazil and concerns Catarina, a young queen who masquerades as a kind of female ...