“The day afterwards,” says Stendhal, “the audience were delighted as usual with the first act, and all went well until the third, when the passage of the Red Sea being at hand the audience as usual prepared to be amused. The laughter was just beginning in the pit, when it was observed that Moses was about to sing. He commenced his solo.
“Dal tuo stellato.”
“It was the first verse of a prayer which all the people repeat in chorus after Moses. Surprised at this novelty, the pit listened, and the laughter entirely ceased. The chorus, exceedingly fine, was in the minor. Aaron continues, followed by the people. Finally Elcia addresses to Heaven the same supplication, and the people respond. Then all fall on their knees and repeat the prayer with enthusiasm: the miracle is performed, the sea has opened to leave a path to the people protected by the Lord. This last part is in the major. It is impossible to imagine the thunders of applause that resounded throughout the house; one would have thought it was coming down. The spectators in the boxes standing up and leaning over to applaud, called out at the top of their voice “Bello, bello! O che bello!” I never saw so much enthusiasm, nor such a complete success, which was so much the greater inasmuch as people were quite prepared to laugh.... After that deny that music has a direct physical effect upon the nerves! I am almost in tears when I think of this prayer.”
After the miracle in “Mosè,” it is not astonishing that Rossini should have become a firm believer in the efficacy of operatic prayer. He now introduced it at every opportunity; and it is noticeable that in each of the four operas which Rossini produced at the Academy a choral preghiera occurs. Auber turned this new dramatic means to admirable account in “La Muette de Portici,” and Meyerbeer, after making liberal use of it in other works, seems to have employed it in “L’Africaine” almost to excess. Here we find prayers all through the opera; from the members of the Inquisition in one act; from the sailors on board the celebrated ship in another; from the priests of Madagascar in a third.
CHAPTER XII.
THREE UNFAMILIAR WORKS.
WHEN Rossini was thirty-seven years of age he had written thirty-seven operas, without counting those enlarged editions of former works, “Moïse” and “Le Siège de Corinthe.” Of this number a good many are forgotten, many too were never known out of Italy at all. The best, and not merely the best, but the most typical, have remained. Admirable works, which might have made the reputation of another composer, have been overshadowed by masterpieces from the same hand. Repetitions too have perished by the side of originals, and the time will no doubt come when people will judge of Rossini almost entirely by the “Barber of Seville”—the best proportioned, the most characteristic, and certainly the most fortunate in regard to a libretto, of all his works.
Everything that relates to Rossini’s earliest works is interesting; indeed at one time “L’Inganno Felice” was his very best opera—which it is evident that “Ricciardo e Zoraide,” the thirtieth on the list, never could have been. This last production, written in the year 1818 for the San Carlo, must have been admirably executed, the chief parts being entrusted to Mademoiselle Colbran, Benedetti the basso, and the two tenors, Nozzare and Davide; but it had the misfortune to be produced immediately after “Mosè,” and was crushed by the greater work.
Of “Ermione” little seems now to be known, except that the libretto was based on Racine’s “Andromaque,” that in addition to Mademoiselle Colbran and the two tenors, Davide and Nozzare, the celebrated contralto Pisarone (for whom Rossini, a few months afterwards, wrote the part of Malcolm Graeme) was included in the cast, and that the work, though presented on the stage with all possible advantages, made no lasting impression. It is not even certain that it made a very favourable impression in the first instance; and if “Ricciardo e Zoraide” lost by coming just after “Mosè,” “Ermione” can scarcely have gained by coming just before “La Donna del Lago.”
Stendhal—an untrustworthy guide, the more so as he makes no distinction between his own personal opinions and those of Carpani, from whom he so constantly borrows—informs us that the music of “Ermione” is composed in the declamatory style of Gluck. M. Azevedo says that it is written in the simple, vigorous style adopted by Rossini for treating the subject of “Guillaume Tell.” The two statements may be reconciled, if indeed (which is quite probable) one has not been suggested by the other. It may be said generally, that in “Ermione” the composer studied the dramatic requirements of his subject more than the vocal capabilities of his singers. The experiment does not seem to have been successful as far as the public taste was concerned.
But between “Ermione” and “La Donna del Lago,” both produced at the San Carlo at Naples, Rossini brought out “Eduardo e Cristina” at Venice.