Camille Merckx and Julie de Maupin: love at first sight!

In her first piece of musical theatre, Julie M en garde et en scène, mezzo-alto Camille Merckx shines a spotlight on Julie de Maupin, known notably through Théophile Gautier’s novel Mademoiselle de Maupin. Onstage, French Baroque music from Lully to Campra rubs shoulders with fencing, which the singer also practiced. Both an artist and a free woman, Julie de Maupin created numerous roles for Campra and was the first mezzo-soprano, or “bas-dessus,” at the Paris Opéra in the 18th century.

Before we turn to the character of Julie de Maupin, a quick word about the company Les Perles de Verre, which you’ve just founded?

Camille Merckx:  I created the company for this show about Mademoiselle de Maupin. Its name is taken from a novel by Hermann Hesse, an author I adore, titled The Glass Bead Game. Of all his books, it’s not my favourite, but the ethic of artistic work that emerges from it speaks to me: it evokes that blend of arts, sciences, nature, everything around us, in order to create a more pertinent, more rational object—whether philosophical, political, or otherwise. 

Let’s come back to Julie de Maupin: who is she?

C. M.: Julie de Maupin is the first mezzo, the first “bas-dessus,” at the Paris Opéra in the 18th century. She was married very young, but that didn’t stop her from continuing to live her life quite quietly. She was extremely free; she traveled alone on the roads. She was a fencer and would fight duels whenever there was a problem. When she traveled alone, she wore trousers or a horseman’s outfit—and not “as a man,” because in my show I’m precisely trying not to say “a man’s outfit.” She was sentenced to death twice because duels had been banned by royal decree, then pardoned by the king. She was bisexual and had two great love stories: a warrior count who followed her all her life, and, at the end of her life, a great, magnificent countess she was mad about. She created an enormous number of roles for Campra. In fact, it was very difficult to choose which elements of her life to tell. If we’d put in everything, we’d have had a four-hour show! The idea wasn’t to do a biopic. We do ricochets, flashbacks, but where I felt most legitimate in telling her life was the years at the opera. As a singer, when I read her biography, I know what she experienced in that place.

How did she know fencing?

C. M.: She grew up in the stables at the Château de Versailles and her father was secretary to the Count of Armagnac. She had no mother and played with the boys; her father probably let her get away with it a little. She sent her husband to the provinces by negotiating a bit with the Count of Armagnac: she agreed to marry him on that single condition. That way she was able to move up to Paris, where she continued her life with her lovers. Which, apparently, was no problem for her husband. She even brought him back to Paris toward the end of her life, while continuing to “play the fool” with her friends.

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