2 Mélodies

Venise (1842)

O ma belle rebelle (1855)

Of the many romantic songs inspired by Venice in one way or another, Gounod’s Venise is one of the most haunting and one of the most touching. While it takes the form of a barcarole like so many others of its kind, it derives its melancholy lyricism from Alfred de Musset’s last stanza which, in its reference to Venice in chains, places the poem and the song firmly in the period of Austrian occupation: hence the anxious piano ritornello and the minor harmonies which colour the shapely vocal line. Gounod is no less successful in reflecting the tone of Jean-Antoine de Baïf’s O ma belle rebelle. A setting of words by one of the seven poets of the (16th-century) Pléiade, it is appropriately presented as a romance with archaic cadences and a ruefully melodious bass line.