Music in Art XXXIV/1–2 (2009)

215© 2009 Research Center for Music Iconography CUNY

ANDRÉ GILL AND MUSICIANS IN PARIS IN THE 1860S AND 1870S:CARICATURES IN LA LUNE AND L’ÉCLIPSE

ANITA BRECKBILL

University of Nebraska, Lincoln

The Music Library at the University of Nebraska at Lincoln holds twenty musical caricatures by AndréGill published as covers of the newspapers La Lune: Semaine comique illustrée (1865–1868) and L’Éclipse: Journalhebdomadaire (1868–1876). The prints are part of the Rokahr Family Archive, which includes over 6000 scoresand books related to opera. According to the collector Jack Rokahr, these drawings are a complete set of cari-catures on musical subjects that André Gill produced for these newspapers. Evidence from contemporarysources indicates that the publication of each caricature is tied to an event or performance. Further study illu-minates issues of censorship in Paris during the time and throws light on the reception of composers andsingers in Parisian society.

André Gill (born as Louis-Alexandre Gosset de Guînes; 1840–1885) [fig. 1] started his illustrating careerin Le journal amusant. As a young man of 25, he was introduced to François Polo, at that time the publisherof the unillustrated newspaper Le Hanneton. Realizing Gill’s potential, Polo established La Lune, the weeklyfour-sheet newspaper, for which Gill was commissioned to draw cover illustrations. The paper was an imme-diate success. In less than two years its circulation surpassed 40,000 printed copies each week and caricaturesby André Gill papered the walls of the Paris boulevards. When La Lune was terminated by the censors in1868, Polo immediately replaced it with L’Éclipse, and Gill continued drawing his caricatures until the news-paper ceased its publication in 1876. L’Éclipse was then replaced by the periodical La Lune rousse (1876–1879)which was edited by Gill. The end of Gill’s life was somewhat tragic. He died at the age of 45 in the Cha-renton asylum where he had been incarcerated for several years. Offenbach had died just a few years earlier,in 1880. These two figures, one artistic and one musical, might be said to sum up the spirit of Parisian societyand culture in the latter part of the nineteenth century.

OFFENBACH [fig. 3]. The first musical caricature that Gill produced for La Lune featured Offenbach, thepreeminent Paris operetta composer. Offenbach came to Paris as a young cellist and played in the orchestraat the Opéra, so Gill pictured him riding the cello. He was an irrepressible youth who would occasionallyplay pranks to fight the monotony of the performances. Once, he secretly tied together several chairs andmusic stands, and during the performance made them dance to the amusement of his fellow orchestra mem-bers. Apparently entertaining himself and his colleagues in the orchestra was worth the deduction from hispay that resulted.1

La vie parisienne, arguably Offenbach’s finest work, opened at the Palais Royal in Paris on 31 October1866. The related cartoon appeared in La Lune on 4 November, within a week of that premiere. In its back-ground are shown characters from earlier operettas: Barbe-bleue (premiered on 5 February 1866 at the Va-riétés), La belle Hélène (1864, Variétés), La chanson de Fortunio (1861, Bouffes), Les deux aveugles (1855, Bouffes-Parisiens), and Orphée aux enfers (1858, Bouffes-Parisiens), while in the foreground a dog with a begging bowllabeled Barkouf, another opera-bouffe of Offenbach, runs away.

Anita Breckbill, André Gill and Musicians in Paris: Caricatures in La Lune and L’Éclipse

216

Offenbach had opened his own theater in 1855 called the Bouffes-Parisiens because of, as he said, “thecontinued impossibility of getting my work produced by anybody else. I said to myself that the Opéra-Comi-que was no longer the home of comic opera, and that the idea of really gay, cheerful, witty music … was gra-dually being forgotten. The composers who wrote for the Opéra-Comique wrote little grand operas”.2 Hecontinued proposing productions for the larger theaters throughout his life with occasional success.

PATTI [fig. 2]. Later in November, Gill published a drawing of Adelina Patti, one of the most celebrateddivas of the Second Empire, and her sister Carlotta Patti, a singer in her own right. Adelina sang with theThéatre Italien, and toured in New York, England, and elsewhere. The article that accompanied this drawingin La Lune passed on Adelina Patti legends—she sang solfège before she knew how to speak, and, as an in-fant, she could whimper entire arias from Norma.3 The drawing of Patti and her sister Carlotta as birds pro-bably refers to their touring. As the caption says, “Loin de notre Paris, pourquoi, mesdemoiselles, emigrersi souvent? Oh! Les vilaines ailes!”4 Several weeks previously a French musical magazine, Le Ménestrel, wrotein glowing terms of Patti’s singing in a recent revival of La Traviata,5 and the magazine often mentioned Pattiin the weekly theater reviews, listing her current tours and travels. While Patti was very popular, there seem-ed to be some doubt as to her artistic sense, as is illustrated by this anecdote.

A son arrivée à Paris, la Patti alla rendre visite à Rossini et, voulant faire le maëstro juge desprogrès qu’elle avait accomplis depuis la précédente saison, elle se mit au piano et roucoula de sa voixla plus fraîche un des morceaux de son opéra: Le Siège de Corinthe.

Lorsqu’elle eut fini de ‘rossignoler’, Rossini s’approcha d’Adelina tout émue, et lui dit, avec sonfin et doux sourire:

— Vous avez chanté à ravir, ma chère enfant; de qui donc est ce morceau?6

1. André Gill at age 25. Photograph by Eugène Lié-bert. From: Charles Fontane, Un maître de la caricature:Andre Gill, 1840–1885 (Paris: Éditions de l’Ibis,[1927]), vol. 1, opposite p. 26.

Music in Art XXXIV/1–2 (2009)

217

STRAUSS [fig. 4], the music director of the court balls and a composer of dance music, was shown sur-rounded by characters dancing the quadrille. This drawing, published on 6 January 1867, is probably remind-ing the viewers of a Near Year’s ball at the Opéra a few days earlier. The published form of this caricatureillustrates some censorship issues. Publishers of the time were proud of “la liberté de la plume” (the freedomof the pen), but they did not also have “la liberté du crayon” (the freedom of the pencil). While the printedword was not subject to prior censorship, drawings were. Robert Justin Goldstein noted that “the Frenchauthorities regulated caricatures more strictly than words because they felt drawings had a greater impactthan words and were more threatening to their power”.7 While a written article could be rebutted, there wasno such possibility for a damaging picture. Thus drawings had to be approved by the censors prior to publi-cation. In addition, beginning in 1852 and continuing until 1881, a living person depicted in a caricature alsohad to give written consent for publication.8 As a result, this put a burden on the artist.

The written consent was sometimes quite cleverly done, and occasionally was published along with thecaricature. In this case, Strauss wrote: “Ainsi que vous le desirez Monsieur, je vous autorise à faire ma charge… en trois temps”.9 To fulfill Strauss’s express wish, Gill included a line of a waltz score at the bottom of thepage. In addition, this issue of La Lune had three printings, each with different colors. The first was printedwith blue and yellow; the second had red added to some of the clothing of the dancers, as well as their noses;in the third printing Strauss himself was retouched. Strauss’s desire to be depicted in triple time was fulfilledhere in color.

2. André Gill, “Adelina et Carlotta Patti”, La Lune II/38 (25November 1866).

Anita Breckbill, André Gill and Musicians in Paris: Caricatures in La Lune and L’Éclipse

218

SCHNEIDER AND SILLY [fig. 5]. Hortense Schneider and Mlle. Silly were divas in every sense of the word.Schneider had long been Offenbach’s leading lady, but in addition to being a gorgeous singer, she was a diffi-cult person. Her acting was described thus:

sur la scène, quelle transfiguration! L’œil gris … s’illumine; on dirait que tous les feux de la rampe s’yreflètent. … Il y a des mots qu’elle lance comme on donnerait un baiser. La narine s’agite, s’enfle, sedilate et frémit avec des impatiences voluptueuses qui traduisent tout ce que la bouche ne peut pasdire.10

Apparently in the first production of Offenbach’s operetta La belle Hélène, Schneider accused her fellowleading lady, Mlle. Silly, of stealing her lines. Later, in 1867, she signed a contract with the Variétés on condi-tion that Silly never again play in the same cast with her. When Gill drew this caricature, Schneider wassinging in a revival of La belle Hélène at the Variétés while Silly was the leading lady in La Vénus aux carottes.11

Here the two divas are closely intertwined. Commentary below the drawing suggests that Gill pictured thesingers as two young vestals tenderly united in the maintenance of the sacred fire, which you see smokingup from the valentines beneath. Schneider, however, is thumbing her nose at us, and Silly is making acursing gesture, so all is not well.

SASS [fig. 6]. Marie Sass was a Belgian soprano who worked in the cafes of Paris until being hired by theThéâtre Lyrique in 1859. At the time of this drawing, Marie Sass was singing the role of Elizabeth de Valoisin Verdi’s Don Carlos at the Paris Opéra. The opera had opened on 11 March 1867 and the caricature is fromthe end of the following month. That summer Don Carlos became the Opéra’s showpiece at the Paris World’sFair. La Lune often included a short article accompanying the front-page picture. Here, the writer points outthe opulence of the soprano’s contours, but also says that “Marie Sass est, pour le moment, et à juste titre,la cantatrice le plus en vogue, à Paris, à côté de la petite Patti, l’ange de la clef de sol”.12

UGALDE [fig. 7]. Marie Sass’s teacher, also a soprano, Delphine Ugalde, is pictured in May of 1867, in hertrouser role of Prince Charming in Cendrillon. Congratulatory bouquets for other roles, in Gil Blas, as Euridiceand as Galathée, surround her. In this year, Madame Ugalde was singing in her own one-act operetta, LaHalte au moulin, at the Bouffes-Parisien, the theater that Offenbach founded.

ROSSINI [fig. 8]. Just like earlier in the caricature of Offenbach, Rossini is also shown with a dog and hisbegging bowl sitting patiently at the side as the composer lights a mirliton as if it were a firecracker. Thedog’s begging bowl probably suggests that Rossini was a modern composer, as was Offenbach, notdependent on a patron or the church for his livelihood, but dependent instead on the payment of the public.On the mirliton are various monikers for Rossini, Le Maître and Le Cynge de Pessaro (the swan of Pessaro),Rossini’s birthplace. As with Strauss, Rossini’s permission for the caricature is published underneath. Hewrites the following from Passy, where he was living at the time: “Monsieur F. Polo. J’adhère avec plaisirà la publication de ma caricature dans votre journal heureux de voir que Le Singe de Pesaro n’est pointoublié”.13 Rossini is making a pun at his own expense, changing “cynge” (swan) to “singe” (monkey). Thisissue of La Lune was published 6 July 1867, and Rossini’s note was dated on 27 June 1867, showing that Gillhad to think ahead to get appropriate permissions before publishing. On 1 July, a few days before thepublication of this issue, but after Rossini gave his permission, a new composition of Rossini’s had beenperformed at the Paris World’s Fair. The piece, Dieu tout puissant, which was a hymn to Napoleon III, isreported to have a bombastic text, performed by orchestra, military band, chorus of high priests, chorus ofsoldiers, bells, side drums and cannon, which we see in the caricature.14 Rossini is dressed as a pifferaro, anItalian pipe player, whose clothing underlines his Italian roots.

PARISIAN ACTRESSES [fig. 9]. Seven Parisian character actresses who had small parts in a variety of ope-rettas—Mlle. Massin, Céline Montaland, Marie Roze, Delval, Georgette Vernet, Blanche Pierson, and Ernes-tine Lecordier, dite Desclauzas—appear in a group portrait. Images of the actresses are held in a hand, whichmight be that of Paris, offering the golden apple to the loveliest actress.15 We can only guess why Delval isshown headless. Did Gill perhaps not have permission to draw a caricature of her? The article accompanyingthis caricature gives short descriptions of twenty-three actresses. Monteland is here called a victim of goodnourishment, and the writer imagines a scene where someone comes to propose to her and must do so fromthe stairs because there is no space in the room.

Music in Art XXXIV/1–2 (2009)

219

GALLI-MARIÉ [fig. 10]. The face of Madame Galli-Marié, a French mezzo, was shown being blackenedwith a brush in preparation for her trouser role as Friday in Offenbach’s Robinson Crusoé. The opera openedon 23 November 1867 at the Opéra-Comique, and the drawing appeared on 1 December. It was Offenbach’ssecond effort to earn success at this theater, and unfortunately it was a comparative failure. The accompany-ing article in La Lune waxes eloquent about Galli-Marié’s bodily and vocal attributes, and ends by saying,

3–6. André Gill, “Jacques Offenbach”, La Lune II/35 (13 November 1866) — “Strauss, chef d’orchestre des Bals del’Opéra”, La Lune III/44 (6 January 1867) — “Silly-Schneider? Schneider-Silly?”, La Lune III/46 (20 January 1867) —“Marie Sass (du théâtre de l’Opéra)”, La Lune III/60 (28 April 1867).

Anita Breckbill, André Gill and Musicians in Paris: Caricatures in La Lune and L’Éclipse

220

7–10. André Gill, “Mme Ugalde, rôle du Prince Charmant dans Cendrillon”, La Lune III/64 (26 May 1867) — “Rossini”,La Lune III/70 (6 July 1867) — “Les jolies actrices de Paris”, La Lune III/86 (27 October 1867) — “Mme Galli-Marié, rôlede Vendredi, dans Robinson Crusoé”, La Lune III/91 (1 December 1867).

Music in Art XXXIV/1–2 (2009)

221

11–14. André Gill, “Le couple Montrouge (Théâtre des Folies-Marigny)”, La Lune IV/97 (10 January 1868) — “L’Éclipseet la censure”, L’Éclipse IV/161 (26 November 1871) — “Niniche, rôle de Mme Judic aux Variétés” [M. Louis Veuillot],La Lune rousse II/64 (24 February 1878) — “Louis Veuillot”, La Lune III/59 (21 April 1867).

Anita Breckbill, André Gill and Musicians in Paris: Caricatures in La Lune and L’Éclipse

222

elle excelle à porter le pantalon. On s’en est aperçu dans Khaled de Lara, on s’en convaincra dansVendredi de Robinson. D’aucuns de mes confrères affirment qu’elle a dû civilizer ce rôle. C’est granddommage, en verité. J’aurais aimé à le lui voir jouer tout à fait en sauvage.16

MONTROUGE [fig. 11]. Madame Montrouge and her husband hold hands on the serinette, a popular toyof the period, and turn to mechanical music. Madame Montrouge, under her maiden name of Macé, was inOffenbach’s original troupe when he opened the Bouffes-Parisiens in 1855. Her husband was a performerand an impresario.

TIP-TOE THROUGH THE CENSORS [fig. 12]. A self-portrait of Gill is a reference to the censorship issues.Drawing musicians usually did not bring the disapproval of the censors; drawing politicians did. Yet Gill’sgoal as a journalist was to make a statement with his pictures, and making political statements is central togood journalism. Ducking the censors became a favorite pastime. One way to avoid censorship was to picturea historical figure, or a fictional figure with just enough current interest to give it a kick. Offenbach did suchthings in his operas, using myths to make statements about current Parisian politics and society. Gill useda different approach picturing one person in the guise of another. Though the reactionary journalist LouisVeuillot had given oral permission at one time for publishing a caricature of him, he was not pleased withhis likeness when it came out and Gill was fined [fig. 14]. Some years later Gill took a revenge by publishinga new picture.

JUDIC [fig. 13]. Gill wrote to the actress Anna Judic, playing the popular title role in Boullard’s Niniche,and asked if he could draw a caricature of her. “I have had a bad hand for a couple of weeks”, he wrote andapologized that the drawing might not “absolutely resemble” her.17 Regardless, she was happy to give herpermission, which was published along with the drawing.

In a like manner, in November of 1867, Gill pictured a popular fictional character in his front pagedrawing for La Lune. All of Paris recognized in the drawing the features of the emperor. This issue workedits way through the political and censorship machinery, and two months later La Lune was shut down by thegovernment. A mere week later a new publication appeared called L’Éclipse! referencing the eclipse of themoon. The page two article in the first issue of L’Éclipse explains further: there was once a wonderfulnewspaper that circumstances caused to disappear. The publishers wished to replace the newspaper withsomething even more wonderful, and to do so applied to the staff of La Lune, who willingly lent them, quote,“ses bureaux, ses vendeurs, ses abonnés, ses primes et les traités qui lui attachaient des dessinateurs et unerédaction”.18 Perhaps the censors were caught napping or simply washed their hands of the subterfuge, butin fact L’Éclipse was not stopped from publication and continued for another eight years.

DUPUSI AND SCHNEIDER [fig. 15]. For the first issue of L’Éclipse Gill chose to illustrate two singers, JoséDupuis and Hortense Schneider, singing Offenbach’s Barbe-bleu, which had first been produced several yearsearlier at the Variétés and was being revived at this time. At the bottom of the caricature is the commentary:“Tout le monde connaît cette farce: Barbe–Bleue pourfend des épouses qui se retrouvent vivantes enrésumé”.19 Charles Fontane in his work on Gill’s caricatures, notes that “comme les épouses qui se retrouventbien portantes après avoir été sabrées, les collaborateurs de la Lune se retrouvent… à l’Éclipse”.20

AUBER [fig. 16]. Daniel-Franços-Ésprit Auber was represented as the Greek god Terminus, complete witha reed pipe, a conductor’s baton, and a bevy of doves to conduct. The reed pipe lists some of the elderlyAuber’s most famous opera-comiques. Several weeks before, Auber’s newest opera, Le premier jour de bonheurhad been produced to great success (15 February 1868). The page two article in L’Éclipse treats us to a verbaldescription of Auber sleeping at the opera: “il s’en donne à toute joie et à toute franchise, la paupièrehermiquement close, le nez sifflant comme une locomotive et le menton enfoncé dans l’estomac”,21 andcomments on Auber’s tendency to be a lady’s man, which explains the bevy of doves in this caricature.

NILSSON [fig. 17]. Christine Nilsson, a Swedish soprano, had just created the role of Ophélie in AmbroiseThomas’s Hamlet at the Paris Opéra. Shortly after this Thomas succeeded Auber as director of the ParisConservatoire. The accompanying article waxes poetic about Ophélie:

Music in Art XXXIV/1–2 (2009)

223

19–20. André Gill, “As-tu déjeuné? … Capoul”, L’Éclipse II/61 (21 March 1869) — 20. “Richard Wagner”,L’Éclipse II/65 (18 April 1869).

15–18. André Gill, “Dupuis & Mlle Schneider, reprise de Barbe Bleue aux Variétés”, L’Éclipse I/1 (26 January 1868) —“Auber”, L’Éclipse I/6 (1 March 1868) — “Mlle Nilsson (Ophélie)”, L’Éclipse I/11 (5 April 1868) — “Hervé, compositeur-auteur-acteur etc., etc., etc., role de Chilpéric aux Folies-dramatiques”, L’Éclipse I/42 (8 November 1868).

Anita Breckbill, André Gill and Musicians in Paris: Caricatures in La Lune and L’Éclipse

224

Ophélie, Ophélie! … tu ne m’apparaîtras plus que sous les traits délicats et touchants de ChristineNilsson! Ophélie! Te voilà bien telle que je t’avais rêvée! Avec tes yeux limpides et profonds, couleurd’aigue marine, et ton auréole de cheveux blonds, de ce blond que prend la neige sous les rayons timi-des du soleil boréal. Ta tête pensive, poétique, où rien d’impur, on le sent, ne peut se voir jamais, oùla candeur la plus virginale éclate, se balance sur ton col flexible, pendant que tu chantes ce chant douxet navrant des jeunes filles que la Mort, la terrible mère, vint bercer dans ses bras toujours avides.22

HERVÉ [fig. 18]. The caricature dedicated to Hervé, Gill entitled “Hervé, compositeur, auteur, acteur, etc.,etc.”, reflecting his multifaceted activities as author, composer, conductor, actor, buffo tenor and producer.23

Hervé’s opera Chilpéric, with him singing the title role, had begun a run at the Folies Nouvelles two weeksbefore the caricature was published. Like Offenbach, Hervé established his own theater, the Folies Nouvelles.“Because of a Napoleonic decree which had never been repealed, every theater in Paris had a special genreprescribed to it by law”.24 Hervé’s license allowed him to produce only one-act shows with two characters,although Hervé tweaked these restrictions from time to time. In one production, for example, he augmentedthe two characters on stage with a singing corpse, and argued that this was permitted because a corpsecannot be considered a character. The public enjoyed Hervé’s antics. At the beginning of 1869 while Chilpéricwas playing at one theater, Offenbach’s La Perichole was having a run at another. Elsewhere in Paris wasplaying a parody of the two called Chilperichole.

CAPOUL [fig. 19]. Victor Capoul, a French tenor, played the title role in Offenbach’s Vert-vert, which hadopened at the Opéra-Comique on 10 March 1869, eleven days before this caricature was published. A bookabout Gill written in the 1920s comments on each of his caricatures, and notes cattily about Capoul: “Il nousest impossible de dire si cet artiste avait le moindre talent, tous les journaux de l’époque que nous avonsdépouillés ne parlant de lui qu’à propos de ses moustaches et de la forme de ses faux cols”.25 Though we dosee a collar, no mustaches are in evidence in this drawing. The lack is explained by a contemporary article,which bemoans the fact that Capoul had recently sacrificed his mustaches for his role as the parrot in Vert-

19–20. André Gill, “As-tu déjeuné? … Capoul”, L’Éclipse II/61 (21 March 1869) — 20. “Richard Wagner”,L’Éclipse II/65 (18 April 1869).

Music in Art XXXIV/1–2 (2009)

225

vert.26 Capoul as a parrot is balanced on an urn that is inscribed: “Hic jacent moustaches de Vert-Vert. LugeteVeneres Cupidinesque”.27 Gill uses the first line of a Catullus lament to a dead sparrow to illustrate thepublic’s sadness at the loss of the moustaches.

WAGNER [fig. 20]. In the caricature of Wagner, Gill drew the composer using a hammer to pierce a largeear drum with his notes, complete with dripping gore. The 1861 production of Tannhäuser at the Paris Opérahad not gone well, and Wagner was still receiving, almost a decade later plenty of criticism in France for hismodernism. Two days before this drawing appeared in April of 1869, a new production of Rienzi had beenlaunched at the Théâtre Lyrique.

After the Wagner drawing of 1869 Gill’s recourse to musical subjects declined sharply and the next mu-sical drawing did not appear until 1874. Music may not have seemed as important as politics, for the year1870 saw the end of the Second Empire in France, when the Franco-Prussian war put Paris under siege. Acouncil called the Paris Commune was elected out of chaos and served for several months until it too wasoverthrown to make way for the Third Republic. Symbolically this political upheaval spelled the end of theera of operetta. In reality, the culture of the Second Empire remained alive beyond its political demise.

THÉO AND JUDIC [fig. 21]. When he turned again to a music subject in 1874, Gill did a caricature thatCharles Fontane characterizes thus: “Pendant que la politique chôme, le théâtre bat son plein avec Offenbachqui bat la mesure de Bagatelle28 et de Pomme d’Api, aux ‘Bouffes-Parisiens’”.29 The singers on the two-headedcat are Louis Théo, la blonde, and Anna Judic, la brune, fierce competitors in Offenbach’s troupe of femalesingers. The commentary goes on to say:

Offenbach, se mit dans la tête d’opérer ce miracle sans exemple dans l’histoire du théâtre: de faire jouersur la même scène les deux divas qui sont devenues, grâce à sa baguette magique, les deux meilleuresamies du monde.30

21–22. André Gill, “Mesdames Théo & Judic”, L’Éclipse VII/288 (3 May 1874) — 22. “Le roi V’lan”, L’Éclipse VIII/368 (14November 1875).

Anita Breckbill, André Gill and Musicians in Paris: Caricatures in La Lune and L’Éclipse

226

BCHRISTIAN [fig. 22]. Another Offenbach singer is Christian, who had opened at the Théâtre de la Gaîtéin Offenbach’s fairy tale opera, Le Voyage dans la Lune, the previous month. Apparently the means of loco-motion for the main character to reach the moon was a twenty league long cannon, so here is Christianpictured with a somewhat shortened version.

PANACHE [fig. 23] and VARÉTÉ [fig. 24].The final two caricatures appeared within the next month in 1875and are tributes to the actors in several Paris theaters. The first shows a group of character actors thatperformed a show called Panache, at the Palais-Royal: Geoffroy, Brasseur, Hyacinthe, Lassouche, andLhéritier. The second group includes character actors that played at the Variétés: Léonce, Berthelier, CoquelinCadet, Dupuis, Pradeau and Baron. Some of these were truly talented comedians who reportedly could sendthe audience into helpless laughter. Leónce, the actor in glasses on the left side, played in drag the femalerole of Mme. Balandard in Offenbach’s Monsieur Choufleuri. “One elderly …wealthy” and presumably my-opic “member of the audience fell for [her] and sent flowers and an invitation to dinner. He was rather putout when a bespectacled gentleman turned up at the restaurant”.31 A review called Bêtises d’hier was playingat the Variétes during the week of this drawing’s publication.

In the proceeding collection of caricatures, Gill chose to do take-offs of musician, and he times the pub-lication of the drawings to coincide with current productions or events in Paris. The caricatures illustrate thedouble standard in censorship issues in Paris at the time, where there was freedom in the written word whiledrawings were censored. André Gill wrote and drew for a few more years, using, in the words of a writerfrom L’Éclipse, “la pointe du crayon et le bec de la plume” to create a “fine et décente ironie … resté fidèleau bon gout, au choix piquant et juste des sujets et à l’excellence des procédés d’exécution”.32

23–24. André Gill, “Les théâtres de Paris, Le Palais-Royal”, L’Éclipse VIII/370 (28 November 1875). — “Les théâtres de Paris, LesVariétés”, L’Éclipse VIII/373 (19 December 1875).

Music in Art XXXIV/1–2 (2009)

227

25. A. Machaux after the photograph of Disderi, André Gill in 1867. From: CharlesFontane, Un maître de la caricature: André Gill, 1840–1885 (Paris: Éditions de L’Ibis,[1927]), vol. 1, opposite p. 50.

Anita Breckbill, André Gill and Musicians in Paris: Caricatures in La Lune and L’Éclipse

228

NOTES

1 Siegfried Kracauer, Orpheus in Paris:Offenbach and the Parisof His Time, transl. by Gwenda David and Eric Mosbacher (NewYork: Alfred A. Knopf, 1938), 19-20.

2 Ibid., 137.3 Star, “Adelina et Carlotta Patti”, La Lune II/38 (25 Novem-

ber 1866), 2.4 La Lune II/38, [1]. “Madamoiselles, why do you migrate so

far and so often from our Paris. Oh, those wretched wings!”5 “Semaine théatrale”, Le Ménestrel XXXIII/50:1050 (11 No-

vember 1866), [3].6 Charles Fontane, Un maître de la caricature: And. Gill, 1840–

1885 (Paris: Éditions de L’Ibis, [1927]), vol. 1, 188. “Upon herarrival in Paris, Patti went to visit Rossini and, wanting to makethe maestro judge the progress that she made during the pre-ceding season, she sat at the piano and cooed with her cool voiceone of the songs of his opera: Le Siège de Corinthe. When she hadfinished twittering. Rossini approached Adelina very tenderly,and said to her with his sweet smile: —You have sung marvel-ously, my dear child; who, then, wrote this piece?”

7 Robert Justin Goldstein, “Approval First, Caricature Se-cond: French Caricaturists, 1852–81”, The Print Collector’s News-letter XIX/2 (May–June 1988), 48-50: 48.

8 Ibid., 48.9 La Lune III/44 (6 January 1867), [1]. “Since you desire it,

monsieur, I authorize you to do a take-off of me … in triple time”.10 Fontane, Un maître de la caricature, vol. 1, 191. “on the

stage, what a transfiguration! Her gray eyes … are illuminated; itseems as though all of the flames of the footlights are mirroredthere. . . . There are words which she flings as one would give akiss. Her nostrils quiver, swell, dilate and shudder with volup-tuous impatience, which translates all that her mouth cannot say”.

11 Jean-Claude Yon, Jacques Offenbach (s.l.: Gallimard, 2000),339.

12 Ernest d’Hervilly, “Marie Sass”, La Lune III/60 (28 April1867), 2. “Marie Sass is, for the moment, and rightly so, the singermost in vogue in Paris, beside the petite Patti, the angel of thetreble clef”.

13 La Lune III/70 (6 July 1867), [1]. “Mister Polo. I agree withpleasure to the publication of my caricature in your journal, andam happy to see that the Singe de Pesaro is not forgotten”.

14 Herbert Weinstock, Rossini: A Biography (New Yok: AlfredA. Knopf, 1968), 350.

15 “Semaine théatrale”, Le Ménestrel XXXIV/47:1099 (20October 1867), [3], mentions a reading of Auber’s opera prelimi-narily titled Hélène, later Le premier jour de bonheur. Marie-Rozeplayed a major role. “La pièce … sera représentée dans le courantde l’hiver”.

16 Star, “M. Galli-Marié”, La Lune III/91 (1 December 1867),2. “She excels in pants roles. One noticed it when she playedKhaled in Lara and one will be convinced of it when she playsFriday in Robinson. My friends say that she had to civilize the role.That’s too bad, in truth. I would have liked to see her play acomplete savage”.

17 Goldstein, “Approval First, Caricature Second”, 49.18 “Au public”, L’Éclipse I/1 (26 January 1868), 2. “its offices,

its salespeople, its subscribers, its bonuses, and the contracts thatwere attached to the cartoonists, and the editorial staff”.

19 L’Éclipse I/1 (26 January 1868), [1]. “All the world knowsthis farce: in sum, Bluebeard kills his wives who return alive”.

20 Fontane, Un maître de la caricature, vol. 1, 237. “like thewives who find themselves in good health after having beenslashed, the collaborators of La Lune find themselves … atL’Eclipse”.

21 Paul Mahalin, “M. Auber”, L’Éclipse I/6 (1 March 1868),2. “…he gives into it with every joy and every freedom, hermeti-cally closed eyelids, nose sniffling like a locomotive and chin sunkinto his stomach”.

22 Le cousin Jacques, “Ophélie-Nilsson”, L’Éclipse I/11 (5April 1868), 2. “Ophelia, … you appear to me now only in the de-licate and touching features of Christine Nilsson. Ophelia, as Ihave dreamt of you. With your limpid and deep eyes, the color ofaquamarine, and your aureole of blonde hair, blonde as the snowin the timid gleam of the northern sun. Your pensive head, poetic,where nothing impure … can ever be seen, where the mostvirginal candor shines, all balanced on your flexible neck, whileyou sing the sweet and heart-rending song of young womenwhom death, the terrible mother, comes to rock in her ever-eagerarms.”

23 Andrew Lamb, “Hervé”, The New Grove Dictionary ofMusic and Musicians (2nd ed., London: Macmillan, 2001), vol. 11,449.

24 Kracauer, Orpheus in Paris, 138.25 Fontane, Un maître de la caricature, vol. 1, 272. “It is im-

possible to say if this artist had the least amount of talent. All theperiod newspapers that we have dug through can’t speak of himwithout mentioning his mustaches and the form of his detachablecollars.”

26 “Vert-Vert à l’Opéra-Comique”, Le Ménestrel XXXVI/15:1172 (14 March 1869), [6].

27 L’Éclipse II/61 (21 March 1869), [1]. “Here lie the mous-taches of Vert-Vert. Lament Venuses and Cupids.”

28 H. Moreno, “Semaine théatrale et musicale”, Le MénestrelXL/25:2288 (24 May 1874), [4] has section on Bagatelle mentioningJudic and also Theo.

29 Fontane, Un maître de la caricature, vol. 2, 56. “When poli-tics is closed for business, the theatre is in full swing with Offen-bach who keeps time in Bagatelle and in Pomme d’Api at the‘Bouffes-Parisiens’”.

30 Fontane, Un maître de la caricature, vol. 2, 56. “Offenbachgot it into his head to perform this miracle without precedent inthe history of the theater: having the two divas play on the samestage, two divas who have become, thanks to his magic wand, thetwo best friends in the world.”

31 Peter Gammond, Offenbach (London: Omnibus Press,1980), 65.

32 “Au public”, L’Éclipse I/1 (26 January 1868), 2. “ the tip ofthe pencil and the point of the quill” “a keen and decent irony …having stayed true to good taste, to piquant and just choices ofsubjects, and to excellence of execution.”

COPYRIGHT INFORMATION

TITLE: ANDR%E GILL AND MUSICIANS IN PARIS IN THE1860S AND 1870S: CARICATURES

SOURCE: Music in Art 34 no1/2 Spr/Fall 2009PAGE(S): 215-28

The magazine publisher is the copyright holder of this article and itis reproduced with permission. Further reproduction of this article inviolation of the copyright is prohibited. To contact the publisher:http://web.gc.cuny.edu/rcmi/musicinart.htm