The French Romantic composer Georges Bizet was a prodigy child. Son of a singer, he was such a gifted young musician that the Paris Conservatoire waived its usual rules to offer him a place at the age of nine. As a young man, Bizet became a regular guest at Offenbach’s parties, where among other musicians he met the veteran Rossini, who Bizet described as ‘the greatest of them all, because like Mozart, he has all the virtues.’
Bizet had the admiration of many maestros and artists of his time.
In May 1861, he was at a dinner party with Liszt. Bizet astonished everyone by sight reading one of the maestro’s most difficult piano pieces. Liszt said, ‘I thought there were only two men able to surmount the difficulties … there are three, and … the youngest is perhaps the boldest and most brilliant.’
In spite of his talent he achieved little success during his lifetime.
He is best known for the world’s favourite opera ‘Carmen’, and ‘The Pearl Fishers’ but he wrote several other operas, some of which were left incomplete or never performed. Besides Carmen, the only ones staged in his lifetime (and occasionally revived today) are The Pearl Fishers (1863, with a popular duet for tenor and baritone), The Fair Maid of Perth (1867), and Djamileh (1872).
The production of Bizet’s final opera, ‘Carmen’, was delayed because its themes of betrayal and murder would offend.
The opera premiere raised controversial opinions. Massenet and Saint-Saëns where present at the performance and loved it. But Gounod accused Bizet of plagiarism and the press was not kind to the opera.
Bizet was convinced that the opera was a failure. But Carmen still represents one of the most performed operas in the world.
