ERNESTINE

THE STORY

Catapult’s Digital Opera Short Ernestine features the first professional recording in half a century of the “Scena” from Ernestine the first opera written by Joseph Bologne, Le Chevalier de Saint-George. Last recorded in 1974 by legendary soprano Faye Robinson under the direction of Paul Freeman and the London Symphony Orchestra, Creator & Executive Producer Alicia Waller honors Ms. Robinson and Joseph Bologne’s legacies in this Short, that features star soprano and Metropolitan Opera Competition winner Raven McMillon as the titular character, singing under the direction of Catapult’s Founder & Artistic Director Neal Goren and the Catapult Opera Orchestra.

Written as a three-act opéra comique, with a libretto by Pierre Choderlos de Laclos (later revised by Nicolas-Marc Desfontaines), based on the novel L’Histoire d’Ernestine by Mme. de Riccoboni, Ernestine premiered on July 19, 1777 at Paris’s Comédie-Italienne. While the music was well-received, the opera had a short life on stage and sadly the vast majority of it has been lost to time. In this “scena”, the titular character Ernestine laments the deep sense of duty and honor that has separated her from her lover Clémangis. This “crisis of separation” would become a common theme for compelling operatic dramas in later works such as Mozart’s Idomeneo, and Verdi’s La Traviata among many others.

The remarkably complex and dramatic aria, shows Bologne’s skill at combining the opéra comique style with intense emotional expression. The music’s meaning is heightened by the stakes: love vs. duty and honor/fate, separation, longing, and the impossibility of living without one’s beloved; classic operatic tropes but delivered with sensitivity. For performers and scholars, the “scena” is important as one of the few surviving operatic works written by Bologne—so it’s often sung in recitals and symposiums on Black composers and 18th century opera.

While other soprano arias from this time period such as “Come scoglio” from Mozart’s Cosi fan tutte have become famous staples of the repertoire due to its technical demands and the immense stamina required of the singer, Bologne’s “scena” is a rare example of a French aria from the same period that offers the same level of dramatic and musical appeal as “Come scoglio”, but without placing incredibly difficult technical and physical demands on the singer. This difference in vocal writing sets Bologne apart from Mozart and some of his German and Italian contemporaries like Christoph Willibald Gluck and Antonio Salieri.

With this historic addition to the operatic canon, Catapult aims to bring greater awareness to Bologne’s contributions to classical music and give sopranos across the globe a wonderful aria to add to their audition and concert repertoire.