Talk:Jean-Baptiste Lully

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[edit] Lully as an 'opera manager'

Surely listing an 18th century court composer as an 'opera manager' - in the company of Bing, Volpe and Co. - is anachronistic? Can we remove the category? What do other people think?

Kleinzach 01:03, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

I have now removed the category.

Kleinzach 00:49, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

I have replaced the category. Lully purchased the monopoly of opera from the King and had to manage it - he was every bit as much a manager as Bing and the rest.--Smerus 14:13, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

I am not an expert on Lully but I have read the article by Rosow in the New Grove Dictionary of Opera and as far as I can tell Lully never managed any operas other than those by Lully, Am I wrong? - Kleinzach 20:56, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

I don't have Rosow's article in front of me, but I do have James Anthony's article in Stanley Sadie's edition of Grove.The royal privilege of 1672 gave Lully ('and his heirs') a perpetual monopoly of opera via the Academie Royale de Musique. The artciel goes on to describe in great detail how Lully not only wrote music but negotiated with singers, librettists, architects, stage-designers, musicians etc. over subsequent years. In fact, undertaking all the activities that an opera manager does. Increasingly indeed he left the job of filling in the harmonies and different parts of the music to his pupils. It may well be that most, or even all, of the operas were written (fully or nominally) by him; but as he worked like an opera manager, looked like an opera manager, acted like an opera manager and bore financial liaiblity like an opera manager, I think it has to be conceded that he was indeed an opera manager.--Smerus 21:22, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Hmm. So I suppose I am right then - he only ever managed his own operas - but if we regard every composer who negotiated with librettists, singers and stage designers as an opera manager, just how many of them would qualify as opera managers? Half of them? Three-quarters?

I have the strong impression that Lully considered himself a musician. So what is the point of awarding him this anachronistic title of opera manager? I believe he also studied the guitar, taught Italian and knew something about ballet. Are you going to list him as a guitarist, an Italian teacher and a choreographer? - Kleinzach 22:05, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

if we regard every composer who negotiated with librettists, singers and stage designers as an opera manager........ but I don't, and nor would anyone else I think. If Lully spent a substantial part of his life teaching Italian, etc, and you can demonstrate this, then by all means list him accordingly. What I think is demonstrable is that Lully had full responsibility (including financial responsibility) for managing an opera company, and that he was therefore an opera manager. The only other composer I can think of who qualifies in this way was Richard Wagner (who also managed his own operas). The actual managing was probably the second-most time occupying activity of Lully's life (probably even more than his pederasty, which seems to me certainly an irrelevant category, but is up there anyway), and eventually seems indeed to have taken up more time than composition. He was an composer and an opera manager just as much as Howard Hughes was an aviator and a film producer. The fact that he managed his own compositions is neither here nor there.--Smerus 06:30, 22 April 2006 (UTC)

The fact that he managed his own compositions is neither here nor there. Hmm. Actually it is the point. Bing was not at the Met with an American monopoly to produce his own works, while being bankrolled by an American President providing free scenery.

The popular idea of a composer may well that be of a starving artist in a garret who sends off a manuscript to a publisher who then arranges for an opera house to produce the work. It has almost never worked like that. Opera composers have been intimately and directly involved in the work of opera companies. Look at Mozart, look at Verdi, look at Wagner, look at Richard Strauss, look at Ben Britten. Of necessity, they all had an intimate involvement in the workings of opera companies.

Category proliferation is a Wikipedia vice. Using multiple categories as a means of promoting your favourite composer leads to confusion and misunderstanding. Common sense should rule here. Lully is important as a composer, not as an Italian who changed his name, or as a pederast, or as a businessman. Kleinzach 08:45, 22 April 2006 (UTC)

Regarding opera management, I find Smerus' argument persuasive. As for pederasty, first we should consider the needs of a reader researching the topic - he needs to have the various historical instances of pederasty (all too few in light of their probable frequency) brought together in a single category, or group of categories. Secondly, for a man's pederasty to have come to light in those days signifies that it had reached such dimensions that it could not be hidden. To use a modern example, it is like modern Americans cheating on their taxes. Most who can probably do a little. Some do a lot and get caught. Haiduc 10:33, 22 April 2006 (UTC)

Hello, Haiduc, we have been here, or hereabouts, before. I was careful to say that pederasty seems to me an irrelevant category; I appreciate that this is a POV and I don't suggest or support taking any action arising from it. Thanks for your comments on Lully's management. --Smerus 15:15, 22 April 2006 (UTC)