Valse du divorce from Boule de neige (1860-1871)

Dîtes-lui from La Grande Duchesse de Gérolstein (1867)

Ah, que j’aime les militaires from La Grande Duchesse de Gérolstein

Nearly all of the Offenbach operettas written between 1855 and 1862 were first performed at the Bouffes-Parisiens. Offenbach’s one effort to appeal to a more sophisticated audience during that time, when he conducted Barkouf at the Opéra-Comique in 1860, ended in failure - in spite, or perhaps even because, of his having recently been awarded French citizenship. The score of Barkouf was too good to waste, however, and he presented it again, to a different libretto and under the new title of Boule de neige, on the re-opening of the Bouffes-Parisiens after the end of the Franco-Prussian war in 1871. Even then it ran for only two months, which was not a success by Offenbach standards. Although the overture is prized by connoisseurs, Boule de neige is best remembered today for its entertainingly proto-feminist Valse du divorce, “J’ai goûté du mariage.” Given the ability to turn out waltzes as stylish and as tuneful as that, Offenbach was well equipped to take on the Viennese on their own ground, as he did in the early 1860s, provoking Suppé, Millöcker and, decisively, Johann Strauss to meet the challenge with their own waltz-laden operettas.

La Grande Duchesse de Gérolstein was first performed at the Variétés during the World Exhibition in 1867 and, after an early revision of the third act, proved to be an immense success - as it was in Vienna later in the same year. It was a great triumph too for Hortense Schneider as the Grand Duchess, a thinly disguised caricature of Catherine the Great, who makes no secret about fancying her soldiers. She is particularly attracted by the dim recruit Fritz, whom she promotes during the course of the first act from private to commander-in chief. The Grand Duchess’s Dîtes-lui comes from the second act where, impressed by Fritz’s military exploits, she attempts to get him to understand she is in love with him - charmingly and fairly explicitly but to no avail. But since he firmly intends to marry his Wanda perhaps he is not so stupid after all. Ah, que j’aime les militaires is the brilliant rondeau to which the Grand Duchess makes her first entry and, with unashamed enthusiasm, declares her definitive liking for brave and smartly turned-out soldiery.