With Le Pre aux clercs, premiered at the Opera-Comique in 1832, Louis-Ferdinand Herold wrote at once his biggest success and his last opera (he died three weeks after the first performance). From the Overture to the Act III finale, the simplicity of the vocal lines, the impact of the dramatic effects and the effectiveness of the choral writing testify to the flowering of Romanticism and the composes assimilation of Rossini, then the paragon of modernity. Following the July Revolution of 1830, it was time to exorcise unfortunate memories: as was its habit, the Paris operatic world did not treat the topic of politics directly but through the fratricidal conflict that began on St. Bartholomews Day. The basis for the libretto was a novel by Prosper Merimee published in 1829, Chronique du regne de Charles IX. The immense success of the opera, virtually contemporary with Meyerbeers Les Huguenots, shows that it was perfectly in tune with the preoccupations of the time- and with the new ambitions of a supposedly light genre.
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