Rameau: Les Boréades, RCT 31

Description

"Les Boréades", edited by Sylvie Bouissou, the project leader of the Rameau Complete Edition and a central figure in international Rameau research, is a milestone – at last this exceptional work is accessible to scholars and performers in all its facets. Due to legal complications surrounding the manuscript preserved in the Bibliothèque nationale in Paris (with Rameau's corrections), the edition of this Major work, which was only discovered and performed in the 20th century, initially had to be postponed for many years.

This critical first edition now benefits all the more from the findings of modern Rameau research and today's editing techniques. As she discusses in the introduction, the editor suspects that the work was not performed as planned in 1763 at the Théâtre de Choisy in Paris because of the sensitive libretto, which may have fallen victim to court censorship. She also discusses problematic editorial issues surrounding bar setting, slurs, the basso continuo and the double bass.

In addition to the score, vocal score and parts in the original keys, the complete performance material is also available in a partially transposed version (BA08875-01). This makes the high registers of the haute-contre parts of Abaris and Calisis workable for performances with a modern orchestra set to 440 Hz pitch; carefully arranged transitions between the keys ensure that these interventions fit in seamlessly.