La fille du tambour-major
The plot, which has elements in common with Gaetano Donizetti's 1840 comic opera La fille du régiment, depicts a young woman discovering her real identity, renouncing her aristocratic upbringing, and marrying a dashing soldier.
After immense success in the 1860s, Offenbach suffered a brief period of unpopularity with the Parisian public in the early 1870s for his association with the fallen Second Empire.
His position as the pre-emininent composer of operetta was threatened by the rise of Charles Lecocq,[1] but by the later years of the 1870s he had recovered his popularity.
[3] The writers Alfred Duru and Henri Chivot were established authors of librettos for comic operas, having collaborated with Lecocq, Léon Vasseur, Edmond Audran and, in 1868, Offenbach (L'île de Tulipatan).
To follow Madame Favart the three wrote La fille du tambour-major for the Folies-Dramatiques and its company, which starred Parisian favourites including Juliette Simon-Girard, Caroline Girard and Simon-Max.
[6][7] The piece was very successful, running for over 240 performances, taking more than 600,000 francs at the box office,[8][n 2] and was still playing when the composer died in October 1880.
The convent is in a war zone, as the revolutionary French army and the occupying Austrians fight for possession of the territory.
The French troops arrive, led by Lieutenant Robert; among their number are the drummer, Griolet, and the drum major, Monthabor.
He tells his comrades that in civilian life, when he was a dyer in Paris, he met a pretty washerwoman, and married her – a grave mistake as she was impossible to live with and they divorced a few years later.
Stella changes into a new vivandiere uniform (made by Griolet and intended for Claudine) and announces to the assembled guests that she is French and the daughter of the drum-major.
She has decided to follow her real father, but at this point the Austrian army, counter-attacking, invades the palace, and the act ends with a battle.
Claudine and Robert have been separated from their comrades during the skirmish, and they take refuge at an inn run by her uncle, a strongly pro-French activist, who distributes French tricolore flags to his customers.
Stella arrives with Griolet and Monthabor: the three are convincingly disguised as, respectively, a little English coachman, a young Italian lord, and a Capuchin friar.
The duc, furious, orders everyone arrested but, as the police lead Robert and Claudine away, martial music is heard.
Robert is freed to go to his Stella and Claudine gives the faithful Griolet her hand and heart, and a double wedding can take place.
[12] Edouard Noël and Edmond Stoullig, in Les annales du théâtre et de la musique, praised the work highly, and said it deserved a long run.
