Comic opera by composer Chevalier de Saint-Georges gets an update

Boston Lyric Opera and Opera Philadelphia in co-production of ‘The Anonymous Lover’

Celina Colby

Celina Colby is an arts and travel reporter with a fondness for Russian novels.... VIEW BIO

It’s a nearly impossible story: In the mid-1700s, Joseph Bologne, the illegitimate son of an African enslaved woman and a French plantation owner, became a brilliant composer known by the moniker Chevalier de Saint-Georges. This month, Boston audiences can experience the fruit of this musical talent’s labor in “The Anonymous Lover,” a romantic comedy opera helmed by a diverse creative team with Boston Lyric Opera.

Portrait of composer Joseph Bologne,
Chevalier de Saint-Georges PHOTO: WIKIMEDIA COMMONS

Bologne’s own story hit the silver screen in 2022 with the film “Chevalier,” spreading some awareness about the life of the composer, soldier and athlete. Before the film, Bologne’s work largely lay undiscovered, championed by only a few voices in the classical music world attempting to diversify programs littered with Beethoven and Mozart.

Highlighting diverse composers “challenges discrimination, it challenges racial bias,” says Dennis Whitehead Darling, the opera’s stage director. “[Bologne’s] life is a testament to that fact. He was the biracial son of a slave who rose in French society in the 18th century. Through his work and skill, he was able to break down barriers and challenge stereotypes. I think by celebrating his work, we bring that connection to a modern audience.”

Stage director Dennis Whitehead Darling. PHOTO: COURTESY BOSTON LYRIC OPERA

This co-production by Boston Lyric Opera and Opera Philadelphia keeps the original score by Bologne, sung in French, intact, but adds a new book adaptation written by Obie Award-winning Boston playwright Kirsten Greenidge in collaboration with Darling. The book mixes English dialogue with the French sung music, bringing an extra layer of accessibility to audiences. Though the performance is still a period piece, Greenidge has written in slightly more contemporary language than the poetic French to make the work more approachable.

Greenidge knew only the basic details of Bologne’s life before starting this project, she says, and was surprised and delighted during her research.

“He was, for lack of a better term, a jack of all trades … an expert fencer, a composer, a conductor,” says Greenidge. “And then he also fought for the French — he was a soldier as well. So to just hold all those identities in one person is really quite astounding.”

In “The Anonymous Lover,” a wealthy widow named Léontine has become disenchanted with the idea of romance, until she starts receiving letters from a mysterious admirer.

Boston Lyric Opera will perform “The Anonymous Lover” for just one weekend, Friday, Feb. 16 through Sunday Feb.18 — conveniently near Valentine’s Day — at The Huntington Theatre. The BLO website offers many resources to learn more about the composer, including links to the “Chevalier” film, a Spotify playlist of Bologne’s compositions and written sources about his life.

As for the show itself, it’s a lighthearted 90-minute story of romance.

“It’s an absolutely adorable rom-com filled with googly-eyed love,” says Darling. “And some unrequited love, and the drama of deciding whether to risk falling in love … It’s delightful.”