Famous composers and their works, Vol. 1

by Unknown

The first embodiment, in large form, of the new ideas was accomplished by Jacopo Peri in his opera, "Daphne," privately performed at the Palazzo Corsi, in 1597. Later works were the "Conte Ugolino" of Galilei, and three operas by Emilio del Cavalieri, entitled "Il Satiro," "La Disperazione di Fileno," and "Il Giuoco della Cieca." The musical style of these compositions was called "lo stile representativo" or "musica parlante." The first publicly performed outcome of this little society's activity was Peri's opera, "Euridice." The text was by Ottavio Rinuccini, the renowned poet of the Bardi coterie. Both Caccini and Peri wrote music to it; but the work of the latter was preferred, and it was given for the first time on the occasion of the marriage of Henry IV. of France and Maria di Medici, in December, 1600.

It was, however, as a result of Monteverde's great genius that the opera, as such, was definitely established. The name "opera" was first used in 1650. Before that time a musical drama of this kind had been known as "melodramma" or "dramma per musica." Monteverde determined certain laws and rules which have ever since served to determine the outlines of the opera form. This great artist was born in 1586 in Cremona, and pursued his first musical studies under the Cremonese theoretician, Ingegneri. It was, perhaps, the too strict discipline of this master that caused Monteverde to throw off the fetters which scholastic pedagogy was accustomed to impose on rising genius. His first published compositions were two madrigals, which gave evidence of revolutionary tendencies. In the works of similar form which followed, however, he wholly cast aside the many cherished traditions of the Palestrina style, and drew on himself the condemnation of all the orthodox musicians of his time. The great theorist, Artusi, author of "Delle Imperfezione della Musica Moderna" (Venice, 1600) was, at first, a spirited advocate of the ideas of Galilei and the Florentine school. Later, on the publication of Monteverde's six volumes of madrigals, he declared himself as decidedly opposed to the plan of renewing the Greek drama, and wrote biting articles against Monteverde in particular. He condemned this composer's violations of the laws of harmony and counterpoint, and, indeed, went so far as to deny him all musical talent. Monteverde was unmoved and uninfluenced by this adverse criticism. He felt himself irresistibly drawn to the composition of homophonic and dramatic music, and felt that artistic ideals could be realized only by a total disregard of the existing canons of musical art.

Another ducal marriage, that of Francesco Gonzaga, son of the Duke of Mantua, brought to Rinuccini the command to write a new libretto. The poet, full of inspiration, produced two texts, one of which, "Arianna," was composed by Monteverde and achieved great success. The Duke of Mantua then proved to be the general protector of the new art, for we note that he commanded Monteverde to write operas for different occasions. "Orfeo" (1608), "Combattimento di Tancredi" (1613), "Le nozze d' Enea," "Il Ritorno d' Ulisse" are all occasional works of the great reformer. Monteverde died in 1643, and was buried in the Chiesa dei Frari.

The great success of Monteverde's works turned the tide of composition towards the creation of operas, and the popularity of these productions soon suggested the desirability of erecting theatres which should be chiefly devoted to the presentation of opera. The first opera house was built in Venice in 1637, and was called the Teatro di San Cassiano. The owners of it were Benedetto Ferrari and Francesco Mannelli, who wrote respectively the libretti and the music to the first two operas represented there. Francesco Cavalli, Monteverde's favorite pupil, also composed operas for this theatre. Two other opera houses were built at Venice within a short space of time. For these theatres operatic novelties were supplied in rapid succession. The names of the composers were Carlo Pallavicini, D. Giovanni Legrenzi, Antonio Sartorio, and Marc Antonio Cesti. Cavalli was a very prolific writer, having composed between 1639 and 1665 not less than thirty-four operas. The best among them were "Il Giasone" (1649) and "L' Erismera" (1665), of which the manuscripts are preserved in the library of St. Mark at Venice. Legrenzi wrote seventeen operas, the most successful being "Achille in Scyro" (1664) and "I due Cesari" (1683). Opera became more and more fashionable; and, as Venice was one of the greatest musical centres as well as one of the most popular pleasure resorts, the city of the laguna possessed, before the end of the seventeenth century, no less than eleven opera houses, all of which were filled to overflowing whenever performances were given. In Rome, the first opera house, known as the "Torre di Nona," was opened in 1671 with Cavalli's "Giasone"; the second, "La scala dei Signori Capranica," was inaugurated in 1679. A third theatre was that of the Palazzo Alberti (1696.)

From these musical centres, the love for opera soon spread to Naples, to Bologna, to Padua, and other places. The courts at Vienna, Dresden and Paris sought to cultivate a taste for Italian opera, and huge theatres were built for this purpose. Ottavio Rinuccini, the poet, went to France in the suite of Maria di Medici, and made an unsuccessful attempt to introduce Italian opera. It was not until the time of Jean Baptiste Lully, an Italian by birth, that the new art-form attained a firm foothold in France.

Meanwhile, the oratorio, which, as has already been said, came into existence almost as early as the opera, was also becoming very popular. This species of sacred composition was the direct descendant of the mysteries and miracle-plays of the middle ages. These mysteries were primarily intended for the instruction of the masses in biblical history. The dramatic facts and occurrences of the Scriptures were treated, it is true, in a rather coarse manner, but the rugged poetry which many of these works contain has not been justly appreciated by either moralists or historians. A remnant of these ancient works is still to be found in the periodical representations at Oberammergau, and some prominent composers of the present epoch have tried to revive this old form of art. We transcribe from the preface of the miracle-play, "Maria Magdalena," produced with great success at Berlin and several important English centres, the following sentences: Mysteries, or miracle-plays, were representations of dramatic scenes borrowed from the Bible, and were performed in the Middle Ages, chiefly by roving Franciscans. This brotherhood, wandering from hamlet to hamlet, from place to place, saw in these shows, performed often with great pomp in churches or public squares, the most effectual means of spreading abroad the principles of the Christian religion. At first, the dramas rested upon a purely declamatory basis, but at the end of the fifteenth century choral songs with incidental solos, accompanied by the organ and other instruments, became incorporated in the representations. We find the embryos of musical mysteries in 1289 at Friuli and at 1343 at Padua. In France, too, these performances were called mysteries, and in Spain "autos sacramentales." Lope de Vega wrote a great number of these holy dramas. It was the universal custom at that epoch for the spectators, previous to the beginning of the drama, to recite some antiphons having connection with the action of the play.

We may regard it as a very striking coincidence, that in the same year which witnessed the production of Peri's "Euridice" at Florence, the first oratorio was performed at Rome, in the church of S. Maria in Valicella, then recently built by St. Philip Neri, the founder of the congregation of the Oratorians. St. Philip, a friend of Palestrina, was a firm believer in the power of sacred music, and its utility as a means of exciting healthy devotional feeling. For the purpose of encouraging a general love for it, he warmly supported the guild or brotherhood called the Laudisti. On certain solemn occasions this order paraded the streets singing hymns of a melodious character, called "laudi spirituali," one of which—"Alia trinità beata"—is still to be heard as a popular hymn-tune. It was probably in the oratory attached to the new church, that the first oratorio was performed, in the month of February, 1600; and it is certain that it was from the name of the edifice that this form of composition derived its name.

The title of the first oratorio was "La Rappresentazione dell' Anima e del Corpo" (The representation of the Soul and the Body). The words were by Laura Guidiccioni and the music by Emilio del Cavalieri. The subject was allegorical, and the style of the music was that of the monodic school, a style wholly declamatory and recognizing no distinction whatever between recitative and air. The inventor and the early masters of the oratorio treated this "sacred drama" more in the manner of the miracle-plays than in that of classical tragedy.

The broad distinction between the mediæval miracle play—which, for a long time, had been popular in Italy, France, Spain, England and Germany—and the oratorio, was that while in the former the dialogue was spoken, in the latter it was recited to musical notes. The oratorio, in fact, as invented by Emilio del Cavalieri was neither more nor less than an opera, based on a sacred subject; and in Italy it never assumed any other form. Other attempts of the same epoch were made by Kapsberger, a German living in Rome: also by Loreto Michelangiolo Capellina, "Il lamento di S. Maria Vergine" (1627); by Stefano Landi, "S. Alessio" (1634); and by Michelangiolo Rossi "Erminio sul Giordano" (1637). The most successful, however, was Domenico Mazzocchi's "Repentimento di S. Maria Maddalena."

Another important composer in this epoch, and connected chiefly with the early evolution of oratorio style, was Ludovico Viadana (Mantua) who wrote concerti da chiesa (church-concertos), pieces for one or more voices with an organ-bass, and thus introduced into chamber music the newly invented monody of Caccini. He is also the first prominent writer who used the basso continuo, so called because it continues with the upper chief melody and gives it a steadfast, harmonic basis. The long-cherished belief that Viadana was the inventor of this device is erroneous.