Mignon

Mignon is an opéra comique (or opera in its second version) in three acts by Ambroise Thomas. The original French libretto was by Jules Barbier and Michel Carré, based on Goethe's novel Wilhelm Meisters Lehrjahre. The Italian version was translated by Giuseppe Zaffira. The opera is mentioned in James Joyce's The Dead, (Dubliners). The first performance was at the Opéra-Comique, Paris, on 17 November 1866. The piece proved popular: more than 100 p... more

Mignon is an opéra comique (or opera in its second version) in three acts by Ambroise Thomas. The original French libretto was by Jules Barbier and Michel Carré, based on Goethe's novel Wilhelm Meisters Lehrjahre. The Italian version was translated by Giuseppe Zaffira. The opera is mentioned in James Joyce's The Dead, (Dubliners). The first performance was at the Opéra-Comique, Paris, on 17 November 1866. The piece proved popular: more than 100 performances took place by the following July, the 1,000th was given there on 13 May 1894, and the 1,500th on 25 May 1919. Despite this success, Thomas was asked to revise the work for the first performance at the Drury Lane Theatre, London on 5 July 1870. This version was given in Italian with recitatives (instead of spoken dialogue) and the role of Mignon was sung by a soprano (Christine Nilsson) and Frédéric by a contralto (Zélia Trebelli). This later became the preferred version outside France, especially in America where the role of Mignon... less