Four Centuries of Great Music June 1, 2025 Sesquicentennial of the death of Georges Bizet

FCGM-06-01-25 death of Bizet

Today Georges Bizet is known by most as the composer of the opera Carmen and that alone.  Ironically Carmen premiered on March 3, 1875 to terrible reviews of music many musicians was unplayable, singers said it could not be sung, and chorus members were upset because they had to act and not just stand at the back of the stage and sing.  Bizet died at 36 years of age exactly 3 months later on June 3rd of a heart attack - knowing in his heart that his greatest work had been a failure and is quoted as describing Carmen  as  “a definite and hopeless flop”.  

But he wrote so much other music that is still in existence - even though many of his manuscripts have been lost.  So today on Four Centuries of Great Music,  I wish to honor him with the sesquicentennial of his death just two days away on June 3rd.  I wish to commemorate this truly great composer by sharing with you some of his surviving music.  He wrote much more than operas and he wrote 15 operas.   But I want in this show to explore the breath of his composition.  

However I must open with his most famous work - in the form of the orchestral suite from Carmen.  It is in 7 movements

Georges Bizet:  Suite from Carmen_ I. Prélude, Act I Georges Bizet:  Suite from Carmen_ II. Entr'acte, Act II (Les dragons d’Alcala)
Georges Bizet:  Suite from Carmen_ III. Entr'acte, Act III (Intermezo)
Georges Bizet:  Suite from Carmen_ IV. Entr'acte, Act IV (Aragonaise)
Georges Bizet:  Suite from Carmen_ V. Séguedilla, Act I
Georges Bizet:  Suite from Carmen_ VI. Avec la garde montante, Act I
Georges Bizet:  Suite from Carmen_ VII. Danse bohème, Act II
20:40
London Symphony Orchestra & Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos
Bizet: Suite from Carmen; L'Arlésienne Suites Nos. 1 & 2
London Symphony Orchestra Recordings

Next on this commemoration of Georges Bizet on this episode of  Four Centuries of Great Music marking the sesquicentennial of his death is his Symphony No. 1 in C Major.   This was written while he was still a student at the Paris Conservatoire studying with the composer Charles Gounod.   It was never published or performed in his lifetime.  But since it’s rediscovery in the archives of the Paris Conservatoire it has become a frequently performed work by orchestras around the world.  It is in four movements: I. Allegro vivo; II. Adagio; III. Allegro Vivace and IV. Allegro Vivace


Georges Bizet:  Symphony No. 1 in C Major: I. Allegro vivo
Georges Bizet:  Symphony No. 1 in C Major: II. Adagio
Georges Bizet:  Symphony No. 1 in C Major: III. Allegro Vivace
Georges Bizet:  Symphony No. 1 in C Major: IV. Allegro Vivace
Leonard Bernstein & New York Philharmonic
Bizet: Symphony No. 1 In C Major - Offenbach: Gaîté Parisienne - Von Suppé: Die Schöne Galatea Overture
Sony


Today on Four Centuries of Great Music, I am playing the music of composer Georges Bizet to honor him on the sesquicentennial of his death just two days away on June 3rd.  I wish to commemorate this truly great composer by sharing with you the range of his music.

Bizet composed a wealth of vocal music both songs and choral works.  Perhaps the best known of his choral works is his Te Deum.  Written in 1858  it is in 4 movements:  Te Deum Laudamus, Tu Rex Gloriae Christie; Te Ergo Quaesumus and Fiat Misericordia Tua

Here is a performance  of Georges Bizet’s Te Deum by Hans Rudolf Zöbeley, conducting  the Munich Symphony Orchestra & Münchner Mottetten Chor from the album Gounod: St. Cecilia Mass - Bizet: Te Deum    PROFIL Records


Today on Four Centuries of Great Music,  I am honoring the composer Georges Bizet by commemorating the  sesquicentennial of his death which is just two days away on June 3rd.

Bizet wrote a great deal of piano music.  Perhaps the most famous of these is his Jeux d'enfants for piano duo.  Many considers this work to be a forerunner of similar childhood-related works by Debussy, Fauré and Ravel.   Bizet's biographer Winton Dean writes that each  of these pieces "evokes a facet of childhood, but there is not a trace of triviality, self-consciousness or false sentiment”.

This work is in twelve movements and the movement titles are:
1.  L’escarpolette – reverie (The swing)
2.  La toupie – impromptu (The spinning top)
3.  La poupée – berceuse (The doll)
4.  Les chevaux de bois – scherzo (Wooden horses)
5.  Le volant – fantasie (Battledore and shuttlecock) Steering wheel
6.  Trompette et tambour – marche (Trumpet and drum)
7.  Les bulles de savon – rondino (Soap bubbles)
8.  Les quatre coins – esquisse (Puss in the corner) the ket-ra quawn. Es-kiss
9.  Colin-maillard – nocturne (Blind man's buff)
10. Saute-mouton – caprice (Leap-frog)
11. Petit mari, petite femme – duo (Little husband, little wife)
12. Le bal – galop (The ball)

Here is a performance of Bizet’s Jeux d’enfants by Étude Noire from the album Bizet: Jeux d'enfants, Op. 22  self-released


I will close today’s Four Centuries of Great Music tribute to the composer Georges Bizet commemorating the sesquicentennial of his death which is just two days away on June 3rd with music from another set of music often played by orchestras,  And that is music from  his two suites of incidental music that he wrote for the play by Alphonse Daudet L'Arlésienne (The Girl from Arles), composed 1872.


Let’s listen to

Georges Bizet:  L'Arlésienne Suite No. 2: Pastorale
Georges Bizet:  L'Arlésienne Suite No. 2: Minuet
Georges Bizet:  L'Arlésienne Suite No. 2: Farandole

Daniel Deffayet, Herbert von Karajan & Berlin Philharmonic
Bizet: L'Arlésienne Suites Nos.1 & 2, Carmen Suite
Deutsche Grammophon