| L'heure espagnole | |
|---|---|
| Opera by Maurice Ravel | |
.jpg) Ravel in 1913 | |
| Librettist | Franc-Nohain |
| Language | French |
| Based on | Franc-Nohain's play |
| Premiere | 19 May 1911 Opéra-Comique, Paris |
L'heure espagnole is a French one-act opera from 1911, described as a comédie musicale, with music by Maurice Ravel to a French libretto by Franc-Nohain, based on Franc-Nohain's 1904 play ('comédie-bouffe') of the same name[1][2] The opera, set in Spain in the 18th century, is about a clockmaker whose unfaithful wife attempts to make love to several different men while he is away, leading to them hiding in, and eventually getting stuck in, her husband's clocks. The title can be translated literally as "The Spanish Hour", but the word "heure" also means "time" – "Spanish Time", with the connotation "How They Keep Time in Spain".
The original play had first been performed at the Théâtre de l'Odéon on 28 October 1904.[1] Ravel began working on the music as early as 1907,[3] and the opera was first performed at the Opéra-Comique on 19 May 1911.[4]
- ^ a b Stoullig E. Les Annales du Théâtre et de la Musique, 30eme edition, 1904. Librairie Paul Ollendorff, Paris, 1905.
- ^ Roland-Manuel, p. 52: When Franc-Nohain heard Ravel play the work through to him for the first time, he apparently looked at his watch and said to Ravel "56 minutes".
- ^ Hill, Edward Burlingame (January 1927). "Maurice Ravel". The Musical Quarterly. 13 (1): 130–146. doi:10.1093/mq/XIII.1.130.
- ^ Cite error: The named reference
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