Télémaque (Destouches) Explained

Télémaque et Calypso (Telemachus and Calypso), also Télémaque or [French: ''ou''] Calypso, is an opera by the French composer André Cardinal Destouches, first performed at the Académie Royale de Musique (the Paris Opera) on 29 November 1714. It takes the form of a tragédie en musique in a prologue and five acts.

The libretto is by Simon-Joseph Pellegrin. The plot is taken from Les Aventures de Télémaque by François Fénelon, itself adapted from Homer's Telemachy: Telemachus is shipwrecked while searching for his father Ulysses, and resists seduction by the sea-nymph Calypso because of his love for the shepherdess Eucharis. The opera was imitated by a number of other Italian and French versions, including by Alessandro Scarlatti and Carlo Sigismondo Capece.[1]

Recording

Destouches: Telemaque & Calypso. Emmanuelle de Negri, Isabelle Druet, Margaux Blanchard, Antonin Rondepierre, Les Chantres Du Centre de Musique Baroque de Versailles Les Ombres, Sylvain Sartre 2CD 2024 Château de Versailles

Sources

Notes and References

  1. Book: Hall, Edith. The return of Ulysses:A cultural History of Homer's Odyssey. 64. JHU. 2008. 9780857718303. 4 June 2016.