Revived operas, propelled young talents, concerts on period instruments in the magnificent setting of the Hospices de Beaune (Côte-d’Or): the International Festival of Baroque and Romantic Opera celebrates 40 years of a pioneering spirit of rediscovery music of the 17th and 18th centuries.
“There was hardly any place where you could listen to old music” : in the early 1980s, baroque had not yet become fashionable again, but Anne Blanchard, its founder and artistic director, had already made it her passion.
Self-taught music lover – “my mother, who played the piano, made me listen to baroque at 9-10 years old” -, Anne Blanchard became a semi-amateur in the world of the Baroque, alongside a career as a history teacher: she took part in numerous juries and produced musical programs on France Culture. But in Beaune, “a musical event was missing”.
Anne Blanchard therefore founded, in 1983, “encounters” of the baroque. “It immediately worked very well”, she says. Very quickly, the festival became a kind of Mecca of the genre. With 10,000 spectators each summer, it is far from the 80,000 of the Festival d’art lyrique d’Aix-en-Provence, but one of the few entirely devoted to the Baroque (and to the Romantic for ten years).
The festival thus becomes one of the biggest events of its kind, alongside Innsbruck in Austria, Bruges in Belgium, Ambronay in France… Largely participating in the “baroque revolution” of the 1970s, which rediscovered this music of the period 1600-1750, Beaune brought back to life forgotten operas by Lully, Rameau or Handel.
Thanks to the intuition and “nose” that Anne Blanchard can claim, he has also revealed young talents that the big stages are snapping up today. The French conductors Stéphane Fuget, Jérémie Rhorer or American William Christie, the German countertenor Andreas Scholl: all these big names started in Beaune.
It is to emphasize this that the 40th edition of the festival (from July 8 to 31) has been designed around these artists: Christie will direct the Partenope of Handel, Rhorer the Tancred by Rossini, Fuget the Orfeo by Monteverdi…
The sumptuous setting of the medieval Hospices de Beaune, or the Notre-Dame basilica, add to the charm of the festival but the public is there “for the music”, assures Anne Blanchard. And he is ready to travel: 30% comes from abroad, in particular from Switzerland, and 35% from outside the Beaune region, mainly from Paris.
“Aging”the public remains however “faithful”, the box office covering about half the budget of a festival held by only three employees. “It’s a bit tiring”dares Anne Blanchard, now retired, who thinks “seriously” to hand over.