Travel Tip: Opera in Hungary
Les Fêtes de Polymnie

Rameau: Les Fêtes de Polymnie

Cast

Stratonice, Oriade: Véronique Gens
Mnémosine, Hébé, Argélie: Aurélia Legay
La Victoire, une Syrienne: Emőke Baráth
Le Chef des Arts, Alcide, Antiochus: Mathias Vidal
Jupiter, Séleucus, Zimès: Thomas Dolié
Le Destin: Domonkos Blazsó

Purcell Choir, Orfeo Orchestra 
György Vashegyi, conductor 

The closing concert of the Budapest Spring Festival offers a modern-day première of an opera first performed in 1745 – but not performed since the 18th century – by the French Baroque composer Jean-Philippe Rameau, who died 250 years ago. The production is presented as a key event under the aegis of the international Rameau Year in 2014, coordinated by the Centre de Musique Baroque de Versailles,

Consisting of a prologue and three acts, the work was written to mark a French victory in the War of the Austrian Succession; it is an opéra-ballet, a genre in which, according to contemporary practice, each act told a separate story. The overture itself is startlingly original, a kind of summary of Rameau’s music rich in eccentricities. Interestingly, the score of the opera was edited by Claude Debussy in 1908 for an old publication of Rameau’s complete works originally published by Camille Saint-Saëns, but for this production the Orfeo Orchestra has prepared its own score based on authentic sources.