Dis-moi Vénus...
ADOR gala concert

«Dis-moi Vénus…»: Love under Louis XV! 

Venus is the goddess of sensuality who weaves a web of mortal passions and often dooms them to damnation. The great orchestrator of pleasures pulls the strings of opera characters as if they were puppets in the French game of Tendre.

This recital invokes the goddess and heroines of French opera from the century of Louis XV. Marie Perbost embodies all the victims of passions unleashed by Aphrodite.

«Dis-moi, Vénus…» reveals the figure of the goddess of Love from the initial chorus of Rameau’s Castor et Pollux to the satirical mockery of Madness in Platée. The programme spans nearly three decades of French opera, with extracts of lyric tragedies and comic operas.

Focused mainly around musicians from the generation of Jean-Philippe Rameau, this Venusian medley also invites us to rediscover the virtuosic pages of Mondonville in Les Fêtes de Paphos (1758). Among the world première recreations are an aria from the pastoral Ismène by Rebel and Francoeur. This opera-ballet was written for the Théâtre des Petits Appartements de Versailles in 1747, with Madame de Pompadour in the title role. We will also discover the Sleep of Cupid taken from Romans (1746) by Jean-Baptiste Niel and the sensuous invitation of the fiery Iphis in Les Fêtes de Thalie (1714) by Mouret, the most widely-performed French opera of the 18th century. The extract from Les Moissonneurs (1768) by Egidio Romualdo Duni, is reminiscent of the nuances of Mozart. The libretto by Charles-Simon Favart, full of tenderness, contributes a great deal.

To mark the release of the CD in the Château de Versailles Spectacles collection, Gaétan Jarry brings together the musicians of the Orchestra of the Opéra Royal for this sparkling tribute to the music of Love – and madness!  The presence of Nicolò Balducci, a young counter-tenor who has already made a name for himself at Versailles, will make this concert even more astonishing, a heady rush of baroque virtuosity!