Sax in Opera
Just turned on R3 to hear an alto sax accompanying Salome in the last act of Massenet's 'Herodiade'; got me thinking - is that the first time [1881] a saxophone was used in an opera? I know Bizet used one in 'L'Arlesienne' but that's incidental music to a play. Other than that, can't think of anything else off the top of my head - any suggestions?!
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Flogging the novice in a Britten Opera probably does count as Sax in Opera. A bit like pressing an over ripe strawberry to your lips and tasting the juice as it gushes out and thrills your taste buds .... Death in Venice.
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Also some Tippett. But I think the OP only wanted to know if there was anything earlier than the example he found.
Ted
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I was looking for the earliest use in an opera; don't suppose Berlioz did - tho it's the sort of thing I would expect him to be trying out!
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If you care about the first time the Saxophone was used, as part of the orchestration, in an Opera (or any orchestral work), it's a quite a difficult task. You have to examine quite a few scores of the period of the invention of the instrument.
However, if you are interested in where the saxophone has a more prominent role in the orchestration, then, as far I can tell, there is a quite limited number of works, most of them already mentioned.
Parla
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I was looking for the earliest use in an opera; don't suppose Berlioz did - tho it's the sort of thing I would expect him to be trying out!
He did. There's a soprano sax in Les Troyens.
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Damn, I misread the title. Thought this was going to be a really fun thread.
Without trolling through my whole collection, I would have thought fertile ground for investigation would be the operas of Ravel, Magnard and Shostakovich. VW was partial to a bit of sax but I just checked Pilgrim's Progress and there isn't one there. Certainly Britten used it in Billy Budd - Act 1 after the novice has been flogged.