Give an account of Purcell and his works.
What was the Masque?
Describe the typical English Opera. The Ballad Opera.
The pupil will note that the development of French Opera took place in the reign of Louis XIV, and that it was after the restoration of Charles II in England that opera began there, Purcell’s work ending with the close of the 17th century.
LESSON XXII.
The Opera in Germany. Handel and Gluck.
Opera in Germany.—The introduction of the opera into Germany dates from 1627. In that year a German translation of Rinuccini’s Dafne, which, it will be remembered, was the text of Peri’s first opera, was set to music by Heinrich Schuetz (1585-1672) and performed on the occasion of the wedding of the Landgraf of Hesse. Schütz, who also composed the first German oratorio, Die Auferstehung Christi (The Resurrection of Christ), had been sent by the Landgraf to study in Italy in 1609, only two years after the production of Monteverde’s Orfeo. The score of his Dafne has been lost, but it was doubtless in accordance with the principles of the Florentine school. The Thirty Years’ War and its lamentable consequences prevented any immediate development of the new form. Occasional productions of Italian opera were given in several German cities, but it was not until the establishment of the Hamburg opera late in the century that the new musical movement gained a permanent footing in Germany. Even then its popularization proceeded but slowly.
Heinrich Schuetz.
German Composers Barred.—It is true that not long after the beginning of the 18th century, great interest was manifested in Italian opera at a number of courts, Berlin and Dresden in particular, but this had no influence in the formation of a national school. Its effect indeed was the exact contrary. Singers and composers were brought from Italy; among the cultivated classes opera in German was considered a barbarism, so that native musicians met with little or no encouragement in this field. They were obliged to write their operas to an Italian text if they wished a hearing for them; the Church alone was freely open to German composers. The Church, too, was the only place where the people could hear music; public concerts were unknown and, save at Hamburg, the opera could be heard only by invitation to those who had entrée to court circles. This led to the remarkable activity in the production of sacred music which is such a feature of that period. This also, as shown by the early history of the Hamburg opera, was more in consonance with German character than the light, ephemeral operas which ruled the Italian stage.
Characteristics of the Early German Opera.—The Hamburg opera house was opened in 1678 with a Biblical Singspiel (literally song-play) of an allegorical nature, Adam und Eva; oder der erschaffene, gefallene und wieder aufgerichtete Mensch (Adam and Eve; or the Created, Fallen and Redeemed Man) by Johann Theile (1646-1724) a noted organist of the day and a pupil of Schütz. This was the first performance of a German opera on a public stage. The Singspiel corresponds to the English ballad opera in being a series of songs, ensembles, etc., mainly of a simple nature, connected by spoken dialogue. The curious taste of the time is shown by the choice of subject; the work itself was a survival of the Miracle Plays and Mysteries of the Middle Ages. It begins with the creation of the earth, which is formed out of chaos by characters representing the four elements; the Almighty descends by means of a flying machine and calls man into being; Lucifer succeeds in his temptation of Eve to the great joy of demons who sing an exulting chorus, etc. As the Italians took the subjects for their early operas from classical mythology, so the Germans took theirs from Bible history. Adam and Eve was followed by a series of similar Singspiele: Michal and David, The Maccabean Mother, Esther, Cain and Abel, and many others.