Wikipedia:Today's featured article/September 30, 2013

Les pêcheurs de perles (The Pearl Fishers) is an opera by the French composer Georges Bizet, with a libretto by Eugène Cormon and Michel Carré, first performed on 30 September 1863 at the Théâtre Lyrique in Paris. Set in ancient Ceylon, it tells how two men's vow of eternal friendship is threatened by their love for a woman, who is herself conflicted between secular love and her sacred oath as a priestess. The duet "Au fond du temple saint", generally known as "The Pearl Fishers Duet", is one of the best-known numbers in Western opera. Although the opera was well received by the public and by other composers, initial press reaction was generally hostile, and it was not revived in Bizet's lifetime. It later achieved popularity in Europe and America, and eventually became a staple part of the repertory of opera houses worldwide. The loss of Bizet's original score meant that, until the 1970s, productions were based on versions with significant departures from the original; recently, efforts have been made to reconstruct the score in accordance with Bizet's intentions. Modern critics have detected premonitions of the composer's genius which culminated, 10 years later, in Carmen. (Full article...)

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