Habanera (From “Carmen”, WD. 31)

This aria from the famous opera Carmen by Georges Bizet is also referred to as "L'amour est un oiseau rebelle." ("Love is a rebellious bird"). Its score was adapted from the habanera "El Arreglito," then popular in cabarets. Bizet thought it to be a folk song, only to discover that it was a recently composed ditty called "El Arreglito" by Basque composer Sebastian de Yradier, who had died only ten years earlier. The composer had to add a note to the vocal score of Carmen, acknowledging its source.

The habanera is a genre of Cuban popular dance music of the 19th century, which was brought back to Spain by sailors, where it became popular for a while and was danced by all classes of society. This aria was so called because it was written in the rhythm of the Cuban dance.

Georges Bizet was born in Paris on Oct. 25, 1838. His father was a singing teacher, and his mother, a gifted pianist. Young Georges was a child prodigy and when only nine, he entered the great Paris Conservatory of Music and rapidly developed into a brilliant pianist. At the age of 19 Bizet won the Grand Prix de Rome, a government scholarship. He studied in Rome for three years before returning to Paris where he refused offers of a teaching position at the conservatory and a career as a concert pianist. Instead he devoted his efforts to composition. His works in this period include the opera The Pearl Fishers and the music for Alphonse Daudet's play L'Arlesienne. However his efforts to achieve a reputation as an operatic composer were largely unsuccessful, and he never remained free of financial worries.