Théâtre des Champs-Elysées, Paris, France
The Théâtre des Champs-Élysées is a theatre at 15 avenue Montaigne in Paris The theater is named not after the famed Avenue des Champs-Élysées, but rather after the neighborhood which it is situated in, the Quartier des Champs-Élysées
Opened in 1913, it was designed by French architect Auguste Perret and founded by journalist and impresario Gabriel Astruc to provide a venue suitable for contemporary music, dance and opera, in contrast to traditional, more conservative, institutions like the Paris Opera It hosted the Ballets Russes for its first season, staging the world première of the Rite of Spring on Thursday May 29, 1913, thus becoming the celebrated location of one of the most famous of all classical music riots
The Théâtre is a jewel of twentieth century French architecture; in 1957 it became one of the first modern edifices to become a listed building, figuring on the register of the Monuments Historiques In 1970, the Caisse des Dépôts acquired the theatre and became the main patron of the Concert Hall It was the Caisse des Dépôts that undertook a complete renovation of the building in 1985, including the Concert Hall and the Comédie; they also decided on the construction of a panoramic restaurant, the “Maison Blanche”, on the roof of the Théâtre
The theatre shows about three staged opera productions a year, mostly baroque or chamber works, suited to the modest size of its stage and orchestra pit In addition, it houses an important concert season It is home to two orchestras: the Orchestre National de France and Orchestre Lamoureux, as well as the French base of the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra The Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France and Ensemble orchestral de Paris play most of their concerts here too, along with other dance, chamber music, recital and pop events
Today, the Théâtre is without doubt one of the most beautiful performance venues in Paris However Gabriel Astruc’s initial project foresaw the building of a Philharmonic Palace containing three stages of different dimensions at the Rond-Point des Champs-Élysées
At the end of 1908, the project was turned down and Gabriel Astruc proposed a new site on Avenue Montaigne, in the spot where the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées emerged in 1913; it opened there on 31 March The building is remarkable for having been designed by a group of artists: architects Henry Van de Velde, Auguste Perret, the painter and sculpter Antoine Bourdelle, the painter Maurice Denis, and the cristal maker René Lalique amongst others It was the first construction to be made entirely out of reinforced concrete
Three of Jean Giraudoux’s plays premiered here: Siegfried in 1928, Amphitryon 38 in 1929, and Intermezzo in 1933
It is a building constructed in 1913 of mixed style art deco and classic sheltering three rooms of spectacle and a restaurant in the summit aligned on the neighboring buildings of three levels.
It was originally intended that the structure be made of steel, which had prompted its first director, Gabriel Astruc, to choose the architects Henry Fivaz and Roger Bouvard. In 1910 Henry Van de Velde was seconded to Bouvard. Van de Velde made the acquaintance of Auguste Perret a year later; it was then that the structure was envisaged in concrete. Van de Velde was finally ousted from the project by using Perret for the concrete frame. Auguste Perret transacted a little with his principles: if he later affirmed that “concrete is self-sufficient,” he dressed here the facade of travertine plates and the stage frame of marble plaques of the Allier, where are integrated the exceptional bas-reliefs in white marble Bourdelle1,2. The four groups of interior poles were left visible. The façade is classified as historical monuments.
The Council of State decided on 16 December 1994 that the 1,000 m2 increase for the restaurant was to give rise to a building permit and not only a declaration of works, this restaurant still does not exist administratively.
The building has three auditoriums: a large, 1905-seat Italian hall dedicated to opera and music; an average room of 601 seats (the Comedy) and a small one of 230 seats (the Studio), both devoted to the theater.
The interior decoration of the theater includes some works by Bourdelle (bronze and frescoes). Maurice Denis made the decoration of the dome of (1910-1912): L’Orchestique grecque, L’Opéra, La Symphonie, The lyrical drama, separated by tondi illustrating The Choir, The Orchestra, The Sonata and The Organ. The painters Édouard Vuillard, Ker-Xavier Roussel3 and Jacqueline Marval (1866-1932) also contributed to the decor.
The Théâtre des Champs-Élysées has been home to a number of symphony orchestras, including the Philharmonic Orchestra of Vienna, Munich, New Orleans, Paris, Paris, Pleyel Hall, Cité de la Musique and Salle Gaveau. York, the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra or the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra. The Orchester National de France is currently in residence there.
It was inaugurated on 2 April 1913 by a concert of French music with the participation of Camille Saint-Saëns: The Sea of Claude Debussy, The Apprentice Wizard of Paul Dukas and the Prelude of Fervaal of Vincent d’Indy by the composers themselves) and the creation of the Ode to the music of Emmanuel Chabrier, under the direction of Désiré-Émile Inghelbrecht. On March 31, the beam of the Eiffel Tower exceptionally illuminates the facade of the theater.
It was in this room that two of the world’s most scandalous creations took place: the first was the creation of Igor Stravinsky’s Sacre du printemps on May 29, 1913, under the direction of Pierre Monteux, which provoked a formidable outcry in which detractors and adjuvants came to the hands; the second was the creation of the real first musical work “mixed” (a work for musical instruments and electroacoustic device): Deserts of Edgard Varese on December 2, 1954 with Pierre Henry with magnetic tape and Hermann Scherchen with the baguette. The shock inspired by the interpolations provoked booing, laughter and jeers. The scandal that resulted was comparable to that of the Sacre 41 and a half years earlier.
In 1920, Jacques Hébertot rented the Salle de la Comédie for three evenings (25-27 March), engaged an orchestra of 45 musicians under the direction of Désiré-Émile Inghelbrecht and presented the Swedish Ballets which he discovered during a tour in Scandinavia the previous year. Jean Börlin, the company’s choreographer and companion of its director, the patron Rolf de Maré, danced several compositions, including Celestial Dance inspired by Siam and Cubist-inspired Negro Sculpture, where he transformed himself into an African statue. It is a great success. Rolf de Maré instructed Hébertot to find a large hall in Paris to present his Ballets on a regular basis.
After attempting to sign the Opéra de Paris and the Sarah-Bernhardt theater, Hébertot took the lease of the two theaters (Grand Théâtre et Comédie) on 1 August 1920 in his name. The Theater will now be the Parisian base of the Swedish Ballets, Rolf de Maré devoted themselves to their world tours, while Jacques Hébertot continues to animate the two Parisian theaters, now under his responsibility. The venue quickly became a first-class artistic center, particularly in the theatrical and musical fields, bringing together high-quality personalities in four years: directors (Georges and Ludmilla Pitoëff, Louis Jouvet, Gaston Baty) Cocteau, Paul Claudel, Blaise Cendrars, Francis Picabia, Anton Chekhov, Jules Romains, Luigi Pirandello), composers (Francis Poulenc, Darius Milhaud, Georges Auric, Germaine Tailleferre and Erik Satie).
Following financial problems, Hébertot quarreled with Rolf de Maré and left the theater in 1925, abandoning the direction of the Comédie to Louis Jouvet, that of the Studio in Gaston Baty. De Maré makes the great hall a music hall and program in October a new attraction: the Black Birds and the dancers of the Revue Negro. Among them, a young black woman, naked, barely covered with a skirt of green feathers, her short hair tied on her head, caused a sensation. This is the dancer Joséphine Baker. His way of moving in space, of borrowing animal gestures or of making large disarticulated displacements disrupts all the canons of dance. For some, this immodesty is a scandal. The journalist Robert de Flers writes: “We are going back to the monkey faster than we had descended. But Baker has his fans. Among them were the painters Pablo Picasso, who made her known throughout Europe, Fernand Léger, Kees Van Dongen, writers René Crevel, who returned every evening for a month, Colette or Jean Cocteau. Born in St. Louis, Missouri with a white mother and a black father, Joséphine Baker escapes by dance to her condition. With the Revue nègre, she landed in France, which became her land of welcome, her “second love” with her country.
From 1949 to 1978, the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées hosted the Musigrains, cycles of concerts and educational conferences founded by Germaine Arbeau-Bonnefoy (1893-1986), focused on classical music with incursions into contemporary music, dance classical or modern, folklore and jazz.
In 2005, a renovation of the room was undertaken to correct an acoustic sound considered “too hard”. According to a report by the Ministry of Culture, two thirds of the places offer satisfactory visibility conditions9. In 2008, its director Dominique Meyer replaced the carpet of the orchestra and the basket by parquet, in order to improve the acoustics of the room. A new wooden concert decor is designed, the orchestra pit and the under floor are redesigned.
In 2010, 50 private Parisian theaters gathered within the Association for the Support of Private Theater (ASTP) and the National Union of Directors and Tourists of Private Theater (SNDTP), including the Théâtre, Comédie and Studio des Champs-Élysées, decided to unite their strength under a common name: the Associated Parisian Theaters.
In the same year, Michel Franck, associate director at Jeanine Roze Production, was appointed general manager of the theater for a five-year term, replacing Dominique Meyer, head of the Vienna Opera.
On April 26, 2012, Kurt Masur is invited to direct the French National Orchestra, at which he is the Honorary Music Director, at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées, a program broadcast live on France Musique, including Dmitri Shostakovich’s Symphony 1 Luc Héry is at the first violin) and the 6 Symphony of Piotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (Sarah Nemtanu is konzertmeister). As he approaches the pulpit of the first violins during the resumption of the theme of the third movement of “Pathétique” in the second part of the concert, he stumbles on the practicable, yet protected from a safety railing, which falling back from the scene in front of the first row of spectators. He is transported by the SAMU to the Georges-Pompidou hospital where the tests are reassuring.
The hall was inaugurated on April 3, 1913 with the creation of Henry Kistemaeckers’ Exile, followed by the review of Jean Bastia, En douce, avec Mistinguett. In 1914, reprise of L’Annunciation made to Marie by Paul Claudel directed by Lugne-Poe, alternating with La Gloire ambulancière and Le Poulailler, two plays by Tristan Bernard. In 1920, L’Enfantement du mort by Marcel L’Herbier, then Le Bœuf on the roof of Jean Cocteau and Darius Milhaud.
Under the direction of Jacques Hébertot, the room takes the name of Comédie-Montaigne. Firmin Gémier created Henri-René Lenormand’s Simoun on December 21, 1920, Gaston Baty The Lovers of Fernand Crommelynck on March 14, 1921 and The Hero and the Soldier of George Bernard Shaw. In 1922, starting from Gemier to direct the Théâtre de l’Odéon, Hébertot installed at the Comédie Georges Pitoëff and his troupe (including Michel Simon). In 1924, the troupe left the Comédie for the theater du Vieux-Colombier.
Louis Jouvet took the direction of the Comédie from Hebert in 1925; he created Siegfried, Amphitryon 38 and Intermezzo by Jean Giraudoux.
In July 1926, the first screening in France of the German film The Adventures of Prince Ahmed by Lotte Reiniger, a pioneering work of animation.
Jouvet leaves in 1934 for the theater of the Athenaeum. Jean Sarrus succeeded him, then Roger Capgras in 1936. During the Second World War, the Comédie remained a theater under the responsibility of the Society of Authors. In 1944, Claude Sainval and Roland Piétri conducted the theater until 1948. Claude Sainval remained sole director until 1977, adding the direction of the Studio to his prerogatives from 1966. Guy Descaux replaced him until November 1992, followed by Jacqueline Cormier and then director Michael Fagadau, who directed the Comedy and Studio from 1994 until his death in 2011. His daughter, Stephanie, succeeds her.