 |
| From incidental music to concert suite: Bizet preserved the contrasting characters of the episodes while giving them a new orchestral design. |
Work Information
- Composer:
- Georges Bizet (1838–1875)
- Title:
- L’Arlésienne, Suite No. 1, op. 23 bis, GB 121
- Year of composition:
- 1872
- First performance:
- 10 November 1872, Cirque d’Hiver, Paris; conducted by Jules Pasdeloup
- Genre:
- Orchestral suite drawn from incidental music
- Musical Period:
- Romanticism
- Structure:
- 4 movements: Prélude, Minuetto, Adagietto, Carillon
- Duration:
- approx. 17–20 minutes
- Instrumentation:
- 2 flutes, 2 oboes (doubling cor anglais), 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, alto saxophone, 4 horns, 2 trumpets, 2 cornets, 3 trombones, timpani, side drum, harp or piano, and strings
Georges Bizet’s L’Arlésienne, Suite No. 1 is an independent orchestral work drawn from his incidental music for Alphonse Daudet’s play. Its four movements bring together a Provençal march, an energetic dance, a slow movement for strings and a finale built around the sound of bells. Their connection lies in the way Bizet shapes contrasts: dense and spare textures, detached and sustained playing, communal celebration and private feeling.
Bizet assembled the suite himself in 1872. Its first performance took place in Paris on 10 November that year, conducted by Jules Pasdeloup. Moving the music from the small ensemble at the Théâtre du Vaudeville to a concert orchestra required substantial work. Bizet expanded the scoring, supplied transitions and endings, and established a new sequence of movements, with the Carillon as the finale.
The dramatic background remains useful. Frédéri is tormented by his love for a woman from Arles, while the life of a rural family continues around him. The suite, however, follows a concert design rather than the play’s sequence of events. The drama, its unseen heroine and the emergence of the two suites are explored in the L’Arlésienne Work Guide. This article concentrates on the first suite’s musical construction: its melodies, its forms and the specific decisions that shape what we hear.
One distinction helps at the outset. This suite’s Minuetto is a different movement from the famous flute-and-harp Menuet in Suite No. 2. The third movement is called Adagietto, although the instruction at the beginning of its music is Adagio. Movement titles suggest character; the directions within the score tell us more precisely how the music is to move and sound.
Movements / Structure
The four movements usually take about seventeen to twenty minutes, depending on tempo and repeats. The outline below identifies their principal landmarks. The keys describe each movement’s main tonal areas; there are further changes within them.
| Movement | Tempo and key | Overall design |
|---|---|---|
| I. Prélude | Allegro deciso; C minor → F minor → A minor | March and variations followed by two contrasting thematic regions |
| II. Minuetto | Allegro giocoso; C minor, 3/4 | Dance section, lyrical centre and return |
| III. Adagietto | Adagio; F major, 3/4 | A concentrated span for muted strings |
| IV. Carillon | Allegretto moderato; E major, 3/4; Andantino, 6/8 | Bells, a pastoral episode in C-sharp minor, and return |
The substantial Prélude already contains several tempos and contrasting characters. Two more concentrated movements follow before the Carillon restores the larger orchestral forces. The progression from C minor to F major and finally E major gives each movement a distinct tonal setting. Proportions, changes of texture and the placement of climaxes do much of the work of holding the suite together.
Musical Analysis
I. Prélude — From the March to an Individual Voice
The Prélude opens with the traditional Provençal song Marche des Rois, also known as La Marcho di Rèi. The marking Allegro deciso (Tempo di marcia) calls for a decisive marching character. The four-beat metre, strong dynamics and clearly articulated melodic rhythm immediately give the listener something firm to recognise.
The opening gains its force from voices acting together. Several instruments deliver the same melodic line. Example 1 shows just the two violin sections, playing the same notes at the same pitch. We hear a single powerful melody rather than two independent themes. The rests and the spaces between the shorter notes keep its rhythmic profile distinct even when many instruments are playing.
| Example 1. Prélude, bars 1–4: the two violin sections in unison; selected staves, not the full orchestra. Edited by Fritz Hoffmann, Breitkopf & Härtel, undated [1904], plate 25133; reprint, Partitur-Bibliothek 4877, first page of music. IMSLP scan No. 61758. Numbering starts with the opening bar, which includes a two-beat rest. Source. |
The tune then passes through a series of variations. Both its instrumental setting and the organisation of its accompaniment change. At some points doubling gives the line weight; elsewhere the parts separate, allowing us to hear the harmony move beneath it. In the gentler Andantino, the march material becomes more songful over a more active accompaniment. Recognising the tune through this change of character is one of the movement’s particular pleasures.
The return of the decisive marching motion completes the first large span. At the Andante molto, tempo, dynamics and tonal setting change together. The alto saxophone introduces a lyrical line in F minor over very quiet strings. Its sound has enough substance to hold the centre of the phrase and enough flexibility to blend with the woodwind. The delicate accompaniment leaves room for the melody’s breathing and its small changes of intensity.
In the theatre, this music is associated with Frédéri’s younger brother, called l’Innocent in the play. That association explains its place in the incidental score. Its concert function is also audible without identifying the character: after the collective, strongly articulated sound of the march, a single voice brings greater continuity and a different scale of expression.
The final section moves towards A minor and a more restless manner, associated in the incidental music with Frédéri. Repeated string figures provide an unsettled background while the melody unfolds in broader, more charged phrases. The texture thickens and the music reaches a climax. The ending then gradually withdraws that force: the dynamics fall and the movement subsides. The Prélude leaves a markedly different impression from the one with which it began.
Its large-scale form is therefore easiest to follow as three successive regions: the march and its variations, the restrained lyrical voice, and the dramatic outburst that ends quietly. Hearing the different functions of those regions tells us more than imposing a general sonata pattern on a movement shaped by its theatrical origins.
II. Minuetto — Energy Around a Lyrical Centre
The title Minuetto might suggest a gentle courtly dance. The score gives a more specific instruction: Allegro giocoso, with a metronome marking of 184 to the crotchet. In C minor and 3/4 time, the violins begin loudly, with short notes and detached articulation. Accents and responses from the other instrumental groups add bite. The three-beat pulse remains clear, but the music has far more drive than the title alone might lead us to expect.
Bizet makes the brevity of the notes productive. The gaps between them keep the rhythm clean and leave space for the wind entries. Loudness and clarity can coexist because the instruments do not occupy every moment with sustained sound. Repeats establish the opening material in the listener’s memory, preparing the contrast to come.
In the central region the melody acquires longer note values. The saxophone has a substantial lyrical role alongside the woodwind. Faster figures and arpeggios—chord notes played in succession—move around its sustained line. Flute and clarinet contribute more active phrases while the strings change their manner of accompaniment. Two rates of motion coexist: the principal phrase stretches out while the surrounding parts maintain an inner current of activity.
This relationship is more revealing than a simple opposition between a fast outer section and a slow middle. Even when the tune relaxes, movement continues in the shorter rhythmic figures. Orchestration changes the music’s weight without having to interrupt its underlying pulse.
The gradual reduction in intensity allows the opening gesture to return with renewed definition. The three-part design becomes audible through the return of its distinctive rhythm and articulation. For the concert suite, Bizet added a six-bar ending to the theatre number. It is a small but consequential adjustment: the movement now has a definite close of its own.
III. Adagietto — Intensity Within a Quiet Sound
The Adagietto reduces the orchestra to first and second violins, violas and cellos. The double basses are silent, and all the participating sections play with mutes: devices fitted to the bridge that alter a string instrument’s tone. Removing the lowest orchestral foundation and restraining the sound brings the four individual lines into closer focus.
The score marks the movement Adagio, in F major and 3/4 time. The violas establish a gentle pulse before the first violins develop their melody. Beginning from within the ensemble has a direct audible effect: the principal tune enters a quiet motion already in progress. Its connected phrases unfold above accompanying voices that retain directions of their own.
The harmony remains active beneath the song. Inner parts change notes, chromatic movements introduce pitches outside the prevailing scale, and some notes delay their resolution into a new chord. Such delays create expectation: a note is briefly held while the harmony around it has already changed. When it finally moves, the phrase gains a sense of release.
The music also has a definite dynamic climax. Phrases broaden, the parts meet in more intense harmonic combinations, and the ensemble rises to a strong level before recovering its initial restraint. The mutes remain in place throughout. Even as its force increases, the climax retains the movement’s particular colour. In the final bars melodic and harmonic motion settle, and F major is quietly confirmed.
In the incidental music this passage belongs to No. 19, near the meeting of the elderly Balthazar and Renaude and their recollection of an earlier love. In the suite, its thirty-four bars form a complete trajectory: a quiet entrance, increasing feeling, a climax and a return. Its brevity gives each change of voice and dynamic particular significance.
IV. Carillon — Bells and a Pastoral Interlude
The Carillon takes the suite into E major. Its French title refers to bells sounding a recurring pattern. Bizet creates the effect with the orchestra itself: at the opening, the horns insist on a short three-note figure while harp or piano reinforces the idea. The instruction cuivrez asks the horns for a more brassy, penetrating sound. In the second violins, a direction to pluck the string forcefully adds a dry, percussive accent.
These details explain why the opening makes such a distinct impression before its melody develops. A recognisable setting is already in place: the recurring pulse, the metallic colour and the moving accompaniment. The first violins introduce a separate tune over it, marked gaiement, cheerfully. The bell figure and the melodic line perform different jobs and can be followed independently.
The three-beat Allegretto moderato depends on this persistent repetition, or ostinato: a figure that continues beneath or beside changing material. As further voices enter and the dynamics shift, repetition gives the ear a point of comparison. If every part receives equal weight, the distinction becomes blurred. When the balance is maintained, the steady figure makes the moving melody easier to perceive.
The central Andantino introduces different material. The metre changes to 6/8 and the music moves into the relative C-sharp minor. Two flutes unfold a gentle pastoral phrase, with distinct small rhythmic groups and much lighter accompaniment. More than volume has changed: the subdivision of the beat, the length of the phrase and the relationship between tune and background all feel different. Fewer simultaneous voices create a greater sense of space.
This is a particularly clear example of the work involved in assembling the suite. Bizet linked the theatre Carillon, No. 18, to pastoral material from the next number, transposed that material into C-sharp minor and extended it. He created a large concert movement from passages with different original positions. A quiet reappearance of the bell idea gradually prepares the return before the opening metre and E major are restored.
At the end, the familiar sound is heard after a substantial change of perspective. The return of the full orchestral force completes both movement and suite, while the quiet centre remains in the listener’s memory. This bright conclusion belongs to the new concert arrangement of the music. The tragedy in the theatre ends differently.
How a Suite of Contrasts Holds Together
Suite No. 1 works with four different scales of expression. The Prélude traces an extended route from marching music to personal distress. The Minuetto concentrates contrast within a dance movement. The Adagietto limits its resources and brings the inner voices forward. The Carillon places a contrasting centre within a strong outer frame. Each movement offers a different relationship between continuity and change.
The keys reinforce that independence. C minor connects the beginnings of the first two movements. F major in the Adagietto and E major in the Carillon establish noticeably different harmonic settings. Within the finale, by contrast, the relative C-sharp minor maintains a closer relationship with the opening key and helps to prepare its return. The overall sequence lets us hear four complete characters without requiring continuous thematic development across the entire suite.
The Marche des Rois gives the Prélude its identity, but Suite No. 1 does not depend on bringing that tune back in every movement. Another connection is more revealing: the slow Adagietto and the pastoral centre of the Carillon come from different sections of the same theatre number. Bizet separates that material and gives it different functions—an independent slow movement in one case, an internal contrast in the other.
Orchestration Shapes the Musical Argument
The boundary between melody and accompaniment is constantly adjusted. When the march is first heard, doubling concentrates the force in a single line. In the lyrical centre of the Minuetto, a slow-moving tune coexists with quicker figures. In the Adagietto, inner voices carry much of the harmonic tension. In the Carillon, the listener needs to distinguish the recurring pattern from the melody moving above it.
The saxophone has a precise place within this economy. It can join the shared wind sound and then take an exposed lyrical phrase. Its significance is especially clear in that change of role. The expanded concert orchestra also remains flexible because Bizet decides carefully when to use its full strength and when to reduce it. The suite’s scale is felt in the withdrawal of instruments as well as in their accumulation.
🪶 A Chapter in the Life of the Work
The Saxophone Had to Stay
As the music of L’Arlésienne was prepared for concert performance and publication, a practical difficulty arose. The orchestras that would play it did not all have the same instruments. The alto saxophone belonged to Bizet’s conception of the music, but its availability at every performance could not be taken for granted.
In an undated letter to his publisher, Choudens, Bizet proposed a specific solution. The saxophone and trumpets were to remain in the score. Smaller notes in other parts would show how they could be replaced if necessary. A piano could substitute for the harp. Bizet made a point of insisting on the saxophone’s place in his original scoring.
The practical outcome appears on the first page of music in the Choudens edition. A note explains the available substitutions and directs the reader to particular pages. Anyone opening the score to organise a performance encounters both the difficulty and its solution immediately.
The detail shows a composer concerned with the identity of his sound and with getting the work played. The preferred orchestration was clearly preserved, while usable alternatives were provided. More orchestras could therefore perform the suite, with the distinction between the original choice and a practical adjustment visible on the page.
🎧 Listening Guide
One recognisable tune. In the Prélude, remember the opening melody and look for it when the accompaniment becomes gentler. Notice whether the tune itself remains your main focus or whether a change of instrument alters your first impression. Then hear how the saxophone’s entrance establishes a different beginning within the same movement.
Two rates of motion. In the middle of the Minuetto, follow the long melodic line first, then the quicker notes around it. Rhythmic activity continues even when the principal phrase seems to stretch freely over its accompaniment.
The inner voices. In the Adagietto, shift your attention briefly from the first violins to the violas and second violins. Listen for the way a small movement increases expectation. Keeping those parts in mind makes the strong climax and the return to a quiet ending more distinct.
The recurring pulse. In the Carillon, separate the bell idea from the violin melody. When the flutes begin the central episode, notice how the sense of time changes. Then listen for the first quiet return of the repeated figure before the final full orchestral statement.
🎶 Further Listening
These releases offer starting points for comparison. On each new hearing, choose a specific feature of the score: articulation, balance between parts or the shaping of a long phrase.
- Sir Thomas Beecham — Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Warner/EMI. A historic choice in this repertoire. Follow the relationship between the beat and the length of the phrase, especially as the march takes on a more singing manner.
- Herbert von Karajan — Berliner Philharmoniker, Deutsche Grammophon. Daniel Deffayet plays the alto saxophone on the 1985 release. Compare the solo voice’s position within the ensemble and the dynamic trajectory of the Adagietto.
- Charles Dutoit — Orchestre symphonique de Montréal, Decca. A useful starting point for following the woodwind’s different functions: sustained melody, faster accompanying figures and combinations with the strings.
- Marc Minkowski — Les Musiciens du Louvre, Naïve. The programme includes the suites alongside additional excerpts from the incidental music. It allows a direct comparison between the independent concert sequence and its wider theatrical context.
📚 Further Reading
Elsewhere in this series, the reflection on the aesthetics of absence considers the relationship between the unseen heroine and the listener’s experience.
- The Choudens orchestral score. Sibley Music Library’s digitisation makes the entire work available to follow. Begin with changes of instrumentation and dynamics before attempting a detailed harmonic reading.
- Lesley A. Wright’s edition of Suite No. 1, Eulenburg, 1998; reprinted by Breitkopf & Härtel, 2013. A modern critical edition for closer study of the musical text. This article’s analysis was based on the historical digitised scores identified below.
- Hugh Macdonald — Bizet, Oxford University Press, 2014. A biography placing L’Arlésienne within the composer’s wider output. Macdonald’s online thematic catalogue provides complementary information about editions, correspondence and arrangements.
- Alphonse Daudet — L’Arlésienne, 1872. Reading the play clarifies the original positions of the musical episodes and helps avoid assigning a particular event in the plot to every concert phrase.
🔗 Related Works
- Georges Bizet — L’Arlésienne, Suite No. 2. Music from the same theatrical source follows a different concert trajectory, with the Intermezzo and Farandole in prominent positions.
- Georges Bizet — Carmen. The interaction of dance rhythm, direct melody and dramatically purposeful orchestration operates on a larger theatrical scale.
- Georges Bizet — Jeux d’enfants, Petite suite. The orchestration of selected piano pieces provides another example of instrumental colour reorganising a small form.
- Edvard Grieg — Peer Gynt, Suite No. 1. A comparable journey from incidental music to the concert hall, in which a new ordering of movements establishes a logic of its own.
- Gabriel Fauré — Pelléas et Mélisande, suite. Restrained orchestral writing and the transformation of theatrical episodes into independent movements offer rewarding comparisons with the Adagietto and with Bizet’s economy throughout the suite.
🎼 Closing Reflection
After the final chord, memory may return to one of the suite’s quietest moments: a phrase heard alone, an accompanying voice that briefly became important. The concert ends, but our own ordering of its impressions continues to take shape. Something that passed almost unnoticed on a first hearing may become the reason we look forward to an entire movement the next time.
That change keeps familiar music open to further discovery. We return to the same work with a different kind of attention and hear a new relationship between its individual voices.
📖 Bibliography and Sources
The musical analysis was based on direct examination of the historical Choudens score. The corresponding parts in Hoffmann’s edition were also checked for the selected example. Information about the suite’s construction and the letter to its publisher was cross-checked against Hugh Macdonald’s scholarly catalogue. Wright’s modern edition appears under Further Reading as a recommendation.
Scores
Bizet, Georges. L’Arlésienne, 1re suite d’orchestre. Paris: Choudens, plate A.C. 2542, later printing of the edition first published in 1873. Sibley Music Library, University of Rochester. Digital record and orchestral score.
Bizet, Georges. L’Arlésienne, Suite Nr. 1. Edited by Fritz Hoffmann. Leipzig: Breitkopf & Härtel, undated [1904], plate 25133; later reprint, Partitur-Bibliothek 4877. Source for Example 1: first page of music, bars 1–4, first and second violins only. IMSLP, scan No. 61758. This edition changes the allocation of trumpets and cornets; the example is confined to the violin parts checked against Choudens.
Thematic catalogue and historical documentation
Macdonald, Hugh. The Bizet Catalogue, GB 121, “L’Arlésienne, suite d’orchestre, op. 23 bis”, and GB 30, “L’Arlésienne”. Washington University in St. Louis. Suite and transcribed correspondence; Incidental music.
Daudet, Alphonse. L’Arlésienne. Pièce en trois actes et cinq tableaux. Paris: Alphonse Lemerre, 1872. Digital text of the play, Project Gutenberg.
Recording information
Official catalogues: Warner Classics, Beecham; Deutsche Grammophon, Karajan; Decca, Dutoit; Marc Minkowski, discography. Performers and programme contents identify the releases; the listening suggestions propose specific questions for comparison.