Episode 015: Faust with Benjamin Poore

The devil categorically should have all the good music. Friend of the pod and Mythical Fuckboy Correspondent Benjamin Poore joins us to wrap up spooky season with Gounod’s devilishly fun Faust. We discuss ecumenical erotics, take a field trip to Paris’s Palais Garnier, and drop in on Gounod’s catastrophic love life.

Additional topics include: Caravaggio, Iran-Contra, the Rocky and Bullwinkle Movie, and Alma Mahler’s burn book.

Find Ben by summoning him during a dark night of the soul.

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Simon says:

“There is even a Faust opera by that rara avis, a female opera composer — Louise Bertin.”

(100 Great Operas. and Their Stories)

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Faust: The story

• Act I

• Act II

• Act III

• Act IV

• Act V

  Item description

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Recordings cited

• Mirella Freni, Nicolai Ghiaurov, Georges Prêtre: Faust (Warner Classics, 1978)

• Joan Sutherland, Franco Corelli, Nicolai Ghiaurov, Richard Bonynge: Faust (Decca, 1966)

• Peter Mattei, Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra, Lawrence Renes: Great Baritone Arias (BIS, 2009)

• Marina Rebeka, Piotr Beczala, Luca Pisaroni, Dan Ettinger: Faust (C Major, 2026)

• Joan Sutherland, Orchestra and Chorus of the Royal Opera House, Richard Bonynge: Art of the Prima Donna (Decca, 1960)

• Cheryl Studer, Richard Leech, José Van Dam, Michel Plasson: Faust (Warner Classics, 1991)

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Further reading

• Steven Huebner: The Operas of Charles Gounod (1990)

• Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, C. F. MacIntyre (trans.): Goethe's Faust, Part I: A New American Version (1957)

• Lorraine Byrne Bodley (ed.): Music in Goethe's Faust, Goethe's Faust in Music (2017)

• Lorna Fitzsimmons (ed.): Lives of Faust (2008)

• Lorna Fitzsimmons, Charles McKnight (eds.): The Oxford Handbook of Faust in Music (2019)

• Lorna Fitzsimmons (ed.): Goethe's Faust and Cultural Memory: Comparatist Interfaces (2012)

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Playlist

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