At a time when female composers from the past are being re-discovered, Camille Delaforge, at the head of her ensemble Il Caravaggio, has chosen to reinstate a unique score and an atypical figure. Mlle Duval was a singer and choir member with the Académie Royale de Musique. She had a strong personality and was one of the few composers who managed to stage an opera in public under the Ancien Régime featuring Élisabeth Jacquet de La Guerre and Henriette Villard de Beaumesnil. 1736, the year of Rameau’s Indes galantes, saw the première of Les Génies her opéra-ballet in a Prologue and Four Acts. The press was astounded at the time to see the young woman herself in the orchestra pit playing the harpsichord. The CMBV’s joint residency with Il Caravaggio at the Sablé festival in 2021 helped resurrect lengthy excerpts. We are delighted that the work will return to the stage in its entirety at the Royal Opera, under Camille Delaforge and Château de Versailles Spectacles. The CMBV’s musical author Benoît Dratwicki complete the missing segments.

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