[Chapter XXIV]
German Opera to Mozart
Schütz and his version of "Dafne"—Hamburg and its opera—Works of Reinhard Keiser—The "Singspiel"—Mozart and his dramatic works—"Don Giovanni," Italian in form and German in tendency.
THE story of the introduction of opera into German is sufficiently amusing to form part of an operetta plot. There was no opera of native origin, but the fame of the Italian product having reached the ears of the Elector John George I., of Saxony, he determined to have one of these new lyric dramas performed as the festival play at the marriage of his daughter. Heinrich Schütz, whom we have already met as the composer of the "Seven Last Words of Christ," was the elector's court-director of music, and he was accordingly commissioned to procure from Florence a copy of "Daphne," the pastoral of Peri and Rinuccini. The copy having been obtained, Martin Opitz, a poet, was ordered to translate it into German. He did his work with poetic feeling, but without musical knowledge, and when his text was completed it could not be sung to the music of Peri. Consequently Schütz was directed to write new music, and thus the first German opera came into existence. It was performed on April 13, 1627. The work has been lost and there is no account of its reception. It is quite probable that its music imitated the Italian monodic style, with which Schütz had previously become acquainted while visiting Italy. After his second journey to Italy Schütz wrote an opera called "Orpheus," which was produced in Dresden, Nov. 20, 1638. This work is also lost, but it was probably an imitation of Monteverde's "Orfeo."
Meanwhile all attempts at establishing a national German opera were overthrown by the outbreak of the Thirty Years' War. When that had ended, Schütz, who had seemed likely to do something for the lyric drama in his country, devoted himself, except in the case of the work already mentioned, to sacred composition. Italian opera had made its way into Germany, where it became the fashionable amusement of the aristocracy of Berlin, Vienna, Dresden, and Munich. It had no connection with the art life of the German people, but maintained its purely exotic condition. Only in Hamburg was there anything that seemed to proceed from native impulse. It was a free city; it had grown enormously wealthy by its commerce; and it was far away from the centre of activity in the war.
Hamburg was a musical centre, and was especially famous for its organists and composers of sacred music. The latter were strong advocates of that kind of individuality of expression in sacred music which paved the way for the Passions of Bach. They did not feel that the intense intimacy of Protestant faith could be embodied in music of the Palestrina school. They introduced a semi-dramatic recitative into their works, and their church cantatas had a decidedly dramatic color. A public taste formed on such church music was ripe for the enjoyment of opera, and the first attempt by a native German composer, though it was hardly anything more than an oratorio given with scenery and action, aroused great interest. This work was "Adam and Eve," composed by Johann Theile (1646-1724). It was produced on Jan. 2, 1678.
It was not until 1693, however,—when Johann Sigismund Kusser (1657-1727) went to Hamburg and introduced his own works modelled after those of Steffani, and also the Italian method of singing,—that decided progress was made. In 1694 Reinhard Keiser (1673-1739) went from Leipsic to Hamburg, where he produced one hundred and sixteen operas, and was all his life the pet of the public. His works were full of facile melody and they had a sincere charm in that they strove to express character in their music. From 1703 to 1706 Handel wrote for the Hamburg opera, but as his works were strictly Italian in style he did not exert such an influence as might have been expected from a man of his genius. Gradually attempts at sustaining German opera became weaker and weaker, and in 1738 it was discontinued in Hamburg, which now, like other German cities gave itself up to the Italians.
Leipsic and Vienna made earnest attempts to support the German "singspiel" (song-play). It is hard to define singspiel, because it is exclusively German. It is a musical drama in which there is spoken dialogue and light music in the song style. Yet at times the Germans themselves have seemed to lose the distinction between singspiel and opera. In the latter we meet with music designed to develop the dramatic design of the work, while in the former no such attempt is made. Works of the singspiel class were produced in Leipsic and Vienna, and they had considerable influence upon the development of German opera. Their construction gave composers experience in writing for voices. Furthermore, the composers gradually adopted the forms and methods of opera and so gained facility in the use of operatic material. This process continued till the advent of the first German genius in the field of opera and his earliest works, though called song-plays, have been accepted outside of Germany as operas.
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791) wrote many works for the stage, of which these were the principal: "Bastien et Bastienne," operetta, one act (1768), "La Finta semplice," opera buffa (1766), "Mitridate, Re di Ponto," opera (1770), "Lucio Silla," opera (1772), "Idomeneo," opera seria (1781), "Die Entführung aus dem Serail," comic opera (1782), "Le Nozze di Figaro," opera buffa (1786), "Don Giovanni," opera buffa (1787), and "Die Zauberflöte," opera seria (1791). Mozart's earliest works and, indeed, some of his later works, which I have not mentioned, were in the strictest Italian style. "Don Giovanni," too, is essentially Italian, and is seldom well performed by Germans. But in all Mozart's dramatic works there is a German spirit, manifested not so much in the style of the music, perhaps, as in the entire sincerity of its character. Mozart made no revolution in operatic forms, and because of that it is by no means easy to define the improvements which he made in the art of the German lyric stage. Yet it is indisputable that before Mozart there was no distinctive school of German opera, and that since his day there has always been one.
"Die Entführung aus dem Serail," often called by its Italian title "Il Seraglio," was Mozart's first attempt at a German work, but the general plan and style follow the Italian opera of the time. What Mozart achieved was the introduction of a more definite and sincere expressiveness in the arias. In "Le Nozze di Figaro" Mozart's music is marvellous in its adaptation to the comic action of the play, and in its suitability to the characters of the various persons. There is absolutely nothing new in the forms or the general plan. The outline is all Italian; the coloring is all Mozart's. And it has that peculiar German solidity which comes from the tendency of the people to get to the bottom of things. Superficiality is opposed to the German nature. It was the fatal weakness of Italian opera. Mozart went below the surface in his "Figaro." A musical feature of this work and of "Don Giovanni," noted by Dr. Parry, is the way in which the composer "often knits together a number of movements into a continuous series, especially at the end of the act. This was the way in which complete assimilation of the musical factors into a composite whole was gradually approached." In "Die Zauberflöte" Mozart again followed Italian forms, but there is a profundity of thought in some parts of the work wholly foreign to all Italian conceptions of beauty. I am unable, however, to find ground for preferring this work to "Don Giovanni," as many writers do. To my mind "Don Giovanni," is not only the greatest of Mozart's works, but of all works in the old form. It was written in the prime of the classical period, before Weber had revolutionized with "Der Freischütz" the German conception of opera, and before Beethoven had become at once the culmination of the classic and the prophet of the romantic school. It has lived through all the changes of a century, and today stands forth in its clear, calm beauty, a thing of joy forever, beside the pulsating creations of the romantic school, even in the presence of Wagner's mighty creations.