Thesée was the third of the tragédies lyriques of composer Jean-Baptiste Lully and librettist Philippe Quinault, and their most long-lived. It was first performed at court 11 January 1675 at St. Germain-en-Laye, and had its first public performance April 1675 at the Palais Royale in Paris. It remained in the Parisian repertoire more than 100 years, and was revived at least 30 times. According to Lajarte (26): "the greatest praise that one could give to that score, is that even after the epoque of Rameau had passed, it was still performed and applauded." Paris revivals include:

• 16 February 1677 Saint-Germain-en-Laye
• January 1678 Saint-Germain-en-Laye
• 29 October 1679 Paris
• October 1688 Paris
• November 1698 Paris
• 23 feb 1699
• 17 November 1707 Paris
• 5 December 1720 Paris
• 29 November 1729 Paris
• 10 December 1744 Paris
• 3 December 1754 Paris (without prologue)
• 13 December 1765 Paris
• In January of 1767: "Mondonville had the dreadful idea of doing a new setting of Quinault's tragedy. At the first performance, the public demanded Lully's opera. Mondonville's score was only played four times. Lully's opera, revived immediately, had 20 performances." (Lajarte 27)
• 1 February 1767 Paris
• 23 March 1770 Paris
• 23 February 1779 Paris (some new music)
• In 1782, Gossec re-set Quinault's libretto, retaining some of Lully's music (Lajarte, 27).

Premieres outside Paris include:

• 18 May 1682 Brussels (new prologue by Fiocco)
• 10 November 1697 Brussels
• 1 January 1713 Brussels
• 19 August 1687 Wolfenbüttel
• 1692 Lyons
• June 1698 Ghent (probabally also the Hague, 1701)
• 1718 Lille

We are not aware of any modern performances of Thesée. Recorded excerpts include:

• Dance music on: Musiques a danser a la cour et a l'opera. Erato, 0630-1070-2, 1995. Les Talens Lyriques, Christophe Rousset, director. La Simphonie du Marais, Hugo Reyne, director.
• Excerpts on Pièces de symphonie. Editions de l'Oiseau-Lyre, SOL 301, 1968. English Chamber Orchestra, Raymond Leppard, conductor. Thesee. Prelude, Ouverture, Trio pour les habitants de l'isle enchantee, Air de trompette. Thesee. Marche des sacrificateurs.
• Highlights on Thesée. RCA Victrola, VICS 1686, 1973. Mimi Mattei, soprano. Anne Ayer, mezzo-soprano. Hugues Cuenod, tenor. Vienna Volksoper Orchestra, Willard Straight, conductor.

If anyone accessing this page has additional information on performances or recordings of this work, please contact the author, Dorothy Keyser, at dorothy_keyser@und.nodak.edu. Please include the source of your information for verification. Thanks!

Useful general sources on opera performance history are:

• Isherwood, Robert M. Music in the Service of the King: France in the Seventeenth Century. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1973.
• Lajarte, Théodore de, ed. Opéra de Paris. Bibliothèque, archives et musée. Hildesheim: G. Olms, 1969.
• Loewenberg, Alfred. Annals of Opera, 1597-1940. 3rd ed. revised and corrected. Totowa, New Jersey: Rowman and Littlefield, 1978.
• Mélèse, Pierre. Répertoire Analytique des documents contemporains d'information et de critique concernant le théâtre à Paris sous Louis XIV: 1659-1715. Paris: Librairie E. Droz, 1936.

The Lully Navigation Nexus (Central Navigation Page)

The University of North Texas homepage

If you have comments or questions about this Website, contact University of North Texas Music Librarian Morris Martin at MMARTIN@library.unt.edu

This page was last updated on December 15, 2000.

This Website is maintained by Dorothy Keyser, Assistant Professor, University of North Dakota, Grand Forks