Vestiges of Virtuosity

Abstract The specificity of late coloratura’s function in arias has its roots in operatic writing before mid-century. Examining the role pairings in Meyerbeer’s popular nineteenth-century repertory opera, Les Huguenots, serves as a starting point for understanding the transition from coloratura as a normative singing style to one that functions as an uncommon and conspicuous gesture in operas like Offenbach’s Les Contes d’Hoffmann, Delibes’ Lakmé, and Massenet’s Manon. The soprano roles in these operas hark back to the zenith of coloratura singing at mid-century, when high notes and melismas were an aural analogue to the ornamental decadence of Second Empire Paris. Coloratura arias in these operas are the late-century exceptions that prove the rule; they are echoes of the virtuosic vocality of the mid-century examples explored in the book. And they help codify the establishment of the modern French coloratura soprano.