83

Pastorale

[musical score]
68 bars
voice and piano

Poem: Jean-François Regnard (1655–1709), from the final scene of Le Bal, comedy in one act (1696). The song is sung by a valet, Merlin, and a shepherdess. Regnard’s works were reprinted many times in the nineteenth century and were enthusiastically praised by Sainte-Beuve and Janin. Castil-Blaze’s version of Regnard’s Les folies amoureuses was revived at the Fantaisies parisiennes on 31-3-1866.

Un jour de printemps,
Tout le long d'un verger
Colin va chantant,
Pour ses maux soulager :
« Ma bergère, tra la la,
Laisse-moi, laisse-moi
Prendre un tendre baiser ! »
La belle, à l'instant,
Répond à son berger :
« Tu veux, en chantant,
Un baiser dérober ?
Non Colin, tra la la,
Tu voudrais, en chantant,
Prendre un tendre baiser ?
Non, non, Colin, ne le prends pas...
Je vais te le donner ! »

Composition: in July 1868 Bizet completed a group of songs for publication by Georges Hartmann, who had just set up in business as a music publisher.

Autograph score: GB-Lam MS 306, bequest of Joseph Barnby, 1896. 2 f., 4 p., 30-stave paper.

At the top, in another hand, crossed out: No. 2, ré mineur, then, in Bizet’s hand, crossed out: Regnard Le Bal, scène 20, then in another hand: Madame Ernest Bertrand / En ré mineur; at the foot, in another hand, G.H. 184
title page, music p. 2–4

Manuscript score: US-CAh bMS Mus 264(99), (Pauline Viardot papers), p. 99-100. In the hand of Claudie Viardot, August 1879, in F minor.

Printed scores:
pl. no.:

G.H. 184K

pages:

title page, music 2–5, blank

date:

1868

ann.: Bibliographie de la France, 24-10-1868 @ 6f
copies:

F-Pn Vm7 (stamped 1868)

IMSLP

E-Mn M/3311/16

GB-Lbl H.2476 (stamped 16-12-68)

2

Choudens, 265 Rue St Honoré, pl. no. A.C. 2366, c. 1872. F-Pn Vm 32710, B-Br. Re-issued from later addresses: GB-NWm (both keys).

3

Choudens, as no. 9 in Vingt Mélodies, 1873, in two keys. The lower key is E minor. IMSLP

4

Choudens, 265 Rue St Honoré, pl. no. A.C. 3784 (1), 1877, in E minor. Also issued from later addresses. GB-NWm. Gallica.

5

Schirmer, New York, pl. no. 4194, 1885, as Giving and Taking. Pastorale, in English (translated by Charlotte H. Coursen), in two keys.

6

Choudens père et fils, pl. no. A.C. 7620, 5 p., 1887, in Italian.

7

Sonzogno, Milan, pl. no. 7620-7621, 5 p., c. 1888, as Pastorale, in Italian (two keys).

8

Durdilly, as no. 557 in Série 23 of Édition française, c. 1890.

9

Hansen, Copenhagen, pl. no. 11864 (high), 11865 (low), 5 p., 1896, in Swedish, French and Danish. D-B.

10

Ditson, Boston, in Modern French Songs, vol. I, 1904, in French and English, translated by Isabella Graham Parker. IMSLP.

11

Schlesinger, Berlin, pl. no. 9372, 6 p., 1906, in two keys, in French and German (tr. Th. Rehbaum).

12

Peters, Leipzig, 1914, as no. 3 of Sechs Gesänge, in French and German, in two keys.

13

Neufeld und Henius, Berlin, in Sang und Klang, 1919, as Im holden Mai, in German (translated by Th. Rehbaum).

14

Garland, New York, 1995, in Romantic French Song 1830–1870, edited by David Tunley, vol. 4, p. 193–97 (facsimile of Hartmann edition).

15

Schirmer, New York, in The Second Book of Mezzo-soprano/Alto Solos, edited by Joan Frey Boytim, c. 1995.

16

Éditions Fuzeau, Paris, 2006, in Six Mélodies (facsimile of Hartmann edition).

Arrangement for voice and orchestra:
1

Cecilia Music Concept, Cologne, 2013, as Souvenirs d'été, no. 6, arranged by Andreas N. Tarkmann.

Dedicatee:
Madame Ernest Bertrand, a singer active in Paris in the years 1864–67 and perhaps later. She sang in the first Paris performance of Gounod’s Tobie (which Bizet arranged in vocal score) on 24-4-1866. Presumably it is she who is depicted on the title page.
Letters
7-1868 Bizet to Galabert:
'Je viens de finir des mélodies pour... un nouvel éditeur. Je crains de n’avoir fait que des choses fort médiocres, mais il faut de l’argent, toujours de l’argent ! Au diable !'
Galabert, p. 140
Summer 1868 Bizet to Marie Trélat:
'Demain [...] je vous porterai mes mélodies ... et je vous prie instamment de n’être pas certaine d’avance que vous les trouverez jolies. Je ne suis pas sûr de moi... et j’ai besoin d’un avis sincère... sévère. Si je publie une mauvaise chose... vous en serez responsable.'
Wright, p. 20
Discography
Bibliography