Talk:Jacques Offenbach

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[edit] French capitalization

As of this writing, most of the French operetta titles (some of which are red links) in the article are capitalized incorrectly. The rule most often misapplied there is that if the first word in a French title is a determiner, one should capitalize the modified noun. For more information on capitalization of titles in the French language, see Laura Lawless's article "French Capitalization of Titles and Names" on About.com. – Ringbang 16:48, 18 January 2006 (UTC)

Hi, I have written on your Talk page to explain why I have reverted.
If you look at the About.com page you have quoted you will see that the author points to three different ways of capitalizing French. We are using a system similar to the third type on the page.
We follow the New Grove Dictionary of Opera style as explained on the Opera Project Wikipedia:WikiProject Opera.
Hope this is all clear. Regards.
Kleinzach 17:30, 18 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] French title?

We follow the Grove? So how come it's Orpheus in the Underworld and not Orphée aux enfers? MOI JE CROIS 13:25, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

There was agreement at the Opera Project that some (not very many) non-English-language operas are much better-known in the English-speaking world under their English titles than under their original titles, and that articles on such operas should appear under their English titles (we were following WP:UE here). An explanation of this is here, where there is also a link to the list of those operas. Of course there are redirects from the original titles. --GuillaumeTell 13:41, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
In other words, we have our very own set of rules that does not correspond to any other set of rules in- or outside of Wikipedia. Nothing wrong with that, as long as we take care not to mislead the reader with overassertive language. To give just one example: having arbitrarily decided to follow the Grove's terminology of "genres", does not give us the right to state catgorically that a given work that scholars are not sure whether to call opéra bouffe, opéra bouffon, opéra féerie, or opéra féerique, is an opéra bouffe. MOI JE CROIS 14:09, 10 May 2007 (UTC)
No, I don't think that is what GuillaumeTell said. We base our editorial style on WP norms. Regarding the designation of operas as opéra bouffe etc. we follow original texts (such as the livret de censure) as Andrew Lamb did. If there are errors please point them out. We don't have a POV on this, We are compiling an encyclopedia. --Kleinzach 14:57, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

If I had the feeling that anyone here was pushing his POV I would not hesitate to say so, but I do not have that feeling. The problem lies elsewhere: The Tales of the Offenbach Scholars have to be taken with a grain of salt. In reality, there's no difference between an opéra bouffe, an opéra bouffon, a bouffonnerie, etc etc. Offenbach, wherever he is, must be rolling with laughter when he sees the scholars earnestly counting and cataloguing "genres" like légende bretonne, anthropophagie musicale, conversation alsacienne. Compiling an encyclopedia means that we have to present the works and views of the specialists, neutrally and in a neutral tone of voice. It certainly does not mean that we have to copy their ways. MOI JE CROIS 18:22, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

Well, we aren't categorizing légende bretonne, anthropophagie musicale, conversation alsacienne etc. so I don't see any problem. All we are doing is recording the designation - which may only be of whimsical interest as you suggest. --Kleinzach 11:22, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

There's nothing wrong with the whimsical designations that Offenbach and his librettists thought up. On the contrary, in the case of Oyayaie (1855) e.g., I am sorry that you decided to use the pedestrian opéra-bouffe in place of the Grove's wonderful anthropophagie musicale. The problem is that the way these designations are presented in our article misleads editors to use them as definitions in other articles. I see two solutions: either we use quotation marks (Le violoneux - "légende bretonne" in one act etc), or we explain what's what in a short note on terminology. MOI JE CROIS 12:52, 13 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Musicals Project

According to both the List of musicals and the Internet Broadway Database the music of Offenbach was used in several musicals. Thus he falls into the Musicals WikiProject along with the opra WikiProject. If the Musicals WikiProject finds that the article needs no mention of the musicals that Offenbach's music was used in, the tag will be removed and the article will remain the same. For now, however, please leave the {{Musicals-project}} tag on this page. Thanks! --omtay38 19:21, 1 July 2006 (UTC)

That's fine. Offenbach is nevertheless an important composer of opera and operetta, and the editing of articles about him and his works follows specific styles (for French) etc. I hope we won't see any radical changes of the articles just because some of his music was reused in some musicals. Usually information about the use of music in other contexts is included in a special separate section. Regards. - Kleinzach 22:52, 2 July 2006 (UTC)
No problem. Chances are, the article won't see anything to drastic as a result of the musicals project, the tag was added to allow for the project to attain an overall sense of the number of articles related to musical theatre within wikipedia, not necessarily to find articles that would be radically changed to fit a musicals template. Your thoughts are well received. Thanks! --omtay38 01:05, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Hortense Schneider

You missed the point. The item (cf Piat e.g.) says something about Offebach! I won't insist. But next time please don't remove important items without discussing them first. Thank you! MOI JE CROIS 13:32, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Relevance

I removed the "itinerant violinist" and the "Offenbacher" and his "audience". They are as irrelevant as the "Napoleonic edicts", and just as misleading. Everybody who learned a trade like bookbinding had to go "wandering" then, and if he played the fiddle at that time, that doesn't make him an "itinerant violinist". Also, anybody coming from Offenbach (with or without a fiddle) would have been known in Deutz as the Offenbacher; and it was the most natural thing that he would end up with this name. This is how Eberst's greatgrandfather had come to his name btw: he came from Eberstadt (Eberscht); no violins and no audience... MOI JE CROIS 13:10, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Posthumous works

What exactly are the following and what is the source for them?

  • The return of Ulysses (1913)
  • The Goldsmith of Toledo (1917)
  • The blue shirt of Ithaca (1930)
  • Myriame et Daphné (1907)

--Kleinzach 08:58, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Jacques vs. Jacob

No mention of Jacob instead of Jacques is in the intro, despite numerous occurrences in the text. This should be fixed. (I don't know anything about Offenbach though, I thought he was Jacques all the time.) --Rajah 06:22, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

Well, there were only two mentions of "Jacob" in the text, and it was obvious from the text that he changed his name to Jaques in 1833 or 1833, but, pursuant to your suggestion, I have added an express statement in the first paragraph under Biography that he changed the name. Usually the change from a birth name to a name used throughout most of a person's life is not discussed in Bio article intros unless it is otherwise important. -- Ssilvers 06:50, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Fact tag in the first paragraph

The article currently has this sentence:

While his name remains most closely associated with the French operetta and the Second Empire, it is his one fully operatic masterpiece, Les contes d'Hoffmann (The Tales of Hoffmann), that has become the most frequently performed of Offenbach's works.

This seems perfectly reasonable to me. Most opera houses do concentrate on Hoffmann. Other works are rarely performed. However it would be difficult to prove without a lot of statistics which might constitute original research etc. etc.

It is now challenged by a fact tag and a invisible text note "I find this hard to believe, particularly if you count amateur productions of Orpheus in the Underworld/Orphée aux Enfers" .

The problem here is that (a) a citation is unlikely to exist, and (b) if it did then it would almost certainly be unreliable.

To solve the problem I have removed the fact tag and rewritten the sentence as follows:

While his name remains most closely associated with the French operetta and the Second Empire, it is his one fully operatic masterpiece, Les contes d'Hoffmann (The Tales of Hoffmann), that has become the most familiar of Offenbach's works in major houses.

I hope that's acceptable.

-- Kleinzach 23:41, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Image

In the French article on Offenbach there is an excellent colour portrait. Does anyone know how to import it? Best regards -- Ssilvers (talk) 15:27, 23 January 2008 (UTC)