Bizets Carmen

Bizets Carmen

🎭 Carmen and the Paris that Rejected Her

It’s hard to believe now, but the first performances of Bizet’s Carmen in Paris in 1875 were poorly received by both audiences and critics. The composer was devastated, writing that Parisians had “not understood a wretched word of the work I have written for them.” He died just a few weeks later, never knowing that Carmen would become one of the most beloved and frequently performed operas in the world.

This course explores the remarkable story of Carmen’s troubled beginnings and the social and artistic climate of Paris in the 1870s, which seemed stacked against Bizet from the start.

We’ll look at:

• The cultural conservatism of the Parisian opera scene and its

• hostility to innovation

• Bizet’s personal struggles to win over both critics and audiences

• The few courageous figures who supported him — including Hector Berlioz and Léon Carvalho

• How Carmen’s realism, energy, and tragic heroine challenged expectations of the time

• The gradual rediscovery of Bizet’s genius after his untimely death

Through music, history, and discussion, we’ll trace how a work once dismissed as shocking and unrefined became a symbol of artistic courage, passion, and transformation.