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Cannon Opera Essay

This document discusses reforms to opera in the 18th century by composers like Jommelli, Traeta, and Gluck. It focuses on Gluck's efforts to make the drama the starting point for opera and unite words and music. Specific aspects of Gluck's opera Orfeo are summarized, including the overture, chorus parts, ballet integration, and lack of da capo arias. The rise of opera buffa is also discussed, tracing its roots in intermezzi and developments in characters, ensembles, and music serving the drama in the works of composers like Piccini. Mozart is described as breaking and remolding forms to suit characters' emotions, with influences from Gluck but also

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163 views

Cannon Opera Essay

This document discusses reforms to opera in the 18th century by composers like Jommelli, Traeta, and Gluck. It focuses on Gluck's efforts to make the drama the starting point for opera and unite words and music. Specific aspects of Gluck's opera Orfeo are summarized, including the overture, chorus parts, ballet integration, and lack of da capo arias. The rise of opera buffa is also discussed, tracing its roots in intermezzi and developments in characters, ensembles, and music serving the drama in the works of composers like Piccini. Mozart is described as breaking and remolding forms to suit characters' emotions, with influences from Gluck but also

Uploaded by

Jonty Coy
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© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Robert Cannon, Opera, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012)

58

Jommelli and Traeta reforms to da capo (extension/responsivity to text), ensemble scenes, chorus,
use of orchestra, recit accompagniato

61

Gluck reforms still set three Metastasio libretti after Orfeo

63

what Gluck addressedwas not style or musical convention so much as the purpose of opera
Drama is the starting point
Relates this to an effort to make union between words and music poem is no more made for the
music than the music for the poem Howard, is this a Gluck quote?

Orfeo:
Overture connected to opening mourning scene\
Integral chorus
Ballet part of drama cf. divertissement
tragic opera manifesting in total continuity, of which each part in intimately connected with every
other Arnaud, in Howard
No da capo aria

65/6
Summary and analysis of Alceste in terms of the way music reflects/serves poetry

69
beg the question as to whether his operas were the start of a new tradition of the end of an old
one

OPERA BUFFA

70
Jommelli/Treatta reforming seria, Gluck breaking it apart, but never altering subject matter + coutly
ethos
Relate musical structures developed directly to dramaturgical implications, e.g. ensemble as a
natural consequence of character humour, establishment of realistic plot

71
Rise of bourgeoisie leading to new art forms e.g. novel, buffa, Diderot le drame
Emergence of comedy as a vehicle for moralistic storytelling

72
Comic opera, two main roots = intermezzo, buffa
Contrascene/intermedio = appetite for unpretentious opera about lower-class characters
Ended with Zeno and Metastasio regularisation
Therefore, took on new life as comic intermezzo, developed in Venice
Buffa developed in Naples

74
Intermezzo appropriation of da capo for comic effect weightier than status of characters/plot
More obviously popular/tuneful

75
Early 18th century origins of buffa, borrowing from classical comedy (Plautus and Terence) and
commedia dellarte
Low reputation

76
Reform comedy of manners in theatre, Goldoni emulating Moliere
Emergence of complex human characters, Shifting emotional states

Examples of comic types: (Galuppi)


Pert servant girl (Vespetta, Serpina)
Pompous marchese (miles gloriosus)
bored, unfaithful wife
Trickster (Arlecchino)

Use of ensemble
Music plays its own part in the drama
Continuous scenes using accompagniato recit

79
Piccini elevates these characteristics, with foolish characters having more depth rather than simple
mockery, genuine sentiment
intensely human, allowing the opera buffa to rival the noble aspirations and classical subjects of the
opera seria

MOZART

Breaks and remoulds form as required by the characters emotions and their situation
writing at the high point of opera tic reform
Identifies Gluck as major influence

80
However, emphasis on music in its own right, greater melodic content

84
ensembles developing organically cf. chain of numbers
Operas span the full range of types none used conventionally

90
Draws distinction between Mozart and previous opera composers music is now integrated with
libretto, dramatic structure, rather than a mirror thereof
NOSKE

10
Quotation as a dramatic device
explains in detail the developmental processes employed to advance the drama, often in subversive
and humorous ways
e.g. Figaro appropriating susannas musical idiom in the garden aria, without the characteristic
rhythmkey relationship
e.g. figure used first by marcellina relating to womans virtue and mens inconstancy, numerous
guises, sung by men, in denouement with cross-characterisation

11
Retrograde transformation of counts theme in denouement = dramatic tension

Detailed sociological/class analysis of each characters musical material 22 32

33
Minuet as social indicator
3 aristocratic minuets sung by lower characters, either for metaphor se vuol ballare, mocking
appropriation (susanna in act 2 to the count), or to elevate the characters themselves (like venus
and ares being caught by Vulcan)

36
Marcellinas fandango = middle class dance, archaism of bass lending aristocracy, tension in inner
voices

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