Georges Bizet

Romanticism

With the realism of 'Carmen' he also anticipated verismo.

💡 Did you know? Bizet was a prodigy admitted to the Paris Conservatoire at nine.

Paris

The prodigy was admitted to the Paris Conservatoire at the age of nine.

💡 Did you know? Bizet came from a musical family: his father a singing teacher, his mother a pianist.

Carmen

Premiered in 1875 at the Paris Opéra-Comique: a scandal at first, a worldwide success today.

💡 Did you know? „Carmen“ flopped at its premiere: too risqué, too violent; today it is one of the most performed operas in the world.

cigarette factory worker

The freedom-loving Romani woman lures the soldier Don José to his ruin: after Prosper Mérimée's novella.

💡 Did you know? That the lead was a lowly cigarette worker rather than a noble heroine outraged the Paris premiere audience of 1875.

Habanera

Bizet borrowed the melody (unknowingly) from a song by the Spaniard Sebastián Iradier.

💡 Did you know? Bizet took the „Habanera“ from a Spanish song: he mistakenly thought it a folk tune.

with rejection

Realistic settings, a morally independent heroine, a murder on stage: too much for the respectable Opéra-Comique.

💡 Did you know? Tchaikovsky, by contrast, predicted in 1880 that 'Carmen' would become the world's most popular opera.

36

He died of heart disease in 1875, on the night after the 33rd performance of 'Carmen': believing he had failed.

💡 Did you know? Bizet died at just 36: convinced „Carmen“ was a failure. He did not live to see its worldwide success.

The Pearl Fishers

The duet 'Au fond du temple saint' is one of French opera's best-loved numbers.

💡 Did you know? The friendship duet „Au fond du temple saint“ from „The Pearl Fishers“ is one of the most beloved duets in opera.

L'Arlésienne

The two orchestral suites drawn from it are concert-hall classics to this day.

💡 Did you know? Bizet's incidental music for „L'Arlésienne“ lives on as an orchestral suite, though the play itself is forgotten.

at 17

The youthful work lay unnoticed in the Conservatoire archives for 80 years: today it is repertoire.

💡 Did you know? Bizet's youthful Symphony in C was long thought lost and was rediscovered only in 1935: today a concert favourite.

Prix de Rome

He spent three happy years at the Villa Medici in Rome.

💡 Did you know? The Prix de Rome gave the young Bizet several years of study in Italy.

Friedrich Nietzsche

He praised its 'African cheerfulness' and confessed to having heard the opera twenty times.

💡 Did you know? The philosopher Nietzsche, once an ardent admirer of Wagner, later hailed „Carmen“ as a light, southern antidote to Wagner's heavy pathos.

Georges Bizet

Georges Bizet was a French Romantic composer whose opera „Carmen“ is today among the most performed in the world.

💡 Did you know? He died at just 36, convinced „Carmen“ was a failure: he did not live to see its worldwide success.

Habanera (Carmen)

Carmen's seductive Habanera: one of the most famous operatic melodies of all.

💡 Did you know? ‘Carmen’ flopped at its 1875 premiere; Bizet died before it became a worldwide success.