Nélée et Myrthis

[1] Nélée et Myrthis may have been intended to form part of a larger opéra-ballet to be called Les beaux jours de l'Amour.

[4] Musicologists now think that Rameau originally intended Mirthis to be part of a multi-act opéra-ballet called Les beaux jours de l'Amour.

[5] Mirthis was never performed and the score may be incomplete - the work is missing the usual dances and choruses which end Rameau's operas and there are only two instrumental movements.

[8] Judging from crossings-out in the manuscript, the character of Nélée was originally named "Anacréon", suggesting that the Greek lyric poet Anacreon would have been the hero of two acts of Les beaux jours de l'Amour.

[11] The Rameau specialist Sylvie Bouissou draws attention to the aria "Malgré le penchant le plus tendre": "This air deserves special comment since Rameau here creates a fundamental antithesis between the sense of the words, which is vindictive in character, and the expressiveness of the music, which betrays Myrthis's profoundly tender feelings for Nélée.