L'Africaine is an 1865 French grand opéra in five acts with music by Giacomo Meyerbeer and a libretto by Eugène Scribe. Meyerbeer and Scribe began working on the opera in 1837, using the title L'Africaine, but around 1852 changed the plot to portray fictitious events in the life of the Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama and introduced the working title Vasco de Gama, the French version of his name. The copying of the full score was completed the day before Meyerbeer died in 1864.
Cover of the 1865 piano-vocal score
Giacomo Meyerbeer, portrayed in 1847
Victor Warot as Don Alvaro
Costume design for Sélika (Ricordi, undated)
Grand opera is a genre of 19th-century opera generally in four or five acts, characterized by large-scale casts and orchestras. The original productions consisted of spectacular design and stage effects with plots normally based on or around dramatic historic events. The term is particularly applied to certain productions of the Paris Opéra from the late 1820s to around 1860; 'grand opéra' has sometimes been used to denote the Paris Opéra itself.
Degas (1871): Ballet of the Nuns from Meyerbeer's Robert le diable (1831); one of the earliest sensations of grand opera
Set design by Francesco Bagnara for act 1 of Il crociato in Egitto by Meyerbeer
Meyerbeer Le Prophète set design for the final conflagration by Philippe Chaperon
Le Cid, Massanet, ballet at Le Cid's camp. Set by Rubé, Chaperon and Jambon.