Albert Roussel: La Testament De La Tante Caroline (Aunt Carolines Will)

Le Testament de la Tante Caroline ('Aunt Caroline's Will') remains one of Roussel's least-known works. It's an energetic and imaginative operetta that sits perfectly in the lineage of French musical comedy, with a plot that concerns the conditions attached to the mischievous aunt's will. The text is inimitably Parisian and Roussel responded with graceful and elegant writing that for some contemporary critics evoked the music of one his orchestral masterpieces, Le Festin de l'araignée. The operetta is heard herein the revision requested by Roussel's widow which cuts three acts down to one.