Significant French Operas
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L’Étoile du Nord
Opera in 3 acts
Music by Giacomo Meyerbeer
Libretto by Eugène Scribe
First Performance: Opéra-Comqiue, Paris, February 16, 1854
Cast:
Tsar Peter Bass
Catherine Soprano
George Tenor
Background
Synopsis
Act
I. The czar, Peter the Great, is disguised as a carpenter, and as such
he meets and loves Catherine, who is on the point of donning male attire
to serve in the army in place of her brother George.
Act II. At the Russian camp. Catherine, now a recruit in a dragoon
regiment, discovers a plot to murder the czar. She betrays the secret
and thus enables the czar to spoil the plot and seize the conspirators.
Act III. This happens at the palace of the czar. Peter longs for
Catherine whom he has not met of late and thinks she must be dead, for
his inquiries have been in vain. But at last he has news that she is
alive but insane. The czar sends for her. To please her he has is garden
laid out so as to resemble the one he tended in Viborg, Finland, where
he first met her. He also puts on his carpenter's costume, and as she
sees him she falls into his arms. He makes her his wife.
Libretto
Links
Last updated: January 09, 2008