Two voices like rays of sunlight, Janine Linda and André Dran, sing a beautiful duetto from Jacques Offenbach's La belle Hélène. Paris has entered the private rooms of Helen of Troy. She awakens but is led to believe it is all a dream: the young Trojan prince is wooing the most beautiful woman in the world, whom he has been promised by the goddess Venus. René Leibowitz conducts this 1952 recording, which has become a classic and should be heard in it's entirety by anyone who loves Offenbach.
(ʒɑk ˈɔ fənˌbɑk)
Born Sunday, June 20, 1819
Died Tuesday, October 5, 1880
Jacques Offenbach was a German-born French composer, cellist and impresario of the romantic period. He is remembered for his nearly 100 operettas of the 1850s–1870s and his uncompleted opera The Tales of Hoffmann. He was a powerful influence on later composers of the operetta genre, particularly Johann Strauss, Jr. and Arthur Sullivan. His best-known works were continually revived during the 20th century, and many of his operettas continue to be staged in the 21st. The Tales of Hoffman remains part of the standard opera repertory.
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