Les fêtes vénitiennes is an opéra-ballet

Opéra-ballet

Opéra-ballet was a popular genre of French Baroque opera, "that grew out of the ballets à entrées of the early seventeeth century". It differed from the more elevated tragédie en musique as practised by Jean-Baptiste Lully in several ways...

in a prologue and three acts by the French

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

 composer André Campra

André Campra

André Campra was a French composer and conductor.Campra was one of the leading French opera composers in the period between Jean-Baptiste Lully and Jean-Philippe Rameau. He wrote several tragédies en musique, but his chief claim to fame is as the creator of a new genre, opéra-ballet...

. The libretto

Libretto

A libretto is the text used in an extended musical work such as an opera, operetta, masque, oratorio, cantata, or musical. The term "libretto" is also sometimes used to refer to the text of major liturgical works, such as mass, requiem, and sacred cantata, or even the story line of a...

 is by Antoine Danchet

Antoine Danchet

Antoine Danchet was a French playwright, librettist and dramatic poet.-Biography:Danchet was born in Riom, in the Auvergne, France. Having been a professor of rhetoric at Chartres and then a tutor at Paris, Danchet gaveup teaching to write for the theatre. He wrote some opera libretti which, set...

. It was first performed at the Académie royale de musique

Académie Royale de Musique

The Salle Le Peletier was the home of the Paris Opera from 1821 until the building was destroyed by fire in 1873. The theatre was designed and constructed by the architect François Debret on the site of the former Hôtel de Choiseul...

 on 17 June 1710.

Versions

For the premiere the prologue was entitled Le triomphe de la folie sur la raison dans le temps du carnaval and was followed by the three entrées: 1.La feste des barquerolles, 2.Les sérénades et les jouers, and 3.L'amour saltimbanque.

However during the course of the next four months Campra and Danchet experimented with a total of two prologues and seven entrées. For the performance on 10 October 1710, the prologue was entitled Le carnaval dans Venise and was followed by 1. Les devins de la place St-Marc, 2.L'amour saltimbanque, 3. L'opéra, ou le maître à chanter, 4. Le bal, ou le maître à danser, and 5. Les sérénades et les jouers.

Main roles

Role	Voice type	Premiere Cast, 17 June 1710 (Conductor:)
Folly	soprano Soprano A soprano is a voice type with a vocal range from approximately middle C to "high A" in choral music, or to "soprano C" or higher in operatic music. In four-part chorale style harmony, the soprano takes the highest part, which usually encompasses the melody...	Marie-Catherine Poussin
Reason	soprano
Carnaval	bass	Gabriel-Vincent Thévenard Gabriel-Vincent Thévenard Gabriel-Vincent Thévenard was a French operatic baritone .Thévenard was born at Orléans or possibly Paris. Arriving in Paris in 1690, he studied under the composer André Cardinal Destouches and went on to become a member of the Académie Royale de Musique...
Fortune	soprano	Françoise Dujardin
Zélie	soprano
Léandre	bass	Gabriel-Vincent Thévenard Gabriel-Vincent Thévenard Gabriel-Vincent Thévenard was a French operatic baritone .Thévenard was born at Orléans or possibly Paris. Arriving in Paris in 1690, he studied under the composer André Cardinal Destouches and went on to become a member of the Académie Royale de Musique...
Eraste	tenor Tenor The tenor is a type of male singing voice and is the highest male voice within the modal register. The typical tenor voice lies between C3, the C one octave below middle C, to the A above middle C in choral music, and up to high C in solo work. The low extreme for tenors is roughly B2...  (haute-contre Haute-contre The haute-contre is a rare type of high tenor voice, predominant in French Baroque and Classical opera until the latter part of the eighteenth century.-History:... )	Jacques Cochereau
Filindo	bass	Charles Hardouin Charles Hardouin Charles Hardouin was a French operatic baritone .Beginning his career as a cathedral singer, Hardouin was engaged by the Paris Opéra as a principal singer around 1693-1694, though from 1697 onwards he was eclipsed by the more powerful Gabriel-Vincent Thévenard...
Léonore	soprano	Marie-Catherine Poussin
Nérine	tenor (haute-contre)	Louis Mantienne
Amour	soprano	Dun
Damire	tenor (haute-contre)	Jacques Cochereau
Léontine	soprano
Adolphe	tenor (haute-contre)
Lucile 1	soprano
Rudolphe	bass
Alamir	bass
Iphise	soprano
Thémir	tenor (haute-contre)
Isabelle	soprano	Françoise Journet Françoise Journet Françoise Journet was a French operatic soprano.Beginning her career at the Lyon Opera, Journet eventually became a pupil of Marie Le Rochois in Paris. In 1699 she appeared as Mélisse in the premiere of Amadis de Gréce by Destouches and subsequently created a number of important roles in operas by...
Lucile 2	soprano
Héraclite	bass	Charles Hardouin Charles Hardouin Charles Hardouin was a French operatic baritone .Beginning his career as a cathedral singer, Hardouin was engaged by the Paris Opéra as a principal singer around 1693-1694, though from 1697 onwards he was eclipsed by the more powerful Gabriel-Vincent Thévenard...
Démocrite	tenor (haute-contre)	Louis Mantienne

Sources

• The Viking Opera Guide ed. Holden (Viking, 1993)
• Le magazine de l'opéra baroque
• Amadeus Almanac