La mascotte
La mascotte (The Mascot) is a three-act opéra comique with music by Edmond Audran and words by Alfred Duru and Henri Chivot.
The story concerns a farm girl who is a "mascotte": someone with the mystic power to bring good luck to all around her, so long as she remains a virgin.
The title of the piece introduced the word "mascotte" into standard French usage, "mascot" into English, and other variants of it into several more languages.
In 1880 "mascotte" was a fairly new French slang word derived from the Provençal term mascoto, meaning "spell" or "bewitchment".
Audran conceived the idea that a person might also be a mascotte, and suggested this as a theme to his collaborators, the librettists Alfred Duru and Henri Chivot.
His first big success, Les noces d'Olivette, opened at the Théâtre des Bouffes Parisiens in 1879, and La mascotte was written for the same house.
The former was from a theatrical family well known in the French provinces, making her Paris debut at the age of 21; she went on to a successful career, starring in new works by Audran and others during the 1880s and 1890s.
The ruler of the principality, Laurent XVII, is out hunting with his daughter, Fiametta, and her fiancé, Prince Fritellini of Pisa, and honours Rocco's farm with a visit.
He loses wars, makes disastrous investments, has no luck when hunting, and has a rebellious daughter who baulks at an arranged marriage with Fritellini.
Rocco, to avenge himself on the fallen autocrat, explains to Pippo about the mascotte and the consequences if he consummates his marriage: he will lose his high status in Fritellini's company and become a simple shepherd again.
[15] The first London production was at the Comedy Theatre, on 15 October 1881 in an adaptation by Robert Reece and H. B. Farnie, starring Violet Cameron, Henry Bracy, Lionel Brough and Minnie Byron.
The Annales du théâtre et de la musique commented that the piece starts off as opéra comique but in the second act crosses the boundary into opérette, "but none the worse for that".
"[21] According to the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, "Many of [Audran's] operas, La mascotte in particular, reveal a degree of musicianship which is rarely associated with the ephemeral productions of the lighter stage.
"[22] The Académie Nationale de l'Opérette lists two complete recordings of the opera, one conducted by Ronald Benedetti, with Geneviève Moizan, Denise Cauchard, Robert Massard and Lucien Baroux, and the other conducted by Marcel Cariven, with Freda Betti, Huguette Hennetier, Willy Clément, Gaston Rey, Raymond Amade and Robert Destain.
The Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins states, "The French operetta La Mascotte by Edmond Audran had its première on 29 December 1880.
At first mascot meant simply "a person or thing supposed to bring good luck" and did not have to be carried or displayed, as now.
