Dutch Composers's video: Belle van Zuylen - Airs et Romances

Belle van Zuylen (1740-1805) Airs et Romances : for soprano and pianoforte 1. L' an passé - 00:00 2. De la ville et des champs - 01:46 3. Pauvre Agneau - 02:51 4. L' amour est un enfant trompeur - 04:22 5. Timarette s'en est allée - 05:06 6. Lise amoit - 06:45 7. Autre air pour Lise aimoit - 07:30 8. Arbre charmant - 08:17 9. Douce retraite - 10:49 10. Tout cède à la beauté d'Elise - 13:13 Madelon Michel, soprano Fania Chapiro, pianoforte Belle van Zuylen was a Dutch writer and composer. From 1771 she lived in Switzerland with her husband Charles-Emmanuel de Charrière de Penthaz. She is remembered especially for her extensive, witty and often caustic correspondence with James Boswell, Benjamin Constant, Germaine de Staël and others (see M. Flothuis: ‘An Unexpected Source of Musical Information: the Correspondence of Belle van Zuylen (1740-1805)’, FAM, xxvii (1980), 33–6; xxviii (1981), 145 only) and also for her novels, plays and pamphlets, all (including the letters) written in French. She was educated by a Swiss governess, Jeanne Prévost, with whom she continued to correspond for several years; only the letters of Mme Prévost have survived. Music played an important role in her career, as was usual in noble families of the time. As early as 1764 she expressed a desire to study composition with Rameau, but he died the same year. In 1785 she started studying with Niccolò Zingarelli, who had just earned his first great success with his opera Alsinda. On 28 May 1785 she wrote, ‘Since this first essay I have dreamt only of music’. Her letters frequently mention composers whose works she knew or wanted to get to know. Belle van Zuylen embarked on several dramatic musical works, for which she wrote her own librettos, but none of these has come down to us except for some text fragments (in CH-N). In 1788 she sent the libretto of Les Phéniciennes to Mozart in the hope that he would set it to music, but neither her accompanying letter nor any reply from Mozart has been found. Her surviving compositions comprise six minuets for string quartet (The Hague and Amsterdam, n.d.), nine piano sonatas and ten airs and romances (Paris, n.d.); all have been published in volume x of her Oeuvres complètes [de] Isabelle de Charrière, Belle de Zuylen (Amsterdam, 1979-1984). They do not surpass the average standard of the time, but the piano sonatas (originally published anonymously) show a gradual increase in the level of invention and skill.