Composers › Camille Saint-Saëns › Programme note
Mon coeur s’ouvre à ta voix (from Samson et Dalila, Op.47)
Gerald Larner wrote 2 versions of differing length — choose one below.
“Sansom, recherchant ma présence…Amour! viens aider ma faiblesse”
“Mon coeur s’ouvre à ta voix”
Samson is a Hebrew boy and Delilah a Philistine girl in Palestine. In the second act of Samson et Dalila (first performed not in Paris but in Weimar in 1877) Delilah is waiting for Samson on her terrace in the Valley of Sorek, determined to betray him. After an orchestral introduction - suggesting first an approaching storm and then, by means of gently undulating and sighing woodwind, the alluringly exotic setting - she calls on love to give her the strength to bewitch Samson and extract his secret from him (“Amour! viens aider ma faiblesse”). The most famous of all arias in any Saint-Saëns opera comes later in the same scene. With its voluptuous vocal line and its erotic orchestral colouring“Mon coeur s’ouvre à ta voix” (long known in English as “Softly awakes my heart”) is a masterpiece of the art of seduction. Samson cannot resist, as he confirms by joining her in a passionate duet.
From Gerald Larner’s files: “Samson et Dalila/Amour! viens…”
It is ironic that, of all the arias in the twelve operas Saint-Saëns wrote in a composing career lasting more than fifty years, the only one which is familiar in this country is an exercise in betrayal. Long known in English as “Softly awakes my heart,” it is the aria in which Delilah persuades Samson to giving away the secret of his strength before delivering him to imprisonment by the Philistines. With its exotic vocal line and its erotic orchestral colouring Mon coeur s’ouvre à ta voix is a masterpiece of the art of seduction. Samson et Dalila was first performed in 1877, just two years after Bizet’s Carmen, which has some pretty seductive numbers itself.
Mon coeur s’ouvre à ta voix, comme s’ouvrent les fleurs
Aux baisers de l’aurore!
Mais, ô mon bien-aimé, pour mieux sécher mes pleurs,
Que ta voix parle encore!
Dis-moi qu’à Dalila tu reviens pour jamais;
Redis à ma tendresse
Les serments d’autrefois, ces serments que j’aimais!…
Ah! Réponds à ma tendresse!
Verse-moi l’ivresse!
Réponds à ma tendresse!
Ainsi qu’on voit des blés les épis onduler
Sous la brise légère,
Ainsi frémit mon coeur, prêt à se consoler,
À ta voix qui m’est chère!
La fléche est moins rapide à porter le trépas,
Que ne l’est ton amante à voler dans tes bras!
My heart opens to your voice, as the flowers open
To the kisses of dawn!
But, O my beloved, to dry my tears away,
Let your voice speak again!
Tell me that you will come back to Delilah for ever!
Say to my tender heart
The vows you used to say, the vows I loved so much!…
Ah! Answer my tender heart!
Fill me with rapture!
Answer my tender heart!
Just as you see ears of corn fluttering
In a gentle breeze,
So trembles my heart, ready for consolation,
On hearing a voice so dear to me!
Arrows are not as quick to reach their fatal mark
As I am propelled by love into your arms!
From Gerald Larner’s files: “Samson et Dalila/Mon coeur…”