The bird dealer
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| Original title: | The bird dealer |
| Original language: | German |
| Music: | Carl Zeller |
| Libretto : | Moritz West , Ludwig Held |
| Literary source: | Vaudeville Ce que deviennent les roses by Victor Varin and Edmond de Biéville |
| Premiere: | January 10, 1891 |
| Place of premiere: | Theater an der Wien , Vienna |
| Place and time of the action: | Rheinpfalz, early 18th century |
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The Bird Dealer is an operetta in three acts by Carl Zeller , with a libretto by Moritz West (Moritz Nitzelberger) and Ludwig Held . This is based on the Vaudeville Ce que deviennent les roses (The Goose Girl) by Victor Varin and Edmond de Biéville from 1857.
General explanations
The Bird was on 10 January 1891 at the Theater an der Wien in Vienna premiered . The well-known Viennese singer and actor Alexander Girardi played the main role. Rudolf del Zopp could be seen as Stanislaus. The play, designed as a comedy, takes place in the Palatinate at the beginning of the 18th century. It is about a pair of lovers, the bird dealer Adam and Christel, the postman in the village.
Among the 17 numbers in the score, all of which offered melodious, pleasing and flattering music, there were some that soon went around the world, including hello, everyone , I am the Christel from the post office , roses are given to each other in Tyrol and Fröhlich Pfalz, God get it . The song Adams Wie mein Ahn'l Twenty Years (with the refrain No amal, no amal sing only sing, nightingale! ) Sold 200,000 pieces within a few months. The bird dealer is one of the half dozen operettas that have continuously asserted themselves in the repertoire of German-speaking theaters since their first performance.
The bird dealer was filmed several times, for example in 1953 (with Gerhard Riedmann , Ilse Werner , Wolf Albach-Retty , Eva Probst ) and 1962 (with Cornelia Froboess , Peter Weck , Maria Sebaldt , Rudolf Platte ).
action
1st act
The elector has announced himself to go wild boar hunting in his hunting ground. Game master Baron Weps explains to the restless farmers that his master will overlook their constant poaching in exchange for payment and also renounce the position of a maiden of honor. But Weps, who mainly needs the money for himself and his indebted nephew, Count Stanislaus (who, to his annoyance, does not want to marry the elderly but wealthy lady-in-waiting Adelaide), learns shortly thereafter that his electoral grace will avoid the Rhine Palatinate today . Without further ado, Stanislaus decides to play the elector in order to save the money.
Meanwhile, the bird dealer Adam has arrived from his home in Tyrol with his colleagues. He is engaged to the postman Christel and is looking forward to seeing her again. He cannot marry his bride yet because he does not have a profitable position. Therefore Christel wants to ask the elector to find him a post as menagerie director. So she meets Stanislaus, who plays the elector, and hands him a petition. But he asks her to discuss her wish with her alone in the electoral hunting pavilion. Although she fends off his intrusiveness there, he finally grants her her wish. Adam gets angry when he learns that his Christel was with the elector, because he suspects a quarrel between the two.
In the meantime, disguised as a peasant girl Marie, the Electress has also arrived to spy on her husband, who is notorious as a womanizer. Adam, who thinks she is a simple girl, pays homage to Her Highness. When she gives him a bouquet of roses to comfort him, he is very taken with her and considers the gesture to be a declaration of love. Adam rejects his unsuspecting Christel in order to instead turn to the supposed peasant girl Marie.
2nd act
Although Adam deliberately gives stupid answers to Professors Süffle and Würmchen before the examination committee, he is appointed electoral menagerie director at the request of the Electress. When he later meets the Electress, he still takes her for the simple girl until a coincidence opens his eyes to his mistake. In the meantime, Her Highness has found out that her husband is not even there and, with the help of Christel, exposes Stanislaus as the culprit. Adam is allowed to dictate his punishment: cassation as an officer or marriage to Christel. To the horror of Adelaide, who already felt like his bride, the cowardly Stanislaus chooses marriage.
3rd act
Prepare for the wedding. But Christel doesn't want to know anything about a marriage to Stanislaus. She mourns her Adam. He is devastated after the loss of his bride; he wants to leave to forget his love for Christel back home. But everything is found again. First, Weps successfully proposes marriage to the lady-in-waiting Adelaide, and finally Christel and the outwardly stubborn Adam reconcile. Both move to Tyrol together.
Musical numbers of the score
No. 1 Introduction (opening scene): Hurray Nur her .... (Schneck, Weps, Chor)
No. 2 song: Howdy to God everyone (Adam, choir)
No. 3 Duet: When the world hung full of roses (Stanislaus, Weps)
No. 4 Merry Palatinate God Preserves (Electress, Adelaide, choir)
No. 5 song: I'm the Christel from the Post (Christel)
No. 6 Terzett: Oh your reputation (Christel, Stansislaus, Weps)
No. 7 Finale I: Vivat! High! Hooray! - If you give yourself roses in Tyrol - Adam, Adam - God beware (all)
No. 8 Introduction to Act 2: Did You Hear? - Rumor has it (Weps, choir)
No. 9 Duet: I am the Vice Dean (Süffle, Würmchen)
No. 10 Trio: Modest with embarrassed cheeks - only composure, only solitaire (Electress, Christel, Adelaide)
No. 11 Duet: It seems to me I know you brittle fairy - just look me right in the face (Stanislaus, Christel)
No. 12 Finale II: We're even playing at court today - Like my ahnl twenty years old - Juhuhuhui what's funny now (everyone)
No. 13 interlude (orchestra)
No. 14 song: When the cherry tree was in flower (Electress)
No. 15 couplet (is usually left out during performances and recordings)
No. 16 Trio: Never fight with women (Christel, Stanislaus, Adam)
No. 17 Finale III: B'hüt em God, everyone - Yes, you can easily embarrass yourself (everyone)
Web links
- The Bird Dealer (Zeller, Carl) : Sheet music and audio files in the International Music Score Library Project
- Original libretto (1891)
- The Bird (1935) in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- The Bird Dealer (1940) in the Internet Movie Database (English) with Johannes Heesters as Count Herbert von Waldendorf
- The Bird (1953) in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- The Bird (1960, TV) in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- The Bird Dealer (1962) in the Internet Movie Database with Cornelia Froboess as Christel von der Post
- The bird dealer (1967, TV) at www.filmportal.de with Lucia Popp as Christel von der Post
- The bird dealer on the Carl Zeller website
- The bird dealer , operetten-lexikon.info
- Entry on The Bird Trader in the State Memory of the History of the State of Lower Austria ( Museum Niederösterreich )
Individual evidence
- ^ Victor Varin, Edmond de Biéville: Ce que deviennent les roses. Comédie-vaudeville en trois actes. M. Levy freres, Paris 1857 ( digitized ).
- ↑ According to the original piano reduction, Bosworth, Leipzig 1891, p. 26 (available from IMSLP ) the Tyrolean choir sings "Grüss enk Gott", while the general choir answers with "Grüss dich". In contrast, the libretto, Leipzig 1891, p. 12 ( online at the Munich digitization center ), only has the wording “Grüß 'dich Gott”.