Divertissement

(Fr.).

A term used since the 17th century, partly as an equivalent of the Italian Divertimento but also in a wider sense for music, usually with spectacle, intended for entertainment or diversion. In the 17th and 18th centuries it could apply to a simple pastorale or to an entire month's entertainment of which the pastorale was but one modest part; a chamber cantata might be subtitled ‘divertissement’ (for example Bernier's fifth book of cantatas ‘en manière de divertissements’), and all six volumes of the music composed by Mouret for the Nouveau Théâtre Italien are grouped generically as ‘divertissements’. The term was also used in 18th-century French instrumental music.

In French opera of the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries two broad categories of divertissement may be distinguished. The first, which flourished particularly during the reign of Louis XIV, was a self-contained musical entertainment, usually in one act, in which ballet often played a prominent role. The second, and more important, was a collection of vocal solos, ensembles and dances that formed an integral part of a larger stage work.

During Louis XIV's reign the term ‘divertissement’ was used in its first sense to describe a wide variety of entertainments. The duties of the Petits Violons, for example, included performing ‘in all the divertissements of His Majesty such as the sérénades, bals, balets, comédies, opéra, appartemens and other special concerts performed for the souper du roy and in all the fêtes magnifiques given on the water or in the gardens of the royal houses’ (Etat de la France, 1702). Court divertissements at Versailles for important occasions (such as royal births, marriages, visits, victories and so on; see Schneider, MGG2) evolved into spectacular events called grands divertissements, the grandest of which were those given in 1664, 1668 and 1674, in which homage and celebration were scarcely more important than a politic display of the king's power at the apogee of his reign. The grand divertissement of 1664 in honour of the queen mother and queen (Marie-Thérèse), its central theme based on an episode from Ariosto's Orlando furioso, generated two new comédies-ballets by Molière and Lully: Les plaisirs de l'île enchantée and La princesse d'Elide. The grand divertissement of 1668 celebrating the Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle took place on 18 July; entitled Fête de Versailles, it featured the comédie-ballet George Dandin by Molière and Lully. The grand divertissement given by the king in 1674 to celebrate the victory of the Franche-Comté campaign lasted from 4 July to 31 August and included Lully and Quinault's Alceste (4 July) and La grotte de Versailles (11 July), Molière’s Le malade imaginaire (19 July) and Lully's Les festes de l'Amour et de Bacchus (28 July).

These elaborate court divertissements declined during the last years of Louis XIV's reign, when there were fewer military victories to celebrate and the king's entertainment came increasingly under the control of his wife, the pious Mme de Maintenon. As the centre of gravity shifted from Versailles to Parisian town houses and country châteaux, musical patronage shifted from king to noblemen and to the wealthy middle classes. New entertainments developed, many dominated by pastoral, mythological and allegorical themes, such as Campra's divertissement of 1697, commissioned by the Duke of Sully and performed at the Hôtel de Sully in Paris in honour of the Duke of Chartres; Campra's Vénus, feste galante, performed in 1698 at the home of the Duchess of La Ferté; Charpentier's many divertissements composed in the 1680s for the Duchess of Guise; and the famous ‘Grandes Nuits’ of the Duchess of Maine, performed at her château at Sceaux, for which Matho, Mouret, Bernier, Marchand, Bourgeois and Collin de Blamont composed a series of divertissements in 1714 and 1715. Divertissements were also composed for the Comédie-Française and the Théâtre Italien, notably by Charpentier, who provided the Comédie-Française with divertissements, intermèdes and incidental music for plays by Pierre and Thomas Corneille, Molière, De Visé, Poisson, Brécourt, Baron and Dancourt. Divertissements were an important part of the plays, ballets and operas performed at the Jesuit Collège Louis-le-Grand as part of the annual ceremony marking the end of a year's work. Much of the music composed for the college by Collasse, Campra, Charpentier, Oudot, Foliot, Clérambault, Lalande and Royer is lost.

The second and more important type of divertissement, consisting of songs, vocal ensembles, choruses and dances, formed a separate scene within a larger stage work. These divertissements could occur within pastorales, tragédies lyriques, opéras-ballets, parodies and opéras comiques, and were often (but not exclusively) ancillary to the main action. The term ‘divertissement’ did not come into general use in this context until 1700, when Campra introduced it in the livret of his tragédie lyrique Hésione, although some authors insisted that it should be reserved for opéra-ballet alone (e.g. Compan, Dictionnaire de danse, 1787). Most 18th-century definitions of this kind of divertissement stress the importance of its close relation to the dramatic action (Cahusac).

Lully and Quinault gave the divertissements in their tragédies lyriques two mutually exclusive functions: first, as a pleasing but non-essential, dramatically neutral ornament; and, secondly, as a decorative and integral part of the dramatic action itself. Both functions shared the panoply of spectacle: dance, chorus, songs, costumes and machines. A notable example of this dual function is the village wedding divertissement in Act 4 of Roland (scenes iii–v). During the wedding, Roland overhears confirmation of Angélique’s betrayal and learns the identity of his rival. The contrast between the mounting anger of the distraught hero and the bucolic levity of the fête is heightened in scene v, where the chorus ‘Bénissons l'amour d'Angélique, Bénissons l'amour de Médor’ is interrupted by Roland's cries, ‘Taisez-vous, malheureux’. The pastoral mood is shattered, and the end of the divertissement elides with Roland's vengeance air ‘Je suis trahis’ (scene vi). Even Lully's tonal scheme emphasizes the conflict of mood: the act opens in C major and shifts in scene iv, the dramatic and harmonic pivot, through G minor to close in B major.

Divertissements frequently sustain a single prevailing mood rather than contrast opposing moods. This is seen in the bellicose divertissements of Thésée, Bellérophon and Amadis, the ‘sommeil’ from Atys and the ‘pompe funèbre’ of Alceste. They could occur anywhere in an act; Lully often used a divertissement to conclude his operas in a blaze of spectacle and sound, although this practice was not universally admired: Le Cerf de la Viéville characterized as ‘unfortunate’ such operas as Amadis, Persée, Atys and Acis et Galathée that end with a divertissement. By contrast, Le Cerf singled out the final act of Armide: ‘there is nothing so perfect. It is an Opera in itself. The divertissement occurs at mid-point and leaves the listener free for the events that follow’ (Comparaison de la musique italienne et de la musique françoise, 1725). The importance Lully allotted to the divertissement may be inferred from Le Cerf’s comment that Lully composed the airs of divertissements first, before passing the music to Quinault, who added the words (this contrasted with Lully's usual method of setting Quinault's given text to music).

The divertissement assumed a central importance during the préramiste period. Campra was accused of ‘completely drowning the subject [of Achille et Déidame] in divertissements’. Other divertissements of this period merged with chaotic events taking place within the same scene (e.g. the tempest in Act 2 scene vii of Collasse's Thétis et Pélée and that in Act 4 scene iii of Rameau's Hippolyte et Aricie).

By the time of Rameau, divertissements, as dramatically static scenes, were placed at or near the ends of acts, and virtually every act had a substantial one – so much so that, in the opinion of some critics, the drama was overshadowed, though others found (and spectators agreed) that they were of great interest, combining the best that the French lyric stage had to offer. Both sides noted the increased emphasis on the divertissement. The connections between divertissements and the main action was sometimes slight. To the elements found in Lully were added italianate ariettes, showing off the virtuosity of the singer. Rameau's Castor et Pollux (1737) is representative: the entire prologue is virtually a divertissement, and much of the opera's action takes place in divertissements in which Castor, though present, is a passive observer.

Partly in reaction to late Baroque opera, Gluck and other late 18th-century composers sought to restore primacy to the drama; however, they did not ignore the potential contribution of divertissements but insisted that they serve dramatic ends. Spectacle became much shorter and more fully integrated. The joyous fête to welcome Iphigenia contrasts ironically with the reality (Agamemnon has already been informed that he must sacrifice her) and with the heroine's vague feelings of foreboding (Gluck's Iphigénie en Aulide, 1774). In Gluck’s Iphigénie en Tauride (1779), Spontini's La Vestale (1807) and numerous other works, spectacle was used to establish a pseudo-religious atmosphere. In nearly all operas of the Classical period, the only substantial divertissement was the final one, after the conclusion of the dramatic action – an arrangement that permitted composers and librettists to conform to their artistic credo and yet meet their audience's expectations for pageantry.

With the rise of grand opéra, composers and librettists sought to use spectacle in innovatory and melodramatic ways. Meyerbeer and Scribe were masters of the art: examples include the ghostly nuns' orgy and seemingly successful seduction of the hero in Robert le diable (1831) and the innocent pastimes of the peasant skaters, sharply contrasted with the bloodthirsty Anabaptists, in Le prophète (1849). Since tragic endings were generally preferred, the conventional placement for the main divertissement was the third act, although there was some flexibility and additional ones might appear elsewhere. (To credit the fiasco of the Parisian version of Wagner's Tannhäuser in 1861 principally to the composer's failure to meet audience expectations for a third-act ballet is to oversimplify a complex social and political, as well as musical, event.)

‘Divertissement’ was also used to describe a short work in which dance featured prominently and whose main theme was rejoicing. It was thus a favourite choice for pièces de circonstance. It could take the form of an opéra (Lully's Eglogue de Versailles, 1685; Gossec's Le triomphe de la République, 1793), an opéra comique (e.g. Propiac's Les trois déesses rivales, to a libretto by J. de Piis, 1788), a work in vaudevilles (Le mai des jeunes filles, ou Un passage de militaires by P.-I. Barré, J.-B. Radet and N. Desfontaines, 1807) or a ballet (R. Kreutzer's La fête de Mars, choreography by Gardel, 1809).

The operatic divertissement influenced collections of chamber music and keyboard music in 18th-century France. In the Apothéose … de Lully (1725), François Couperin revisited a divertissement by Lully and re-created in trio texture a ‘Vol de Mercure aux Champs-Elysées’ and a ‘Descente d'Apollon’. Typical of keyboard collections is J.-F. Dandrieu's Premier livre de pièces de clavecin (1724), whose subtitle states ‘contenant plusieurs divertissements dont les principaux sont les caractères de la guerre, ceux de la chasse et la fête de Village’. L.-C. Daquin's Premier livre (1735) contains one divertissement, Les plaisirs de la chasse, for ‘hunting horns, oboes, violins, flutes, musettes and vielles’. The vogue for keyboard divertissements continued throughout the century, reaching a nadir with Michel Corrette's Divertissements pour le clavecin ou le forte piano contenant les échos de Boston et la victoire d'un combat naval (1779), in which the sounds of battle are colourfully portrayed.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

AnthonyFB

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JAMES R. ANTHONY, M. ELIZABETH C. BARTLET