Chapter III: Act III: A wood. Orpheus, still under the prohibition imposed by the

gods, has released the hand of his bride and is hurrying on in advance of her urging her to follow. She, still not comprehending why he does not even cast a glance upon her, protests that without his love she prefers to die.

_Orpheus_, no longer able to resist the appeal of his beloved bride, forgets the warning of _Amor_. He turns and passionately clasps _Eurydice_ in his arms. Immediately she dies.

It is then that _Orpheus_ intones the lament, "Che farò senza Euridice" (I have lost my _Eurydice_), that air in the score which has truly become immortal and by which Gluck, when the opera as a whole shall have disappeared from the stage, will still be remembered.

[Music]

"All forms of language have been exhausted to praise the stupor of grief, the passion, the despair expressed in this sublime number," says a writer in the Clément and Larousse _Dictionnaire des Opéras_. It is equalled only by the lines of Virgil:

Vox ipsa et frigida lingua,
"Ah! miseram Eurydicen," anima fugiente, vocabat;
"Eurydicen;" toto referabant flumine ripae.

[E'en then his trembling tongue invok'd his bride;
With his last voice, "Eurydice," he cried,
"Eurydice," the rocks and river banks replied.

DRYDEN.]

In fact it is so beautiful that _Amor_, affected by the grief of _Orpheus_ appears to him, touches _Eurydice_ and restores her to life and to her husband's arms.

The legend of "Orpheus and Eurydice" as related in Virgil's _Georgics_, from which are the lines just quoted is one of the classics of antiquity. In "Orfeo ed Euridice" Gluck has preserved the chaste classicism of the original. Orpheus was the son of Apollo and the muse Calliope. He played so divinely that trees uprooted themselves and rocks were loosened from their fastnesses in order to follow him. His bride, Eurydice, was the daughter of a Thracian shepherd.

The rôle of _Orpheus_ was written for the celebrated male contralto Guadagni. For the Paris production the composer added three bars to the most famous number of the score, the "Che farò senza Euridice," illustrated above. These presumably were the three last bars, the concluding phrases of the peroration of the immortal air. He also was obliged to transpose the part of _Orpheus_ for the tenor Legros, for whom he introduced a vocal number not only entirely out of keeping with the rôle, but not even of his own composition--a bravura aria from "Tancred," an opera by the obscure Italian composer Fernandino Bertoni. It is believed that the tenor importuned Gluck for something that would show off his voice, whereupon the composer handed him the Bertoni air. Legros introduced it at the end of the first act, where to this day it remains in the printed score.

When the tenor Nourrit sang the rôle many years later, he substituted the far more appropriate aria, "Ô transport, ô désordre extrême" (O transport, O ecstasy extreme) from Gluck's own "Echo and Narcissus."

But that the opera, as it came from Gluck's pen, required nothing more, appeared in the notable revival at the Théâtre Lyrique, Paris, November, 1859, under Berlioz's direction, when that distinguished composer restored the rôle of _Orpheus_ to its original form and for a hundred and fifty nights the celebrated contralto, Pauline Viardot-Garcia, sang it to enthusiastic houses.

The best production of the work in this country was that of the American Opera Company. It was suited, as no other opera was, to the exact capacity of that ill-starred organization. The representation was in four acts instead of three, the second act being divided into two, a division to which it easily lends itself.

The opera has been the object of unstinted praise. Of the second act the same French authority quoted above says that from the first note to the last, it is "a complete masterpiece and one of the most astonishing productions of the human mind. The chorus of demons, 'What mortal dares,' in turn questions, becomes wrathful, bursts into a turmoil of threats, gradually becomes tranquil and is hushed, as if subdued and conquered by the music of _Orpheus's_ lyre. What is more moving than the phrase 'Laissez-vous toucher par mes pleurs'? (A thousand griefs, threatening shades.) Seeing a large audience captivated by this mythological subject; an audience mixed, frivolous and unthinking, transported and swayed by this scene, one recognizes the real power of music. The composer conquered his hearers as his _Orpheus_ succeeded in subduing the _Furies_. Nowhere, in no work, is the effect more gripping. The scene in the Elysian fields also has its beauties. The air of _Eurydice_, the chorus of happy shades, have the breath of inalterable calm, peace and serenity."

Gaetano Guadagni, who created the rôle of _Orpheus_, was one of the most famous male contralti of the eighteenth century. Händel assigned to him contralto parts in the "Messiah" and "Samson," and it was Gluck himself who procured his engagement at Vienna. The French production of the opera was preceded by an act of homage, which showed the interest of the French in Gluck's work. For while it had its first performance in Vienna, the score was first printed in Paris and at the expense of Count Durazzo. The success of the Paris production was so great that Gluck's former pupil, Marie Antoinette, granted him a pension of 6,000 francs with an addition of the same sum for every fresh work he should produce on the French stage.

The libretto of Calzabigi was, for its day, charged with a vast amount of human interest, passion, and dramatic intensity. In these particulars it was as novel as Gluck's score, and possibly had an influence upon him in the direction of his operatic reforms.

ARMIDE

Opera in five acts by Gluck; words by François Quinault,
founded on Tasso's _Jerusalem Delivered_.

Produced, Paris, 1777, at the Académie de Musique; New York,
Metropolitan Opera House, November 14, 1910, with Fremstad,
Caruso, Homer, Gluck, and Amato.

CHARACTERS

ARMIDE, a Sorceress, Niece of Hidraot _Soprano_
PHENICE } { _Soprano_
SIDONIE } her attendants { _Soprano_
HATE, a Fury _Soprano_
LUCINDE } { _Soprano_
MÉLISSE } apparitions { _Soprano_
RENAUD (RINALDO), a Knight of the Crusade
under Godfrey of Bouillon _Tenor_
ARTEMIDORE, Captive Knight Delivered by Renaud _Tenor_
THE DANISH KNIGHT } Crusaders { _Tenor_
UBALDE } { _Bass_
HIDRAOT, King of Damascus _Bass_
ARONTES, leader of the Saracens _Bass_
A Naiad, a Love _Apparitions_

Populace, Apparitions and Furies.

_Time_--First Crusade, 1098.

_Place_--Damascus.

Act I. Hall of _Armide's_ palace at Damascus. _Phenice_ and _Sidonie_ are praising the beauty of _Armide_. But she is depressed at her failure to vanquish the intrepid knight, _Renaud_, although all others have been vanquished by her. _Hidraot_, entering, expresses a desire to see _Armide_ married. The princess tells him that, should she ever yield to love, only a hero shall inspire it. People of Damascus enter to celebrate the victory won by _Armide's_ sorcery over the knights of Godfrey. In the midst of the festivities _Arontes_, who has had charge of the captive knights, appears and announces their rescue by a single warrior, none other than _Renaud_, upon whom _Armide_ now vows vengeance.

Act II. A desert spot. _Artemidore_, one of the Christian knights, thanks _Renaud_ for his rescue. _Renaud_ has been banished from Godfrey's camp for the misdeed of another, whom he will not betray. _Artemidore_ warns him to beware the blandishments of _Armide_, then departs. _Renaud_ falls asleep by the bank of a stream. _Hidraot_ and _Armide_ come upon the scene. He urges her to employ her supernatural powers to aid in the pursuit of _Renaud_. After the king has departed, she discovers _Renaud_. At her behest apparitions, in the disguise of charming nymphs, shepherds and shepherdesses, bind him with garlands of flowers. _Armide_ now approaches to slay her sleeping enemy with a dagger, but, in the act of striking him, she is overcome with love for him, and bids the apparitions transport her and her hero to some "farthest desert, where she may hide her weakness and her shame."

Act III. Wild and rugged landscape. _Armide_, alone, is deploring the conquest of her heart by _Renaud_. _Phenice_ and _Sidonie_ come to her and urge her to abandon herself to love. They assure her that _Renaud_ cannot fail to be enchanted by her beauty. _Armide_, reluctant to yield, summons _Hate_, who is ready to do her bidding and expel love from her bosom. But at the critical moment _Armide_ cries out to desist, and _Hate_ retires with the threat never to return.

Act IV. From yawning chasms and caves wild beasts and monsters emerge in order to frighten _Ubalde_ and a _Danish Knight_, who have come in quest of _Renaud_. _Ubalde_ carries a magic shield and sceptre, to counteract the enchantments of _Armide_, and to deliver _Renaud_. The knights attack and vanquish the monsters. The desert changes into a beautiful garden. An apparition, disguised as _Lucinde_, a girl beloved by the _Danish Knight_, is here, accompanied by apparitions in various pleasing disguises. _Lucinde_ tries to detain the knight from continuing upon his errand, but upon _Ubalde_ touching her with the golden sceptre, she vanishes. The two then resume their journey to the rescue of _Renaud_.