IN seeking the earliest examples of operatic music, in its
true sense, the student must turn to ancient Greece. There, where
all that is greatest in art had its origin, the employment of
music to increase dramatic effect of drama produced a true opera,
in our most modern understanding of the term. Unfortunately,
we have nothing more than scattered fragments of the Grecian
music. But from these, and from the writings of the ancient authors,
we can for a dim idea of the effect attained. There is no doubt
that the great choruses of tragedies like "Agamemnon"
and "Antigone"
were sung to the grandest music then composed. The dialogue,
too, was never spoken, but declaimed with musical inflection
throughout, and the works were accompanied by an orchestra of
lyres and flutes, corresponding in tone-colour to the harps and
clarinets of the present.
Between ancient and modern times there is nothing to be found
resembling opera, except the comic ballad operetta "Robin
et Marion," and one or two similar works by the trouvère
Adam de la Hale (1240-1287). The so-called miracle and mystery
plays were undoubtedly operatic in the sense of possessing music;
but they exerted no influence upon secular composers. After the
decline
of minstrelsy, musical composition became a mere intellectual
exercise, consisting of a mathematical interweaving of vocal
parts. With the modern era came a revolt against this technicality.
But even the music of such great writers as Orlando di Lasso
and Palestrina, with all its expressiveness, was hardly dramatic
in spirit. Some composers of the Italian polyphonic school made
attempts to employ this style for operatic purposes, but the
earliest opera now existing resulted from an independent effort
to "revive the just designs of Greece."
At the end of the sixteenth century, a band of Florentine
enthusiasts attempted to resuscitate the old style of musical
declamation, and originated opera as it exists today. "Dafne,"
with music by Jacopo Peri, is lost, but "Euridice,"
produced by the same composer in 1600, is still in existence.
According to its preface, it was written "to test the effect
of the particular kind of melody" which musicians of that
day imagined "to be identical with that used by the Greeks
and the Romans throughout their dramas." Except for a few
bars of chorus, the work was made up of accompanied recitative.
The orchestra consisted of a violin, chitarone (large
guitar), lira grande (large viol with ten or more strings),
liuto grosso (lute), and gravicembalo (harpsichord).
The harmonies are indicated by the figured bass, and the instrumental
parts of the work are rather thin. The beauty lies in the vocal
score, which is really expressive, and follows the inflections
of the human voice with much success.
But Peri and his rival Caccini, though original, were not
skilled musicians. It remained for the genius of Claudio Monteverde
to reveal the possibilities of the new form. Trained in the school
of Palestrina, he was never at ease in writing according to the
contrapuntal rules and restrictions of the older masters. But
in the opera he found the style of work for which his harmonic
gifts were best fitted. His "Arianna" (1607), of which
only a few passages are left, "visibly moved the entire
theatre to tears," according to a critic of the time. His
"Orfeo," produced a year later, is preserved to us
in its entirety, and shows a tremendous advance over the simple
Florentine music-dramas. The instruments used at the first performance
were two harpsichords, two bass viols, ten viols, a double harp,
two small French violins, two chitaroni, two organi
di legno (sets of wooden pipes), three large viole de
gamba, four trombones, one regale (tiny folding organ),
two cornetti (wooden horns), one flute, one clarino
(trumpet), and three sordini (muted trumpets). Since Monteverde
was himself a good technical musician (violist to the Duke of
Mantua, at whose command the two operas were written), the immense
success of his works is not surprising, and after his settlement
in Venice we find him surrounded by pupils and imitators. Here
he introduced two new orchestral effects, the pizzicato of plucked
strings, and the violin tremolo.
Cavalli, the most famous pupil of Monteverde, carried on the
good work in Venice. He it was who made the first deviation from
the strict "musica parlante" of the Florentines, by
the introduction of the aria. He considered that his natural
melodic gifts should not be hampered by the artificial declamatory
rules of the age of Pericles,
and by his frequent use of tunes he became the first cause of
many a modern quarrel over the true function of opera. The aria
was still further elaborated by Cesti, who added the da capo,
or repeat of the first part after the close of the second. Cesti
was a pupil of the great Roman composer Carissimi, and from this
renowned teacher he imbibed a thorough knowledge of the best
methods of phrasing and instrumentation. Cavalli had enriched
opera by introducing programme-music, which attempts to reproduce
in tone the actual sights and sounds of nature. Cesti, by combining
Cavalli's methods with his own musical learning, raised opera
to a higher dignity than it had ever before attained. At the
same time, however, this very musical learning made him give
too little attention to dramatic significance.
Meanwhile the lyric drama, at first the luxury of princes
and nobles, came to depend on the support of the whole people.
In Venice, in the year 1637, the first public opera-house was
opened, and met with such success that by the close of the century
the city contained ten other similar institutions, and gave a
livelihood to a score of minor composers. In Rome, no opera was
performed until 1632, and no theatrical representations given
until 1671, though a band of strolling players presented an operetta
on a cart in the carnival of 1606. Bologna seems to have encouraged
opera from its inception, though no theatre appeared there until
1680. Naples, afterward such an operatic centre, seems to have
been later than any of the Italian cities in giving encouragement
to the new form.
By far the most famous composer of the century was Alessandro
Scarlatti, the founder of the Neopolitan school. Endowed with
great natural gifts, he soon recognised the value of strict training
to develop his talent. The history of music contains many instances
of the value of hard work. Beethoven kept at the piano by a stern
father, Schubert earnestly striving to master the centerpoint
he had neglected in childhood, and Mendelssohn writing some musical
thought each day, are but a few of many examples. In Scarlatti's
case, unlike Schubert's, the forethought came first, and not
afterward. The great Italian never ceased to labour at the science
of music until he became recognised as the most learned composer
of his time. His knowledge of counterpoint, combined with his
great natural genius, enabled him to write with a freedom and
breadth of style that put all his predecessors far in the background.
In his hands the "da capo" of Cesti became fully developed,
and the interminable monologue of previous times was broken up
into three distinct forms,--the recitativo secco, or plain
recitative of ordinary stage action, the recitative stromentato,
or accompanied recitative, used in moments of intensity, and
the aria, for the impassioned soliloquy so often indulged in
by operatic characters. He wrote no less than 108 operas, besides
many cantatas of more or less dramatic style, and all of these
are marked by a rare freshness of melody that does not fail to
charm even at the present day. It must be noted, however, that
mere beauty of music is not sufficient for the needs of the stage,--the
music must be appropriate, as well as attractive, and must reflect,
or intensify the dramatic situation. Judged according to this
rule, Cesti's music began to deviate from the true path, while
Scarlatti's departed from it still farther.
Meanwhile the other countries of Europe adopted the new form
of amusement that Italy had found so successful, changing it
more or less to suit their needs and accord with existing conditions.
In France, as early as 1581, the success of "Le Ballet Comicque
de la Reine," by the Italian Baltazarini (Beaujoyeaulx),
showed that the court of Henry III was fully able to enjoy its
diaphanous plot, and appreciate its pretty music. In 1600, Rinuccini,
the librettist of Peri's "Euridice," visited Paris
in the suite of Maria de' Medici, and attempted to introduce
the new cult of the Florentines, but met with little encouragement.
The ballet, with more or less incidental music, continued its
aristocratic career, undisturbed by rival entertainments, for
nearly fifty years. Cardinal Mazarin made a second attempt to
import the Italian article, also without permanent result. It
was not until 1646, with Venice already revelling in the luxury
of four public theatres, that the first French opera appeared.
In that year the Abbé Mailly, secretary to the papal nuncio,
saw his tragedy, "Achébar, Roi de Mogol," produced
at Carpentras, by his master, Cardinal Bichi. After some performances
of Italian works, the native talent again came to the front in
1659, in the shape of a pastoral by the poet Perrin, with music
by Cambert. As the work pleased Louis XIV, its success was assured,
and more of its kind followed by the royal command. So enthusiastic
did the Frenchmen become that even Italian operas met with a
cold reception, and in 1669 Perrin was given a royal charter
allowing him to found a national academy of music.
The success of Cambert's "Pomone" and "Les
Peines et Plaisirs d'Amour" (1671) aroused the jealousy
of that foremost of intriguers and musicians of the time, Jean
Baptiste Lully. Born near Florence about 1633, Lully entered
the kitchen service of Mlle. de Montpensier, in Paris, when thirteen
years old. Escaping from that post by his skill in violin-playing,
he rose to be composer, director, and music-master to the royal
family. Not yet satisfied, he succeeded in getting control of
the academy in 1672, and in conjunction with the poet Quinault
proceeded to create a school of French opera that won him everlasting
fame. Up to this time he had produced many ballets and divertissements,
and the years 1672-1686 witnessed the production of no less than
twenty operas, in which widely different subjects were treated
with consummate mastery. To Lully belongs the development of
the overture, which he found as a faint-hearted Italian prelude,
and bequeathed to posterity as a well-marked musical form consisting
of a dignified largo, a bright fugal allegro, and a stately minuet.
He invested the dull recitative secco with new beauty,
by adding accompaniment, and he introduced his choruses with
consummate dramatic skill. The freshness of his melodies compensates
largely for their monotony and poor harmonic treatment, but his
works would hardly please modern ears, because of the frequent
changes of rhythm which he used in producing declamatory effects.
He died in 1687, after reigning supreme in the French art world
for fifteen years.
None of Lully's immediate successors were of the mental proportions
necessary to assume the mantle of the departed genius. Colasse,
Danchet, Campra, and Destouches did little but imitate, and it
is not until the appearance of Rameau (1683-1764) that we find
a musician worth more than a passing mention. This composer,
famous in connection with clavichord playing and systematic harmony,
did not enter the operatic field until his fiftieth year, and
then began with an apparent failure. His "Hippolyte et Aricie,"
produced in 1733, fell flat at first, but time showed that this
was the fault of the audience rather than the composer, and the
score of operas and ballets that followed it placed him at the
head of the French school. For the monotony and trivialities
of his rivals he substituted new forms, piquant rhythms, bold
modulations, and a richer orchestration. Instead of merely allowing
the wood-wind to play in unison with the strings, he wrote separate
parts for it, and brought the flutes, oboes, and bassoons into
increased prominence. He was unfortunate in not finding a good
librettist, and his melodies were less simply captivating than
those of Lully, but he enjoyed a tremendous popularity in spite
of the growing strength of Italian opera in Paris.
In Elizabethan England, the masque occupied the same position
that the ballet held on the other side of the channel. It was
always given with more or less incidental music, and as at the
time the English composers were scarcely less famous and less
numerous than the poets, there can be no doubt that the form
was thoroughly worthy of the popularity it enjoyed. In 1617 a
masque of Ben Jonson's was given a complete
musical setting (by Lanière), which must have made it
a true opera, but no imitations followed it. What is generally
spoken of as the first English opera was "Dido and Æneas,"
the work of England's greatest composer, Henry Purcell.
Most of the dramas of the Restoration
contained incidental music, and Charles II, who disliked the
elaborate counterpoint of the day, sent Pelham Humphrey to learn
the Paris fashions and bring back a full description of Lully's
works. The result of Humphrey's operatic studies in the gay capital
is to be found in the composition of his pupil, Purcell, which
was first produced in 1679 at a young ladies' school in Leicester
Fields. Purcell's later work for the stage consisted wholly of
incidental music, but many passages show marvellous genius, and
in melody and dramatic power alike he was far ahead of his French
contemporaries. Purcell was the last great musical genius of
England, and no further activity there is to be recorded until
the advent of Handel.
Meanwhile the Germans had kept fairly well abreast of the
other nations in operatic progress. There can be no doubt that
but for the Thirty Years' War Germany would have taken a preëminent
position in the art world as well as in the political life of
Europe. But under the existing conditions she had to borrow her
civilization from her neighbors. As early as 1627 we find a German
composer, Heinrich Schütz, setting to music a translation
of Rinuccini's "Dafne" for performance at the marriage
of the Landgrave of Hesse, in Torgau; but, unfortunately, all
trace of this, as of Peri's earlier setting, is lost. Italian
operas were given at Regensburg in 1653, at Vienna in 1665, and
at Munich in the same year. "Seelewig," a semi-sacred
opera by Sigmund Staden, was printed at Nuremburg as early as
1644, but German opera was not established on a permanent basis
until the opening of an opera-house in Hamburg, in 1678, with
a performance of "Adam and Eve," by Johann Theile.
In that year three other operas were given, and a number of composers
soon came forward. One man, however, Reinhard Keiser (1673-1739),
was decidedly primus inter pares, and did for Germany
a service similar to that of Lully in France and Purcell in England.
Of the 116 operas that he is said to have produced, only a few
remain; but these few show that Keiser, though less perfect in
finish than Lully, was a master of expression, and made evident
efforts to attain dramatic truth.
But Hamburg was to witness the triumphs of a much greater
artist, whose music has a firm hold on public favour today, though
his operas are too archaic in form for the present,--Georg Friedrich
Handel. Born in Halle in 1685, he showed an early fondness for
the forbidden luxury of music, and is said to have concealed
a clavichord in his room during his seventh year. In his youth
he studied the respectable profession of law, at his father's
desire, but gave up this distasteful work in 1702. His first
opera, "Almira," was produced in 1705, and was followed
quickly by three others. Handel's wonderful gift of melody brought
the Hamburg school to its highest point, but his earlier works
are marred by the barbarous fashion of mixing Italian and German
to suit the needs of the singers, who seem to have been dictatorial
in the past as well as in the present. The early crudities soon
disappeared, however, and in 1707 the composer left for Italy,
to worship the shrine of Scarlatti. Here "Rodrigo"
(Florence, 1707) and "Agrippina" (Venice, 1708) brought
fresh laurels to the Saxon genius. In 1710 he settled in London,
where his "Rinaldo" (composed in a fortnight) surpassed
everything previously existing in the operatic world. Here he
brought forth one piece after another, during a period of thirty
years; managing theatres, soothing the disputes of singers, braving
the wrath of the dandies by composing in his own chosen methods,
triumphing over his rival, Buononcini, making fortunes and losing
them, and finally leaving the stage with "Deidamia,"
in 1741. From that year until his death in 1759, he spent his
time in composing oratorios and paying off his debts.
Handel's compositions represent the highest development of
the opera in the past. The works of his successors are cast in
a different mold, and foreshadow the triumphs of the present,
while his own are rather the result of a successful evolution
than the cause of a new progress; therefore it may not be amiss
to pause for a moment and inspect their style more closely. In
place of the straightforward drama emphasized by music, according
to the canons of the Florentine classicists, the musical elaborations
of Cesti, Scarlatti, and his pupils had led to the establishment
of definite rules regarding the kind of arias to be employed,
their number, their order in the opera, and even the number of
characters to be introduced.
The performers were generally six, at most seven. Usually
three were women and three men, two of the former being sopranos
and a third being a contralto, while the first man was always
an artificial soprano, the second either soprano or contralto,
and the remaining one (or two) tenor or bass. On the popularity
of these singers much of the success of the work depended. We
should find it strange today if Hercules were to sing a soprano
solo, or Theseus warble out a series of roulades in alt;
the conventions of Handel's day, however, not only accepted these
conditions, but insisted on them. The light opera prima donna
of the present, so often decked out in the full regalia of manhood,
is but the logical successor of the eighteenth century opera
heroes.
The airs entrusted to these personages were arranged in well-defined
classes. All the numbere were in the "da capo" form,
closing with a repeat of the first part, but they differed from
one another in the character of their music. The aria cantabile
was a work of simplicity and sweetness, though even this was
often garnished with vocal ornaments by the singer. The aria
di portamento, also a slow movement, was more symmetrical
and more strongly marked in rhythm, allowing the singer to swell
on sustained notes or glide from one to another, but admitting
of little embelishment. Its expression was sedate and dignified,
its accompaniment simple. The aria di mezzo carattere,
as its name implies, possessed medium qualities, and was taken
at a fair speed. Its accompaniment was richer than the preceding,
and more varied. The aria parlante was more declamatory
in character, and therefore well suited to the expression of
strong emotion. The aria di bravura, or d'agilita,
was entirely a display piece, and contained rapid or difficult
passages that were intended to exhibit the utmost skill of the
singer. To such a pitch was the art of singing carried in Handel's
time that the best artists of today need care and study in preparing
passages that the Handelian singers attacked with ease.
No less stringent were the laws governing the number and characters
of the airs to be employed. The operas were divided into three
acts, and each artist sang at least one aria in each act. No
performer was allowed to sing two arias in succession, nor could
two similar arias occur together even when sung by different
performers. The most important selections were placed at the
close of the first and second acts. In the last two acts the
hero and heroine each expected a special scena consisting
of a recitative followed by a display aria. Besides these, their
desire for applause had to be still further gratified by a grand
duet. No trios or quartets were permitted, though in one instance
Handel was bold enough to defy this rule and introduce a quartet
into "Radamisto." The operas were always concluded
by a lively chorus, sometimes accompanied by a dance. Under these
conditions it is not surprising to find that the librettists
were unable to treat their subjects in a worthy manner, and the
composers cared little or nothing about suiting their music to
the dramatic emotion of the words. Opera had degenerated into
a set of contrasted vocal forms, as definite as the group of
instrumental movements that constituted the suite. In Handel's
case the man was greater than the method, and the formal rules
of the time often lost their absurdity through the force of his
genius, but not even his wonderful music could give permanence
to an art form that was based on incorrect aesthetic principles.
The orchestra of Handel's time had also reached the point
where the old was discarded and the new began. The obselete organs
and guitars of Monteverde no longer appear. In their place we
find a complete set of stringed instruments, consisting of first
and second violins, violas, violoncellos (rarely used), and contrabasses;
an adequate group in the wood-wind, including flutes (rarely
used), oboes, and bassoons; and a brass band consisting of horns,
trumpets, and in the oratorios an occasional trombone. Thus the
only important modern instrument still lacking was the clarinet.
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