The Aesthetic Foundations of German Opera in Leipzig, 1766-1775

The Aesthetic Foundations of German Opera in Leipzig, 1766–1775

A dissertation submitted to the

Graduate School

of the University of Cincinnati

in partial fulfillment of the

requirements for the degree of

Doctor of Philosophy

in the Department of Composition, Musicology, and Theory

of the College-Conservatory of Music

Adam Marc Shoaff

B.M.E., Indiana University, 2001

M.M., University of Cincinnati, 2012

Committee Chair: Mary Sue Morrow, PhD

ABSTRACT

German public opera experienced a renaissance in the wake of the Seven Years’ War

(1756–63). Leipzig played a crucial role in this rebirth because of its annual trade fairs,

prestigious university, lack of a local court presence, and active literary culture. The opera

developed here quickly spread to other parts of the German-speaking world, encouraging other artists to experiment with German opera and inspiring aesthetic debates that would resonate into the next century. This dissertation examines opera in Leipzig during this critical period between

1766 and 1775 from a variety of angles. It surveys contemporary music periodicals, examining the nature of German aesthetic debates. It studies musical scores to see how compositional choices reflected these debates. It compiles theater records to gauge the popularity of German opera vis-à-vis its French, Italian, and Viennese relatives. Finally, it takes into account non- periodical writings from artists and non-artists alike to grant a broad view of the social context for opera in Leipzig. In the end, it sheds light on the aesthetic foundations of a pivotal stage in

German operatic history.

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Special thanks go to my adviser, Dr. Mary Sue Morrow, for her helpful guidance and suggestions on research, organization, and writing. I also want to thank the other members of my dissertation committee, Dr. Jeongwon Joe and Dr. bruce d. mcclung, for their thoughtful insights and careful evaluation. A research grant from the Deutscher Akademischer Austausch Dienst

(DAAD) enabled me to travel to Berlin and Leipzig during the spring and summer of 2015 to examine the opera manuscripts and theater records discussed in this dissertation. The employees in the Musikabteilung of Berlin’s Staatsbibliothek on Unter den Linden and Leipzig’s

Stadtgeschichtliches Museum deserve thanks for their assistance in locating materials for me.

During the 2015–2016 school year, a Graduate School Dean’s Fellowship from the University of

Cincinnati provided the financial means to complete this dissertation in a timely manner. Finally,

I want to thank my family for their support during my graduate school years. I owe you dinner.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

ABSTRACT ii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS iv

TABLE OF CONTENTS v

LIST OF TABLES vii

LIST OF MUSICAL EXAMPLES viii

LIST OF FIGURES x

INTRODUCTION 1

CHAPTER ONE: LEIPZIG, A “KLEIN PARIS” 10 Leipzig’s Trade Fairs 11 Opera in Leipzig: From Strungk to Seyler 15 Conclusion 33

CHAPTER TWO: JOHANN ADAM HILLER AND THE WÖCHENTLICHE NACHRICHTEN UND ANMERKUNGEN, DIE MUSIK BETREFFEND 35 Hiller’s Early Efforts in Music and Criticism 35 General Overview of the Wöchentliche Nachrichten und Anmerkungen 41 The WNA’s Aesthetic Prescriptions for Opera 45 Conclusion 91

CHAPTER THREE: OTHER WRITINGS ON OPERA 93 The Journals and Their Writers 93 Aesthetic Prescriptions for Opera 98 Taking Stock of the Writings on Opera 146

CHAPTER FOUR: OPERATIC MUSIC IN LEIPZIG 149 Existing Music and Current Locations 149 Musical Characteristics of the Operas 154 Conclusion 242

CHAPTER FIVE: OPERA AT DAS THEATER AUF DER RANSTÄDTER BASTEI 243 Das Theater auf der Ranstädter Bastei: Construction and Performance 244 Record of Operatic Performance at the Theater auf der Ranstädter Bastei (1776–95) 251

CONCLUSION 273

BIBLIOGRAPHY 276

APPENDIX A: GERMAN TEXTS FOR CHAPTER 2 286

APPENDIX B: GERMAN TEXTS FOR CHAPTER 3 298

APPENDIX C: GERMAN TEXTS FOR CHAPTER 5 308

LIST OF TABLES

2.1: WNA Volume 1 (July 1766–June 1767) 42

2.2: WNA Volume 2 (July 1767–June 1768) 43

2.3: WNA Volume 3 (July 1768–December 1769) 44

2.4: WNA Volume 4 (January 1770–December 1770) 45

4.1: Operas, Premieres, Locations of Premieres, Connections to Leipzig 152

4.2: Operas Included in This Project, Format, Library Sigla, Current Location 153

5.1: Programs from the Theater auf der Ranstädter Bastei (1776–95) 252

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LIST OF MUSICAL EXAMPLES

3.1: “Welch ein schöner Gegenstand,” mm. 36–52 112

3.2: “Welche königliche Lust,” mm. 94–129 125

4.1: “O Bild, voll göttlich hoher Reize,” mm. 21–30 156

4.2: “Bald die Blonde, bald die Braune,” mm. 9–32 159

4.3: “Ein Esel ist gestraft genug, dass er ein Esel ist,” mm. 13–25 163

4.4: “Als ich auf meiner Bleiche,” mm. 5–20 165

4.5: “Sprach sie nicht noch heute,” mm. 1–25 167

4.6: “Wie freue ich mich, in meinem Garten,” mm. 44–69 170

4.7: Der lustige Schuster, Sinfonia III, mm. 33–80 177

4.8: “Versöhnte Liebe, ach, wie schön,” mm. 9–28 179

4.9: “Ach, ach, ich arme Frau! Ich bin ganz blau,” mm. 1–18 185

4.10: “Hannchen, siehst du dort den Bach,” mm. 44–73 189

4.11: “Das ist die Mode so,” mm. 5–32 199

4.12: “Lass mich an deine schöne Brust,” mm. 9–22 205

4.13: “Was gleichet, schönster Engel, dir,” mm. 49–52 209

4.14: “Heysa, heh! Nun hab’ ich Geld,” mm. 27–30 210

4.15: “Zu viele Complimente,” mm. 25–41 212

4.16a: “Mein lobt mir doch nur nicht die Nacht,” mm. 5–12 218

4.16b: “Mein lobt mir doch nur nicht die Nacht,” mm. 49–74 219

4.17: “Wo Peter ist, da bleib’ ich nicht,” mm. 97–140 223

4.18: Die Einsprüche, Zwischen Acts Musick, mm. 51–62 229

4.19: Die Liebe auf dem Lande, Sinfonia II, mm. 1–14 233

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4.20: “Wer wollte nicht sein Gut und Leben,” mm. 63–87 237

LIST OF FIGURES

5.1: Floor Plan for the Dresden Court Theater (1754/55) 246

5.2: Model Reconstruction of the Theater auf der Ranstädter Bastei Interior 247

5.3: Theater Curtain of the Theater auf der Ranstädter Bastei 248

Introduction

Any doctoral candidate will tell you that writing a dissertation inspires a number of existential questions: What is my dissertation’s purpose? Why is this work important to the field?

What gap in the scholarship does it address? Fortunately, I am reminded of the value of my work every time someone asks me about my topic. By now, their reaction has become predictable.

When I say that I am exploring the aesthetic roots of German opera in the 1760s and 1770s, even highly educated musicians—doctors of musical arts or performers with decades of experience— will respond with slightly arched eyebrows, a slow nod, and, eventually, the question I have come to expect: “So . . . who is that?” Occasionally, some might guess Hasse or Joseph Haydn.

When I mention Georg Benda, Johann Adam Hiller, Christian Gottlob Neefe, Anton Schweitzer, or Ernst Wilhelm Wolf my questioner usually returns to the slow nod, punctuated now by a soft

“Hmm,” and I can tell that I have stepped into what is, for them, completely foreign territory.

Such an encounter is entirely understandable given the state of research on mid- eighteenth-century opera. Works of this period tend to be overshadowed, both in scholarship and performance, by those of Handel and Mozart on the outer ends of the century. Curious explorers of the crucial middle period will find research on Gluck and opera reform, the querelle des bouffons, Italian intermezzi and opera buffa, English ballad opera, and French opéra comique, but less material exists on contemporary German opera, making this genre something of a neglected pathway within an even larger (and still unfamiliar) forest. By embarking on this particular journey of dissertation research, I hope to bring more attention to an important period in German musical history and contribute at least some small measure to our understanding of mid-eighteenth-century music.

Of course, I am not alone in studying this repertoire, and my dissertation owes a

considerable debt to those who have already prepared such a strong foundation for further research. Without question, the most important source on German opera in the latter half of the eighteenth century is Thomas Bauman’s North German Opera in the Age of Goethe (1985).1

This book surveys the genre’s lifespan from its Saxon rebirth in the 1760s until its eventual

displacement in the 1790s by the popular operas coming north from Vienna. He discusses all of

the important locations for opera, the forms of patronage that sustained its performance, the

major librettists and composers, and characteristics of German musical style. A reading of this

book inspired my own dissertation topic, and I seek to expand on some of the subjects that

Bauman discusses only briefly in his early chapters, namely the aesthetic premises underlying

German opera in Leipzig and the genre’s relationship to its French and Italian cousins. Whereas

Bauman’s groundbreaking work addresses the crucial who, what, where, and when of German

opera, my dissertation will focus much more intensively on the writings that shaped the genre,

and it will also use program data to gauge audience reception. Bauman’s dissertation, “Music

and Drama in Germany: A Traveling Company and Its Repertory, 1767–1781” (1977), examines

the troupe of Abel Seyler, which achieved great success in a tenure spent largely in central

Germany.2 This research provides additional contextual support for my own study. Bauman’s

article “The Music Reviews in the Allgemeine deutsche Bibliothek” (1977) offers an overview

of the periodical, its contributors, and its general philosophical principles. Chapter three of my

dissertation will explore the actual content of the opera reviews.3

1 Thomas Bauman, North German Opera in the Age of Goethe (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985).

2 Thomas Bauman, “Music and Drama in Germany: A Traveling Company and Its Repertory, 1767–1781” (PhD diss., University of California, Berkeley, 1977).

While Bauman’s work on German opera dates mostly from the late 1970s and 1980s,

Estelle Joubert has completed several projects within the last decade, mostly dealing with

musical form and public reception. Perhaps the most relevant for my dissertation is “Songs to

Shape a German Nation: Hiller’s Comic Operas and the Public Sphere” (2006).4 Joubert

describes how Hiller composed his arias with a mind to their being detached from their dramatic

context and sold as songs with keyboard accompaniment for domestic consumption. Having

looked at some of Hiller’s music and read some of Weisse’s own thoughts on creating a body of

songs for the German people, I find Joubert’s thesis very convincing.

Other important secondary sources on eighteenth-century German opera include John

Hamilton Warrack’s German Opera: From the Beginnings to Wagner (2001).5 Warrack’s

overview is quite useful for looking at eighteenth-century German opera within the chronological

“big picture,” considering the cultural forces that shaped it as well as the legacy it left for the

nineteenth century. My research on the contemporary music journals and several music scores

goes further in addressing the question of how eighteenth-century Germans viewed the

interaction of drama and music. Annie Janeiro Randall’s “Music and Drama in Weimar 1776–

1782: A Socio-Historical Perspective” (1995) considers opera at the private court of nearby

Weimar and thus provides an interesting comparison to Leipzig’s public atmosphere.6

3 Thomas Bauman, “The Music Reviews in the Allgemeine deutsche Bibliothek,” Acta musicologica 49, no. 1 (1977): 69–85.

4 Estelle Joubert, “Songs to Shape a German Nation: Hiller’s Comic Operas and the Public Sphere,” Eighteenth-Century Music 3, no. 2 (September 2006): 213–30.

5 John Hamilton Warrack, German Opera: From the Beginnings to Wagner (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001).

6 Annie Janeiro Randall, “Music and Drama in Weimar 1776–1782: A Socio-Historical Perspective,” (PhD diss., University of Cincinnati, 1995).

German-language sources include Fritz Hennenberg’s Geschichte der Leipziger Oper von

den Anfängen bis zur Gegenwart (2009) and Kyoko Kawada’s dissertation “Studien zu den

Singspielen von Johann Adam Hiller (1728–1804)” (1969). Hennenberg’s lengthy chronological span does not allow for a detailed discussion of the late eighteenth century. He writes about the founding of the new theater; the first collaborations of Koch, Weisse, and Hiller; and the

importance of Hiller for German music of the period. While Hennenberg mentions Hiller as the

editor of the first music magazine, he does not describe the magazine or its contents in any

detail.7 Kawada’s dissertation presents Hiller’s biography and, briefly, those of his librettists; recounts the genesis of his fourteen Singspiele and summarizes their plots act-by-act; and, in the

final section, considers the music by genre (overtures, instrumental pieces, solo songs,

ensembles, and other vocal pieces), including form and tonality.8 Together, these sources supply

a thorough description of key events and characteristics of Hiller’s compositional style. Where I

have expanded on both is by providing additional context for the aesthetic debates surrounding

opera in Leipzig. I have also considered composers besides Hiller.

My research methodology for this dissertation involved a four-step process. I began with

an examination of the secondary-source material to sketch a picture of Leipzig’s cultural,

literary, economic, and social background in the middle of the eighteenth century, especially as

this context related to the annual trade fairs. The fair seasons brought in visitors from all over

Europe, and it was during these times that opera was staged. In the second step, I read primary-

source materials, especially contemporary music periodicals, and noted German critics’

prescriptions regarding various aspects of opera, for instance, drama, poetry, music, scenery,

7 Fritz Hennenberg, Geschichte der Leipziger Oper von den Anfängen bis zur Gegenwart (Beucha: Sax- Verlag, 2009), 22.

8 Kyoko Kawada, “Studien zu den Singspielen von Johann Adam Hiller (1728–1804)” (PhD diss., University of Marburg, 1969).

performance, and national styles. After the second step was well underway and I had a sense of

the critics’ general preferences for German opera, I could begin the third step—musical score study. Using the critics’ most discussed aesthetic issues as my guiding framework, I examined several scores by Benda, Hiller, Neefe, Schweitzer, and Wolf to see whether and how their compositional choices reflected the critical debates. For the fourth and final step in my research,

I set out to examine program records for Leipzig’s principal venue for opera, the Theater auf der

Ranstädter Bastei, from 1766 until the end of the century to see how many times these German operas were staged, how long they lasted on the stage, and whether they were subsequently revived. While most records from the first decade have not been preserved, available records from 1776 to 1795 still allow us to see which operas remained popular later in the century and how they fared against operas from neighboring countries.

The organization of this dissertation follows the sequence of my methodology. Chapter 1,

“Leipzig, a ‘klein Paris,’” describes the particular confluence of historical, economic, and social forces that made eighteenth-century Leipzig a cosmopolitan center for trade and one of the few locales in the German lands that supported public opera. It explains the connection between

Leipzig’s trade fairs and its opera seasons, provides a chronological sequence of important developments in the city’s operatic life, and introduces the main figures (impresarios, composers, librettists, and singers) who will be discussed throughout this dissertation as well as their relationships to one another. This chapter corresponds to the first step of my methodology. While preliminary in character, this background chapter is nonetheless necessary to show the connections among the artists. Placing their lives in context can also enhance our understanding of the critical writings and musical choices encountered in other chapters.

Chapters 2 and 3 correspond to the second step of my methodology and share the same

function—transmitting the prescriptions for opera found in contemporary critical writings.

Chapter 2 focuses on Hiller, the central figure in German opera of this period for his activities as

a composer, conductor, vocal pedagogue, writer, and editor. This chapter also considers the music periodical that Hiller edited, the Wöchentliche Nachrichten und Anmerkungen, die Musik betreffend (hereafter “WNA”). This periodical reprinted the essays of numerous European writers regarding opera history and aesthetics; it also featured several opera reviews that included additional prescriptions. Throughout his tenure as editor, Hiller contributed his own writings and commented on those of the critics. In short, the WNA is the most important primary source for accessing the many ideas about opera circulating through Leipzig in the late 1760s and early

1770s. Chapter 2 thus offers a survey of the aesthetic prescriptions for a number of operatic elements relating to drama, poetry, music, performance, and national styles. Music, in particular, included many aspects to consider: melody, harmony, form, texture, instrumentation, rhythm, recitative, aria, ensembles, choruses, and sinfonias.

Because of its similar function, chapter 3 follows the same format as the previous

chapter. In chapter 3 I consider other writings that either circulated through Leipzig or

commented on activities there. Some of these writings include periodicals from other cities, such

as the Allgemeine deutsche Bibliothek (Berlin), Der Teutsche Merkur (Weimar), and

Unterhaltungen (Hamburg). Other significant writings include Christian Felix Weisse’s prefatory

remarks to his Komische Opern (1768) and Johann Reichardt’s Briefe eines aufmerksamen

Reisenden (1774) and Über die deutsche komische Oper (1774). As in chapter 2, I introduce

these writings and then provide a survey of their aesthetic prescriptions for opera. Because

chapters 2 and 3 present a large amount of information on aesthetic preferences (some of them

contradictory), I end chapter 3 with a brief summary listing the writers’ general opinions.

Chapter 4 corresponds to the third step of my methodology. In this chapter, I describe my

rationale for selecting certain music for the dissertation; I also comment on the availability of

music manuscripts and keyboard editions as well as the relative merit of the latter. Most of this

chapter is devoted to another walk through the same musical elements outlined in chapters 2 and

3 (melody, harmony, form, etc.), but here I examine how these elements are treated by

composers in their music. This chapter thus provides several musical examples to supplement the

discussion.

The fifth chapter aligns with the fourth step of my methodology. Here I focus more

narrowly on Leipzig’s Theater auf der Ranstädter Bastei, recounting the city’s interest in its

reconstruction and its reflection of Leipzig’s Enlightenment ideals of taste and naturalness. I also

present a catalogue of dramatic performances (both spoken and operatic) at the theater from 1776

to 1795. This chapter concludes with observations about opera in Leipzig, specifically regarding

generic designations, the distribution of operatic and spoken performances, and the balance of

German operas vis-à-vis those from other countries.

Before I begin, a few terms require explanation. The reader may already be wondering

why I continue referring to German “operas” and not “Singspiele.” The periodical writings

indicate that mid eighteenth-century Germans saw little distinction between these terms and

might use them interchangeably, but they tended to prefer “opera.” Bauman writes, “[Singspiel]

had no clear and precise meaning in the eighteenth century, being neither widespread enough to

merit the right of universality, nor precise enough to be attached to a specific genre.”9 My research supports this observation. Of the nearly two dozen operas I examined over the course of

9 Bauman, North German Opera, 9.

my research, nearly all carried a designation such as “Oper,” “Operette,” “Komische Oper,” and

in one case “Opera buffa” on their cover pages; only Alceste received the subtitle “Singspiel,” a

reflection of its librettist’s, Christoph Martin Wieland’s, desire to create a new genre of German

musical drama.10 Since German librettists and composers of the late 1760s and early 1770s

generally referred to their works as “operas,” there is a clear historical justification for using this

term.11 Thus my own discussion will use the term “opera,” although the term “Singspiel” will

appear from time to time in quotations from the eighteenth-century literature.

A second justification for using “opera” is that it underscores the close relationship that

German opera shared with Italian opera seria and opera buffa, and French opéra comique. Since, as I will argue, German opera absorbed characteristics from each of these, it makes sense to use a designation that reflects, rather than obscures, these ties. Finally, I would note that the term

“opera” has been used historically by many writers and artists either inclusively or exclusively.

For example, it can be used inclusively to encompass works as diverse as Orfeo, Lulu, and West

Side Story. On the other hand, Wagner, like Wieland before him, used it exclusively when he defined his works as “music dramas” (i.e., not operas). In this dissertation, my use of the term

“German opera” reflects an inclusive agenda. It is a subtle form of advocacy for a neglected

subgenre of opera, intended to emphasize its place within a larger family.

The same reasons apply for my use of the term “aria” instead of “Lied.” Kawada, in her dissertation on Hiller, makes a distinction between the strophic Lied and the larger-form aria, but even she concedes that she is setting her own boundaries and that other writers have defined

10 Wieland describes his musical-dramatic ambitions in “Versuch über das Teutsche Singspiel,” Der Teutsche Merkur 4 (1775). On page 158, he explicitly calls Singspiele “würklich eine neue Gattung” (truly a new genre).

11 Bauman notes that Alceste did set a precedent for the use of “Singspiel,” but it was not until the 1790s that the term was applied to all types of German opera, serious and comic, with or without recitative. See North German Opera, 11.

them differently.12 From my reading, I believe that “aria” tended to designate a larger form than

“Lied,” but that the distinction between the two was not drawn as clearly as twenty-first-century audiences sometimes prefer. In this dissertation, I will generally refer to solo songs as “arias” but reserve “Lied” as a synonym for smaller strophic forms.

Finally, I have included appendices (A–C) after the main body of the text. These contain all of the original German quotations used for chapters 2, 3, and 5. Since extensive quotations in these chapters would have created sizable footnotes, I elected to move the original German to the appendices. Chapters one and four do not include as many quotations, so I have placed those

German texts in footnotes within their chapters for easy comparison. While this decision creates inconsistency, I think the reader will find it a more convenient solution.

12 Kawada, “Studien zu den Singspielen von Johann Adam Hiller,” 125.

Chapter 1

Leipzig, a “klein Paris”

In historical accounts of eighteenth-century Leipzig, one sometimes encounters a

particular verse taken from the first part of Goethe’s Faust: “Mein Leipzig lob ich mir! / Es ist

ein klein Paris und bildet seine Leute” (A toast for my Leipzig! It’s a little Paris and gives a man

polish).1 While Goethe, who had long since departed Leipzig, may have meant these words

ironically, placing them in the mouth of a witless student at a drinking party, the epithet “klein

Paris” nevertheless captures the prosperity and cosmopolitan atmosphere that the city enjoyed for

much of the century. Its annual trade fairs attracted a diverse audience and enriched a large, local

merchant class. Leipzig University, founded in 1409, welcomed numerous intellectuals and

ensured an educated population. Finally, Leipzig’s status as a free city with no local court

encouraged a broad, public base of support for artistic patronage, which contributed to its

distinctively bourgeois splendor. Even the Seven Years’ War, with its extraordinary financial

burdens, proved to be merely an interruption as Leipzig in the 1760s resumed its position as a

small-scale version of the fashionable French capital.

As in Paris, opera in Leipzig benefitted from and contributed to the city’s success. This

chapter will discuss the confluence of factors that enabled Leipzig to become a “klein Paris” and

the center for a new flourishing of German opera. The first section, “Leipzig’s Trade Fairs,” will

provide a contextual overview of the trade-fair culture that formed a bustling background to the city’s operatic activities. It will also briefly describe the impact of the Seven Years’ War on the city and its fairs, as well as Leipzig’s efforts to recover from the war both commercially and

culturally. I will show that opera played an important role in this recovery. The second section,

1 Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Faust, trans. Peter Salm, rev. ed. (New York: Bantam Books, 1985), 134. Translation by Salm.

“Opera in Leipzig: From Strungk to Seyler,” offers a summary of operatic events in the city,

beginning with the tenure of Leipzig’s first impresario, Nicholas Strungk, in the 1690s, and

concluding with the arrival of Abel Seyler’s troupe in the mid-1770s. This walk through history lays an important foundation for subsequent chapters of this dissertation. It will allow us to observe some of the performance traditions and aesthetic preferences for opera in Leipzig that pre-date the 1760s, many of which continued into the 1770s. This section will also introduce many of the main characters (troupe leaders, composers, librettists, and singers) who influenced

Leipzig’s operatic environment during the late 1760s and early 1770s. Finally, this section will describe, at different stages along the timeline, the views of citizens who supported or opposed opera. We will see that the genre sometimes fit awkwardly into a city that combined cosmopolitan trade fairs with a climate of social conservatism.

Leipzig’s Trade Fairs

Opera in eighteenth-century Leipzig owed its existence to the city’s long-established tradition of three annual trade fairs, or Messen. Documentary evidence dating to the twelfth century attests to the presence of an Easter Fair (Ostermesse), which normally took place in April or May, and a St. Michael’s Fair (Michaelismesse), centered around St. Michael’s Day,

September 29. The city added a New Year’s Fair (Neujahrsmesse) in 1458. The fairs enjoyed the support of Maximilian I, who issued an edict in 1497 that each fair should run for one week. As they proved to be such a commercial success, Maximilian enhanced Leipzig’s position further in

1507 by granting the city a retail monopoly, banning fairs in neighboring towns, and even requiring merchants traveling within a seventy-mile radius of the city to pass through and display

their goods for three days before moving on.2 Not surprisingly, Leipzig became a major hub for international trade. The three fairs gradually lengthened over the next two centuries, so that by

1700, each lasted for about three weeks, and Leipzig could rival Frankfurt and Hamburg in commercial importance.

Eighteenth-century Leipzig achieved a golden age that exceeded even the prosperity established by Maximilian as shifting trade routes made the annual fairs an important central

European conduit for the movement of colonial goods. Fair attendance also augmented the local population. In the mid-1750s, Leipzig’s inhabitants numbered over thirty thousand permanent residents. By comparison, the three fairs of 1755 attracted an additional seven thousand merchants, a pre-war record.3 Contemporary accounts indicate that they were a motley crowd.

One anonymous writer described the scene in his diary around 1740:

Although the city is not large, the alleys were thronged with people. The streets were filled with cargo and market wagons arriving and unloading, with carriages, and with people of both sexes and from all nations and social classes. The pretty Saxon women and the galant Leipziger gentlemen mixed with all the foreigners, Hungarians, Siebenbürgern, Jews, Turks, Greeks, Arabs, Armenians, Chinese, Persians, Muslims, Russians, Dutch, English, etc., who amaze the eye with their varied, strange, silken, colorful, long, and also flowered clothing; with their collars, daggers, and belts set with precious stones; with their long beards and their bare sunburned chests.4

2 George Stauffer, “Leipzig: A Cosmopolitan Trade Centre,” in The Late Baroque Era, ed. George J. Buelow (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1994), 257.

3 Robert Beachy, The Soul of Commerce: Credit, Property, and Politics in Leipzig, 1750–1840 (Leiden & Boston: Brill, 2005), 37.

4 “Obgleich die Stadt an sich nicht groß, waren doch die Gassen breit und nach der Schnur. Alle waren mit Fracht- und Marktwagen, die ankamen und abluden, mit Karossen und mit Nationen und Stand angefüllt. Das artige sächsische Frauenzimmer, die Leipziger galanten Herren, vermischt mit allerlei Ausländern, Ungarn, Siebenbürgern, Juden, Türken, Griechen, Arabern, Armeniern, Chinesen, Persianern, Mohren, Russen, Holländern, Engelländern usw. In ihren verschiedenen, seltsamen und zum Teil seidenen, bunten, langen, auch geblümten Kleidern, wobei der Bund und die Dolche mit dem Gurt mit Edelsteinen besetzt waren, mit ihren langen Bärten, mit bloßer, von der Sonne braungebrannter Brust setzen das Auge in Erstaunen.” Quoted in Karl Czok, Das alte Leipzig (Leipzig: Koehler & Amelang, 1985), 149.

The international crowd of fair attendees could find among the trade-fair merchandise a similarly

eclectic inventory: English metal works; French silk; Russian leather and linen; indigo, sugar,

and coffee from more far-flung places; alongside locally manufactured metals and textiles.

Leipzig’s fairs also provided opportunities for various forms of music consumption.

Besides the operas that took place, fair-goers could enjoy live music provided by the city’s

multiple collegia musica. Patrons could also buy more music, more cheaply thanks to Immanuel

Breitkopf, whose mid-1750s invention of a movable type for music replaced expensive copper

engravings.5 The most popular sheet-music collections contained galant-style strophic songs,

simple enough for their middle-class audiences to sing and play. In this way, Leipzig’s fairs

helped to encourage and disseminate the modern galant style. Estelle Joubert has described how

Hiller and Weisse capitalized on this market by making keyboard arrangements of songs from

their operas available at the fairs.6 Indeed these profit-seeking motivations must not be forgotten

alongside the more high-minded aesthetic debates that shaped German opera.

The Seven Years’ War (1756–63) arrested Leipzig’s mid-century economic growth and severely curtailed fair activities. Saxony was not a primary belligerent in this war, but the region’s unfortunate location between Prussia to the north and Austria to the south made it ripe for occupation, especially for the Prussian King, Frederick II, who had already been considering an annexation of Leipzig.7 Because of the war and its attendant famine and illness, Leipzig’s

population declined from a high point of over thirty-two thousand in the mid-1750s to less than

twenty-six thousand by 1763.8 The city was also crippled financially by retribution payments to

5 Czok, Das alte Leipzig, 150.

6 Estelle Joubert, “Songs to Shape a German Nation: Hiller’s Comic Operas and the Public Sphere,” Eighteenth-Century Music 3, no. 2 (September 2006): 213–30.

7 Dennis Showalter, The Wars of Frederick the Great (London: Longman, 1996), 132–34.

Prussia. Part of Frederick’s military strategy involved occupying new territory and then extorting

“appeasements,” which were then used to bankroll the invasion of yet more land. By the end of

the war, Leipzig’s per-capita debt far exceeded what most Leipzigers made in a year. During the

war, the city never cancelled its trade fairs, but they were scaled back, taking on the appearance

of “modest country markets.”9

Leipzig’s postwar recovery represents a crucial period in the city’s history, not only for its financial and commercial revival, but also for the new investments the city made in the arts.

The Saxon state embarked on an intelligent plan for paying down its debt.10 Leipzig’s population

gradually increased again, and attendance at the fairs surged past pre-war levels. Robert Beachy

notes that the autumn fair of 1765 alone drew more than six thousand visitors, and by 1770, the

three annual fairs brought in more than ten thousand, a figure that would hold steady until further

growth in the nineteenth century.11 Leipzig’s postwar revitalization of the arts took place on

many fronts. Adam Friedrich Oeser founded the Leipzig Art Academy in 1764. The university

8 Beachy, The Soul of Commerce, 79.

9 Ibid., 78.

10 The architect of Saxony’s economic recovery was Thomas von Fritsch (1700–76), head of the Saxon Restoration Commission, founded in 1762. Fritsch undertook two important steps to reform and modernize Saxony’s economy and improve its financial outlook. First, as the leader of the Saxon delegation at the Hubertusburg conference, which ended Saxony’s involvement in the Seven Years’ War, Fritsch introduced a treaty clause that converted Saxony’s territorial debt into a bond issue and transferred formal liability for the debt from the prodigal Saxon Elector-Kings to the estates of the Saxon Diet, thus making the debt “public.” Consequently, Saxony increased investor confidence and lowered their borrowing costs. Fritsch’s second wise strategy involved the establishment of a special fund for paying down the debt. Approximately half of the state’s annual budget of 1.1 million Thaler was devoted to debt service. In the first years of the program, most of this fund went to interest payments, but a small margin was devoted to the principal. As the principal declined over time, so did the interest payments; as the interest declined, a greater amount of the special fund allocation could then be devoted to ever larger payments on the remaining principal. Beachy says that such a strategy is self-evident by modern standards but that “Fritsch’s approach marked an evolutionary leap in the history of public finance.” A final important factor in Saxony’s recovery involved the rejection of the Polish Crown, originally acquired by Elector Friedrich August I (“The Strong”) in 1697. Fritsch, the Restoration Commission, and the Saxon Diet all resisted the additional spending required to maintain Polish land, and their combined efforts were able to restrain the Saxon rulers. In 1782, Elector Friedrich August III renounced his candidacy for the Polish Crown, effectively ending Saxony’s claims on the eastern territory. Beachy, The Soul of Commerce, 91–94.

11 Ibid., 103.

founded a Gelehrten-Konzert in 1765. A decade later, Hiller founded the Musikübende

Gesellschaft, a popular organization made up of students and non-professional musicians. Its success eventually led to the construction of a concert hall in the Gewandhaus (Clothiers’

Exchange) in 1781. Finally, a new theater was constructed in 1766 on the northwest part of town on the grounds of an old bastion, or bulwark, near the Ranstädter Gate. This theater, the Theater auf der Ranstädter Bastei, would become the site of German opera’s mid-eighteenth-century resurgence.12

Opera in Leipzig: From Strungk to Seyler

With the exception of isolated events, such as Johann Kuhnau’s dramma per musica staged in 1683 for a visit by the Elector Johann Georg III, opera in Leipzig was inextricably linked to its trade fairs. An important step occurred in 1692 when Johann Georg IV granted

Nicolaus Adam Strungk (1640–1700) a ten-year license to present fifteen operas at each of the three annual fairs. Strungk had travelled in Italy and was currently serving as the court

Kapellmeister in Dresden, where Johann Georg III had cultivated Italian opera. In 1693 Strungk acquired a marshy plot of land in Leipzig known as the Brühl, and he commissioned an opera house by the architect Girolamo Sartorio, who had also constructed the public opera house in

Hamburg. Opening night at Das Opernhaus am Brühl took place on May 8, 1693, during the

Easter Fair and featured a performance of Strungk’s Alceste with a cast of local performers,

including one of the composer’s own daughters singing the role of Antigone.13

12 This theater will be discussed in greater detail in chapter 5.

13 Arnold Schering, Musikgeschichte Leipzigs in Drei Bänden (Leipzig: Kistner & Siegel, 1926), 2:447.

Whereas private opera in Dresden benefitted from royal funding, Leipzig’s venture into public opera relied on the patronage of wealthy citizens, university students, and fair visitors.

Consequently, its limited resources often led to budget-saving measures. A contemporary poet,

Barthold Feind, compared the Brühl to other German theaters and penned, “The Braunschweiger

Opera House is the most beautiful; Hamburg’s is the most spacious; Leipzig’s, however, is the poorest.”14 The use of local talent, as in the Alceste premiere, also proved to be the rule. Strungk composed at least eight operas for Leipzig. Subsequent directors did the same, including Georg

Philipp Telemann, Johann David Heinichen, Melchior Hoffmann, and Johann Gottfried Vogler, all of whom studied at either the Thomasschule or the university.15 Male singers included the composers themselves or university students; female roles usually went to wives and daughters.

The orchestra was filled with musically talented university students or Leipzig’s Stadtpfeifer.16

As we will see, Leipzig continued this tradition of local involvement (patronage, composition, and performance) into the latter half of the eighteenth century.

Despite the limited resources, opera in Leipzig was not a lower-class, lowbrow affair.

Schering reports that the electoral prince attended the spring premiere and returned again for

Strungk’s Nero in the fall.17 Strungk and later directors offered their audiences a mix of serious and comic works. Unfortunately, the music for nearly all of these has been lost. However, we know from surviving librettos that the plots often focused on classical or mythological themes, with other stories drawn from German history, European history, or contemporary novels. A

14 “Der Dichter Barthold Feind sagen konnte, das Braunschweiger Opernhaus sei das schönste, das Hamburger das geräumigste, das Leipziger aber das pauverste.” Quoted in Schering, Musikgeschichte Leipzigs, 2:445.

15 Stauffer, “Leipzig: A Cosmopolitan Trade Center,” 282.

16 Schering, Musikgeschichte Leipzigs, 2:445.

17 Ibid., 446, 450.

specialty in Leipzig was the Schäferspiel, the shepherd’s play, a theme that illustrates bourgeois

Leipzig’s idealization of nativeness and nature. As elsewhere, spectacle remained an essential

ingredient of Leipzig opera, regardless of genre. For example, Strungk’s Phocas (1696) called

for a burning tower, a wild bear, a storm, and a ghostly apparition. As one anonymous Leipziger

put it, “An opera isn’t worth much if something doesn’t come from heaven.”18 While the music

has largely vanished, it seems to have also offered a balance of high and low, with pleasing strophic songs mixing with more sophisticated arias in the same opera.19

The incorporation of spectacle and mixture of high and low styles appealed to Leipzig’s

diverse audience, and opera found numerous supporters from each stratum of the city’s

socioeconomic hierarchy. Upper-class burghers, manufacturers, and bankers recognized opera as

a civic attraction that supported their commercial ventures by drawing audience members—all

potential customers—to the trade-fair marketplace. The city’s intellectuals likewise supported

theater and music, though often with the reservation that the productions must be high-quality.

Finally, students and the general public made up the largest group of opera supporters. Though

lacking the clout of burghers or intellectuals, this group participated more directly in the life of

the theater, making up most of the audience, supplying the demand for new works, and

occasionally taking jobs as musicians, actors, or stagehands. In fact, Arnold Schering writes that

university students were so enthusiastic about playing in the opera orchestra that most waived

any compensation.20 However, the opera’s popularity among young people proved to be an

18 “Sonsten wird eine Opera wenig aestimiret, wenn nicht etwas, wie man sagt, von Himmel kommt.” Quoted in Schering, Musikgeschichte Leipzigs, 2:463.

19 Fritz Hennenberg, 300 Jahre Leipziger Oper: Geschichte und Gegenwart (Munich: Langen Müller, 1993), 14.

20 Schering, Musikgeschichte Leipzigs, 2:445.

irritation to Kuhnau, who as Thomaskantor complained early in the century that Telemann, the

current opera director, was monopolizing all his best musicians.21

The opponents to Leipzig’s first experiments with opera had constituted a much smaller,

though vocal, group. During the days of the Opernhaus am Brühl, Leipzig’s Pietist community

had voiced the loudest objections. Pietist opposition to opera sprang from a deeply held belief

that secular activities and luxury consumption, such as that offered on a regular basis by the trade

fairs, were sins that invited divine punishment. Such arguments were strongest between the

1680s and 1730s, but then gradually faded away as Orthodox musicians such as Johann

Mattheson and Gottfried Scheibel made increasingly persuasive arguments in favor of secular

music, arguing that operatic music could be used for training church musicians or reinforcing

church sermons if set with religious texts.22

Supporters of opera were not so concerned with the sinfulness of song and dance but

rather with liberating German opera from its foreign models. Italian opera in particular had

exerted a strong influence on Germany from the beginning. The librettist for Heinrich Schütz’s

Dafne (1627), Martin Opitz, wrote in the preface to his score that his drama was not only

translated from Jacopo Peri’s original but that it was “written in the Italian manner.”23 Sigmund

Staden’s Seelewig (1644) advertised in its title that its music was “auf italienischer Art gesetzt,”

a reference to its use of recitative. At the turn of the century, Hamburg’s public theater at the

Gänsemarkt presented both German and Italian operas with German-language librettos available

21 Ibid.

22 Tanya Kevorkian, Baroque Piety: Religion, Society, and Music in Leipzig, 1650–1750 (Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2007), 138.

23 “Günstiger Leser, wie diese Drama aus dem Italienisch mehrentheils genommen, also ist es gleichfalls auff selbige Art . . . geschrieben worden.” Quoted in John Warrack, German Opera: From the Beginnings to Wagner (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001), 21.

18 for the audience. Because of Italian opera’s strong influence in the north, German musicians of the late eighteenth century increasingly issued calls for the establishment of a national style of opera that could command equal respect on the international stage. In this, they imitated German literary societies, known as Sprachgesellschaften, which since the seventeenth century had touted the quality of German poetry and promoted its use on stage. Playwrights had likewise been encouraged to separate themselves from the influence of classical and Latin models. Thus when Hiller declared in the pages of the WNA that the Germans had no national opera, and he lamented the fact that German composers concerned themselves so much with Italian texts, he was echoing the concerns that the Sprachgesellschaften had voiced nearly a century and a half before.24

After Strungk’s death in 1700, opera at the Brühl survived on the charismatic leadership of Telemann and Hoffmann. Yet by 1715, this leadership was gone, debts began to accumulate, and the theater fell into disrepair. Faced with a dilapidated venue, student performers, and the lack of a strong composer and director, Leipzig’s burghers had little choice. In 1720, they closed the Brühl permanently, and in 1729, the building was torn down.

Between the closing of the Brühl in 1720 and the opening of the Theater auf der

Ranstädter Bastei in 1766, Leipzigers were still able to enjoy various forms of opera, even during the dark days of the Seven Years’ War. The itinerant groups that came to Leipzig performed on temporary stages during fair times. While their resources were sometimes crude, these groups kept Leipzig abreast of new operatic trends. Among them, German Wandertruppen, who had already been active in other parts of the country for several decades, kept alive the tradition of

German vernacular song. Warrack calls these troupes a crucial influence on the development of

24 Johann Adam Hiller, “Critical Design of a Musical Library,” WNA 3 (August 22, 1768): 59.

the late-century Singspiel.25 The brothers Angelo and Pietro Mingotti enjoyed great success in

the 1730s and 1740s by bringing to town a virtuoso vocal ensemble, including two castrati,

proving that Italian fare could still win wide acclaim in Germany despite the nationalistic sentiments of some critics. In 1748 an Italian named Nicolini brought a troupe of children to

Leipzig to stage pantomimes and opera intermezzi, including Pergolesi’s La serva padrona. The

intermezzi caused such a furor that German theater directors began to include them between the

acts of their own spoken-theater pieces.26 Finally, Giovanni Battista Locatelli arrived from

Prague with an Italian opera troupe in 1753.

The popularity of the opera intermezzi provided an important impetus for the re-

establishment of regular opera in Leipzig. The figure most responsible for this development was

the theater director Heinrich Gottfried Koch (1703–75). He came to his theatrical experience

through Caroline Neuber’s renowned acting troupe, which he joined in 1728. Koch proved to be

a versatile talent, a splendid actor who could also write translations, adaptations, and poetry. He

even excelled in painting and produced his own set decorations.27 In 1749 the Leipzig city

council conferred on Koch the title of Prinzipal. That is, it granted him a stipend and the

exclusive privilege to stage theatrical productions. Koch’s troupe initially performed in an open-

air space but moved into an enclosed theater at Quandt’s Court in 1751.

As Prinzipal, Koch recognized that the continuing performance of more elevated theater works often required the occasional crowd-pleasing gesture. Shortly after the opening at

Quandt’s Court, Koch introduced Johann Martin Leppart, court fool to the current Saxon Elector,

25 Warrack, German Opera, 63.

26 Hennenberg, 300 Jahre Leipziger Oper, 15.

27 Ibid., 17.

Frederich August II, for a series of Harlequin escapades.28 Koch also staged popular Italian intermezzi between the acts of comedies and tragedies. In fact, Bauman writes that Koch did more to cultivate the intermezzo in Germany than any other principal.29 He made his first foray

into true comic opera with the production of the farcical Der Teufel ist los, subtitled Die

verwandelten Weiber, an adaptation of Charles Coffey’s English ballad opera The Devil to Pay

(1728). With a libretto by Christian Felix Weisse and simple, tuneful music by Johann Standfuss,

a violinist in Koch’s troupe, Die verwandelten Weiber met with great success when it premiered

at Quandt’s Court on October 6, 1752, during the autumn St. Michael’s Fair season.

The reaction to Koch’s success was as varied as his repertoire. In 1751 Christian

Fürchtegott Gellert, a poet and professor of philosophy at Leipzig University, wrote of the

necessity “to offer to the people of a great city such public pleasures as comedies and tragedies”

so long as a “skilled and noble-minded supervisor” winnowed the repertoire of mediocre pieces

and farces. He also claimed that the theater must be constantly concerned to put on “gute Musik”

in order to please the audience. Perhaps Gellert’s most radical suggestion, though, was that

actors, specifically the Comödianten, should be paid a decent salary and accorded a more

respectable social position.30

28 Ibid.

29 Thomas Bauman, North German Opera in the Age of Goethe (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985), 23.

30 “ . . . dem Volke in einer großen Stadt solche öffentliche Vergnügungen anzubieten, als gute Comödien und Trauerspiele sind . . . Es könnte vielleicht den meisten Klagen wider das Theater abgeholfen werden. Erstlich sollten die Comödianten einen geschickten und edelgesinnten Aufseher haben, dessen Urtheils sie alle Stücke unterwerfen müßten, welche sie aufführen wollten. . . . Die Comödianten müßten eine ansehnliche Besoldung und einen gewissen Rang bekommen, damit sie ordentlich und anständig leben . . . .” Quoted in Gertrud Rudloff-Hille, Das Theater auf der Ranstädter Bastei, Leipzig 1766 (Leipzig: Museum für Geschichte der Stadt Leipzig, 1969), 27. Gellert’s hopes for a more elevated German theater and more respectable social position for actors came to fruition with the founding of a Schauspielerakademie in 1753 by Konrad Ekhof, one of Germany’s foremost actors; the popularity of Gotthold Ephraim Lessing’s sentimental bourgeois tragedy Miss Sara Sampson (1755); the creation of

Johann Christoph Gottsched, professor of poetry, logic, and metaphysics at Leipzig

University, took a harder line. Like Gellert, Gottsched opposed the low humor of farces, and in

October 1737, he convinced the Neuber troupe to carry out a mock auto-da-fé for Harlequin in

Leipzig, which symbolically banished him from their stage. The 1752 success of Die verwandelten Weiber, with its slapstick violence and magical tale of metamorphosed wives, predictably set him off, and he initiated a pamphlet war against Koch, which only fueled public interest in the opera.31

Gottsched’s salvo in response to Die verwandelten Weiber amounted to only his latest

attack on opera. His first writings against the genre appeared in 1728, when he referred to opera

as a “Mischmasch von Poesie und Musik.” He perhaps felt little regret on seeing the Opernhaus

am Brühl torn down in 1729, or when Hamburg closed its public opera theater in 1738.

Throughout the 1730s and 1740s, when Leipzig had no public opera house and was served by

only traveling troupes, he regularly predicted the demise of German opera, a development that he

attributed to the public’s improving taste.32 Its popular reappearance under Koch’s leadership

must have seemed a step in the wrong direction and understandably caused him considerable

alarm.

While histories of German opera regularly paint Gottsched as a conservative pedant of

almost comic rigidity, a reputation undoubtedly sealed by his failed pamphlet war, he

nevertheless exercised a progressive influence on Leipzig University upon his arrival from

Königsberg in 1725. It was Gottsched who brought Enlightenment ideas to the philosophy

the Hamburg National Theater by Konrad Ackermann and Lessing in 1767; and the success of Weisse and Hiller’s operas in the late 1760s and early 1770s.

31 Bauman, North German Opera, 23.

32 Hennenberg, 300 Jahre Leipziger Oper, 15.

faculty and influenced literary developments in Leipzig.33 Like the Sprachgesellschaften of

previous decades, Gottsched advocated for the German language and proposed French

neoclassicism as the model upon which German writers should create their national literature.34

His reputation brought numerous poets to Leipzig, including Schlegel, Lessing, Klopstock,

Goethe, Jean Paul, and others.

Gottsched opposed opera because it violated the French neoclassical codes that he saw as

the basis for true drama. He also criticized opera for failing to observe the three Aristotelian

unities of action, place, and time, and for defying neoclassical definitions of comedy and tragedy.

Furthermore, he hated its improbable and fantastical plots, its splendor and spectacle, and what

he considered as the unnaturalness of delivering one’s speech through song. In brief, Gottsched

dismissed opera as an exercise in unreason: “One must either leave one’s intellect home and only

bring one’s ears along whenever one goes to the opera, or one must violate oneself and tolerate

all the improbabilities which are presented in it.”35 As I will show in the following chapters,

other critics, composers, and librettists shared some of Gottsched’s concerns about lowbrow

entertainment, spectacle, and the verisimilitude of singing. Yet while they wrestled with these

issues in their own writings, none came even close to Gottsched’s call for the abolition of opera.

The outbreak of the Seven Years’ War in 1756 accomplished what Gottsched’s pamphlet

war did not: Koch shuttered his operations in occupied Leipzig and moved north to Lübeck. In

33 Czok, Das Alte Leipzig, 138 and 143.

34 As we will see in chapter 3, Friedrich Nicolai, founder of the Allgemeine deutsche Bibliothek, also saw French literature as a model for German writers.

35 “Man muss seinen Verstand entweder zu Hause lassen und nur die Ohren mitbringen, wenn man in die Oper geht; oder man muss sich Gewalt antun, und alle Unmöglichkeiten, die uns darin vorgestellt werden, verdauen können.” Quoted in Gloria Flaherty, Opera in the Development of German Critical Thought (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1978), 95. Translation by Flaherty.

this city, on January 18, 1759, his troupe staged the premiere of the sequel to Die verwandelten

Weiber, subtitled Der lustige Schuster. Once again, Weisse provided the libretto, freely

translated from the English original, and Standfuss supplied the music. However, further

collaboration among these three was thwarted when Weisse moved to Paris for two years,

returning to Leipzig in 1761, and Standfuss died in Hamburg.36 For the time being, the rebirth of

public opera in Germany had stalled.

When the Treaty of Hubertusburg in February 1763 ended Saxony’s involvement in the

war, Koch was free to resume his activities in Leipzig. He returned to the city on September 19,

1763, but soon encountered another obstacle. The death of Friedrich August II on October 5,

with its attendant period of mourning, temporarily pushed Koch to Hamburg, although he

returned a second time in 1764.37 From then on, Koch’s troupe performed regularly at the Easter

and St. Michael’s fairs, showcasing its repertoire of spoken and musical performances. It quickly

regained its former popularity, thanks in part to the charm and talents of Caroline Elisabeth

Steinbrecher, Koch’s leading singer. Steinbrecher had joined the Koch troupe in 1752 at only

nineteen, and the naiveté she displayed as Lene in Die verwandelten Weiber helped to fuel the opera’s initial success. Now in the mid-1760s, she shone as the heroine of the intermezzi in

Koch’s repertoire, and from 1766 to 1773, she created the leading female roles in Weisse and

Hiller’s major comic operas.38 In subsequent chapters, we will encounter her name again in

opera reviews as a model of naïve and naturalistic performance.

Having reestablished himself in Leipzig, Koch now looked to recapture his earlier

success with German-language opera, and he prevailed upon Weisse to revise both Die

36 Schering, Musikgeschichte Leipzigs, 3:290.

37 Ibid., 3:434.

38 Bauman, North German Opera, 23.

24 verwandelten Weiber and Der lustige Schuster. For the music, Koch now turned to a local friend,

Johann Adam Hiller. Weisse’s second version of Die verwandelten Weiber reflects his time in

Paris. Instead of re-adapting Coffey’s The Devil to Pay, Weisse used as his model Jean-Michel

Sedaine’s opéra comique Le diable à quatre (1756), Sedaine’s own adaptation of Coffey’s work.

The French model expanded the English original from eight scenes not divided into acts into a three-act format, and crucially, tamed the farce’s rowdy character, making it more a tale of bourgeois sentimentality than violent, bawdy satire.39 Weisse evidently thought these characteristics more attuned to German audiences. Hiller composed music appropriate to

Weisse’s sentimental tone, although he preserved some of Standfuss’s original songs, noting in the preface (Vorbericht) to his 1770 keyboard edition their enduring popularity with the public.40

Like its predecessor, this second version of Die verwandelten Weiber enjoyed much public acclaim at its premiere on May 28, 1766 at Quandt’s Court. Der lustige Schuster followed later in the same year. With these two works, public opera in Leipzig finally began an unbroken string of performances that would last to the end of the century and beyond.

The May premiere of Die verwandelten Weiber coincided with the construction of a new theater in Leipzig, the Theater auf der Ranstädter Bastei. I will describe this theater in greater depth in chapter 5. For now, we can note that the theater’s construction represented Koch’s greatest triumph in Leipzig and the culmination of years of persuasion. Since the 1750s, Koch had argued that Quandt’s Court was too small and unsuited for operatic production. Before the

Seven Years’ War, he had been rebuffed by the Leipzig city council, but now, in the 1760s, with the city undergoing a cultural revival and in need of the revenue that the theater might bring,

39 Ibid., 30 and 32.

40 Johann Adam Hiller, Vorbericht to Die verwandelten Weiber (Leipzig: J. F. Junius, 1770).

Koch secured the necessary support. Construction began in April 1766 and proceeded rapidly.

The first performance took place on October 10 and featured a nationalistic drama by Johann

Elias Schlegel, Hermann, in which Koch himself took a leading role. The theater soon came to

be so closely associated with the Prinzipal that it acquired the nickname “Koch’s Theater.”

After the pivotal year of 1766, Koch maintained a mixture of spoken tragedies and

comedies, intermezzi, and ballets. However, he began to replace the intermezzi with new German

operas, largely because of their popularity with the public and their ability to compensate for

lagging tickets sales for spoken works.41 Hiller’s music came to dominate the stage, not only in

Leipzig but throughout northern Germany. After the two parts of Der Teufel ist los, Hiller

composed a two-act version of Lisuart und Dariolette (1766), expanded the next year to three

acts. The libretto had been written by a friend of Hiller’s in Leipzig, Daniel Schiebeler, who

arrived in Leipzig in 1765 after studying law in Göttingen.42 Schiebeler went on to obtain a

doctorate in law at the university, but he seems to have been inclined toward literature and

poetry. With Lisuart und Dariolette, a fairy-tale opera in which a knight and his servant attempt to rescue a missing, magically transformed princess, Schiebeler and Hiller sought to elevate

German opera above the low humor of Der Teufel ist los. The two also collaborated on a one-act

afterpiece set in ancient Athens, Die Muse (1767). With Weisse, Hiller created a series of works

extolling bourgeois sentimentality and the virtues of unspoiled rural life, themes that Weisse had

observed in French opéra comique but now came to be associated with German opera as well.

These works, the most popular of the era, included Lottchen am Hofe (1767), Die Liebe auf dem

Lande (1768), Die Jagd (1770), Der Dorfbalbier (1771), Der Aerndtekranz (1772), and Die

41 Hennenberg, 300 Jahre Leipziger Oper, 21.

42 Kyoko Kawada, “Studien zu den Singspielen von Johann Adam Hiller (1728–1804)” (PhD diss., University of Marburg, 1969), 36.

Jubelhochzeit (1773). Just like Nicolaus Strungk so many decades before, Weisse and Hiller

recognized the appeal of mixing styles to appeal to a diverse audience. Each of their works

displays a collection of high and low characters, and their portrayal of class tensions undoubtedly

resounded with the many social layers that made up the public theater audience in Leipzig.

Madame Steinbrecher created the original roles of Dariolette, Lottchen, and Lieschen (in Die

Liebe auf dem Lande).43

In addition to Hiller’s works, Koch also began in the early 1770s to stage the operas of

Christian Gottlob Neefe (1748–98). Neefe had come to Leipzig in 1767 and commenced law studies at the university in 1769. However, the topic he chose for his 1771 public disputation,

“Whether a father is entitled to disown his son because he dedicates himself to the theater,” seems suspiciously personal and suggests that Neefe’s heart lay elsewhere.44 At some point,

Neefe made the acquaintance of Hiller, in whom he found a kindred spirit, both of them

educated, sensitive by nature, idealistic about art, and prone to bouts of hypochondria. Hiller

took him in, cared for him in his weaker hours, provided him with readings, and pushed him to

resume the musical studies that he had begun as a child.45 Hiller allowed Neefe to write articles

for the music periodical he had begun in 1766, the WNA, and also share in the composition of

Der Dorfbalbier—ten of the twenty-three vocal numbers are by Neefe. In time, Neefe composed

his own operas. His setting of Johann Jakob Engel’s Die Apotheke premiered in 1771, and

Johann Benjamin Michaelis’s Amors Guckkasten followed a year later. A one-act version of

Michaelis’s Der Einspruch, first produced in late 1772, was expanded to two acts and retitled

43 Schering, Musikgeschichte Leipzigs, 3:442.

44 Ibid., 3:457.

45 Ibid., 3:458.

Die Einsprüche. This revision received its premiere in 1773. Koch brought all of these into his repertoire.

Despite his theatrical successes and a rapidly expanding collection of German operas,

Koch did not last long in Leipzig. The triumphs of 1766 eventually gave way to new protests against the opera. Once again, the university faculty offered the most vocal opposition. Shortly after the opening of the Theater auf der Ranstädter Bastei, they began to complain about the bad influence and distraction that comedy and opera presented to students.46 In October 1767, a member of the theology faculty, Johann August Ernesti, appearing with some colleagues before the Electoral court in Dresden, claimed that “Comoedien” and “Concert” were hindering scholarship. The following April, Johann Heinrich Winckler, a professor of physics, complained that the performances at the theater often coincided with his regularly scheduled five o’clock lectures. The Saxon government decided in June 1768 that Koch could perform only twice a week outside of fair times: Wednesdays and Saturdays. This restriction contradicted Koch’s privilege, but Schering writes that the move came as part of a larger crackdown by the government and city against a rebellious student body.47 The decision proved to be a fateful one for opera in Leipzig, as Koch began to explore other options. Bauman notes that as early as 1767,

Koch had sought permission from the Prussian court to perform in Berlin, a city with five times

Leipzig’s population, but his request had been rejected.48 Beginning in September 1768, he found welcome instead at the Weimar court of Anna Amalia, where his comic operas were well- received, and it was Weimar that witnessed the January 29, 1770 premiere of Die Jagd, Weisse

46 Ibid., 3:456–57.

47 Ibid., 3:457. Schering describes this “Messenkrieg” as a struggle between the students on one side and the rector and city regiment on the other.

48 Bauman, North German Opera, 59.

and Hiller’s most popular collaboration and the pinnacle of mid-century German opera. During

this time, Koch also became acquainted with the work of Weimar’s Kapellmeister, Ernst

Wilhelm Wolf (1735–92), whose opera Das Rosenfest (1770) became a mainstay in Koch’s

repertoire.49

In addition to his conflicts with the university faculty and state authorities, Koch also had to deal with competition from other troupes, despite his status as Prinzipal. The presence of other

performing groups in Leipzig threatened to siphon a portion of Koch’s audience, particularly

with him now spending much of the year at Weimar and returning to Leipzig only for the trade-

fair seasons. In late 1769, the troupe of Johann Christian Wäser arrived from Dresden, and while

the following January Koch was staging Die Jagd in Weimar, Wäser was playing at “Koch’s

Theater” at the Ranstädter Bastei. For the 1770 Easter Fair, Koch returned to Leipzig to stage the

first local performances of Die Jagd. Because Koch owned the privilege, Wäser had to relocate

from the theater to a new wooden playhouse constructed near the Grimm Gate. This new venue,

paid for and rented out to acting troupes by a man named Zimmerman, could seat several

hundred spectators and came to be known as the “Wäsersche Bude.”50 Wäser’s troupe offered dramas, comedies, intermezzi, and ballets, but his repertoire leaned toward the farcical, and he had no music that could rival Hiller’s in popularity, and so Koch retained the upper hand in

Leipzig.51

The next few years were lean ones for opera in Leipzig. In 1771 concerns about new restrictions on comedic and operatic performances put a new damper on theatrical offerings.

49 Bauman notes that Das Rosenfest was so popular in Berlin in the early 1770s that Koch’s troupe performed it forty times, a number matched by only one other opera in his repertoire, Hiller’s Der Aerndtekranz. Ibid., 79.

50 Schering, Musikgeschichte Leipzigs, 3:458.

51 Ibid., 3:458–59.

Koch performed there only during the months of April and May. However, instead of alternating

with Weimar, Koch gained an even bigger prize—entry to Berlin. With the death of the Prussian

Prinzipal, Franz Schuch the Younger, Koch purchased the privilege and Schuch’s former theater

from his widow.52 A troupe led by Abel Seyler, which would eventually come to Leipzig, filled

the vacancy in Weimar. Meanwhile, Wäser left Leipzig for Breslau.53 For the rest of the year,

there was no theater or opera in Leipzig.

In April 1772, a new director, Carl Theophil Döbbelin, arrived from Berlin to try his luck

in Leipzig. Since Koch still held the rights to the Theater auf der Ranstädter Bastei, Döbbelin’s

troupe took up residence in the Wäsersche Bude. Like Wäser before him, Döbbelin failed to

produce performances that could compete with Koch’s. Charles Burney, while on his musical

tour through Germany, attended a performance by the Döbbelin troupe of Monsigny’s Le

déserteur, translated into German, and later recalled, “The performers did not charm me, either

by their singing or acting; all were out of tune, out of time, and vulgar.”54 Koch likewise spent

the 1772 Easter Fair in Leipzig, though it would be his last. His troupe performed the popular

operas of Hiller and new works by Neefe, but according to Schering, Koch had had enough of

the “machinations of professors and intellectuals.”55 He relinquished his Leipzig privilege and

remained full-time in Berlin until his death on January 3, 1775.

Operatic life in Leipzig after Koch underwent a period of transition. Weisse turned away

from writing comic librettos and eventually began editing a periodical for children, Der

52 Bauman, North German Opera, 59–60.

53 Schering, Musikgeschichte Leipzigs, 3:462.

54 Charles Burney, The Present State of Music in Germany, The Netherlands, and United Provinces, 2nd ed. (London, 1775), 2:75. Burney mistakenly attributes the opera to Gretry.

55 Schering, Musikgeschichte Leipzigs, 3:462.

Kinderfreund. Hiller likewise ceased writing works for the theater; after Die Jubelhochziet

(1773), which Koch premiered in Berlin, Hiller did not compose another opera until Das Grab des Mufti (1779). During the intervening years, he created instructional guides for vocal pedagogy and formed the Musikübende Gesellschaft, a musical association that brought together amateur and professional musicians. Both of these ventures reflected Hiller’s interest in developing the vocal and instrumental performing abilities of German musicians, a prerequisite, he believed, to gaining international respect for German opera. Neefe remained in Leipzig, but did not produce any new works for the stage until after 1775. As the only theater director left,

Döbbelin now obtained the Saxon privilege. New competition arrived in April 1773 when Joseph

Bustelli came from Dresden with a traveling troupe of Italian virtuosos, an event that recalled the occasional visits by Italian musicians to Leipzig from the 1730s to 1750s. They put on forty-five performances in the Theater auf der Ranstädter Bastei between April and August of that year, and the Leipziger Zeitung observed that these received general praise.56

The St. Michael’s Fair of 1774 witnessed the first appearance in Leipzig of the troupe led by Abel Seyler (1730–1801). Seyler had been in residence at the Weimar court from 1771, after

Koch departed for Berlin. While in Weimar, the Seyler troupe established a reputation as one of the most formidable companies in Germany, thanks to its composer, Anton Schweitzer (1735–

87); their leading soprano, Franziska Koch (no relation to the former Prinzipal, Heinrich

Gottfried); and two other talented singers, Josepha and Friedrich Hellmuth. Its production of

Schweitzer’s Alceste (1773), with a libretto by Christoph Martin Wieland (1733–1813), marked a

56 Die Leipziger Zeitung, April 26, 1773. Quoted in Schering, Musikgeschichte Leipzigs, 3:463.

significant moment in German opera history: Alceste was the first full-length serious opera in

German.57

A fire in May 1774 destroyed Weimar’s playhouse, and Anna Amalia was forced to

dismiss the troupe, but not without a quarter year’s wages and a letter of recommendation to

Duke Ernst II in Gotha.58 While in Gotha, Seyler met the court Kapellmeister, Georg Benda

(1722–95), and he adopted Benda’s first comic opera, the one-act Der Jahrmarkt (1775), libretto

by Friedrich Wilhelm Gotter, into his repertoire. Seyler’s contract in Gotha allowed him to play

at the nearby Leipzig trade fairs, which is how he ended up in the Wäsersche Bude during the St.

Michael’s Fair of 1774.

The talent of Seyler’s troupe overwhelmed Döbbelin, just as Koch’s had, and within three

weeks Döbbelin surrendered to them the use of the Theater auf der Ranstädter Bastei.59 The

following Easter, Döbbelin did not return to Leipzig, as he was in a debtor’s prison.60 Wäser’s

company came back from Breslau to take his place, and both he and Seyler applied to the

Dresden court for Döbbelin’s Saxon privilege. The superior talent of Seyler’s troupe won out.

Wäser’s offerings failed to attract much public interest, his permission to perform was revoked,

and later that year, the Wäsersche Bude, always an unsafe wooden structure, was torn down.61

During the Seyler troupe’s tenure in Leipzig, its most popular opera was Schweitzer’s

Alceste. Next in line was Benda’s Der Jahrmarkt, which was expanded to a two-act version and

57 Wieland’s writings on Alceste and opera are considered in greater detail in chapter 3.

58 Bauman, North German Opera, 111.

59 Ibid., 112.

60 Ibid.

61 Schering mentions the persistent concerns about the building’s construction. Schering, Musikgeschichte Leipzigs, 3:458, n. 27.

32 retitled Der Dorfjahrmarkt.62 In this second iteration, it received its premiere at the Theater auf der Ranstädter Bastei on April 26, 1775. Besides these, the Seyler repertoire also included all of

Hiller’s operas as well as Wolf’s Das Rosenfest. The continuing presence of these earlier operas serves as an indication that a critical hurdle had been crossed, and opera in Leipzig had reached a new stage. Instead of having to create a new body of works, as Hiller had done in the mid to late

1760s, there was now a stock of operas from which impresarios could draw. We can see that by

1775, opera in Leipzig had survived its rebirth and was now an established genre.

Conclusion

Despite the rapid turnover of Leipzig’s performing groups in the early 1770s, the city did not witness yet another collapse in public operatic performance. On the contrary, by this time, opera had securely established itself in Leipzig as a popular genre. Various factors had contributed to this development. Politically, opera in Leipzig had benefited from the period of peace that reigned in Saxony after the cessation of the Seven Years’ War. In fact, the desire to restore the city’s reputation after the war had been a motivating factor in the construction of its new permanent theater. Economically, opera in Leipzig had profited from the city’s restored commercial position as well as an increasingly prosperous middle class that could attend operas and purchase operatic music for domestic performance. Artistically, German opera had attracted a growing number of librettists and composers, and as the genre took root, it also had produced more talented performers—trained singers rather than singing actors. By the mid-1770s, opera had also gained acceptance as a valid artistic genre. To be sure, there were still plenty of debates

62 Hiller contributed musical additions to the two-act version, including the Obriste’s “Bald soll der hochzeitliche Kranz” and “In andrer Glück,” Suschen’s “Schlaf immerhin,” Fickfack’s “Auf ewig o Kriegsgott,” the Tumultgesang sextet plus chorus “Dort lief er hin,” and supplemental dance music for the trio “Pflicht und Ehre.”

33 about opera, but there were fewer calls for its abolition. Finally, German opera had benefitted culturally from a growing pride in national culture and a desire to see that culture achieve international respect.

This chapter has offered a chronological overview of the important figures and events involved in Leipzig’s operatic revival. In the next two chapters, I will focus on an important social phenomenon in the history of eighteenth-century opera: the burgeoning industry of music periodical literature aimed at a bourgeois reading audience. This material also helped to boost public interest in opera and exposed readers to a wide variety of aesthetic views. These writings will reveal some of the ideas behind the events described in this first chapter.

Chapter 2

Johann Adam Hiller and the Wöchentliche Nachrichten und Anmerkungen, die Musik betreffend

As the most influential figure within Leipzig’s musical life in the late eighteenth century,

Johann Adam Hiller (1728–1804) played a pivotal role in shaping the opera that was staged there. This chapter will describe his early efforts in music and criticism. It will provide an overview of his periodical, the Wöchentliche Nachrichten und Anmerkungen, die Musik betreffend (hereafter “WNA”). Finally, it will discuss the aesthetic prescriptions for opera presented in the journal by Hiller and various writers. I have divided these prescriptions into five main categories: drama, poetry, musical composition, performance, and national style. To be sure, the writers did not reach agreement on every topic, but I will show that, on many issues, the critics expressed similar enough views that we can derive a consistent aesthetic for opera from the pages of the WNA.

Hiller’s Early Efforts in Music and Criticism

For an overview of the early educational and musical experiences that prepared Hiller for his role as music critic, we may turn to his autobiography, Mein Leben. Published in 1784, Mein

Leben offers a window into Hiller’s genuinely modest character and his preference for practical music-making. During his early adult years, Hiller developed his talents as a musician and writer while living in Dresden and Leipzig. In 1746, while still seventeen, he was granted a scholarship to attend the Kreuzschule in Dresden. Hiller recalled these years in the Saxon capital as being pivotal for his musical development, the period where “I found opportunity to expand

my knowledge in music, augment my as yet small skill, develop my taste, and, in short, become

a composer and musician, if I should now be one of both.”1

Hiller’s studies at the Dresden Kreuzschule required daily practice in singing. In addition,

he received instruction in the keyboard and general bass with Gottfried August Homilius, a

student of Johann Sebastian Bach and the organist at the Frauenkirche, and the flute with an

oboist named Schmidt, a member of the Elector’s chapel.2 During these years in the late 1740s,

Hiller encountered the work of two composers who would exercise a great influence on him through the period of the WNA: Johann Adolph Hasse and Carl Heinrich Graun. Hiller had the opportunity to hear their works performed by Europe’s greatest singers, and he also obtained some scores for his own personal study. In Mein Leben, Hiller, who always maintained that his

accomplishments sprang more from industriousness than inborn talent, recounted one

particularly intense period of work:

Once, in a quarter year between Christmas and Easter, I copied out for myself seven scores of Hasse’s operas, but without recitative because I could not otherwise find them. Since I now could write little during the day on account of the school hours and chorus work, thus remained to me only the hours after evening prayers when the other students had gone to bed. There I then sat over my scores, sometimes until four o’clock in the morning, frozen from the cold.3

Despite this extraordinary effort, which seems believable given his modesty and typically matter-of-fact recollections, Hiller insisted, “It was never my purpose to dedicate myself entirely to music.”4 While at the Dresden Kreuzschule, he embarked on a comprehensive course of study,

1 Mark Lehmstedt, ed., Johann Adam Hiller: Mein Leben: Autobiographie, Briefe, und Nekrologe (Leipzig: Lehmstedt, 2004), 10. The translation is mine. With the large number of quotations in this chapter, I have elected to place all the original German texts for chapter 2 in Appendix A. The number of each German text corresponds to the footnote number in chapter 2.

2 Ibid., 10–11.

3 Ibid., 11.

4 Ibid., 13.

including history, rhetoric, and poetry. He also studied languages, learning Latin and French

through the school curriculum and Italian on his own so that he could better understand the

operas that so captivated him. Hiller would eventually draw on all of his academic background

and linguistic skills as the editor of the WNA.

In 1751 Hiller, now twenty-two, left Dresden and matriculated at Leipzig University to

study law. He attended lectures by Johann Christoph Gottsched, who as we saw in chapter 1, was

a strident opponent of opera. Unfortunately, Hiller writes nothing about Gottsched’s views on

opera in his autobiography. If they ever came up in lectures or personal conversation, Hiller apparently did not hold them against the senior scholar. In Mein Leben, Hiller recalled Gottsched fondly, noting his “special friendship” and his suggestion that Hiller take a professorship in

Petersburg.5 Besides attending the lectures of Gottsched, Hiller also enjoyed those of Christian

Fürchtegott Gellert, professor of philosophy and poetry and a supporter of music theater.

Continuing his habit of self-didacticism, Hiller always kept on hand “a small number of good books” with which he would teach himself.6

As he had in Dresden, Hiller devoted his remaining hours to music. He taught keyboard

lessons, and played the flute and sang bass in Leipzig’s public concerts. While he occasionally

played concertos on keyboard, flute, and violin, Hiller considered himself an “average”

(mittelmäßig) performer. He offered many reasons for this: a lack of good instruction and good music early in his life, his prior school and work activities, his enjoyment of many instruments and inability to focus on only one, and finally, his taste for light and tuneful music instead of difficult and arduous styles.7 The light style pervades Hiller’s early compositions of this Leipzig

5 Ibid., 14.

6 Ibid.

37 period: a half dozen symphonies, a pair of church cantatas, assorted Lieder, and some German arias with instrumental accompaniment. (As we will see in chapter 4, he frequently displayed his tunefulness in the operatic compositions of his maturity as well.) Hiller also began a setting of

Gellert’s Das Orakel at this time but came to regard it as “nothing but the raw material of a good composition.”8

Despite his performing and compositional activities, Hiller asserted in Mein Leben that he was always most satisfied when others recognized his musical knowledge.9 In Leipzig he continued to study musical scores and books, drawing from them the fundamentals of harmony.

He also began his first forays into writing about music. In 1754 he produced an essay on musical aesthetics, the “Abhandlung über die Nachahmung der Natur in der Musik,” a treatise considering the artistic theories of Charles Batteux. Hiller was swayed by Batteux’s principal assertion that all arts seek to imitate nature; he called his own treatise “entirely set in the horizon of Batteux.”10 In time, however, he departed from many of Batteux’s beliefs, for instance, the prescription that opera must present only divine or mythological plots as only these could justify continuous singing.

In August 1754 Hiller left Leipzig, returning to Dresden to become steward and tutor to the young Count Brühl, Heinrich Adolph. Again, Hiller was exposed to the operas of Hasse, and he described being especially struck by the varied and characteristic expressions of Ezio.11

However, the Dresden court’s opera productions were soon curtailed by the eruption of the

7 Ibid., 14–15.

8 Ibid., 15–16.

9 Ibid., 15.

10 Ibid., 16.

11 Ibid., 17.

Seven Years’ War in 1756. At the same time, Hiller was also hindered in his activities by strong,

recurring symptoms of a hypochondriac condition (“der böse Plagegeist der Hypochondrie”),

which he claimed had plagued him since childhood.12 During this second period in Dresden,

Hiller apparently left behind no additional writing but did compose a few sinfonias, partitias, and

a cantata for the entertainment of the Count’s household.

Hiller returned again to Leipzig in 1758, this time in the employ of Count Brühl, who had

himself come to study. The more social environment of Leipzig seems to have improved Hiller’s

condition. In Mein Leben he described his reunion with Gellert and other friends as

“uncommonly pleasant.”13 He composed the Choralmelodien zu Gellerts geistlichen Liedern, a

Passion cantata, a symphony, and other small vocal pieces. Hiller also began publishing in 1759 a weekly collection of short Lieder and keyboard pieces for amateurs, the Musikalischer

Zeitvertreib. This periodical proved to be successful, and Hiller’s interest in disseminating music for widespread domestic consumption eventually carried over to the WNA, which often included

a short piece for keyboard or voice at the end of each issue.

Despite these accomplishments, Hiller’s health problems continued, most likely because

of exhaustion. He recalled in Mein Leben a schedule that bore resemblance to the grueling hours

he had kept at the Kreuzschule: “I accompanied my Count with effort and difficulty to some

lectures, to some visits, worked with him yet a few hours in the room, and spent my remaining

time partly with my books, of which I had quite a supply, and partly with composing various

things.”14 In 1760 Hiller discontinued the Musikalischer Zeitvertreib and also withdrew from the

12 Ibid.

13 Ibid., 18.

14 Ibid.

Count’s service, citing his severe physical discomfort. The Count offered Hiller a year-long

pension, after which he made his living producing translations, mostly of French historical

works.

The year 1762 brought about an improvement of Hiller’s health and also marked the first

time in his life where he pursued music-related activities full-time. He published a few piano sonatas and, at the urging of a young gentleman studying at the university, he began leading public subscription concerts.15 The following year, he was granted directorship of the Grosses

Concert-Gesellschaft, a position that he held until 1771. Hiller set about improving the

performing standards of the ensemble and engaged two accomplished singers, Corona Schröter

and Gertrud Elisabeth Schmeling, who became stars of the German stage. In May 1766 Hiller’s

first collaboration with Heinrich Gottfried Koch and Christian Felix Weisse, Die verwandelten

Weiber, premiered at the local theater known as Quandt’s Court to great success. Not far away,

the construction of the Theater auf der Ranstädter Bastei, begun only a month before, promised

even greater opportunities.

When Hiller began publication of the WNA in July 1766, he was able to draw on a

significant reservoir of personal experience. His wide-ranging background included study in

poetry, history, philosophy, aesthetics, and languages. He had experience playing multiple

instruments, composing, teaching music, and leading musical ensembles. He was a vocalist and

instrumentalist; he had studied general bass and harmony. He even had previous editing

experience with the Musikalischer Zeitvertreib. Perhaps as a result of his own versatility, Hiller intended the magazine to address many different musical topics. While he frequently solicited articles and reviews from readers, he wrote many of the articles himself. The varied WNA thus stands as a reflection of its multi-talented creator. It also marks an important moment in the

15 Ibid., 21.

history of musical criticism: Bauman calls it “the first specialized musical periodical in the

modern sense.”16

General Overview of the Wöchentliche Nachrichten und Anmerkungen

Hiller released the first issue of the WNA on July 1, 1766. Thereafter, the magazine appeared on a weekly basis until the end of December 1770. The first two volumes, or

Jahrgänge, consisted of fifty-two issues and ran from the beginning of July until the end of the following June. By the end of volume 3, however, Hiller had decided to align the beginning of the next volume with the beginning of the new year. Thus, volume 3 spanned from July 1768 until the end of December 1769, with the additional six months included as an appendix, or

Anhang. Volume 4 was renamed as the Musikalische Nachrichten und Anmerkungen auf das

Jahr 1770 but follows the same format as the previous volumes. Each weekly issue, or Stück, included eight pages, mostly of text, though most issues also devoted anywhere from one to three pages to a musical piece. These selections presented newly published keyboard music as well as keyboard reductions of opera arias, songs, and sacred music. Hiller shrewdly included some of his own music among the offerings.

As the editor of the WNA, Hiller ensured that the periodical reflected his own concern for practical and current music-making. In the first issue, he declared the magazine’s commitment to timely reporting of relevant musical events: “Our aim is [to consider] whatever comes to our attention, so to speak, as well as the history of today’s music, as best it can be set together from the collection of news.”17 The articles that Hiller wrote or selected for inclusion tended to avoid

16 Grove Music Online, s.v. “Johann Adam Hiller,” by Thomas Bauman, accessed October 14, 2013, http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/.

17 Johann Adam Hiller, WNA 1, no. 1 (July 1, 1766): 1.

abstract theorizing about music, and where they delved into questions of aesthetics, they usually

grounded their observations in contemporary performance practices. Hiller identified three principal foci of the journal’s contents: reports on musical events and famous musicians, which addressed stage music, court chapels, church music, and public music societies; notifications of published writings and music; and theoretical-practical remarks on various musical materials.

Like other German music journals of the late eighteenth century, the WNA addressed itself to a

broad readership of amateurs rather than experts, and Hiller’s informative writing style reflected

a directness of communication that would parallel the accessible nature of his operas.

The four volumes of the WNA featured a variety of named and anonymous writers. In

some cases, an author will sign off on an article with a cipher such as “R. S.” or “N. N.”; in other

cases, the authorship remains a mystery. It is likely that many of these anonymous articles are in

fact by Hiller. A few were also written by Hiller’s protégé, Christian Gottlob Neefe. However, in

some cases, we know that the writing must not belong to either because Hiller adds a plea at the

end of the article for the author to reveal himself. Table 2.1–2.4 below provides a listing of the

WNA articles that address opera, including volume and issue number, authorship as given or

deduced from the article, and a succinct description of the article’s contents.

Table 2.1. WNA Volume 1 (July 1766–June 1767)

Issue # Author Article

2 Anonymous Review, Talestris (“E. T. P. A.” = Maria Antonia)

5 Anonymous Report on the Dresden theater

6–9 R. S. Review, Xindo riconosciuto (Benda)

12 Anonymous Report on the intermezzi performed at Gotha

Review, Le Sorcier (Philidor) (continued in #13)

14–16 Anonymous Review, Romolo ed Ersilia (Hasse)

19 N. N. Review, Il buon Marito (Benda)

20–23 Anonymous Review, Achille in Sciro (Agricola)

22 Johann Adam Hiller Remarks on the Musical Recital

28 Johann Adam Hiller Brief history of opera in Leipzig

33 Johann Adam Hiller Report on Lisuart und Dariolette (Hiller)

40–48 Charles-Henri de Blainville Observations on Music and Its Various Parts

49–50 Jean-François Chastellux Essay on the Unification of Poetry and Music

Table 2.2. WNA Volume 2 (July 1767–June 1768)

Issue # Author Article

12 Johann Adam Hiller Remarks on the Musical Recital (cont. of Vol. 1, #22)

13–14 L’Abbé Richard Brief Report on the Circumstances of Music in Italy

15 Johann Adam Hiller Remarks on the Musical Recital (cont. of Vol. 2, #12)

18 Daniel Schiebeler Remarks on Lisuart und Dariolette

23–26 L’Abbé Richard Cont. of Report on the Circumstances of Music in Italy

25 Anonymous Writing on National Schools of Music

27–30 Anonymous Musical Report from France, 1767

31 L’Abbé de Lacassagne General Treatise of the Elements of Song

38–41 Jean-Jacques Rousseau Dictionnaire de Musique

47–50 Anonymous (English) On Music: Its Force, Principles, Goals

Table 2.3. WNA Volume 3 (July 1768–December 1769)

Issue # Author Article

1–11, 13–14 Johann Adam Hiller Critical Design of a Musical Library

17–18 Anonymous Review, Alceste (Gluck)

19 Jean-Jacques Rousseau Cont. of Dictionnaire de Musique

32–38 Jean-Baptiste le Rond On the Freedom of Music

D’Alembert

50–51 Francesco Algorotti Essay on Musical Opera

An. 1–3 Francesco Algorotti Cont. of Essay on Musical Opera

An. 4–6 John Brown Observations on Poetry and Music

An. 8–11 Anonymous Review, L’Amore di Psiche (Agricola)

An. 12–13 L. M. N. Writing on Comic Opera from the Hanoverian

Magazine

An. 16 Johann Kirnberger Miscellaneous Musical Supplies

An. 17 Anonymous (French) Admonition of a Father to His Son Concerning Music

An. 18–20 Anonymous Review, Piramo e Tisbe (Hasse)

An. 24–25 Jean-Jacques Rousseau Cont. of Dictionnaire de Musique

Table 2.4. WNA Volume 4 (January 1770–December 1770)

Issue # Author Article

1 Johann Adam Hiller Untitled (On Rousseau, German opera)

2–7 Jean-Jacques Rousseau Cont. of Dictionnaire de Musique ( On “Expression”)

8–14 Jean-François Chastellux Essay on the Unification of Poetry and Music

43–44 Anonymous On the Bouffons, or Dispute over the Music in France

45–48 Jean-François Marmontel On the Opera

The WNA’s Aesthetic Prescriptions for Opera

As Tables 2.1–2.4 demonstrate, Hiller’s journal devoted considerable space to opera,

sometimes printing articles that might span multiple issues and thus run for several weeks. These

discussions of opera also appear in a variety of contexts. Some essays deal directly with opera;

others address opera within a larger topic, for instance, in Hiller’s “Criticial Design of a Musical

Library” in volume 3. The numerous reviews obviously will include detailed prescriptions for

opera. Other issues deal with the state of music in places both near (Dresden and Gotha) and far

(France and Italy), and touch on opera in the course of their discussion. Finally, we can also see

from Tables 2.1–2.4 that Hiller brought together authors of many nationalities: German, French,

Italian, and English. These, of course, were all translated into German. Considered as a whole,

the contents of the WNA show that Leipzig received a broad sampling of international influences when it came to opera.

Despite the multiplicity of perspectives in the WNA, it is possible to recognize within its

pages the clear outlines of an aesthetic theory of opera, at least on some issues. To begin with the

most basic question, what is opera, we find general agreement among the critics: Opera joins

together various arts into harmonious union. Long before Wagner employed the term

Gesamtkunstwerk to describe his ideal vision for music drama that incorporated its component

parts into one integrated whole, European critics expressed an interest in exploring the

combination of various artistic media.18 Opera received special attention because of its necessary

mixture of several art forms: music, poetry, dance, acting, and painting. Eighteenth-century

writers offered numerous opinions about the relative merits of these arts, their boundaries, and

their possibilities for combination. The WNA thus offered a fair representation of contemporary aesthetic thought in its publication of articles calling for a unification of the arts.

In the June 12, 1769 issue, Hiller reprinted Count Francesco Algorotti’s “Essay on

Musical Opera,” commending him in the process for his account of Italian opera. Algorotti claimed that opera unites in itself everything that has charm: poetry, music, pantomime, dance, and painting. Far from elevating music above the other arts, Algorotti condemned operas that did not seriously consider all aspects of the work.19 Jean-François Marmontel likewise extolled the

artistic unification to be found in opera. Writing of Armide, Marmontel noted the additional

realism and sensory satisfaction one could gain through witnessing the opera in the theater rather

than simply reading its story: “The theatrical muses bring all the splendor of the wonderful to the

stage. Because it has music, dance, and painting to help, the theater shows to us, through a new

magical craft, the wonder that its rival [tragedy] had only presented to the imagination.”20

18 In the modern scholarly literature, John Hamilton Warrack has also noticed the historical German interest in a careful synthesis of the arts. German Opera: From the Beginnings to Wagner (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001). Wagner himself later rejected the term “music drama” in favor of “Bühnenfestspiel” (festival stage play) or “ersichtlich gewordene Taten der Musik” (acts of music make visible).

19 Francesco Algorotti, “Versuch über die musikalische Oper,” WNA 3, no. 50 (June 12, 1769): 387. Algorotti was somewhat of an outlier with regard to Italian opera, having spent much of his life in France and northern Europe. That Hiller commends his work perhaps shows his own interest in balancing the arts within opera.

20 Jean-François Marmontel, “Ueber die Oper aus Marmontels Dichtkunst,” WNA 4, no. 45 (November 5, 1770): 347–48.

Writers justified their desire for what we might call an operatic Gesamtkunstwerk by

claiming that the idea of artistic unification had ancient roots. In the conclusion to his “Essay on

Musical Opera,” Algorotti explained that his goal was not just to revive Italian theater but also

ancient tragedy through a coherent unity of architecture, poetry, music, dance, and decoration.21

Dr. John Brown, in his “Observations on Poetry and Music,” asserted that the unification of the

arts reflected an original, natural state from which modern society had departed. He recounted

his observations of the North American Iroquois and concluded that their “wild and uncivilized”

practices must have resembled those of the ancient Greeks for whom music, dance, and poetry

were once combined. After discussing how these arts were separated over time, Brown

speculated on how they might be effectively recombined.22

The WNA’s prescriptions for the dramatic element of opera touch on three main

subtopics: genre, plot, and characterization. Regarding genre, Charles-Henri de Blainville’s

“Observations on Music,” reprinted over nine issues near the end of volume 1, writes that opera

encompasses tragedy, ballet, and the pastorale.23 In the next volume, Daniel Schiebeler, librettist

for Hiller’s Lisuart und Dariolette, identified several more generic possibilities. He includes on

his operatic list the heroic-tragic opera cultivated by Metastasio, the Ovidian opera of Quinault,

the allegorical comedy, comic opera, and two genres that involve magic: the romance-tragedy

(such as Armide) and the romance-comedy. In the latter, he includes his most recent libretto,

Lisuart und Dariolette, because it shares the same fairy-tale content with Favart and Duni’s La

21 Algorotti, “Fortsetzung des Versuchs über die musikalische Oper,” WNA 3, Anhang no. 3 (July 17, 1769): 22.

22 John Brown, “Betrachtungen über die Poesie und Musik,” WNA 3, Anhang no. 4 (July 24, 1769): 25–28.

23 Charles-Henri de Blainville, “Blainville Betrachtung über die Musik,” WNA 1, no. 46 (May 12, 1767): 359.

fée Urgèle (1765).24 By providing this list of genres and examples within them, Schiebeler

invites his countrymen to produce more of the same.

Regarding plot, Schiebeler’s discussion of fairy-tale content touches on a frequent subject

of debate in mid-eighteenth-century writings on opera and thus in the WNA. Writers, aware of

the trend toward naturalism in the arts, asked whether opera, which requires its characters to

deliver their lines singing, must restrict itself to similarly unnatural settings. In other words,

critics juxtaposed narratives of the wondrous with those that treated natural subjects. In his Les

Beaux-arts réduits à un même principe (1746), Charles Batteux had prescribed limiting opera to

divine or supernatural plots, believing that this could justify the artificiality of continuous

singing. While Hiller had initially been influenced by Batteux’s ideas, he subsequently came to

reject many of them. In the WNA Hiller gave space to both views. In volume 4 he reprinted

Marmontel’s Batteux-like opinion that “music produces within it the charm of the wonderful; the wonderful, however, produces the verisimilitude of the music.”25 Marmontel went on to fault the

Italians for moving away from fabulous plots in their operas because, in his opinion, these go

best with music. Algorotti saw things differently, and pictured the transition from mythological

to historical subjects as a natural progression of the genre from birth to maturity, just as it had

also grown from the courts out into the public theaters. While not excluding the possibility of

wondrous events, Algorotti encouraged poets to keep their stories “simple and familiar.”26

François-Jean Chastellux sought a middle ground between these stances and advocated a laissez- faire attitude toward the debate. Reprinted in the WNA’s fourth volume, Chastellux’s essay

24 Daniel Schiebeler, “Anmerkung zu Lisuart und Dariolette, von dem Verfasser desselben,” WNA 2, no. 18 (November 2, 1767): 137–38.

25 Marmontel, “Ueber die Oper aus Marmontels Dichtkunst,” WNA 4, no. 45 (November 5, 1770): 348.

26 Algorotti, “Versuch über die musikalische Oper,” WNA 3, no. 50 (June 12, 1769): 393.

considered the positions of those who want to make opera more realistic by removing its “gods

and machines” and those who would make the wondrous an “unavoidable duty.” His ultimate

verdict emphasized the importance of drama over subject matter: “It doesn’t matter whether the

content is fabulous or historical. It is much more important that all interesting situations, all

pathetic expressions, and terrible or pleasant images of the poet be considered as the true domain

of music.”27

Despite their differences over content, the writers of the WNA all agreed on the

importance of vivid emotional expression within opera plots. Marmontel called for “a mixing of

painful and comforting situations, of moments of unrest and fear, of rest and hope alternating in

pathetic song.”28 Such ingredients would be most likely to move the hearts of the audience, which all agreed was opera’s principal aim. As Algorotti put it, the purpose of opera is “to charm the senses, to bewitch the heart, and to produce a pleasant deception.”29 Hiller concurred when

he declared that a good opera “stirs the heart, employs the reason, and flatters the senses.”30

The WNA’s writers also expressed concerns about the obstacles to an appropriately heart-

stirring plot, particularly in the arias and ballets. In volume 4, Chastellux’s essay on the

unification of poetry and music speaks at length on the appropriate time for an aria and the

importance of not allowing the music to override dramatic interest:

27 François-Jean Chastellux, “Fortsetzung über die Vereinigung der Poesie und Musik,” WNA 4, no. 14 (April 2, 1770): 104–5.

28 Marmontel, “Fortsetzung, über die Oper aus Marmontels Dichtkunst,” WNA 4, no. 46 (November 12, 1770): 356.

29 Algorotti, “Versuch über die musikalische Oper,” WNA 3, no. 50 (June 12, 1769): 387.

30 Hiller, commentary to “Zweyte Fortsetzung über die Freyheit der Musik, vom Herrn D’Alembert,” WNA 3, no. 34 (February 20, 1769): 264.

[Composers] must feel that the transition from declamation to music can be well made only through a growth of interest or passion that appears to demand from itself a new and stronger expression. They must be on their guard to apply arias during cold situations and use these only in the middle of dialogue before the plot has become very lively. Finally, they must not misuse the music and not pile the arias in their pieces too high. If they do this, I dare say those composers will find greater fame. . . . One must especially take care to avoid two mistakes: to relegate the music only to the divertissements or to desecrate it through artificial arias and tasteless rondeaus with which they commonly interrupt the plot.31

The coherent integration of ballet seems to have posed a great challenge to mid-eighteenth-

century critics. An anonymous writer, reviewing Agricola’s L’Amore di Psiche for the August

28, 1769 issue, remarked on the “naturalness” with which a ballet followed the chorus ending the

first act, and noted that such a connection was a rarity in Italian opera.32 Algorotti likewise

complained about the presence of irrelevant ballet. In his “Essay on Musical Opera,” he asserted

that they are never part of the story and often work against it, offering, as an example, operas in

which the plot is set in Rome but the interloping ballet in Cuzco or Peking. “Nothing,” he wrote,

“fights more against the law of continuity—a law that is holy in nature and that should be just as holy to her artistic imitator [i.e., opera].” Besides serving as a distraction, ballets varied little from opera to opera in Algorotti’s eyes: “You only need to have seen one to have seen them all.

The costumes of the dancers change, but the character of the ballet never does.”33 Marmontel defended the use of dance in opera, perhaps not surprisingly given his French nationality, though he noted its unsuitability for Italian opera seria. He cited its presence in French opera as part of

31 Chastellux, “Fortsetzung über die Vereinigung der Poesie und Musik,” WNA 4, no. 14 (April 2, 1770): 104–5.

32 Anonymous, “Fortsetzung über die Oper l’Amore di Psiche vom Herrn Agricola,” WNA 3, Anhang no. 9 (August 28, 1769): 66.

33 Algorotti, “Fortsetzung des Versuchs über die musikalische Oper,” WNA 3, Anhang no. 1 (July 3, 1769): 7.

celebratory intermezzos (Zwischenfälle) that nevertheless cohere with the plot, and argued for ballet’s applicability anywhere in an act, so long as it is in “the proper place.”34

When assessing the quality of an opera’s plot, the writers of the WNA generally expressed

a preference for judging it by actually seeing it performed in the theater rather than by simply

reading the libretto. This may seem like an obvious method for modern-day audiences, but

eighteenth-century critics occasionally drew their opinions solely from the verbal text, usually

because the critics were more likely to be poets and writers rather than composers or performers.

Indeed, when Gottsched’s critics mocked his stubborn negativity toward opera, they declared

that his attitude would likely change if he ever attended one. The WNA’s writers expressed a

belief in the value of live performance through their many opera reviews, written by Hiller or

other correspondents who actually attended performances in Berlin, Leipzig, Dresden, Gotha,

and Vienna. One anonymous writer, L. M. N., made the point explicitly in an article on comic

opera: “The poetry, however, must be judged not by reading it but by seeing the effect that it

makes in the theater.”35 Gloria Flaherty writes that this inductive, experiential approach to

evaluating opera echoes a north German aesthetic tradition whose roots went back to the early

part of the eighteenth century.36

Beside these drama-related questions of genre and plot, the writers of the WNA offered few comments on characterization. In one of the first issues, an anonymous correspondent going

34 Marmontel, “Fortsetzung, über die Oper aus Marmontels Dichtkunst,” WNA 4, no. 48 (November 26, 1770): 371.

35 L. M. N., “Schreiben über die komische Oper, aus dem hannoverischen Magazin,” WNA 3, Anhang no. 12 (September 18, 1769): 91.

36 Gloria Flaherty, Opera in the Development of German Critical Thought (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1978), 103. Flaherty cites the remarks of Johann Georg Hamann (1697–1733), a literary scholar who wrote of opera: “I judge only from the effects of this so magnificent art and can give evidence from my own experience as well as from that of other sensible people, how often we felt the stamp of it.” Hamann’s flexible approach to theatrical rules grew out of his experiences in Hamburg, where he moved in 1727 and encountered a liberal artistic circle including Brockes, König, Richey, Weichmann, and Feind.

by the initials R. S., reviewing Benda’s Xindo riconosciuto, criticized the tendency of some

characters to change their personality. He noticed that one protagonist, Bagode, metamorphosed

from “generous and humane” and “wise and faithful to the welfare of the cities of his queen”

early in the play to “a fool, a proud man, a cowardly and assassinating traitor” by the end of the

second act. He asked, “Is it not one of the first rules of theatrical writing that the people must

always remain themselves from the beginning to the end of the entire piece in all their

actions?”37 More frequently, critics admonished composers to avoid characters whose humor

stooped too low. In his report on Lisuart und Dariolette, from February 10, 1767, Hiller is

careful to point out that the secondary roles of the servant, Derwin, and of the court ladies are

comic roles but not “grotesque comedy.”38 Hiller’s avoidance of low humor suits Leipzig’s long-

standing theatrical environment of bourgeois respectability. Whereas Hamburg may have always

enjoyed its farces, Leipzig in the late eighteenth century still practiced a more restrained style of

entertainment.

The WNA’s prescriptions for poetry provide evidence of an important shift that was

taking place in opera after the middle of the eighteenth century. At the time, the aesthetic

pendulum was swinging away from the musical virtuosity epitomized by Italian opera seria, and

many reform-minded writers, including some in the WNA, were announcing that poetry should now be the mistress of the music. In the June 6, 1768 issue, an unnamed English writer declared that “music shows its greatest force when it is a helper [eine Gehülfinn] to the poetry.”39 Just

37 R. S., review of Xindo riconosciuto, WNA 1, no. 6 (August 5, 1766): 44–45.

38 Hiller, “Nachricht von der comischen Oper: Lisuart und Dariolette,” WNA 1, no. 33 (February 10, 1767): 255–56.

39 Anonymous, “Fortsetzung: Ueber die Musik, ihre Gewalt, Grundsätze, Endzweck,” WNA 2, no. 49 (June 6, 1768): 384.

over a year later, Algorotti’s “Essay on Musical Opera” agreed with the idea that music is better

off when it holds less power:

Another primary cause of the current decay of music is the singular and special sovereignty it has claimed for itself and now climbed to such an extraordinary height. The composer sets himself up as a despot. He wants to work only for himself, to please only as a musician. It never occurs to him that he should be subordinate and that the music makes a greater effect if it is a servant and helper [Dienerinn und Gehülfinn] of the poetry.40

The elevation of poetry, however, did not carry with it a complete dismissal of musical

considerations, and some WNA writers even recommended that poets pursue musical training.

Hiller wrote, “It is true that a poet, in order to manufacture a good musical poem would have to

be to a certain degree himself a musician, himself a composer.”41 Hiller went on to claim that the

Italians, especially Metastasio, provide much better models for musical poetry than the French.

Chastellux concurred with Hiller’s distinction between Italian and French poetry but showed even less sympathy for the poets of his home country. “I confess,” he wrote in his “Essay on the

Unification of Poetry and Music,” reprinted in February 1770, “that everything that concerns lyrical verse in all French operas is, in my opinion, so much neglected that one should almost believe that everyone who wrote these poems had only a very weak conception of music.”42 The

French, he went on, seem to write their verses without any thought to the music that must be

connected to them. As for the Italian poets, “One should believe that they themselves had

invented each theme of their aria and left to the composer merely the effort to create an

accompaniment to it.”43

40 Algorotti, “Fortsetzung des Versuchs über die musikalische Oper,” WNA 3, no. 51 (June 19, 1769): 395.

41 Hiller, “Nachricht von der comischen Oper: Lisuart und Dariolette,” WNA 1, no. 33 (February 10, 1767): 254.

42 Chastellux, “Fortsetzung über die Vereinigung der Poesie und Musik,” WNA 4, no. 12 (March 19, 1770): 89.

Besides agreeing on the importance of an opera’s libretto, the WNA’s writers also demonstrated similar concern for a certain poetic tone, one that conveyed both strong sentiment and pleasant naturalness. In the WNA’s second issue, published on July 8, 1766, Hiller reviewed

Talestri, Regina delle Amazzoni, an opera by Maria Antonia, Electress of Saxony, and raved about its libretto:

What euphony in the verses! Full of thoughts, of strong and tender feelings, of noble and well-chosen images. They make the most vivid, most pleasant impression everywhere on the heart of the reader. One must value them so much higher the less they are copies of others but rather themselves original imitations of beautiful Nature. And these poetic beauties, clothed in tones, in the most exquisite, most masterful tones, what kind of effect are they then not first capable of doing!44

A few weeks later, an anonymous writer echoed Hiller’s praise for effusive emotion in a review of Andreas Galletti’s libretto for the opera Xindo riconosciuto. He applauded the “awe and love” in the speeches, the “beautiful passion” in the words, and the “tenderness set in the strongest and most beautiful light.”45 Marmontel likewise agreed with Hiller’s idea of poetry being an

“original imitation of beautiful Nature.” Near the end of its final volume (1770), the WNA reprinted his claim that “poetry is the means to consider between nature and art. Its duty is to imitate the former and follow the latter and choose language that agrees best with the latter and paints best the former.”46 These selected quotations from the beginning and the end of the WNA reflect a theme found throughout its pages. Few ideas are expressed with greater frequency than the aesthetic preference for vivid emotional expression and the aspiration to imitate nature.

43 Ibid.

44 Hiller, review of Talestri, Regina delle Amazzoni, WNA 1, no. 2 (July 8, 1766): 10.

45 Anonymous, “Beitrag: Die zu Gotha aufgeführte Oper betreffend, von einem Liebhaber und Verehrer der Musik,” WNA 1, no. 6 (August 5, 1766): 44.

46 Marmontel, “Fortsetzung, über die Oper aus Marmontels Dichtkunst,” WNA 4, no. 48 (November 26, 1770): 371.

While the WNA’s writers shared a belief that poetry could be both musical and

expressive, they also assumed that not all languages were equally suitable for operatic use. “Each

language has its inconveniences,” wrote Blainville, especially if their pronunciation emerges

from the nose or the throat.47 He argued that such a vocal production could hinder any nation in

the production of beautiful voices, though he was not prepared to grant Italian an advantage over

French. The presumed difficulty in setting German to music was an issue that preoccupied Hiller

for the duration of the WNA’s publication. In fact, his desire to prove the beauty of the German language provided an important motivation for his vocal compositional output. In the February

10, 1767 issue, he penned an impassioned defense of his native language:

We Germans are always yet so unfortunate that we have no Singspiels or operas in our mother tongue. Where lies the blame? Certainly no further than that the genius of the Germans is not respected enough, not teased out and encouraged enough. The Italians and their language have seized the highest courts in Germany and their singing stages, and if also at some courts a German genius has had the luck to attain the fame of the position of Kapellmeister, very few of his works in the German language stand in good stead. “Yes, it is said, the German language does not lend itself to music.” This accusation rests on a very weak basis. At most it can with reliability say nothing further than the German language is not entirely as comfortable for music as the Italian. . . . The inconveniences of the language quite fall away if the poet will be attentive and cautious enough to not consider everything as musical “verse” that could be screwed together into a single verse. All languages have poets to thank for their improvement and it is incumbent upon ours likewise to release our language from a reproach that, if it were founded, would be detrimental to all its poems.48

Hiller diagnosed the difficulty of applying German poetry to music and offered a solution:

One of the greatest inconveniences of our language is that so many syllables do not end with vowels but with consonants; however, can a skilled singer who has a fluid tongue and a light pronunciation not improve this mistake very much if he pronounces the vowel always very distinctly and prolonged, bringing out the clustered consonants faster in contrast? In brief, if he imagines all syllables end with a vowel and all the following consonants belong to the following syllable. The pampered and seduced ears of the listeners would likewise be able to contribute something to this improvement of the

47 Blainville, “Betrachtungen über die Musik,” WNA 1, no. 40 (March 31, 1767): 308–9.

48 Hiller, “Nachricht von der comischen Oper: Lisuart und Dariolette,” WNA 1, no. 33 (February 10, 1767): 253–54.

language if they demanded less the shiny and shimmering in song and in contrast would adopt more the stirring and expressive. Of the latter is our language always perfectly capable in music; of the former, however, not so much as Italian. It is true, we occasionally lose beauty because of this; however, we will also be able to hear less musical nonsense.49

Hiller’s dichotomy between “shiny and shimmering” Italian song and German art that is “stirring

and expressive” reflects a stereotype that persisted for decades.

On the topic of poetic form, the writers of the WNA tended to express a preference for

order and concision. In volume 1 Chastellux noted that since musical periods have a certain

symmetry and proportion, the syllable measures of the verse should as well.50 In volume 4 he reaffirmed his call for order, relationship, and symmetry, and offered Metastasio as an example of a poet who can create such consistent, well-chosen rhythm in his verse that the musical theme practically presents itself to the composer.51 Other critics exhorted poets to be succinct.

Marmontel wrote that, especially in simple recitative, the poet must not be too wordy or have too

crowded of a style; otherwise, “the verses whose style is crowded are slow, difficult to sing, and

of a monotonous expression.”52 Chastellux also cautioned that arias not become too verbose, and he cited as examples French arias that included twenty-three to thirty-two verses.53 Along with

this call for formal discipline, however, one can find in the WNA praise for poets who, like

composers, defy rules in order to express the passions. Chastellux adopted a stance of passion-

over-reason that anticipates early Romanticism:

49 Ibid., 254.

50 Chastellux, “Essai sur l’union de la Poesie et de la Musique,” WNA 1, no. 49 (June 2, 1767): 383.

51 Chastellux, “Fortsetzung über die Vereinigung der Poesie und Musik,” WNA 4, no. 13 (March 26, 1770): 99.

52 Marmontel, “Fortsetzung, über die Oper aus Marmontels Dichtkunst,” WNA 4, no. 47 (November 19, 1770): 367.

53 Chastellux, “Fortsetzung über die Vereinigung der Poesie und Musik,” WNA 1, no. 50 (June 8, 1767): 388.

People in an opera never appear on stage to speak wittily. Music can’t do anything with wit. It requires images and passion. There is no type of dramatic presentation that doesn’t demand a true portrayal of the passions. A strong pain never expresses itself through expressions and periods cohering to one another. Its thoughts are without coherence and order, its transitions fast and unexpected. Thus must appear the passion on the stage and even in epic poetry. . . . It appears to be the general mistake of our [French] writers that they have too much wit and want to be too methodical, too considerable. The poet would want to connect the expression of the passions too much and place them in order; the composers make the same error by wanting to prepare their modulations too much.54

The critics of the WNA listed several models of poetic excellence. By far, the most

frequently mentioned and praised among these was Metastasio. In the same article where Hiller

had envied the success of the Italians at German courts and attributed a “shiny and shimmering”

superfluity to Italian song, he also freely acknowledged the greatness of Metastasio and hinted

that “his verse types can be imitated very easily in German.”55 Two years later, Hiller returned to

the topic of Metastasio again, citing his work with Hasse, and noting that the Italian “possesses

knowledge and feeling of true musical song.”56

Chastellux was another writer who often commended Metastasio’s librettos. In the June

2, 1767 issue, for example, he praised Metastasio for the symmetry and proportion of his verses

as well as his accomplishment in uniting the charms of lyrical poetry with the force and pathos of

tragedy.57 Chastellux again commented on Metastasio’s technique in the March 19, 1770 issue.

After complaining that French poets do not seem to write verses with any consideration of the

music, Chastellux discussed examples where Metastasio, responding to a new dramatic situation,

54 Chastellux, “Fortsetzung über die Vereinigung der Poesie und Musik,” WNA 4, no. 14 (April 2, 1770): 105–6.

55 Hiller, “Nachricht von der comischen Oper: Lisuart und Dariolette,” WNA 1, no. 33 (February 10, 1767): 255.

56 Hiller, commentary on “Fortsetzung von D. Brown’s Betrachtungen über die Poesie und Musik,” WNA 3, Anhang no. 6 (August 7, 1769): 43.

57 Chastellux, “Essai sur l’union de la Poesie et de la Musique,” WNA 1, no. 49 (June 2, 1767): 383.

alters his poetic theme and meter when he anticipates the composer will employ a new musical

theme and time signature. Chastellux also observed Metastasio’s complementary use of feminine

and masculine rhymes. Taken together, he concluded that Metastasio’s thorough knowledge of

musical rhythm contributed to the preference for his librettos over those of Apostolo Zeno.58

Finally, Chastellux cited Rousseau who, he claimed, urged young French composers to go to

Italy, read Metastasio, make themselves familiar with his language, and hear the music of Hasse

and Pergolesi.59

Such was the esteem for Metastasio among the WNA’s writers, that few other Italian

poets received mention. Nevertheless, in the October 5, 1767 reprint of Abbé Richard’s “Brief

Report on the Circumstances of Music in Italy,” Richard described Carlo Goldoni as a man of

considerable natural talent, an observer of the world and of people, and capable of capturing the

true nature and passions of his characters. “Never,” wrote Richard, “has a writer had a facility

that would equal his.”60

While France had a reputation in the eighteenth century for being a literary nation, and

while the WNA’s writers recognized the high quality of French poetry, the assumption prevailed

in the magazine’s pages that the French could not produce great librettos. Hiller cautioned

musical poets to not follow French models as they lacked feeling and cluttered their poems with

too much painting and epigrammatic wit.61 As mentioned above, Chastellux believed that the

58 Chastellux, “Fortsetzung über die Vereinigung der Poesie und Musik,” WNA 4, no. 12 (March 19, 1770): 90–92.

59 Ibid., 100–101.

60 Abbé Richard, “Kurze Nachricht von dem Zustande der Musik in Italien,” WNA 2, no. 14 (October 5, 1767): 104.

61 Hiller, “Nachricht von der comischen Oper: Lisuart und Dariolette,” WNA 1, no. 33 (February 10, 1767): 255.

French wrote their librettos without any consideration for their musical setting. Yet even though

opposition existed toward French poetry as a whole, the WNA’s writers nevertheless found

positive traits in the work of individual French poets. Chastellux praised Michel-Jean Sedaine’s comedy of situations and naiveté of manners.62 Marmontel lauded Quinault’s “beautiful and easy

phrasing, the exactness, the decorum, the natural . . . such a style that it appears as though the

poet himself had written it while singing.”63 Despite his regard for Quinault, however,

Marmontel still ended this section of his treatise with a gibe at French lyrical poets in

comparison to their Italian counterparts.64

What German poets did the WNA favor? Schiebeler had high hopes for Christoph Martin

Wieland. In his November 2, 1767 article, Schiebeler noted that the German-speaking nation had no romantic-heroic poem analogous to Ariosto’s Orlando furioso, and he proposed that Wieland undertake the task.65 Hiller recommended Christian Gottfried Krause, whose “Von der

musikalischen Poesie” (1753) offered instructions for writing a good musical poem.66 Hiller also

promoted the work of Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock. In a brief May 1770 notice, he wrote that

Klopstock had written a German parody of the text for Pergolesi’s Stabat Mater. Hiller believed

that Klopstock’s work expressed the feelings of the music far more effectively than the original,

and if Pergolesi had lived and spoken German, he might have preferred this text to his Latin

62 Chastellux, “Fortsetzung über die Vereinigung der Poesie und Musik,” WNA 4, no. 14 (April 2, 1770): 104.

63 Marmontel, “Fortsetzung, über die Oper aus Marmontels Dichtkunst,” WNA 4, no. 47 (November 19, 1770): 364.

64 Ibid., 368.

65 Schiebeler, “Anmerkung zu Lisuart und Dariolette, von dem Verfasser desselben,” WNA 2, no. 18 (November 2, 1767): 136.

66 Hiller, “Nachricht von der comischen Oper: Lisuart und Dariolette,” WNA 1, no. 33 (February 10, 1767): 254.

one.67 While this claim may seem far-fetched, it reflects Hiller’s unrelenting optimism about the

future of German opera. He knew that the genre would need to be developed in stages, with

attention to poetry, music, and performance. His use of the WNA to promote various German poets should be seen as one part of his overall goal to raise the status of German opera on the international stage.

In the area of musical composition, the writers of the WNA discussed nearly every element of music and provided prescriptions for the various musical components of an opera.

Many idealized what we might term “middle-way music,” that is, music that avoided the ostentatious virtuosity of earlier opera seria yet did not stoop to tavern songs. In Hiller’s second issue (July 8, 1766), he praised Maria Antonia’s Talestri for its “good melody, which falls neither into the overblown and affected nor into the banal and common-place.”68 Algorotti likewise commended musical modesty. His “Essay on Musical Opera,” reprinted on June 19,

1769, criticized composers who were only out to please and surprise the ear, especially with show-stopping high notes:

The melody never turns out better than when it sticks to the middle road. . . . Transitions should be used where the words express a passion or movement. Otherwise they become only obstructions and disruptions of musical comprehension. And how boring and unbearable are the eternal repetitions and accumulations of words that only happen to please the music and have no sense in the least?69

An anonymous writer also invoked the “middle-way” metaphor in a review of Agricola’s

L’amore di Psiche. Referring to the tendency of some composers to have the vocalist sing too much while others indulge in too many instrumental passages, the critic praised Agricola for

67 Hiller, “Leipzig,” WNA 4, no. 19 (May 7, 1770): 150.

68 Hiller, review of Talestri, Regina delle Amazzoni, Dramma per Musica, WNA 1, no. 2 (July 8, 1766): 10.

69 Algorotti, “Fortsetzung des Versuchs über die musikalische Oper,” WNA 3, no. 51 (June 19, 1769): 400.

striking the right balance between singer and orchestra: “This middle way pleases us best:

because to want the singer to do nothing at all is capriciousness, too much for him to do is

slavery.”70

The “middle way” held importance to critics as it was regarded the surest path to those

qualities most valued by eighteenth-century aestheticians: naturalness, beauty, and simplicity.

These, of course, were closely related ideas, and the invocation of one usually implied the others.

The August 19, 1766 issue (volume 1) reprinted an excerpt from the Hamburg periodical

Unterhaltungen in which the writer asserted a close connection between nature and art: “Musical

taste consists of an assessment of the tones that reach our senses. The author derives from the

imitation of nature the rules according to which music and taste in themselves must be assessed.

Music flows from natural tones embellished by art.”71 Excerpts from an English treatise titled

“On Music: Its Force, Principles, Goals,” which appeared near the end of volume 2, discussed

the importance of naiveté (Einfalt) in melody and harmony in pleasing the ear.72 Likewise,

Rousseau urged composers to convey simplicity—or at least the appearance of it: “A great

beauty of the melody is lightness and a flowing motion behind which the composer has hidden

the effort that the invention of it cost him.”73

Along with an embrace of naturalness and simplicity came a repudiation of music that

appeared too methodically constructed. This trend mirrored the contemporaneous rejection of

wordy or too-intricate poetry. An anonymous French treatise, reprinted in volume 3 (1769),

70 Anonymous, review of L’amore di Psiche, WNA 3, Anhang no. 11 (September 11, 1769): 88.

71 Anonymous, “Abhandlung vom musikalischen Geschmacke,” WNA 1, no. 8 (August 19, 1766): 63.

72 Anonymous, “Fortsetzung: Ueber die Musik, ihre Gewalt, Grundsätze, Endzweck,” WNA 2, nos. 48–49 (May 30–June 6, 1768). See especially pp. 373, 382–83.

73 Jean-Jacques Rousseau, “Fortsetzung zu dem musikalischen Wörterbuche,” WNA 3, no. 44 (May 1, 1769): 344.

stated, “One does not learn [taste] through mathematical theories of music, much less achieve it,

as indicated by all the frigid and uninteresting composers who convince themselves that an

arithmetic exactitude is the highest merit of a composer. The contempt for and ruin of their

compositions amply demonstrates to them that the rigor of calculus is not the rule of taste.”74

Rousseau seconded this idea in his essay on musical expression, reprinted in volume 4 (1770),

writing, “Just as a great speaker does not become great through logic and rhetoric, even so little

will a composer become great in the expression of the passions through rules.”75

Rousseau’s reference to “the expression of the passions” gets to the primary goal of mid- eighteenth-century music: to move the passions of the listener. Qualities of naturalness, beauty, and simplicity were merely aesthetic means to a heart-stirring end. The English writer of “On

Music: Its Force, Principles, Goals” maintained very clearly, “A goal of music is to provide pleasure. A far nobler and greater one is to seize the passions and to stir the heart.”76 Hiller also voiced this viewpoint while commenting on Rousseau’s essay “On Musical Expression.”

Responding to Rousseau’s thoughts on theater music, Hiller asked,

What does the composer now have to actually express? Or, what are the things with which music most concerns itself? It is the passions; these to quiet or to arouse and to provide the heart a pleasant pleasure. That is the demand made of all music and all composers. . . . The music has sufficiently achieved its purpose if it has aroused something similar [to pleasure, joy, and melancholy]. The heart requires no further explanation: if it has been stirred, then it has everything that it desires.77

74 Anonymous, “Ermahnung eines Vaters an seinen Sohn, die Musik betreffend,” WNA 3, Anhang no. 17 (October 23, 1769): 131.

75 Rousseau, “Fortsetzung über den musikalischen Ausdruck,” WNA 4, no. 5 (January 29, 1770): 33.

76 Anonymous, “Ueber die Musik, ihre Gewalt, Grundsätze, Endzweck,” WNA 2, no. 47 (May 23, 1768): 363.

77 Hiller, commentary on “Ueber den musikalischen Ausdruck nach dem Rousseau,” WNA 4, no. 3 (January 15, 1770): 19.

The importance of stirring the heart emerges clearly in the numerous opera reviews, which

appear throughout the WNA’s four volumes. Critics generally write the most about those recitatives and arias that convey the most vivid emotions and arouse the greatest emotional effect.

The search for music that reflected the emotions of operatic characters and aroused the passions of audience members accompanied a significant change in thinking about musical expression. Gloria Flaherty notes that European music at this time was undergoing a gradual shift from a theory of mimesis (i.e., imitation) to one of expression.78 The WNA bore witness to this transition. In “On Music: Its Force, Principles, Goals,” the critic wrote, “The great purpose of vocal music is the expression of feeling.” He went on to note, “Where one wanted to imitate, this must largely be left to the accompanying instruments . . . and it must meanwhile be left to the voice the freedom to express the emotions.”79 Rousseau advised the same in his “Essay on

Musical Expression”:

Opportunities occur where the composer should want to imitate certain natural things instead of the passions. Most arias, which contain similes, belong here. In such cases, the composer should exercise great caution and moderation, so that he does not drive the matter into the vulgar and ridiculous. Thus it is almost always better if he leaves such imitation to the instruments and spares the voice from it.80

Algorotti lodged his own complaint about an over-reliance on imitation in his “Essay on Musical

Opera.” He decried composers who painted individual words to give them their proper sentiment and called this act “a dissonance of expression that no reasonable man can bear.”81 His statement

78 Flaherty, Opera in the Development of German Critical Thought, 179.

79 Anonymous, “Beschluß: Ueber die Musik, ihre Gewalt, Grundsätze, Endzweck,” WNA 2, no. 50 (June 13, 1768): 386–87.

80 Rousseau, “Fortsetzung über den musikalischen Ausdruck,” WNA 4, no. 7 (February 12, 1770): 51.

81 Algorotti, “Fortsetzung des Versuchs über die musikalische Oper,” WNA 3, no. 51 (June 19, 1769): 400.

that “one must not express the sense of individual words but what they comprise taken together”

reflects the contemporary emphasis on emotional expression.82

Of the various components of music, melody, often referred to as “song,” consistently

ranked as the most essential among the writers of the WNA. Critics rarely identified the particular

structural elements of a good melody, but they had no problem recognizing one when they heard

it, with its pleasing galant qualities of naturalness, simplicity, and beauty. While the writers commended numerous composers for various skills, they singled out Pergolesi most often as the master melodist. Hiller called him the “founder of good song” and noted that he created a sensation with his “exquisite gifts for a light and pleasing melody.”83 D’Alembert mentioned

Pergolesi in his essay “On the Freedom of Music,” reprinted in volume 3 of the WNA. He described the popularity of La serva padrona, even in his native France, and wrote of Pergolesi’s melodies, “It is difficult to urge the imitation of nature and truth of expression in song higher.”84

Finally, a British writer, known only as L. M. N. in the Hanoverian Magazine, awarded Pergolesi

the first rank among composers, singling out his comic operas for their “pleasing melodies” and

“noble simplicity.” To support his views, L. M. N. quoted Rousseau’s own praise of a duet (“Io

conosco a quegli occhietti”) from La serva padrona: “I cite this duet as a model of pleasant song,

of unity of melody, of simple, glowing, and pure harmony, of true accent, of dialogue, and of

taste.”85

82 Ibid.

83 Hiller, “Sechste Fortsetzung des Entwurfs einer musikalischen Bibliothek,” WNA 3, no. 8 (August 22, 1768): 57.

84 D’Alembert, “Vierte Fortsetzung über die Freyheit der Musik,” WNA 3, no. 36 (March 6, 1769): 278.

85 L. M. N., “Schreiben über die komische Oper, aus dem Hannöverischen Magazin,” WNA 3, Anhang no. 12 (September 18, 1769): 91.

The operatic tradition of composing or improvising vocal melismas presented a special

challenge to critics who favored simpler melodic construction. Opera reformers of the current

and previous decade had sought to rein in melismatic excess. However, Rousseau had argued in

“On Musical Expression” that music would become tiring if it were restricted to only syllabic

declamation.86 So then, what was the balancing point? How many melismas could an opera have? An anonymous reviewer, commenting on a performance of Agricola’s L’amore di Psiche for the September 11, 1769 issue, noted that the sentiment among most audience members could be expressed as “je bunter, je besser”—the more colorful, the better.87 Critics, however, could be

more restrictive. A few months after the L’amore di Psiche article, another anonymous review,

this one of Hasse’s Piramo e Tisbe, congratulated the composer for limiting his use of “syllable

stretches and runs,” calling such devices “Klingklang.”88 Clearly, audiences and critics did not

see eye-to-eye on the appropriate use of melismas in operatic melodies.

If melody occupied the top spot in the hierarchy of musical elements for the WNA’s critics, the second position belonged to harmony, which was assumed to serve the melody as an accompaniment.89 However, for modern readers, it may be more helpful to use the German word

“Harmonie” instead of the literal English translation “harmony,” as the eighteenth-century

understanding of Harmonie—not just in Germany but throughout Europe—differed in important

ways from our modern conception of harmony. At the time, Harmonie was understood as more

86 Rousseau, “Fortsetzung über den musikalischen Ausdruck,” WNA 4, no. 6 (February 5, 1770): 42.

87 Anonymous, review of L’amore di Psiche, WNA 3, Anhang no. 11 (September 11, 1769): 86.

88 Anonymous, review of Piramo e Tisbe, WNA 3, Anhang no. 20 (November 13, 1769): 152.

89 There was ongoing debate throughout the eighteenth century about the primacy of melody or harmony. In the pages of the WNA, the collective appears to favor melody, judging by the amount of space dedicated to it and the importance it is granted within a composition.

than a simultaneous occurrence or vertical representation of chord tones; Harmonie also encompassed the relationship between the voices. If the principal voice was the “Melodie,” every other supporting voice was considered part of the “Harmonie.” Thus praise for a composer’s

beautiful Harmonie often referred more to a compelling movement or interaction among the

accompanying parts rather than the color of the sonorities or the inventiveness of the chord

progressions; eighteenth-century writers usually referred to the latter as “Modulation” rather than

“Harmonie.” The importance and function of Harmonie was thus described by the writer of “On

Music: Its Force, Principles, Goals,” reprinted in part on June 6, 1768: “Musical taste consists in

the accompaniment of melody with spirit and beauty. The discernment in music shows itself in

the invention of the harmonic accompaniment of the melody, which confers variety without

harming its naiveté, in the preparation and resolution of the dissonances, and in the skillful

progressions from one key to another.”90

It is with this broader understanding of harmony that we should consider Hiller’s praise

for the Harmonie of Hasse and Graun, which he judged superior to Pergolesi’s.91 An anonymous

writer offered similar approval for Handel, declaring that “no one has better understood

Harmonie than this thorough composer, though many have exceeded him in Melodie.”92

Rousseau echoed the WNA’s writers on the accompanying role of Harmonie in his essay “On

Musical Expression.” After a section in which he claims that melody is the musical element that gives all others their character, he goes on to write that Harmonie “reinforces the expression in

90 Anonymous, “Fortsetzung: Ueber die Musik, ihre Gewalt, Grundsätze, Endzweck,” WNA 2, no. 49 (June 6, 1768): 384.

91 Hiller, “Sechste Fortsetzung des Entwurfs einer musikalischen Bibliothek,” WNA 3, no. 8 (August 22, 1768): 57.

92 Anonymous, “Schreiben über die verschiedenen Schulen der Musik,” WNA 2, no. 25 (December 21, 1767): 194.

that it gives to the intervals of the melody more distinctness and determination.”93 Finally,

D’Alembert cautioned composers against prioritizing Harmonie over Gesang, claiming that this

hierarchical error was hindering French music:

Our French composers see nothing but voices piled on voices. They seek the effect in a strong filling-out. The singing voice is covered and smothered by its accompaniment. . . . It is as if one heard twenty books read aloud at the same time, so little is our harmony brought together in a whole. Can one thus be surprised if the Italians say that we do not know how to write music? The origin of this mistake lies in the prejudice with which our artists seek more in the harmony than in the song, wherein they commit a great error.94

Besides their calls for expressive Harmonie and skillful modulation, the WNA’s critics provided occasional prescriptions regarding key and key-related affects. The idea that certain keys aligned with certain affects was a common yet controversial idea in the eighteenth century.95 Many people theorized that such a phenomenon existed, but no one could provide

definitive evidence; nor did they agree on which keys produced which affects. In his

“Observations on Music,” Blainville instructed composers that to express fear, grief, or dejection

in their music, they should use “weak” flat keys. On the other hand, to convey rage, vengeance,

or despair, they should turn to “hard” sharp keys.96 An anonymous French article on the

similarities between music and painting, reprinted on September 19, 1768, also voiced support

for the theory of key affects by stating that each key has its own expression. While not providing

a complete list of tonality-expression correspondence, the writer does claim that D or G major

should be used for cheerful and martial songs, C minor for stirring and pathetic songs, and F

93 Rousseau, “Ueber den musikalischen Ausdruck,” WNA 4, no. 2 (January 8, 1770): 11.

94 D’Alembert, “Sechste Fortsetzung über die Freyheit der Musik,” WNA 3, no. 38 (March 20, 1769): 293.

95 George Buelow has provided a list of musical and non-musical sources from before 1800 dealing with rhetoric and the affects in “Music, Rhetoric, and the Concept of the Affections: A Selective Bibliography,” Notes 30, no. 2 (December 1973): 250–59. Rita Steblin describes the long association of keys with certain affects in A History of Key Characteristics in the Eighteenth and Early Nineteenth Centuries, 2nd ed. (Rochester, NY: University of Rochester Press, 2002).

96 Blainville, “Betrachtung über die Musik,” WNA 1, no. 45 (May 5, 1767): 348.

minor for somber and sad presentations.97 Rousseau expressed some skepticism of key affect in

“On Musical Expression,” noting that many composers “want to admit no difference regarding

tonality, but are of the opinion that each passion can be expressed in all keys.”98 Rousseau

himself declined to take a stand on the issue, writing that the theory was worthy of future study.

On the topic of formal structure, the WNA disseminated a preference for flexibility that

mirrored developments elsewhere in Western Europe as opera reformers after mid-century

continued to freely adapt the da capo aria. Algorotti argued that the first part of the da capo aria

should not be repeated as this went “entirely against the natural course of speech and passion,

which never turn back on themselves.”99 The reviewer of Hasse’s Piramo e Tisbe praised the composer’s habit of beginning the da capo in the middle of the first part so that the repetition does not become too long and tedious.100 He described another aria, noting also its departure

from da capo practice, by pointing out its four-part structure: the first in G, the second in D, the

third in C, and the fourth modulating back to G and closing.101 Indeed, this particular review

touched on the innovative formal structures of Hasse’s arias almost as much as it discussed their

emotional expression, something atypical among the WNA’s reviews. The critic also asserted that

Hasse found more success in avoiding conventional, hackneyed forms than Gluck did in his

Alceste.102

97 Anonymous, “Beantwortung der Frage: Was finden sich zwischen der Musik und der Mahlerey für Aehnlichkeiten?,” WNA 3, no. 12 (September 19, 1768): 91.

98 Rousseau, “Ueber den musikalischen Ausdruck,” WNA 4, no. 3 (January 15, 1770): 19.

99 Algorotti, “Fortsetzung des Versuchs über die musikalische Oper,” WNA 3, no. 51 (June 19, 1769): 400.

100Anonymous, review of Piramo e Tisbe, WNA 3, Anhang no. 19 (November 6, 1769): 149.

101 Ibid., 144.

102 Ibid., 145.

The transformation of the da capo form was motivated by contemporary aesthetic

concerns for expression and naturalness. By shaping an individual aria’s form in accordance with

its dramatic situation or emotional content, composers and poets could achieve an appearance of

spontaneity and naturalness that was impossible by adhering to traditional da capo form. In a

review of L’Amore di Psiche, appearing in the August 28, 1769 issue, the anonymous reviewer

extolled Agricola’s formal flexibility and its appropriateness to the sentiment of the text:

This aria did not lend itself to a da capo. The composer has arranged it therefore very fortunately according to another plan. He allows the second part to follow the first twice [ABAB] and changes each time the 4/4 meter to 6/8. The first tempo is fast; the other slow and softer. In this way, the song is so correctly appropriate to the words that any other realization certainly would have been worse than this.103

In addition to the abbreviated da capo forms and the ABAB form mentioned above, the rondo

represented another option for composers. In his “Essay on the Unification of Poetry and Music,”

Chastellux appeared to endorse this form when he commended composers who begin an aria

with a theme, interrupt it through multiple transitions, but always return to the theme again. The joy of such a procedure, wrote Chastellux, came from the detours through various keys and the return to the theme when the listener believes himself removed from it.104

While the WNA’s critics may have achieved a consensus on formal flexibility, they

differed somewhat in their prescriptions for musical texture, particularly regarding the presence

of counterpoint, which conflicted with the galant sensibilities of some writers. Algorotti cited his

countries “best masters” when he contended that counterpoint might lend “a great dignity and

solemnity” to church music, but for the opera, “it is not at all suited to the awakening of

103 Anonymous, review of L’amore di Psiche, WNA 3, Anhang no. 9 (August 28, 1769): 68.

104 Chastellux, “Fortsetzung über die Vereinigung der Poesie und Musik,” WNA 4, no. 11 (March 12, 1770): 86.

passion.”105 Other writers, however, embraced the use of counterpoint. Blainville called the

practice of counterpoint a lost art in his day, though he did not specifically call for its use in

theater music.106 Some critics did make room for contrapuntal textures in opera. The anonymous

reviewer of L’Amore di Psiche, in addition to complimenting Agricola’s formal flexibility,

commended his use of imitation and maintained that aria composers must have insight into

canonic style. He dismissed the simple, two-voiced textures that had come to dominate the

galant style, writing with a touch of sarcasm: “Our aria composers often make the work rather

easily. They invent a melody and some frilly passages, make a bass, and at most a middle voice

with it. Thus is the masterpiece ready. But have they also attempted it with duets, trios, and

quartets?”107 Johann Philipp Kirnberger, future author of Die Kunst des reinen Satzes in der

Musik (1774), also advocated the use of counterpoint in opera, questioning its sparing

appearance in operas by Handel and Graun in his 1769 article “Miscellaneous Musical Items,”

reprinted in the WNA’s October 16, 1769 issue.108

Apart from counterpoint, the WNA’s critics did prefer an effective deployment of the

middle voices within the musical texture. Agricola was applauded again, this time for his opera

Achille in Sciro, for just this quality. The reviewer gushed, “What fire in the invention, what power and what expression in the filling-out middle voices! How properly horns and oboes accompany this aria,” and wrote that “the work of the middle voices consists in trills and

105 Algorotti, “Fortsetzung des Versuchs über die musikalische Oper,” WNA 3, no. 51 (June 19, 1769): 402.

106 Blainville, “Betrachtung über die Musik,” WNA 1, no. 47 (May 19, 1767): 364.

107 Anonymous, review of L’amore di Psiche, WNA 3, Anhang no. 11 (September 11, 1769): 81.

108 Johann Philipp Kirnberger, “Beschluß der Recension vermischter Musikalien,” WNA 3, Anhang no. 16 (October 16, 1769): 119.

70 sixteenths, and nothing could be more appropriate to the matter than this type of expression.”109

Likewise, Hiller noted the “favorable effect” (glückliche Wirkung) that a lively middle voice could bring to a composition when introduced in certain places.110

The reference to horns and oboes in the Achille in Sciro review illustrates the attention paid to orchestration by the writers of the WNA. Most of the references to instrumentation came from French critics, an unsurprising fact considering the French fascination with orchestral color that ran from Lully to Rameau and beyond. Blainville, who suggested that composers use flat keys to convey fear, grief, and dejection, also felt that adding flutes, bassoons, and horns to the accompaniment made these anxious emotions even more vivid.111 Rousseau noted the varied expression of the instruments as well, though his ascription of emotions to instruments differed from Blainville’s: “The flute is tender; the oboe cheerful; the trumpet martial; the horn sonorous, majestic, and appropriate to a great expression. However, there is no instrument on which one could produce so many things, and would be more generally useful, than the violin.”112

Chastellux went a step further than either writer, considering not simply what emotion corresponds to what instrument, but how varying combinations of instruments blend within an orchestra. Chastellux’s words doubtless caught Hiller’s eye by crediting German musicians with appreciating this more sophisticated understanding of orchestration:

The German symphony composer, for example, looks to invent not only a simple theme but to produce beautiful effects through the Harmonie, which they obtain through the great number of various instruments that they apply and through the way with which they let them work together. Their symphonies are a type of concerto where the instruments show themselves in turn, where they ask and answer each other, fight with one another,

109 Anonymous, review of Achille in Sciro, WNA 1, no. 23 (December 2, 1766): 179.

110 Hiller, commentary on Rousseau’s Dictionnaire, WNA 3, Anhang no. 25 (December 18, 1769): 191.

111 Blainville, “Betrachtung über die Musik,” WNA 1, no. 45 (May 5, 1767): 348.

112 Rousseau, “Ueber den musikalischen Ausdruck,” WNA 4, no. 2 (January 8, 1770): 13.

and unite themselves again. It is, so to speak, a constant conversation. Meanwhile, amidst all this contrast a theme is always developed, especially in good works, which is the foundation of the entire structure. Each voice concerns itself with it freely in turn. This place is for the horn; that one is for the oboe. It is a musical period that is distributed among all voices of the orchestra; a phrase to which each instrument makes a small enhancement.113

The WNA’s writers did not discuss rhythm and meter as much as those characteristics

described above, but they did offer occasional praise for rhythmic interest and variety. For

instance, in an anonymous review of Hasse’s Piramo e Tisbe, the critic singled out the duet “Pur

ti riveggo alfine” for having a rhythm about which “various remarks” could be made.

Unfortunately, the reviewer declined to provide any details, deciding that “since one must have

the entire piece before one’s eyes, we will leave it for those informed in the matter.”114 In “On

Musical Expression,” Rousseau wrote that meter and tempo play an important role in correctly

portraying mood and emotion.115 To demonstrate his point, he compared four different settings

of the same tragic aria, “Se tutti i mali miei,” from Metastasio’s Demoofonte, showing the wide

variety that can result from different keys, meters, tempos.116 Hiller also noticed the difference

that meter and tempo could have on text-setting and expression, and he called for variety in these areas. After all, varied emotions must require different meters just as they require different

113 Chastellux, “Fortsetzung über die Vereinigung der Poesie und Musik,” WNA 4, no. 11 (March 12, 1770): 84.

114 Anonymous, review of Piramo e Tisbe, WNA 3, Anhang no. 18 (October 30, 1769): 137.

115 Tempo was much more closely related to meter in the mid-eighteenth century than it is today. Generally, a meter that indicated its unit of pulse as an eighth note moved faster than a piece whose unit of pulse was a quarter note. Likewise, quarter-note pulse moved faster than a half-note pulse. Thus, 3/8 was assumed to be faster than 3/4, which was assumed to be faster than 3/2.

116 Rousseau, “Fortsetzung über den musikalischen Ausdruck,” WNA 4, no. 5 (January 29, 1770): 35–36; and WNA 4, no. 6 (February 5, 1770): 43–44. As part of his argument, Rousseau supplied two of his own settings. In the first, he provided a 3/8 melody characterized by sentimental Lombardic rhythms and a sighing figure on “miei.” The second sets the text as a 6/8 Sicilian dance. Rousseau is both showing how meter and tempo can affect the mood of an aria and also making a point about the absurdity of setting a tragic text to an inappropriate musical style.

melodies, harmonies, and textures. While commenting on Rousseau’s essay, Hiller complained

that composers rely too much on 4/4, especially when the nature of a piece seemed to call for

another time signature; 6/8 produced similar confusion. He concluded that many composers

appear to have studied meter far less than rhythm.117

Having examined the WNA’s treatment of the various elements of music within the

context of opera, I will now consider the WNA’s prescriptions for the components of opera itself,

namely, recitative, aria, ensembles and choruses, and sinfonias/overtures. Recitative captured the

attention of writers more than any other operatic subject. Whereas modern audiences tend to

overlook recitatives, even accompanied ones, in favor of arias while discussing or analyzing

mid-eighteenth-century operas, scholars should remember that it was the recitatives that inspired

the most enthusiastic critical writing, at least in the WNA. Indeed, for eighteenth-century listeners, the accompanied recitative often provided the most intensely emotional moments of the entire opera. Rousseau defined recitative as “not a speaking but a singing declamation. . . . The composer brings what the speaking declamation has left uncertain. . . . He strengthens and weakens the tone, but all in a more sensitive and more expressive way.”118 Hiller agreed with

this definition but refined it even further by clarifying its boundaries:

Recitative is a declamation set in notes according to certain rules of melody and harmony. Since it is a singing declamation, it does not restrict itself to the narrow range of tones used in speaking. . . . However, it may not digress into song. The only case where one can allow it is in certain moments of passion where the voice of speaking declamation would itself exceed the boundaries and thereupon arises the accompanied recitative or at best an arioso. Lully’s smallest mistake is that he exceeds the borders of speaking declamation with the voice in recitative. One rebukes him correctly that his recitative abuts generally too near to aria.119

117 Hiller, commentary on “Ueber den musikalischen Ausdruck,” WNA 4, no. 3 (January 15, 1770): 21.

118 Rousseau, “Fortsetzung über den musikalischen Ausdruck,” WNA 4, no. 6 (February 5, 1770): 41–42.

119 Hiller, commentary on “Vierte Fortsetzung über die Freyheit der Musik, vom Herrn d’Alembert,” WNA 3, no. 36 (March 6, 1769): 279–80.

Besides defining recitative as a type of singing declamation that was less than song, the

critics established a few other requirements. First, a recitative must be beautiful and contain

some surprises. For instance, a review of Hasse’s Piramo e Tisbe extolled its recitatives: “The

type of accompaniment is very diverse and changing, but everything is so strongly, so sensitively

expressed that one can name it without a doubt a masterpiece of declamation and expression. In a

few places, it is mixed with arioso style, and the words at the end . . . certainly could not be said

to be more stirring in their key and their melody.”120 Second, the recitatives must be an indispensable part of the story’s emotional expression. In the October 24, 1768 issue, a reviewer praised Gluck’s recitative accompaniment for being “not merely an add-on or an idle filling-out

of space but an essential part of the expression since it makes the entire content comprehensible

and the words almost expendable.”121 A year later, D’Alembert’s “Freedom of Music” essay

prescribed accompanied (“obbligato”) recitative for scenes where much expression was

necessary. D’Alembert went so far as to declare, “Connoisseurs give the advantage to it

[obbligato recitative] over the aria without any doubt because the expression of the feeling is less

cluttered, simpler, and consequently truer.”122 Not all writers would have agreed with this

assessment of the recitative as simpler. Chastellux, in his “Unification of Poetry and Music,”

wrote that if he needed to portray multiple emotions, he would use recitative; for conveying a

120 Anonymous, “Fortsetzung über die Oper Piramo e Tisbe,” WNA 3, Anhang no. 19 (November 6, 1769): 150. The reviewer cites a passage from Piramo’s recitative “Ma s’avanza la notte” where the music turns to Eb minor and Bb minor for the words “Ombra cara amorosa.” The previous phrase had ended in Eb major, making the beginning of the new phrase in the parallel minor all the more striking. The modal shift thus provides an effective portrayal of the advancing night.

121 Anonymous, review of Alceste, WNA 3, no. 17 (October 24, 1768): 129.

122 D’Alembert, “Dritte Fortsetzung über die Freyheit der Musik,” WNA 3, no. 35 (February 27, 1769): 271–72.

single thought, however, he would create an aria.123

Despite all the emphasis on recitative, the WNA’s writers did leave room for forms of

music theater that included spoken dialogue. One critic, going by the initials L. M. N., discussed

the prevalence of spoken dialogue in English, French, and German opera. He noted that the

Italians use recitative to reduce the unnaturalness of the transition from regular speech to song.

While other nations had begun to imitate this, L. M. N. contends that the Italian language is

“infinitely better suited” to song.124 Concerns about the “unnaturalness” of speaking and singing

in opera appear frequently in eighteenth-century writings on musical aesthetics, reflecting a

broad spectrum of opinion. In Leipzig, Hiller showed no reservations about using spoken

dialogue in his own operas. He nevertheless gave space in the WNA to writers who thought

differently. In the February 27, 1769 issue, D’Alembert argued against including both spoken

and sung dialogue in the same opera, writing that mixing different types of declamation would

lack verisimilitude.125

Even though the recitative provoked much debate in the WNA, the aria was certainly not

neglected. Numerous opera reviews provided detailed discussions of particularly moving arias,

noting especially how text, melody, Harmonie, and instrumentation combined to portray vivid

emotions or stir the hearts of the audience. Blainville called the aria “a beauty set apart. It is a

pretty floral decoration, discovered gold, or if one prefers, the most splendid and prettiest thing

in an opera.”126 Rousseau, a longtime partisan of Italian operatic convention, felt that the aria

123 Chastellux, “Fortsetzung über die Vereinigung der Poesie und Musik,” WNA 4, no. 9 (February 26, 1770): 70.

124 L. M. N., “Schreiben über die komische Oper, aus dem Hannöverischen Magazin,” WNA 3, Anhang no. 12 (September 18, 1769): 92.

125 D’Alembert, “Dritte Fortsetzung über die Freyheit der Musik,” WNA 3, no. 35 (February 27, 1769): 273.

served as opera’s most crucial ingredient. In his Dictionnaire de Musique, excerpts of which

were reprinted in volume 3, he crowned the aria as the masterpiece, not only of opera, but of all

music. His paean to the aria deserves to be quoted in full, as it also displays Rousseau’s

descriptive and persuasive prose style:

The arias of operas are, so to speak, the canvas or the ground on which the imitating music is painted. The melody is the drawing, and the harmony is the coloring. All picturesque objects of beautiful nature, all studied feelings of the human heart are the models that the artist imitates. The attention, the interest, the charm of the ears, and the stirring of the heart are the end-goal of these imitations. A good and beautiful aria, an aria invented by genius and performed with taste, is the masterpiece of music. A beautiful voice arouses attention here, a beautiful accompaniment of the instruments makes it yet more charming, and passion seizes the soul unnoticed by means of the senses. One is pleased if one has heard a beautiful aria. The ear demands nothing further; it remains in the thoughts. One takes it with oneself; one repeats it where one wants.127

In addition to solo singing, the writers of the WNA also commented on ensembles.

Rousseau wrote in his Dictionnaire that duets must have parts that follow after one another in discussion, yet hang together in a coherent melody. This discussion must not have long periods, like the recitative, but consist of short questions, answers, and exclamations. In serious operas, duets are most appropriate for moments of separation, the return of an unfaithful lover, the stirring struggle between a mother and son, and all moments of grief. Rousseau also asserted that duets for like voices create the greatest effect, especially if they are sopranos, as their tone is more stirring. The voices should not sing together often, but when they do, they should sing in homophonic thirds and sixths. Moments of clashing dissonance, shouting tones, and orchestral

fortissimo should be sparse, and the audience’s hearts should be prepared for these events with

soft and fervent music. Finally, moments of stirring music should not last too long, because this

126 Blainville, “Betrachtung über die Musik,” WNA 1, no. 43 (April 21, 1767): 338.

127 Rousseau, “Aus Rousseau Dictionnaire,” WNA 3, no. 19 (November 7, 1768): 147.

would exceed the boundaries of nature and cease to stir.128 Regarding comic duets, Rousseau noted that these more often paired unlike voices: tenor or bass with a soprano or alto. While comic duets lack the stirring element of serious opera, they make up for it with changes, variety, and foolishness. Finally, comic duets should follow the same rules as serious duets with respect to dialogue, melodic naiveté, and simple harmony; Rousseau cited “Io conosco quegli occhetti” from La serva padrona as an example.129

Chastellux also offered some brief remarks on operatic ensembles. In “Unification of

Poetry and Music,” he recognized that interpersonal conflict was the key to dramatic interest and

designated the “passionate duet” (affektvolles Duet) as the “genre that is most fruitful, in view of

the action, the play, and the music for the opera.”130 Like Rousseau, he provided some typical

scenarios that invited the inclusion of a duet: “It is impossible in a piece that two loving people

should not appear that are tortured by blind jealousy or are inconsolable over a separation; a

pain-stricken mother and daughter who sigh over the sacrifice that the one presents and the other

has promised; an unhappy family that should lose its pillar and consolation.”131 Chastellux also

realized the dramatic potential of larger ensembles—not to mention the commercial possibility of publishing popular ensemble pieces for public consumption. He speculated, “If three or four of the speaking persons could come into a single situation, in this way one will produce one of the

128 Rousseau, “Fortsetzung aus Rousseau Dictionnaire,” WNA 3, Anhang no. 24 (December 11, 1769): 183–86.

129 Ibid., 187.

130 Chastellux, “Fortsetzung über die Vereinigung der Poesie und Musik,” WNA 4, no. 14 (April 2, 1770): 105.

131 Ibid.

greatest theatrical effects and call forth tears every time, as often as some amateurs gather

themselves around a piano to perform this work.”132

The chorus represented the least prestigious part of mid-eighteenth-century opera, but it

did merit mention in the WNA on a few occasions. In these few comments, we can gain some

understanding of the formal structure, function, and effect of the operatic chorus as it was

described by Hiller’s magazine. In the November 11, 1766 issue, the anonymous reviewer of

Agricola’s Achille in Sciro, perusing the score, praised a three-strophe chorus for the “sublime

effect” it must have made in the theater. The critic judged it “solemn and splendid.”133 Hiller

recommended a “full and fiery” chorus rather than solo pieces to close musical works. In his

remarks, Hiller also seems to assume that most, if not all, choruses will be strophic.134

Finally, the writers of the WNA also addressed the opening sinfonias and overtures.

“What is an overture?” asked D’Alembert in “The Freedom of Music.” “It is a musical piece,

with which an opera is begun, and which should prepare the hearer for that which he is about to

hear. The character of this piece must thus be varied in the things that it presents to the

audience.”135 D’Alembert went on to complain about the formulaic nature of Italian overtures:

“Why must an overture now always consist of an Allegro, Andante, and Minuet? The Minuet,

which according to its nature is specifically a dance, is especially in the wrong place.”136 He

132 Ibid.

133 Anonymous, review of Achille in Sciro, WNA 1, no. 20 (November 11, 1766): 156.

134 Hiller, “Nachricht von der comischen Oper Lisuart und Dariolette,” WNA 1, no. 33 (February 10, 1767): 256.

135 D’Alembert, “Sechste Fortsetzung über die Freyheit der Musik,” WNA 3, no. 38 (March 20, 1769): 298.

136 Ibid.

called for the overture to reflect the content and character of the first scene, and he provided

examples by Rameau—Zaïs, Naïs, Platée, and Pigmalion—that accomplished this task.

Algorotti also thought that overtures tended to sound too much alike—always “two

Allegros and a Grave,” in his description. Like D’Alembert, he felt that overtures needed a

stronger connection to the ensuing drama:

Their main purpose is to announce the plot in a certain way and to prepare the hearers for the impression of the affects that will arise from the rest of the remaining drama. . . . Today’s symphonies, however, are regarded as a thing that does not belong to the drama at all. Rather they are trumpet and timpani pieces with which one must temporarily capture and numb the ears of the listeners.137

Algorotti compared contemporary overtures to pretentious exordiums that some speakers attach

to the beginning of all their speeches.

Some overtures did not simply set the mood for the first scene; they provided a brief musical synopsis of the entire drama. The critic who reviewed Hasse’s Piramo e Tisbe for the

October 30, 1769 issue wrote at length about the overture because he was so impressed by the

way it encapsulated the tragedy. It began with a serious movement in Bb major, then continued

with an Allegro featuring some counterpoint. Next, an Andante in F major depicted the two

young lovers, its peaceful atmosphere disturbed occasionally by musical symbols for wailing and

consoling. The third movement ended the overture with a proud imperiousness that reflected the

father in the story. The reviewer wrote that it was “as if Hasse had wanted to paint the entire

story in the sinfonia.”138 A cadence in the starting key of Bb major sounded the formal conclusion to the overture, but the critic discovered that Hasse had saved a final surprise: a six-

measure transition to G minor preparing the way tonally for Tisbe’s opening cavatina. Few of the

137 Algorotti, “Fortsetzung des Versuchs über die musikalische Oper,” WNA 3, no. 51 (June 19, 1769), 396.

138 Anonymous, review of Piramo e Tisbe, WNA 3, Anhang no. 18 (October 30, 1769): 135.

opera reviews in the WNA devoted so much space to the overture/sinfonia as this one did. The

commentary offers proof of its novelty. In its emotional variety, its relevance to the plot, and its

final transition, this must have seemed like the perfect overture.

Captivating drama, beautiful poetry, and stirring music may be essential components of

any opera, but the quality of a work’s performance often determines whether it translates its

dramatic potential into box-office success. Naturally, the writers of the WNA debated the

defining characteristics of a “good performance.” Several called for strong singing combined

with convincing acting. Rousseau wrote, “It is not enough for an actor of the opera to be an

excellent singer if he is not also an excellent pantomimer. . . . If he forgets for a moment the

person that he is playing, and they [the spectators] become aware of him as a singer, they will see

him as nothing more than a musician on the stage. He is no longer an actor.”139 Algorotti claimed

that a good composition in itself is insufficient to produce a good effect; much depends on the

manner in which the singer presents it. He turned to a military metaphor to explain the

relationship between composer and performers, comparing the composer to a general who must

train his soldiers for battle.140 Algorotti also complained about the stances, movements, facial

expressions, and gesticulations of Italian singers, calling all of them poor.141 Perhaps this low

state of affairs inspired his curious metaphor that teaching singers to act was like going to war.

German-speaking writers also showed a concern for strong singing and acting. A reviewer known as R. S. provided a detailed description of the appearance and abilities of several actors and actresses taking part in a performance at Gotha. While most of his comments

139 Rousseau, “Aus Rousseau Dictionnaire,” WNA 3, no. 19 (November 7, 1768): 146.

140 Algorotti, “Fortsetzung des Versuchs über die musikalische Oper,” WNA 3, Anhang no. 1 (July 3, 1769): 2.

141 Ibid., 3.

80 addressed singing, he noted which of the performers possessed strong action. His favorite was

Ernst Christoph Dreschler, referred to as “the best singer and tenor of our time.” Dreschler’s acting, according to R. S., was “good and masterly; it is natural without everything artificially pleasing and engaging.”142 Hiller displayed a concern for performance in his essay on the musical recital. He advised singers to perform recitative with great distinctness so that the listeners have time to grasp the mental picture. They should also vary their voices according to the emotion they present, the other actors on stage, and the location in the plot.143 Finally, the anonymous reviewer of Gluck’s Alceste, staged in Vienna, recognized the potential for opera reform to improve the quality of operatic acting. Writing in the October 24, 1768 issue, he criticized the older practice of stationary singers delivering virtuosic vocal parts at the expense of realistic acting, and he emphasized that music and acting must complement each other. The reviewer believed that Gluck’s “simple style” could more capably develop the opera singer- actor.144

As with poetry and music, an aesthetic of naturalism and simplicity governed performance. Hiller recommended that performers become like a child who “tells a story with all natural charms and beauties of utterance.”145 To this end, he suggested that singers not rush through fermatas or cadenzas, as these display the charms of the composer and please the listeners. He also encouraged singers to study their texts, and give to each word and syllable the correct accent and emphasis. However, the performance should not become mechanical; Hiller wrote that singers should give each part of a song a strong expression. Finally, he recommended

142 R. S., review of Xindo riconosciuto, WNA 1, no. 9 (August 25, 1766): 67.

143 Hiller, “Anmerkungen über den musikalischen Vortrag,” WNA 1, no. 22 (November 25, 1766): 167–69.

144 Anonymous, review of Alceste, WNA 3, no. 17 (October 24, 1768): 129–33.

145 Hiller, “Fortsetzung der Anmerkungen über den Vortrag,” WNA 2, no. 12 (September 21, 1767): 91.

solemn pauses after lofty thoughts, and occasional resting points for effect and understanding.

Such thorough preparation may seem anything but natural and childlike, but Hiller insisted, “It is

unbelievable how advantageous and comfortable such an unforced, full, and considered

performance is, and indeed for all musicians.”146 How could one learn the natural, childlike

style? Hiller answered this question in the October 12, 1767 issue: “To express oneself in the

lightest and most natural type of speech, both in the tone of voice and in the manner of speaking,

one learns from observations of common life.”147 Hiller especially recommended observing

musicians, who must produce strength, expression, facility, and purity through their voices,

fingers, tongues and bows. Finally, one should study works that are “full of taste and feeling”

(voll Geschmack und Empfindung).

The WNA’s other contributors showed a similar concern for naturalistic performance. In

the October 31, 1768 issue, the reviewer of Alceste in Vienna congratulated Madame Bernasconi,

playing the title role, for her truthful, sensitive, and compassionate performance: “The gestures

of Bernasconi follow only the movements of the heart, and her heart leads them constantly to the

most appropriate and, not infrequently, to the finest expression.”148 He then described in vivid

detail her portrayal of Alceste’s separation from her children. The reviewer curiously noted

another aspect of Bernasconi’s naturalism: she stayed in character when other characters were

singing. Of others, he complained about their tendency to lose themselves in the audience’s

attention: “Generally the female singers [Sängerinnen], as soon as their arias are over, are

146 Ibid.

147 Hiller, “Fortsetzung der Anmerkungen über den musikalischen Vortrag,” WNA 2, no. 15 (October 12, 1767): 117.

148 Anonymous, review of Alceste, WNA 3, no. 18 (October 31, 1768): 135.

completely out of the scene: their eyes either hunt after new prey or confer with those already in

their nets.”149

Given the mid-eighteenth-century equation of simplicity with naturalness, it is

unsurprising that virtuosic performance would come to be seen as artificial and unnatural. The

anonymous reviewer of Alceste in Vienna questioned the benefit of long fermatas, deciding that

“the noble charms of feeling, the sensuous pleasure of hearing” were butchered by a virtuosic

display of “mechanical skills.”150 Italian opera, in particular, came in for harsh criticism by the

WNA’s writers. D’Alembert claimed that the Italians added too much virtuosity; their cadenzas

came “at the cost of taste and nature.”151 On the other hand, the writings of the WNA did not entirely rule out improvisation. Algorotti criticized the French for not allowing any improvisation at all, a practice he found boring.152 Only a few singers, in his estimation,

possessed the necessary taste to find the correct balance.

Resistance to vocal virtuosity coincided in the mid-eighteenth century with an increasing

rejection of the use of castrati in opera. These had appeared on Leipzig’s stages in previous

decades, but public opinion was certainly turning against them by the late 1760s, and the WNA

reflected this trend. In the March 31, 1767 issue, Blainville’s “Observations on Music” ridiculed

the practice of having Julius Caesar sing like a choirboy.153 L’Abbé Richard’s “Brief Report on

the Circumstances of Music in Italy,” reprinted in the next volume, expressed bafflement over

their popularity; the author claimed that the feelings of his heart were more readily stirred by the

149 Ibid., 136.

150 Anonymous, review of Alceste, WNA 3, no. 17 (October 24, 1768): 129.

151 D’Alembert, “Fünfte Fortsetzung über die Freyheit der Musik,” WNA 3, no. 37 (March 3, 1769): 288.

152 Ibid.

153 Blainville, “Betrachtungen über die Musik,” WNA 1, no. 40 (March 31, 1767): 310.

voices of women and boys.154 Algorotti piled on, characterizing the music of his homeland as a disharmonious mess and suggesting that someone “must bring order to the musical kingdom and subject the virtuosos [i.e., castrati] to discipline and authority.”155 In a later issue, Algorotti

added that Italian virtuosos make serious music into a “trifling, sugar-sweet absurdity.”156 Hiller

himself weighed in on the matter in the journal’s third volume. Comparing German and Italian

singers in the August 22, 1768 issue, he wrote:

We would set against them [the Italians], however, a sufficient number of good tenor voices, and it is certain that a good tenor is always to be prized over the best soprano. These voices would also lend themselves far better to the majority of operatic roles than any piping castrato voice. How much honor for the German people if they were able to show to the musical world that one does not have to commit cruelties against human nature in order to have beautiful song!157

Hiller’s dream of tenors bringing glory to the German people points to another issue

related to operatic performance in Leipzig: the current inadequacies of German singers.

Improving this state of affairs remained one of Hiller’s primary goals throughout his career, and

its importance to him can be seen in the numerous musical excerpts published in the WNA for amateurs and children. While he felt that the German-speaking lands possessed a strong tradition in sacred music, he acknowledged Italian superiority in other genres. Why the disparity? In the

February 1, 1768 issue, Hiller diagnosed the problem while commenting on L’Abbé de

Lacassagne’s “General Treatise of the Elements of Song.” Lacassagne had written, “To sing well, one must be able to declaim well because the song is nothing more than a melodic

154 Richard, “Fortsetzung der Nachrichten von der Beschaffenheit der Musik in Italien,” WNA 2, no. 24 (December 14, 1767): 185.

155 Algorotti, “Versuch über die musikalische Oper,” WNA 3, no. 50 (June 12, 1769): 388.

156 Algorotti, “Fortsetzung des Versuchs über die musikalische Oper,” WNA 3, Anhang no. 1 (July 3, 1769): 5.

157 Hiller, “Sechste Fortsetzung des Entwurfs einer musikalischen Bibliothek,” WNA 3, no. 8 (August 22, 1768): 60.

declamation that is yet more beautiful through the harmony.”158 Hiller went on, speculating,

“Then why does the German language often sound so terrible if it is sung? Certainly for no other

reason than because the singer does not know how to declaim it.”159 A few months later, he went

a step further and blamed the poor quality of declamation on a lack of institutions for singing.160

If the Germans possessed as many singing schools as Italy, they would produce the fine tenors

that Hiller desired. Nevertheless, he remained optimistic about the future of German song. In the

February 13, 1769 issue, he noted in an annotation that “good song” was spreading more and

more in Germany while in Italy it seemed to be growing rarer.161

Of the five categories of aesthetic prescriptions presented in this chapter, the WNA’s discussion of national style stands somewhat apart from its concerns with drama, poetry, music, and performance. National conventions could intersect with all of the other categories, and eighteenth-century critics often took great care to distinguish between national artistic styles as a way of defining themselves and others. In the German-speaking territories, positioned as they were beside two culturally dominant neighbors in France and Italy, self-definition achieved an even greater urgency. When Hiller asked, “Why do we have yet no German opera?” (Warum haben wir noch keine deutsche Oper?), he echoed a question that had been repeatedly voiced in

German operatic criticism. In the eighteenth century, German writers regularly assessed the distance between their own operatic works and the foreign works upon which they were modeled, and often concluded that the German works had insufficiently established their artistic

158 Lacassagne, “Traité général des élémens du chant,” WNA 2, no. 31 (February 1, 1768): 239.

159 Hiller, commentary on “Traité général des élémens du chant,” WNA 2, no. 31 (February 1, 1768): 239.

160 Hiller, “Sechste Fortsetzung des Entwurfs einer musikalischen Bibliothek,” WNA 3, no. 8 (August, 22, 1768): 60.

161 Hiller, commentary on “Fortsetzung von der Freyheit der Musik, vom Herrn D’Alembert,” WNA 3, no. 33 (February 13, 1769): 254.

independence. Thus, Hiller’s question reappears in various forms throughout the WNA. And while several writers debated the virtues and drawbacks of various national styles, Hiller especially seemed to wrestle with the topic.

“Why do they not prefer to sing German in German lands and before German ears? Why do we have yet no German opera? Why do the most excellent German composers concern themselves with Italian texts?”162 With these insistent questions, Hiller expressed his most ardent

plea for a distinctively national operatic style. Over the course of the WNA, he identified several causes for its neglect. In the February 10, 1767 issue, he indicted national prejudice:

Where lies the blame? Certainly no further than that the genius of the Germans is not respected enough, not pulled out and encouraged enough. The Italians and their language have seized the highest courts in Germany and their singing stages, and if also at some courts a German genius has obtained the luck to clothe himself with the glory of the position of Kapellmeister, thus always the fewest of his works of the German language stand in good stead.163

In multiple articles, Hiller also pointed to the lack of good German poets and singers.164 As

mentioned above, he attributed the lack of good singers to the lack of singing schools compared

to Italy.

Despite this criticism, Hiller’s outlook never descended into pessimism about the future

of German opera. In the August 29, 1768 issue, he observed, “The small attempts, which have been recently done at the Leipzig theater with Singspiels . . . serve at best to display the possibility of better and more complete operas.”165 Just over a year later, L. M. N. testified to the

162 Hiller, “Sechste Fortsetzung des Entwurfs einer musikalischen Bibliothek,” WNA 3, no. 8 (August, 22, 1768): 59.

163 Hiller, “Nachricht von der comischen Oper Lisuart und Dariolette,” WNA 1, no. 33 (February 10, 1767): 253.

164 Hiller, “Nachricht von der comischen Oper Lisuart und Dariolette, WNA 1, no. 33 (February 10, 1767): 253–55; and Hiller, “Sechste Fortsetzung des Entwurfs einer musikalischen Bibliothek,” WNA 3, no. 8 (August 22, 1768): 59–60.

significance of the Leipzig experiments. He wrote that the Germans had not had comic opera for

long, but he noted the great potential found in the success of Weisse and Hiller.166 Such

statements reflect a positivity that German opera was now well on its way to rebirth after the

Seven Years’ War, and they also affirm the centrality of Leipzig in this process. As for Hiller, he

suggested that the cultivation of German opera could stir the hearts of the people not only to a

contemplation of beauty but also to nationalistic feelings. Opera in a country’s own language, he

wrote wistfully, was “a wish, whose performance would bring certain honor to the patriotic

attitudes of a people and could be performed nowhere sooner and more easily than among the

Germans, if only . . . .”167

Besides serving as a platform for Hiller to issue his calls for German opera, the WNA also

offered commentary on other national styles. For instance, an article from the Gazetin de

Bruxelles, reprinted on December 21, 1767, referred to a Pergolesi school in Italy, Lully and

Rameau schools in France, and a Handel school in England. The anonymous author judged the

Pergolesi school to hold the first rank because “Pergolesi exceeds the others through a simplicity whose particular character it is to set the passions in motion.”168 He asserted that French music

tends to be serious, slow, and sad. Of English music, the writer mentioned the importance of

Purcell and his eclipse by Handel but unfortunately offered no general descriptions of English

music.

165 Hiller, “Siebende Fortsetzung des Entwurfs einer musikalischen Bibliothek,” WNA 3, no. 9 (August, 29, 1768): 68.

166 L. M. N., “Schreiben über die komische Oper, aus dem Hannöverischen Magazin,” WNA 3, Anhang no. 12 (September 18, 1769): 93.

167 Hiller, commentary on “Zweyte Fortsetzung über die Freyheit der Musik, vom Herrn D’Alembert,” WNA 3, no. 34 (February 20, 1769): 267.

168 Anonymous, “Schreiben über die verschiedenen Schulen der Musik,” WNA 2, no. 25 (December 21, 1767): 193.

Italian and French music received the most attention among the WNA’s writers, with

Italian music generally the more highly praised of the two, even among French writers. The

broad sampling of articles thus allowed German music enthusiasts to remain abreast of the

volleys still being fired in the long-running querelle des bouffons. Regarding Italian music,

writers regularly asserted Italian superiority in comic opera. Blainville attributed their success in

this genre to the fact that their songs were more cheerful.169 Chastellux identified phrase periodicity as another distinguishing characteristic of the Italian style. On several occasions in his “Essay on the Union of Poetry and Music,” he commended its presence in Italian music and criticized its omission from the French.170 When Italian music fared poorly alongside the French,

it was usually for its limited, string-dominated orchestration. For example, one writer, reviewing

Philidor’s Le Sorcier at Gotha, referred to one particular aria as “completely Italian, although the

accompaniment of the instruments establishes something entirely different than is commonly

maintained in the Italian arias. The reader will see in it as much, if we say to them that besides

the usual instruments, still a concerted oboe, a horn, and a bassoon have been introduced.”171

While Italian music was usually described as cheerful or naïve, French music was

criticized for being too serious and ponderous. Blainville wrote that French songs, “even in the

most cheerful moments, are serious.”172 D’Alembert contended that French recitative was sung

much more slowly in the mid-eighteenth century than in Lully’s day, and this presentation made

169 Blainville, “Betrachtung über die Musik,” WNA 1, no. 47 (May 19, 1767): 364.

170 See for examples the articles reprinted on June 8, 1767 (WNA 1, no. 50); February 26, 1770 (WNA 4, no. 9); March 5, 1770 (WNA 4, no. 10); and April 2, 1770 (WNA 4, no. 14).

171 Anonymous, “Fortsetzung von der französischen Oper Le Sorcier,” WNA 1, no. 13 (September 23, 1766): 101.

172 Blainville, “Betrachtung über die Musik,” WNA 1, no. 47 (May 19, 1767): 364.

it “unbearably boring.”173 Hiller, perhaps a bit more objective in his views as a bystander to the

querelle, struck a more even balance in his commentary on French opera. He explained that the

French are becoming more known, especially to the Germans, through various publications of

their comic operas. He also singled out three composers, François-André Danican Philidor,

Pierre-Alexandre Monsigny, and Egidio Duni, who have, “in the choice of instruments to support

the expression and in the diligent working out of the accompaniments, certain obvious

advantages over the Italian composers.”174 Hiller was also likely the author of an issue that

praised French programmaticism. In the September 16, 1766 issue, he critiqued a performance in

Gotha of Philidor’s Le Sorcier and described in vivid detail the composer’s portrayal of a violent

storm at sea. After narrating the harrowing events in the scene, he wrote: “Many an Italian

composer should have become angry enough to present these manifold and difficult-to-achieve

images of nature in notes. And actually this is the field wherein the French composers were very

often superior to the Italian.”175 If the French could not match the Italians in cheerful tone or

good song, at least some writers gave them the edge in orchestration and lively musical story-

telling.

If Italian and French music represented two ends of an operatic spectrum, where did

German music fall? Did German opera bear a closer resemblance to one or the other? Should it

attempt to be like one or the other? Should it borrow characteristics of both? The writers of the

WNA offered opinions on all of these questions. The August 19, 1766 issue reprinted a short

173 D’Alembert, “Vierte Fortsetzung über die Freyheit der Musik,” WNA 3, no. 36 (March 6, 1769): 278.

174 Hiller, “Siebende Fortsetzung des Entwurfs einer musikalischen Bibliothek,” WNA 3, no. 9 (August 29, 1768): 66. Duni was, in fact, born in Matera, in southern Italy. He studied in Naples but settled in Paris in the late 1750s, remaining there until his death in 1775. Hiller must have viewed Duni’s work as sufficiently French to separate him from “the Italian composers.”

175 Anonymous, review of Le Sorcier, WNA 1, no. 12 (September 16, 1766): 96.

article, “Discussion of Musical Taste,” that had originally appeared in the Hamburg journal

Unterhaltungen. In it, the author, after defining musical taste, compared Italian, French, and

German tastes, and called the German taste a mixture of the other two.176 Hiller agreed that

German music represented a mixture, but in his “Report on Lisuart und Dariolette,” he wrote

that it more closely coincided with the Italian style.177 This close connection to Italian music,

however, sometimes bred resentment among some of the WNA’s German critics about Europe’s

lack of recognition for German music. Hiller, despite all his admiration for Hasse’s Italianate

style, chafed at the priority given to Italian music, even among his countrymen. In the January 6,

1767 issue, he noted the prejudice that has “always stood in the way of the Germans” and leaned

toward Italian taste.178 Over a year later, Hiller addressed the topic again, critiquing the idea that all music “must be beautiful if made by an Italian and bad if made by a German.”179

Despite all the talk about differentiating national styles, there emerged a few calls to look

for universalities. When Rousseau claimed in his essay on “Expression” that “the German always

screams out a high note if he is angry; the Italian, however, modulates his voice in a thousand

ways,” Hiller objected, asking: “Should this observation not be just as true and correct as those

that Herr Rousseau has made? It is our rule that the natural expression of the passions among all

people is one.”180 The idea of a common expression provided a theoretical basis for combining

176 Anonymous, “Abhandlung vom musikalischen Geschmacke,” WNA 1, no. 8 (August 19, 1766): 63. Johann Joachim Quantz had already come to the same conclusion in his Versuch einer Anweisung die Flöte traversiere zu spielen (1752).

177 Hiller, “Nachricht von der comischen Oper Lisuart und Dariolette,” WNA 1, no. 33 (February 10, 1767): 257.

178 Hiller, review of Lisuart und Dariolette, WNA 1, no. 28 (Janaury 6, 1767): 219.

179 Hiller, “Zehnte Fortsetzung des Entwurfs einer musikalischen Bibliothek,” WNA 3, no. 14 (October 3, 1768): 108.

national styles. At the time of the WNA, few critics suggested this as an ideal.181 Most promoted

the music of one nation or another, debating the virtues of Pergolesi or Rameau, but few seem to

have thought that a composer might deliberately cultivate a truly international style. One

anonymous writer, however, did foresee this possibility. In a review of Gluck’s Alceste,

appearing in the October 24, 1768 issue, the critic said of the composer: “His imagination is so

tremendous that the barriers of all national styles are too narrow for him. He has made a music

that is his own out of the Italian, out of the French, out of the music of all people. Furthermore,

he has found in nature all the tones of true expression and taken possession of them.”182 While neither Hiller nor any other writer in the WNA suggested that cosmopolitanism might itself become the German style, we can see the idea here beginning to take root.

Conclusion

The four volumes of the WNA offer a substantial commentary on opera. Yet despite many quibbles over various issues, the critical collective articulated many of the same basic principles regarding opera. They called for a thoughtful combination of the arts; naturalism and simplicity in plot, dialogue, and music; and a vivid, heart-stirring emotional expression. Critics regarded

Metastasio as the ideal poetic model and argued that poets should have a feeling for music. They found the greatest musical inspiration also in Italy, especially in the works of Pergolesi, whose expressive galant melodic style seemed to point the way to greater naturalism in music.

180 Hiller, commentary on “Fortsetzung über den musikalischen Ausdruck,” WNA 4, no. 5 (January 29, 1770): 36.

181 However, the idea of a national synthesis was in the air, as shown in François Couperin’s ideal of les goûts-réünis.

182 Anonymous, review of Alceste, WNA 3, no. 17 (October 24, 1768): 128.

Hiller made an effort in the WNA to introduce readers to current European thinking on

opera. Yet his inclusion of essays from several non-German writers highlights the relative lack of contribution from native critics. As Tables 1–4 have shown, the journal did not publish many operatic articles by German writers besides Hiller’s own. The writings of Johann Kirnberger and

Daniel Schiebeler each appear in only one article, and the anonymous reviews are likely by

Hiller or possibly Neefe. In the next chapter, which examines other periodicals and writings circulating through Leipzig, German writers will constitute a much stronger presence.

Chapter 3

Other Writings on Opera

Besides the Wöchentliche Nachrichten und Anmerkungen, die Musik betreffend, a number of other writings circulated through Leipzig in the late 1760s and early 1770s, providing additional viewpoints on what constituted good opera. Because the contents of Hiller’s journal

were subject to his own editorial discretion, the writings presented in this chapter will offer a

broader view of German aesthetic opinion. This chapter will first introduce these writings and

some of the motivations of their authors. I will then discuss some of the authors’ aesthetic

prescriptions for German opera. In the final section, I will briefly consider what conclusions can

be drawn by combining and summarizing the prescriptions presented in chapters 2 and 3.

The Journals and Their Writers

The most widely circulated source on German opera—and a host of other subjects—

during the late eighteenth century was the Allgemeine deutsche Bibliothek (hereafter AdB).

Appearing in Berlin in 1765, the journal included 118 volumes and a variety of supplements

(Anhänge) by the end of its run in 1796. The AdB was the foremost journal of the German

Enlightenment, and in keeping with the intellectually curious spirit of the times, it sought to educate the public on an impressive array of issues: theology and philosophy, economics and finance, science, medicine, mathematics, education, law, military studies, and fine arts.

The contents of the AdB and its enlightened perspective were guided by the journal’s editor, Friedrich Nicolai (1733–1811), who contributed some of the articles on opera. Nicolai opposed the dominance of French literature in the German lands and championed the work of

Klopstock, Lessing, Mendelssohn, and Wieland. Yet Nicolai was not a proponent of all German

writers; he remained critical of Goethe, Herder, and others in the budding Romantic movement.1

Nicolai outlined his purposes for the AdB in the preface (Vorbericht) to the periodical’s first

issue in 1765. In addition to acquainting German readers with the latest original German

writings, Nicolai wanted the AdB to bring to the public’s attention books that would otherwise

remain unnoticed outside their province of publication. He intended for the AdB to connect

German readers, and in doing so, Nicolai helped to foster the idea of a German nation, united at

least through their shared cultural interests and readership.

The AdB’s principal music reviewer from the journal’s beginning in 1765 until shortly

before his death was Johann Friedrich Agricola (1720–74), who came with significant

credentials. In 1738 he had moved from his birthplace in Dobitschen to Leipzig, where he had

studied law at the university and music with Johann Sebastian Bach. Three years later, Agricola

had gone to Berlin, beginning studies with Johann Joachim Quantz and joining a musical circle

that included Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach and Carl Heinrich Graun. Frederick the Great had

named Agricola a court composer in 1751, and upon the death of Graun in 1759, Agricola had

been appointed musical director of the Opera. In addition to his accomplishments as a composer,

Agricola, like Hiller, had also gained a reputation for vocal pedagogy, and Burney called him

“the best singing master in Germany.”2

Perusing Agricola’s writings for the AdB, the reader will notice certain traits that emerge with striking clarity. Agricola tended to be very conservative in his musical tastes. As an

Italianized opera composer influenced by the serious works of Hasse and Graun, he was nevertheless resistant to new Italian comic operas. In 1768 he bemoaned that this shift from

1 Grove Music Online, s.v. “Friedrich Nicolai,” by Howard Serwer, accessed November 24, 2015, http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/.

2 Charles Burney, The Present State of Music in Germany, The Netherlands, and United Provinces, 2nd ed. (London, 1775; repr., New York: Broude Brothers, 1969), 91–92.

serious to comic constituted a sign that music was sliding from its elevated and noble purpose.3

Agricola’s rhetoric also struck a distinctly nationalistic tone, despite the debt that his own style

owed to Italy. Mary Sue Morrow has written on Agricola’s role in a review collective that often

poured scorn on Italian instrumental works in order to elevate German music by comparison.4

Not surprisingly, he brought the same bias to his operatic reviews. Finally, Agricola showed

himself to be a champion of music criticism. In his review of Hiller’s WNA, he commented on

the need to establish a study of music that parallels the study of other arts.5 In a later issue, after

the WNA had been discontinued, Agricola regretted its cancelation and expressed his wish that it might be renewed with more help.6

A second periodical that was read in Leipzig was the Hamburg-based Unterhaltungen.

Like many journals of its time, Unterhaltungen lasted only a few years, in this case, 1766–70.

During this five-year span, the publisher, Michael Christian Bock, produced a total of ten volumes, with each volume covering six months of the year. Unterhaltungen adopted a narrower focus than the AdB and addressed only the arts: music, theater, painting, and literature. Within its musical offerings, the journal provided advertisements and reviews of performances, copies of opera librettos, piano/vocal arrangements of opera arias, and like the WNA, reprints of philosophical treatises on music, including writings by Metastasio, Quantz, and Rousseau.

3 Johann Friedrich Agricola, review of Wöchentliche Nachrichten und Anmerkungen die Musik betreffend, AdB 7, no. 2 (1768): 118.

4 Mary Sue Morrow, German Music Criticism in the Late Eighteenth Century (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997). See especially pages 47–53 for Morrow’s description of German prejudice toward Italian compositions. Her discussion of how German critics sometimes labeled the Italian style as “comic” (i.e., frivolous) and opposed to their own “serious” style (p. 53) adds another layer of meaning to Agricola’s complaint in AdB 7, no. 2 about the vogue for new Italian comic operas.

5 Agricola, review of WNA, AdB 7, no. 2 (1768): 114.

6 Agricola, review of Wöchentliche Nachrichten und Anmerkungen die Musik betreffend 2–4, AdB 23, no. 1 (1774): 252.

A third important source for understanding the operas performed in Leipzig is Der teutsche Merkur (hereafter TM), published in quarterly installments in Weimar from 1773 to

1789 by Christoph Martin Wieland (1733–1813). One of the most respected writers of his day,

Wieland was an accomplished poet, dramatist, and librettist. He moved to Weimar in 1772 to tutor the young dukes, Karl August and Konstantin, sons of Anna Amalia. Within the vibrant intellectual climate of Weimar’s enlightened court, Wieland produced works of neoclassical dramatic poetry, including Alceste (1773) and Die Wahl des Herkules (1773), both set to music by Anton Schweitzer.

Inspired by the Mercure de France, Wieland intended the TM to inform its readers about a variety of subjects. In this respect, it bears resemblance to the AdB, although the TM gives far greater priority to literary topics. Like the AdB and Unterhaltungen, the TM solicited contributions from a number of writers. Its most relevant writings on aesthetics and opera, however, come from Wieland himself. In a series of articles published in 1773 and 1775, he expressed his interest in the establishment of German musical drama. His “Briefe an einen

Freund über das deutsche Singspiel, Alceste” (1773), “Über einige ältere teutsche Singspiele”

(1773), and “Versuch über das teutsche Singspiel” (1775) contain his most extensive and significant thoughts on the new genre. Because Wieland published these essays around the time he was working on his libretto for Alceste, they offer valuable explanations regarding his aesthetics.

A few other writers offer further viewpoints on contemporary German opera that should also be considered. Christian Felix Weisse (1726–1804) was Hiller’s most frequent librettist and therefore the most important librettist for German opera at this time. The preface (Vorrede) to his

Komische Opern (1768) is brief, but it provides valuable insights about Weisse’s justification for comic opera and how he shaped his librettos for the German stage.

Johann Friedrich Reichardt (1752–1814) was still a young man when he began traveling northern Germany as a violinist and keyboard player. In the early 1770s, he came to Leipzig, met

Hiller, and began to study his operas and attend his concerts. As a result of his travels, Reichardt became well acquainted with operatic activities in Saxony.7 He called Hiller the favorite

composer of the nation, placed Ernst Wilhelm Wolf second to Hiller, and noted the emerging

talent of Hiller’s student Christian Gottlob Neefe.8 Reichardt was also an active and opinionated

critic, even from a young age. Like Agricola, whom he eventually followed as a reviewer for the

AdB, Reichardt was strongly nationalistic, although he was more receptive to the galant style of his day. Among his pre-1775 writings on opera, we find the treatises Über die deutsche komische

Oper and Briefe eines aufmerksamen Reisenden, die Musik betreffend, both from 1774.9 The

former presents a movement-by-movement descriptive analysis of Hiller’s Die Jagd with the aim

of providing an example for novice opera composers. Because of its pedagogical nature, this

treatise can provide aesthetic prescriptions on a number of issues. The latter, Reichardt’s letters

recounting his travels through Prussia, Saxony, and Bohemia, touches on many of the same

issues as the first treatise, but it discusses additional composers and works. Because working

musicians often did not write extensively about their aesthetic preferences, Reichardt’s writings

represent an important contribution to this study.

7 During this time, Reichardt also tried his hand at his first operatic works, settings of Johann Benjamin Michaelis’s Amors Guckkasten and Johann Christian Bock’s Hänschen und Gretchen, both composed in 1772. Bauman speculates that neither was ever performed. Bauman, North German Opera in the Age of Goethe (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985), 68.

8 Johann Reichardt, Briefe eines aufmerksamen Reisenden, die Musik betreffend (Frankfurt & Leipzig, 1774), 156–58.

9 Reichardt published a second volume of Briefe eines aufmerksamen Reisenden, die Musik betreffend in 1776.

Aesthetic Prescriptions for Opera

As in the pages of the WNA, the authors of other writings expressed unanimous interest in uniting the various arts in opera, making the operatic performance a kind of Gesamtkunstwerk,

though of course no one yet coined that particular term. Rousseau’s work, which we encountered

frequently in the final two volumes of the WNA, circulated through other periodicals as well and

advanced the Gesamtkunstwerk ideal. In volume 6 of Unterhaltungen, an excerpt translated from

his Dictionnaire de musique speaks to the desire to unite multiple arts in opera: “Opera is a

dramatic and lyrical play in which one, in the presentation of an expressive plot, seeks to unite

all charms of the beautiful arts, and to bring forth participation and deception through the help of

pleasant feelings.”10 Rousseau also described how these arts work together: “The parts that make

up an opera are the poem, music, and the decoration. Poetry speaks to reason, music speaks to

the ear, painting to the eyes, and all of these unite themselves to move the heart and bring forth

through various senses the identical impression in the same.”11

Writers in other journals also advocated for artistic unity in opera. Readers of the AdB

commended Dr. John Brown’s suggestion in his “Observations on Poetry and Music” that

connecting these two arts would return them to their most noble purpose.12 In the TM Wieland

quoted Algorotti, who wrote that “in opera, poetry, music, declamation, dance, and painting must

unite all of their most attractive charms in order to flatter the senses, delight the heart, and to

charm the soul through the most pleasant deception.”13 He further asserted that a lack of concord

10 Jean-Jacques Rousseau, “Von der Oper,” Unterhaltungen 6 (1768): 282.

11 Ibid.

12 F. C. Lichtenburg, review of Dr. John Brown’s “Betrachtungen über die Poesie und Musik,” AdB 11, no. 1 (1770): 256.

13 Christoph Martin Wieland, “Versuch über das Teutsche Singspiel,” TM 3 (1775): 67.

among poet, composer, actor, and decorator had led to the degradation of contemporary opera.

Because their collaborations produced an unharmonious mixture of arts, the opera became not a

“masterpiece of human ingenuity” but a “grotesque monster.”14 Remembering that Brown’s and

Algorotti’s work also appeared in the WNA, we can see that their writings on artistic unity in

opera circulated widely in north German critical circles.

While critics could agree that opera should unite the arts, they disagreed on how they

should be connected. Certainly not all viewed poetry and music as equally important partners in

opera. Perhaps not surprisingly, librettists often came down on the side of poetry. The second

volume of Unterhaltungen printed an essay by Metastasio, translated as “Schreiben über die

musikalische Poesie,” in which the poet argued, “If music wants priority over poetry, then it

damages poetry and itself.”15 He also felt that poetry possessed a self-sufficiency that music lacked: “My pieces are infinitely better received all over Italy if they are simply declaimed than if they are sung in the opera theater. Place just once the best music without its text to just this test. Do you think it will endure?” Metastsio thus regarded the showy arias of his day as a threat to poetry’s rightful dominance: “Now one hears on the stage nothing but Arien di Bravura, and through them, music prompts the distortion of the piece and the decay of the stage.” He saw only one solution: music, a “seditious slavegirl” in Metastasio’s colonial personification, must “either subject herself anew to the laws of her mistress, who knows how to give her so much grace and beauty, or she must completely separate and, in the future, content herself with her own melody.

Music might then be appropriate for concerts or a ballet, but it should not mix with the things of the theater.”

14 Ibid., 70.

15 All quotations in this paragraph are from Pietro Metastsio, “Schreiben über die musikalische Poesie,” Unterhaltungen 2 (1766): 55–57.

Wieland also held music subordinate to poetry. Remarking on his collaboration with

Schweitzer on Alceste, Wieland described the composer’s assistance: “Others regard the poet

merely as their henchman; he as his commander. He knows to be silent where the poet alone

must speak, but where that one is at the limits of his art, there he rushes with all of his powers to

help. . . . He loses himself in his poet; he becomes with him one person, a genius. A heart

appears to enliven them both.”16 (One wonders if Schweitzer himself would have described their

relationship in this way.) Wieland drew on Algorotti again for support, citing his directive that

music and poetry must be sisters and unite together, but in uniting the music must obey the

poetry, and it becomes an empty feast for the ears if music decides to dominate. Wieland also

used an art metaphor that we will see from others, presenting poetry as the drawing of an opera

and music as the coloration: “And what can result if he applies the colors and wants to distribute

shadow, light, and so on without consulting the drawing and the thoughts of the inventor? Music

and action are in the Singspiel merely organs through which the poetry works on our souls.”17

Partisans of music obviously saw things differently. Volume 6 of Unterhaltungen relayed

an opinion by Rousseau that placed music at the head of the artistic hierarchy: “Music is capable

of presenting all the paintings of nature, of awakening every feeling, of competing with poetry to

give it a new strength, to decorate it with new charms, and insofar as music crowns poetry with

laurel, music triumphs over it.”18 Agricola also came to music’s defense. In his review of

Gluck’s Alceste for the AdB, he advanced a long argument disputing Gluck’s attempt to rein in musical excess. He argued that Gluck’s position has long been that of those who “don’t love and

16 Wieland, “Briefe an einen Freund über das deutsche Singspiel, Alceste,” TM 1 (1773): 37.

17 Wieland, “Versuch,” TM 4 (1775): 167.

18 Rousseau, “Von der Oper,” Unterhaltungen 6 (1768): 282–83.

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don’t understand music, and consequently have no taste and no feeling for it.”19 He also ascribed it to opera poets who want “their poetry alone to have the attention and favor of the audience.”20

For additional support, Agricola drew on music-friendly French aestheticians. He quoted Charles

Batteux: “The theater belongs to music. Poetry has the second rung; dance the third. The verse should follow the song and not precede it. The words . . . are nothing but a reinforcement that one gives to the musical expression in order to make the meaning of it more distinct and intelligible.”21 Agricola also proposed an art metaphor similar to Wieland’s, but he inverted it to

favor music. Whereas Gluck, like Wieland, had called poetry the drawing and music the

coloration, Agricola cited Rousseau, who in his Dictionnaire de musique called melody the

drawing and harmony the coloration.22 In this formation, poetry is not even a part of the picture.

Despite the disagreement over the priority of poetry or music, no writer ever called into

question the Gesamtkunstwerk ideal, though Wieland did propose an alternate, slimmed-down

version. He observed that less ostentatious productions might be better for German opera in the

long run. In his “Versuch,” he wrote: “It is not a lack of genius or the unmelodious quality of the

German language that holds the Germans back. It is the prevailing opinion that the opera seria

must be a work of fairies in which all the beautiful arts struggle in competition with one another

to produce the most complete satisfaction of the eyes and ears of the most sensitive and

pampered audience member.”23 He contended that the expense of opera production made this

unattainable for most of Europe’s princes. Wieland called for the creation of a “new and most

19 Agricola, review of Gluck’s Alceste, AdB 14, no. 1 (1771): 7.

20 Ibid.

21 Ibid., 8.

22 Ibid., 13.

23 Wieland, “Versuch,” TM 3 (1775): 67.

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interesting type of theater” that minimized costume and scenery, and concentrated on poetry,

music, and action. He wrote that this would require much less effort and could be staged in even

the moderately large German cities. If the Germans would adopt this new art form, Wieland

predicted a future of noble public pleasures, an improvement in taste and morals, and an

environment in which music schools would produce good masters who would be distributed

throughout the German lands and, in turn, develop good students.24

In addition to their calls to unite the arts in opera, critics offered many prescriptions for opera’s constituent parts. To provide an overview of these, this chapter will follow the same method as chapter 2, proceeding through various elements of opera (poetry, music, performance, and dance), and discussing components within these categories. For instance, the category of poetry will include the critics’ thoughts on appropriate poetic models, “natural” tone, plot, and characterization. The music category will touch on music’s role in manipulating the emotions, music’s powers of imitation, the verisimilitude of singing, and models for musical composition.

It will also include prescriptions for melody and Harmonie, recitative and aria, sinfonias and choruses, etc. The ordering of these topics will not correspond exactly to chapter 2 but will unfold according to a plan encouraged by the source material for this chapter. Commentary on national styles will then conclude this section.

While discussing poetry, the critics touted a few librettists, both foreign and German, who could serve as models for the re-emerging German opera. Like the WNA, other journals heaped the highest praise on Metastasio. Jean-Georges Noverre, best known today as a dancer and balletmaster but also a writer, praised Metastasio’s work in Unterhaltungen.25 In the TM

24 Ibid., 69. Wieland never explained how low-budget costumes and scenery would lead to an improvement in the public’s taste and morals. He seems to have subsumed this idea into his larger assumption that high-minded entertainment makes people behave better.

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Wieland credited him with giving a new shape to lyric theater.26 Among German writers, no one, according to Christoph Daniel Ebeling, was more qualified to write for music than Daniel

Schiebeler, author of Lisuart und Dariolette. Ebeling noted in the AdB that Schiebeler had studied Metastasio “and knows how to imitate him . . . so far as our language allows in the choice of harmonious and musical syllable measures.”27 In a statement that recalls praise in the

WNA for “middle-way music” (see chapter 2), Ebeling suggested a similar approach to poetry,

and he congratulated Schiebeler for maintaining “a happy medium between the high flight of the

ode, to which the music can only seldom achieve, and the tone of the Lied, in which it finds

nothing to express.”28 An anonymous reviewer for the AdB wrote that Wieland’s work for

Alceste is “full of beautiful, noble feelings, beautifully and nobly expressed.”29 In the same issue,

another reviewer, Johann Joachim Eschenburg, praised Gottlob Ephraim Heermann’s libretto Die

treuen Köhler, subsequently set by Ernst Wilhelm Wolf, for its “uncommonly natural dialogue”

and “most skillful expression of the honest feelings of uncorrupted rural folk.”30

Eschenberg’s preference for Heermann’s natural dialogue reflects a general concern for a

text that flowed with the language and rhythm of everyday life. While Ebeling had applauded

Schiebeler’s skill in writing verse, he criticized his prose, declaring, “The language lacks in

brevity and fire of expression; the periods are not those of common life but of books.”31

25 Jean-Georges Noverre, “Einige Bemerkungen des Herrn Noverre über die französische Opernmusik,” Unterhaltungen 1 (1766): 261.

26 Wieland, “Versuch,” TM 4 (1775): 171.

27 Christoph Daniel Ebeling, review of Schiebeler’s Musikalische Gedichte, AdB 14, no. 1 (1771): 437–38.

28 Ibid., 438.

29 Anonymous, review of Wieland’s Alceste, AdB 21, no. 1 (1774): 189.

30 Johann Joachim Eschenburg, review of Wolf’s Die treuen Köhler, AdB 21, no. 1 (1774): 190.

31 Ebeling, review of Schiebeler’s Musikalische Gedichte, AdB 14, no. 1 (1771): 441–42.

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Unfortunately, he did not quote any of the offending passages. To achieve greater naturalism in

dialogue, Ebeling recommended that Schiebeler “make himself more familiar with the dialogue

and the language of human life or to study the works of Lessing, Moliere, et al.”32 In a later review, Ebeling leveled a similar criticism at Weisse, whose dialogue in Der Aerndtekranz he found “somewhat stiff and without life, especially in the serious scenes.”33 At least in the case of

Der Aerndtekranz, Ebeling tells us that act 3, scene 7, when a disguised Frau Amalia confronts

her unfaithful husband, stands out as unnatural, although Ebeling again does not provide any

examples of “stiff” dialogue, nor does he recommend changes to make it more lively.

Despite their call for naturalism in operatic language, German critics remained adamant

that the tone could not descend too low. Ebeling may have embraced “the language of human

life,” but he also rejected farcical comedy, which he claimed “one must often hear to disgust in

the comic operas of the French and Italians.”34 In this opinion, Ebeling fit within a German

tradition that rejected low comedy—trifles that are “beneath the worth of music” in his own

description. For this reason, he promoted Schiebeler, who in his estimation, “gives occasion to

comic, strongly marked declamation, to lively paintings, and to droll wordplay in which resides

the strength of good comic music if it speaks not merely the lively language of humorous

affect.”35 Agricola also delivered an indirect shot at low comedy when he thanked the Koch

theater for giving occasion to Neefe to develop Die Apotheke from one act to two and, in the

process, to “depart from the entirely comic tone.”36

32 Ibid., 442.

33 Ebeling, review of Weisse’s Komische Opern, Bd. 3, AdB 19, no. 1 (1773): 435.

34 Ebeling, review of Schiebeler’s Musikalische Gedichte, AdB 14, no. 1 (1771): 438.

35 Ibid.

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Critics recommended that the operatic poet, besides being a naturalistic writer, must also

be a musical writer. This suggestion aligns with similar support found in the WNA for poets to know something about music. In an early edition of the AdB, Agricola explained that the comfort and appropriateness of the poetry in Maria Antonia Walpurgis’s Talestri arias came from the

composer and poet being the same person.37 A few years later, in his review of Hiller’s Lieder

mit Melodien, Agricola wrote that the reason for an unmusical poem was that often the poet did

not understand the rudiments of musical rhythm and meter. He recommended Friedrich Wilhelm

Marpurg’s Anleitung zur Singcomposition for instruction in these fundamentals, insisting that

“the poet must have constructed his syllable measure so that the composer can bring it into a

good musical rhythm.”38 Reichardt also believed that poets should learn something of music

before writing their own verses, and in his Briefe eines aufmerksamen Reisenden, he made his

own endorsement for poets, Joseph Martin Krause’s Von der musikalischen Poesie.39 Even

Nicolai, though not a musician himself, also urged the poet to keep an eye on how his words could be set to music.40

The aforementioned concern for naturalism in poetry mirrored a similar concern for

realistic plots. In the search for realism, many librettists set their stories in rural environments,

Weisse being a frequent and the most notable example. He had been drawn to the rural simplicity

of French opéra comique, and Nicolai approved his adaptations of French plots for Lottchen am

Hofe and Die Liebe auf dem Lande, both of which focus on the contrast between rural naiveté

36 Agricola, review of Neefe’s Die Apotheke and Amors Guckkasten, AdB 19, no. 1 (1773): 257.

37 Agricola, review of Walpurgis’s Talestri, AdB 3, no. 2 (1766): 128.

38 Agricola, review of Hiller’s Lieder mit Melodien, AdB 21, no. 1 (1774): 202.

39 Reichardt, Briefe (1774), 159.

40 Friedrich Nicolai, review of Weisse’s Komische Opern (2 vol.), AdB 11, no. 2 (1770): 3.

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and urban, aristocratic corruption.41 However, not all critics were completely happy with

Weisse’s pastoral focus. Ebeling in the AdB preferred a realism that reflected a more elevated

view of German life, writing: “We generally find in those stories adapted from the French the

French naiveté too often changed into German simplicity. The rustic quality in the character and

in the language of the people often does not suit the individual thoughts and situations that are

held among the Germans.”42 In his Briefe Reichardt also criticized Weisse’s treatment of rural

topics, claiming that while his operettas are full of noble, natural naiveté, Weisse’s main purpose

was to get laughs, and Reichardt linked him with other poets who present the innocent farmer as

something of a bumpkin.43 Reichardt, in other words, could accept the “farmer quality” in his operas, but he favored a more elevated treatment.

With this preference for realism, it should come as no surprise that critics frequently

rejected fantastic plots, as Rousseau had done in articles circulating in the WNA. His views also

appeared in the Unterhaltungen. In an excerpt from his Dictionnaire de musique, translated as

“Von der Oper,” Rousseau theorized about the origin of supernatural plots and how they came to

dominate opera despite being cold and lacking in their imitation of nature.44 He continued on

about how opera improved once it abandoned the wonderful and embraced the natural, “Once

music had learned to paint and speak the charm of feeling, the theater was cleansed of

mythological gibberish, participation took the place of the wonderful, the machines of the poet

and decorator were destroyed, and the lyrical play received a nobler and less monstrous form.

41 Ibid., 1.

42 Ebeling, review of Weisse’s Komische Opern, Bd. 3, AdB 19, no. 1 (1773): 429.

43 Reichardt, Briefe (1774), 152.

44 Rousseau, “Von der Oper,” Unterhaltungen 6 (1768): 287.

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Everything that could stir the heart was applied with fortunate success.”45 In the AdB Ebeling

criticized the fairy mythology of Hiller’s Lisuart und Dariolette, adding that the story of a

wandering knight lacks entertainment value because “few observers can transfer themselves into

the time.”46 Finally, Wieland also dismissed fantastic plots in the TM: “The opinion that the subject of the Singspiel must be taken from the region of the wonderful . . . because everything in the Singspiel is music, appears to me to have no more reason than if the engraver were restricted to wonderful objects because in his pages, everything is black or white.”47 However, Wieland could support plots set in an idealized shepherd’s world, despite their romanticized portrayal of actual shepherding life, “What is more pleasant to us than these laughing pictures of rest, innocence, love, and happiness; these concerned more with pleasure than with emergency, the carefree life in the lap of nature?”48 Wieland favored the idealized shepherd’s world because of its equal remove from both wildness and urban sophistication. It was unreal, but it offered a desirable vision of reality. As Wieland wrote, it presents “a beautiful naiveté and goodness of morals to which our heart calls us.”49

In addition to their instruction to focus on realism in opera plots, critics and poets also

encouraged writers to focus on the depiction of vivid emotion. For Rousseau, this was opera’s

central task. In the Unterhaltungen he argued that the difference between the lyrical Schauspiel

(i.e., an opera) and an actual spoken tragedy is that the lyrical bans everything that speaks to

45 Ibid., 290. The German “Wunderbar” (wonderful) in this context appears to refer to the supernatural or mythological. By banishing these from the stage and treating natural subjects instead, opera producers, according to Rousseau, allowed their audiences to more strongly identify (i.e., to participate) with the characters.

46 Ebeling, review of Schiebeler’s Musikalische Gedichte, AdB 14, no. 1 (1771): 440.

47 Wieland, “Versuch,” TM 3 (1775): 83.

48 Ibid., 87.

49 Ibid.

107 reason and leaves what speaks to the heart, “The energy of all feelings, the vehemence of all passion are thus the most excellent object of the lyrical drama.”50 Wieland agreed. In the

“Versuch über das teutsche Singspiel,” he asserted, “Music is the language of the passions.”51

For this reason, he concluded that intricate political topics simply do not work for music theater,

“Pieces in which the nature of the subject deals with many states’ interests or where the people have to hold long dialogues or speeches in order to convince one another through the strength of their reasons or the tide of their eloquence should be totally excluded from the lyric theater.”52

For Wieland, music’s role was to express emotion, not advance a plot. In fact, these two elements, music and plot, existed in an inverse relationship to one another within a drama. If the plot grew more complicated, then that allowed for less musical treatment: “The most possible naiveté in the plan is proper and essential to the Singspiel. Plot cannot be sung; it must be acted.

Thus, if it has more plot, it must have less song.”53 It then followed that including more music in a drama necessitated a less complicated plot. Wieland emphasized this point in the following installment of the TM:

The poet must choose a subject capable of musical treatment. He must also lay aside those that are contrary to the nature of the plot or are too loaded with incidents and lend themselves better to tragedy than Singspiel. He must choose subjects that lose none of the truth of their character, passion, and situation through the musical decoration. He must restrict the plan and keep as few people as possible. He must also avoid all episodes that weaken rather than strengthen the main interest. Finally, he must present his character more in feeling and inner emotion than in external plot.54

50 Rousseau, “Von der Oper,” Unterhaltungen 6 (1768): 291.

51 Wieland, “Versuch,” TM 3 (1775): 77.

52 Ibid., 78.

53 Ibid., 81.

54 Wieland, “Versuch,” TM 4 (1775): 157–58.

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Here Wieland reiterated all his prescriptions for plot: simplicity, a restricted number of

characters, and a focus on emotion. He saw all these characteristics as the means for setting

German opera apart from Italian opera and creating an entirely new genre of music drama.

Wieland attempted this experiment when he put these theories into practice a few years before in

Alceste. However, it should be noted that no one else followed Wieland quite so far down this

road. Whereas Alceste rotated its four main characters through a series of emotionally powerful

yet dramatically stagnant tableaux, other librettists and composers were not ready to abandon

secondary characters or dramatic momentum.

Regardless of the size of the cast list, some critics emphasized the importance of a

mixture of character types. They especially seemed to prefer the thoughtful introduction of

serious characters or elevated musical numbers into comic operas. In his 1769 review of Lisuart

und Dariolette for the AdB, Agricola cited Schiebeler’s and Hiller’s justifications for elevated roles in a comic opera in the WNA (Vol. 2, no. 18) and in the preface to the published keyboard edition, respectively. Approving of the mix of serious and comic elements, he noted the contrasts of characterization: the cheerful women’s chorus; the seriousness of Queen Ginevra’s aria (“Gib grausames Geschick die Tochter mir zurück”); the comic servant, Derwin; the sublimity of

Lisuart’s “O Bild” aria; and the trio between the Old Woman, Lisuart, and Derwin in which

Derwin’s comic part stands apart from the other two (“Dein Leben war verloren”). He even noted that Lisuart’s “O Bild” aria could fit within a serious opera. What Agricola liked best about Lisuart’s integration was the essential role the serious characters play in the story, and in his characteristically nationalistic fashion, he then took this opportunity to point out the superfluous appearance that serious characters make in Italian comic opera: “Indeed the Italians always bring into their comic operas at least two completely serious roles. However, often these

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roles are so little connected with the others that they could be left out without significant damage

to the whole.”55 A few years later, an anonymous reviewer made similar remarks about Weisse and Hiller’s Die Jagd. This reviewer also liked how the poet and composer treated the serious

character of the story (i.e., the King), and like Agricola, he also criticized what he saw as

unnecessary serious characters in Italian opera.56 As in the case of stiff dialogue, the critics here

provide no examples of offending characters in Italian opera to support their accusations, nor do

they explain what makes them unnecessary to the story.

While critics generally approved of a mixture of serious and comic characters in an

opera, this variety had to be handled with care. A number of critics held reservations about

characters transgressing the boundaries of social class and indulging in musical personalities that

contradicted their standing. In other words, upper-class characters should not debase themselves with music too low, and lower-class characters should not trespass on a style too elevated.

Reichardt especially showed discomfort in this regard, and he returned to the topic many times.

In his Briefe he showed general approval for Hiller’s Lisuart and its combination of characters,

but he noted the risk involved in characters from different classes singing together. He

mentioned in particular the duet between Madasine, one of the queen’s attendants, and Derwin,

Lisuart’s comic sidekick (“Ich seh’ dich in den Luften schweben”). Reichardt felt it ridiculous if

one character assumes the other’s standing, and he insisted that Derwin should always sing in a

style that reflects his social class.57 In Über die deutsche komische Oper, Reichardt also

questioned the Act 2 final duet of Die Jagd between Michel and the King. He observed, “The

55 Agricola, review of Hiller’s Lisuart und Dariolette, AdB 10, no. 2 (1769): 180–81.

56 Anonymous, review of Hiller’s Die Jagd and Der Aerndtekranz, AdB 17, no. 1 (1772): 566.

57 Johann Reichardt, Briefe eines aufmerksamen Reisenden, die Musik betreffend (Frankfurt & Breslau, 1776), 36.

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King sings like the farmer, and the farmer like the King.”58 Previously in the essay, Reichardt had praised the King’s humble style, but here he could not abide the swapping of social roles, and he wrote that he would not have composed it. A few pages later, Reichardt expressed his displeasure again over the King’s portrayal, this time in the aria “Welch ein schöner

Gegenstand.” Again, he found it too “niedrig komisch” (low comic) for a royal figure, and he suggested that the short notes reminded him of the ridiculous Derwin character of Lisuart.59

Reichardt does not mention a particular offending passage, but Example 3.1 below offers a likely example. The short notes and repetition in mm. 39–43 reflect a musical delivery not usually associated with operatic royalty.

58 Johann Reichardt, Über die deutsche komische Oper (Hamburg, 1774; repr., Munich: Emil Katzbichler, 1974), 81.

59 Ibid., 88.

111

Example 3.1. “Welch ein schöner Gegenstand,” mm. 36–52

112

Other critics joined Reichardt in his criticism of social class and musical characterization.

In the AdB, Ebeling also disapproved of “Welch ein schöner Gegenstand,” judging it inappropriate to the King’s character and tone. He also felt that the tone of Michel and the farmers sometimes reached too high.60 Johann Karl August Musäus, in his review of Michaelis’s

60 Ebeling, review of Weisse’s Komische Opern, Bd. 3, AdB 19, no. 1 (1773): 431–32.

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libretto for Amors Guckkasten for the AdB, wrote that Komus had been treated “too stalely and

more like a farmer than the god he is.”61 Finally, Johann Erich Biester, in an AdB review of

Wolf’s comic opera Das große Loos (1774), felt that sometimes the poet Bertuch’s language in

the arias was too beautiful for the farmers and not in the tone of the rest of the piece.62

While critics wanted characters to remain in their social places, they were also adamant

that comic characters should remain well behaved and not descend into farce. In his review of

Lottchen am Hofe, Agricola praised Lottchen’s comic laughing aria (“Hahahaha, wie schnakisch

steh ich da”) for maintaining “a certain noble being that never sinks into low, base depths.”63 He

went on to recommend this aria as a model for foreign composers and poets. Musäus likewise

commended Michaelis’s libretto to Amors Guckkasten for achieving a comic expression in his

piece that nevertheless did not stray too low.64 Finally, Eschenburg, in his AdB review of Neefe’s

Die Apotheke, congratulated the composer for depicting bourgeois life while avoiding the dull,

low, and farcical.65

In the same review, however, Eschenburg provided a rare glimpse into public taste—and

how it departed from the cultivated preferences of the critics—when he noted: “Our public gladly watches farces though they would gladly look as if they despised them. They laugh heartily at Goldonian pieces but then shrug their shoulders when they’re over.”66 Christian Felix

Weisse had made a similar remark in the preface to his 1768 Komische Opern when he poked

61 Johann Karl August Musäus, review of Michaelis’s Operetten, 1. Teil, AdB 19, no. 1 (1773): 573.

62 Johann Erich Biester, review of Wolf’s Das große Loos and Die Dorfgala, AdB 25, no. 1 (1775): 500.

63 Agricola, review of Lottchen am Hofe and Die Liebe auf dem Lande, AdB 13, no. 1 (1770): 86–87.

64 Musäus, review of Michaelis’s Operetten, AdB 19, no. 1 (1773): 573.

65 Eschenburg, review of Neefe’s Die Apotheke, AdB 21, no. 1 (1774): 191.

66 Ibid.

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fun at opera goers who shake their heads over comic opera yet see them again and again.67

Musäus also illustrated the divide between the critical view and public opinion when he noted

that the Schulmeister role in Die Apotheke was old, but “it never fails to get loud laughter from the gallery.”68 It seems that low comedies and stock comic figures represented a kind of guilty

pleasure for eighteenth-century German audiences, though the critics usually condemned them as

being too niedrig (low). Yet Eschenburg did find a redeeming possibility in low entertainment.

Noting that some members of the public pretend that they attend farces to hear only the music,

Eschenburg suggested that artists could exploit this taste while also awakening a heightened taste

for music.69

Having discussed the writers’ prescriptions for poetry, plot, and characterization, I come

now to their opinions on the music of an opera. It seems appropriate to first consider their words

on what they saw as music’s very purpose—touching the heart. Just as the plots were supposed

to speak to the heart, the music was also meant to communicate on a purely emotional level.

Wieland declared just this goal for Alceste. In the TM he spelled out his plan to minimize long speeches, which could create a strong effect in spoken drama, in favor of emotion: “Here [in an opera], where the language of the muses must alone be spoken, must everything be warm feeling or glowing affect. An amateur who breathes out in melting tones his feeling stirs us. A sophist who wants to sing to us reasonable conclusions would make us impatient or put us to sleep.”70

Wieland’s elevation of emotion shows that this trend, prevalent in contemporary instrumental

67 Weisse, Vorrede to Komische Opern (1768), quoted in Renate Schusky, Das deutsche Singspiel im 18. Jahrhundert: Quellen und Zeugnisse zu Ästhetik und Rezeption (Bonn: Bouvier, 1980), 13.

68 Musäus, review of Michaelis’s Operetten, AdB 19, no. 1 (1773): 573.

69 Eschenburg, review of Neefe’s Die Apotheke, AdB 21, no. 1 (1774): 191.

70 Wieland, “Briefe an einen Freund,” TM 1 (1773): 39–40.

115 music of the early 1770s, was also part of operatic aesthetics. Yet in the “Versuch,” Wieland pointed out, “Not all passions lend themselves to being characterized through song and music.”71

He barred music from portraying the most negative feelings: “Beautifying everything that

[music] imitates is its nature. The anger of the angel who strikes the rebellious Satan into the abyss . . . the rage of the love goddess over the jealous Mars . . . the rage of Oedipus . . . are prohibited to it. All things that admit no broken colors, all wild and stormy passions that are not lightened through hope, fear, or tenderness lie outside its area.”72 Wieland stands alone in this opinion; no other writer disallowed the expression of certain emotions. Nevertheless, his reluctance to allow music to indulge in unrestrained passions intersects with a traditional assumption about the effect of music on society. In the second installment of his “Versuch,” he wrote, “The music of a people . . . stands in a very narrow relationship to the public morals.”73 In this, he reflected the same beliefs about music’s social impact that led German critics to discourage farces and promote morally edifying stories.

If touching or stirring the heart was music’s highest purpose, then imitation (i.e., mimesis) was the means by which music reached the heart. According to Rousseau, imitation elevated music to its status as one of the “beautiful arts.”74 Moreover, music possessed an advantage over other arts in that it could paint things that listeners cannot see: “That is the greatest wonder of an art that can work only through its movements, that it is capable even of

71 Wieland, “Versuch,” TM 3 (1775): 78.

72 Ibid.

73 Wieland, “Versuch,” TM 4 (1775): 160.

74 Rousseau, “Von der Oper,” Unterhaltungen 6 (1768): 282.

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representing the image of rest. Sleep, the stillness of night, loneliness, and even maintaining

silence belong among the various paintings of composition.”75

However, when writers of the late 1760s and early 1770s praised the imitative qualities of

music, they were not referring to the musical depiction of motions, spatial location (high notes

for heaven, etc.), weather events, or animals. By this time, the doctrine of mimesis was giving

way to one of expression, and critics much preferred music that imitated inner emotional states.

According to Rousseau, music produced images of feelings that arise in the audience rather than

images that fall into the senses, as through paintings, “[The composer] does not present the thing

directly, but he awakens in our soul the similar feeling that is generated in us while viewing the

thing.”76 Quantz seconded this application of music when he complained that older composers

did not express the sense of the words but rather the mere words themselves or the affect

connected to them, for example, the highest notes for heaven, lowest notes for hell, etc.77

Reichardt was especially critical of the mimetic approach. In Über die deutsche komische Oper, he criticized the mimetic treatment in the Act 1 closing chorus of Hiller’s Die Jagd, “Der König jagt,” writing that the neighing of horses, barking of dogs, and cries of hunters may be a little too low and that Hiller has been “entirely too true” to his poet.78 However, he approved the music

for the approaching storm at the end of the Act 2 duet “Siehst du wie jene Wolken ziehen.” He

wrote that it contains a fine illusion of the storm “without descending into tasteless painting. It

expresses much more only the feeling of horror that arrives in the masculine and especially in the

75 Ibid., 298.

76 Rousseau, “Von der Oper,” Unterhaltungen 6 (1768): 298–99.

77 Quantz, “Abhandlung von der Musik,” Unterhaltungen 10 (1770): 26–27.

78 Reichardt, Über die deutsche komische Oper, 53.

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feminine soul during such turmoil of nature and arouses it.”79 Reichardt made the point again

later in the same treatise when he wrote that Hiller has taste enough not to express the flight of

ghosts, the haunting of mountains, the cries of witches, etc. He accused Telemann and Mattheson

of these things and declared, “Shame on their imitators!”80

The discussion of imitation and illusion brings up the issue of verisimilitude, a matter of

concern for writers who wanted to defend against the charge that opera was unrealistic, since

actual people do not sing through their everyday interactions. Weisse, in the preface to his

Komische Opern, readily conceded that comic operas have many improbabilities

(Unwahrscheinlichkeiten), but he justified his work on the grounds of artistic hedonism: “Gladly we want to concede to the opponents that our recreation, our pleasure is the main purpose of operettas, and if they do not feel it is their duty to seek pleasure, then we will have to agree to disagree.”81 Wieland provided a more detailed defense in his “Versuch.” He admitted that some

people will consider singing unnatural. Yet he protested that singing is no more unnatural than

the plays of the ancients, the rhyming verse of French tragedy, or people articulating their most

important and secret matters alone or to a trusted confidant with a hundred spectators sitting right

in front of them. He wrote, “Every type of theater hypothesizes a certain contract between the

poet and actor, and the spectators” in which the spectators agree to go along with the illusion so

long as they are presented with only true nature in the characters, passions, morals, language,

plot, etc.82 For Wieland, “true nature” was found in modern dramatic trends and acting

79 Ibid., 76.

80 Ibid., 82.

81 Weisse, Vorrede to Komische Opern (1768), quoted in Renate Schusky, Das deutsche Singspiel im 18. Jahrhundert, 13.

82 Wieland, “Versuch,” TM 3 (1775): 73–74.

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techniques, as well as modern, galant music and the ideals of operatic reform: “Reasonable

men . . . do not have a problem with hearing Alexander or Porus singing. What annoys them is

the unskillfulness of the composer or the stubbornness of the singers and the tyranny of the fashion, to which the greatest masters have often succumbed, if Alexander and Porus do not sing in a way appropriate to the greatness of their character.”83 In the end, Wieland’s position on the

verisimilitude of singing showed nuance. While he endorsed natural plots and naturalistic

singing appropriate to character, he still regarded the music and singing of opera as a type of

idealized language elevated above normal human expression, a kind of Göttersprache.84

For models of naturalistic composition, critics pointed to numerous composers, many of

them Italian, though with several recent German additions. Rousseau’s praise for Italian

composers, which had appeared so frequently in the WNA, turned up in Unterhaltungen as well,

where he promoted Leonardo Vinci, Leonardo Leo, and Giovanni Pergolesi for giving feelings to

heroes and a new language to the human heart. According to Rousseau, they “despised the

menial imitation of their predecessors and opened a new path.”85 The anonymous author of an article on serious opera that appeared in the tenth volume of Unterhaltungen also touted Vinci,

Leo, and Pergolesi, but he went on to mention several other composers.86 He found in Niccolò

Jommelli good song, much expression, and an artful accompaniment. He commended Handel,

Graun, and Hasse. After these, he briefly discussed Agricola, Georg Benda, and Johann Christian

Bach. He praised Gluck for bringing composers back to “uncontrived nature” and also liked

François-André Danican Philidor and Pierre-Alexandre Monsigny in France. Finally, he

83 Ibid., 83–84.

84 Ibid., 84.

85 Rousseau, “Von der Oper,” Unterhaltungen 6 (1768): 292.

86 Anonymous, “Fortsetzung der musikalischen Bibliothek,” Unterhaltungen 10 (1770): 505–25.

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commended Hiller, noting his fine judgment, flowing song, excellent accompaniment, tender

expression, and marked declamation. This listing of Hiller’s compositional virtues aligns quite

neatly with most contemporary aesthetic priorities. Attributing these qualities to Hiller shows his

prominence in German musical society in 1770, the year of Die Jagd, his greatest operatic

triumph.87 By the mid-1770s, Hiller had become a model for Reichardt as well. In Über die

deutsche komische Oper, Reichardt called him better than all comic-opera composers in all other

nations at the depiction and maintenance of character; he added that only Hasse could equal

Hiller in serious opera.88

Among the models for comic operas, Pergolesi’s La serva padrona (1733) remained the gold standard several decades after its premiere. The author of the article on serious opera for

Unterhaltungen praised its light and simple yet lively manner, good declamation, lack of

decoration, comic dialogue in its duets, and sparingly applied comic painting (i.e., low-comedy

text painting).89 Quantz added that Pergolesi had a natural talent for the flattering, the tender, and

the pleasant.90

For models of serious opera, Wieland urged composers to turn to Gluck, whom he

compared to Pericles, suggesting that Gluck was doing for opera what Pericles did for the

tragedies of Sophocles and Euripides. Besides making this connection to the ancients, Wieland

saw Gluck as a “powerful genius,” a liberator inaugurating a new epoch in which poet and

composer would no longer need to subject themselves to the tyranny of convention and singers.

87 The writer of this article incorrectly lists 1769 as the year of Die Jagd’s premiere. It actually took place in Weimar on January 29, 1770.

88 Reichardt, Über die deutsche komische Oper, 11.

89 Anonymous, “Fortsetzung der musikalischen Bibliothek,” Unterhaltungen 10 (1770): 522.

90 Johann Joachim Quantz, “Abhandlung von der Musik,” Unterhaltungen 10 (1770): 14.

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He wrote that Gluck’s work “sets nature on a throne” and that a series of Glucks would

“establish the supremacy of uncorrupted nature over music.” For Wieland, the gateway to this

utopian future lay in Gluck’s simple style, which he wrote would bring about the beautiful

agreement of all parts into the great unity of the whole and make it permanent.91

The future of opera and opera reform required attention to its many component parts, and as in the WNA, writers offered many prescriptions for these. Regarding the opening sinfonias, critics held a general agreement on form and content. With form, the fashion for three-movement sinfonias was fading into the past. In Agricola’s 1771 review of Gluck’s Alceste, he accepted

Gluck’s one-movement form, although he considered some passages in it too bizarre and wild and the first section too long, noting that sixty-one measures passed before the arrival of the first main cadence in the dominant.92 In his “Versuch” Wieland noted disapprovingly that opera

overtures are always in three movements and have not the least connection with the rest of the

piece.93

Wieland’s insistence on the sinfonia connecting to the opera echoes a common

prescription among German critics. According to Reichardt, the Italians believed the purpose of

a sinfonia was to make listeners quiet and attentive. He added, however, that the sinfonia should

also “present the contents of the piece, prepare the plot, and if possible bring the listener into

sympathy with the feelings of the first actors who appear.”94 He held up Hiller, his model

German opera composer, as one who carefully displays character in his sinfonias.95 Agricola also

91 Wieland, “Versuch,” TM 4 (1775): 171–73.

92 Agricola, review of Gluck’s Alceste, AdB 14, no. 1 (1771): 19.

93 Wieland, “Versuch,” TM 4 (1775): 169.

94 Reichardt, Über die deutsche komische Oper, 33.

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favored a sinfonia that matched its opera in character, and he commented on this trait in several

of his AdB reviews. For instance, he praised the fiery character of the sinfonia to Maria Antonia

Walpurgis’s Amazonian opera seria, Talestri.96 In a subsequent review, he noted that the

sinfonias to Lottchem am Hofe and Die Liebe auf dem Lande were “very appropriate to their

contents.”97 Finally, he wrote of Neefe’s Die Apotheke: “The sinfonia announces the content of

the pieces already very happily.”98 In his review of Gluck’s Alceste, Agricola acknowledged

Gluck’s instruction about relating sinfonias musically to the rest of the opera, but in his

characteristically nationalistic fashion, he claimed that Johann Adolph Scheibe and Quantz, two

north Germans, had long before thought of this idea.99

While critics could agree on the basic characteristics of the sinfonia, they departed when

it came to recitative. Wieland in the TM criticized what he called “the common neglect of the recitative” in Italian opera, by which he seems to indict composer, performer, and audience.100

Wieland sarcastically noted that it was not worth the attention of the composer and singer.

People seemed to consider it more a resting point for the singer and listener to catch their breath

and collect their powers for the aria di bravura. He complained that audience members usually

talk, laugh, flirt, or sleep during the recitatives until the sound of the ritornello catches their

attention. On one hand, in Alceste, Wieland and Schweitzer attempted to restore some of the

recitative’s dramatic interest and musical value. Their interest in stirring recitative thus places

95 Ibid., 12.

96 Agricola, review of Walpurgis’s Talesti, AdB 3, no. 2 (1766): 129. For more on this opera, see Jill Munroe Fankhouser, “Talestri, Regina delle Amazzoni: An Opera seria by Maria Antonia Walpurgis” (master’s thesis, University of Cincinnati, 1998).

97 Agricola, review of Lottchen am Hofe and Die Liebe auf dem Lande, AdB 13, no. 1 (1770): 85.

98 Agricola, review of Neefe’s Die Apotheke, AdB 19, no. 1 (1773): 257.

99 Agricola, review of Gluck’s Alceste, AdB 14, no. 1 (1771): 15.

100 Wieland, “Versuch,” TM 4 (1775): 169.

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them alongside many critics of the WNA such as D’Alembert and Chastellux who also argued for

the expressive value of recitative. On the other hand, Friedrich Nicolai, in an AdB review of the

libretto to Eschenburg’s Lukas und Hannchen, expressed preference for the French practice of speaking the dialogue and criticized the “all-too-celebratory clothing” (allzufeyerliches Kleid) of the recitative.101 For the time being, Nicolai’s view won out, as German composers, at least of

comic operas, included few passages of recitative in their works.102

German critics also offered conflicting prescriptions for the aria. In their search to define

the German aria, critics focused their attention on the Italian da capo aria; the French air and

ariette were never mentioned. When confronting the Italian aria, different critics favored or

discarded different features. Wieland, for example, did not care for what he saw as empty

virtuosity. In his “Versuch,” he wrote that the Italian aria does not make a great effect on the

heart, but has become a “playground” (Tummelplatz) for the composer and singer.103 Yet again

he drew on Algorotti’s criticisms of Italian opera as supporting evidence, citing his complaints

about passagien that say nothing, excessive word repetitions, unnatural da capo forms, and a

ritornello that forces the singer to wait for her entrance. Wieland called all of these accusations

“only too well founded.”104 In the AdB Ebeling also took aim at the ritornellos, arguing in his

review of Lisuart und Dariolette that the long opening ritornello of Dariolette’s “Lass Mutter,

lass mich voll Entzücken” weakens the overall effect.105

101 Nicolai, review of Eschenburg’s Lukas und Hannchen, AdB 11, no. 2 (1770): 5.

102 For exceptions, see chapter 4.

103 Wieland, “Versuch,” TM 4 (1775): 169–70.

104 Ibid., 171.

105 Ebeling, review of Schiebeler’s Musikalische Gedichte, AdB 14, no. 1 (1771): 443.

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Agricola tended to take a more conservative view of the aria. On the question of

ritornellos, he showed himself to be a traditionalist. In his review of Gluck’s Alceste, he disputed

Gluck’s assertion that having singers wait for the end of a boring ritornello saps heat from a

scene. Agricola instead contended that the ritornello must display or even strengthen the heat of

the discussion, and if it does not, then that is the composer’s fault.106 However, Agricola was not

so dogmatic about maintaining da capo form. In the same review, he granted composers

permission to depart from the form, so long as they do not do it too often. Agricola reasoned that

some flexibility allowed composers the opportunity to show off their inventive power.107

Agricola also showed that he could have a sense of humor about Italian opera conventions. In his

review of Die Liebe auf dem Lande, he noticed the opera seria characteristics of Hiller’s “Der

Gott der Herzen findet,” a mock-pretentious and comically interrupted aria. Agricola accepted this poke at the Italian style and judged it “a perfect caricature of the bravura aria.”108 (This aria

is discussed in greater detail in chapter 4.)

For all their talk about Italian serious arias, German critics offered few specifics on how

exactly German serious arias should sound, and how they should differ from the Italian. Thus

when Reichardt singles out Hiller’s “Welche königliche Lust” from Die Jagd, calling it an

archetypal aria for combining royal majesty with rural simplicity, it deserves special notice, as

this is one of the few instances where critics pointed to a specific example for German

composers. In his typically patriotic fashion, Reichardt called the aria worthy of Graun and wrote

that it is unlike anything in serious opera or the great arias of Italian comic opera. He went on to

106 Agricola, review of Gluck’s Alceste, AdB 14, no. 1 (1771): 10.

107 Ibid., 13.

108 Agricola, review of Lottchen am Hofe and Die Liebe auf dem Lande, AdB 13, no. 1 (1770): 88.

124 call it a model for serious arias in a comic opera.109 Example 3.2 shows the conclusion of

“Welche königliche Lust,” beginning with the return of the King’s opening melody.

Example 3.2. “Welche königliche Lust,” mm. 94–129

109 Reichardt, Über die deutsche komische Oper, 91–93.

125

126

127

128

Critics also commented on the strophic arias that represented such an important part of

the German comic-opera tradition. They clearly did not esteem these as highly as da capo arias and longer through-composed forms, and their prescriptions usually dealt with the difficulty of expressing the text of multiple strophes with only one melody. An anonymous reviewer for the

129

AdB, critiquing Hiller’s Der Aerndtekranz, cited the strophic aria “Wär doch schon mein

Lieschen mein” as an example, where Hiller was forced to set the lines “unter hundert Küssen”

(among a hundred kisses) and “in der trockne Erde” (in the barren earth) to the same music.110

Ebeling, also in the AdB, criticized Weisse’s Komische Opern for the same reason: the later

stanzas in his strophic songs did not fit the music quite as well as the first.111 Reichardt identified

one aria that managed to escape this trap: “Schön sind Rosen und Jesmin” from Die Jagd. He

praised this popular strophic song for its beauty, its unity of feeling, and its consistency in

sections and words through all stanzas—“a perfect model of the type.”112

Unlike arias, the chorus tended to be overlooked by reviewers and critics, as it had been

in the WNA. Their actual prescriptions regarding a chorus’s musical content or its integration into

the plot turn up only rarely. Agricola wrote that he liked the simplicity of Gluck’s choruses for

Alceste. He also noted how they are “occasionally and happily interrupted” by recitative, arioso,

and aria, and said that this deserved praise for the poet and composer.113 Most references to

choruses, however, offer little more than a passing word of judgment, as when Agricola

concluded his review of Lisuart und Dariolette with the perfunctory note that the closing chorus

was “splendid” and the vaudeville “perfect.”114 Perhaps we must read the critics’ lack of

prescription as its own prescription. The chorus in German operas was regarded as an

afterthought. Internal choruses might be interrupted, as Agricola wrote, but they were assumed to

110 Anonymous, review of Hiller’s Die Jagd and Der Aerndtekranz, AdB 17, no. 1 (1772): 568.

111 Ebeling, review of Weisse’s Komische Opern, Bd. 3, AdB 19, no. 1 (1773): 437.

112 Reichardt, Über die deutsche komische Oper, 89–90.

113 Agricola, review of Gluck’s Alceste, AdB 14, no. 1 (1771): 20.

114 Agricola, review of Hiller’s Lisuart und Dariolette, AdB 10, no. 2 (1769): 189.

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be simple counterweights to the more serious solos and ensembles. Closing choruses functioned

as celebratory codas to the already completed drama.

In addition to a closing chorus, many operas also featured a divertissement. Within the

repertoire considered here, we find them in Hiller’s Die verwandelten Weiber, Der lustige

Schuster, Die Jagd, and Die Liebe auf dem Lande, and in Neefe’s Die Einsprüche and Amors

Guckkasten. The inclusion of divertissements shows the influence of the French tragédie en

musique, though their placement at the end of German operas suggests their peripheral

importance. In the Unterhaltungen, Rousseau questioned whether dances belong in an opera, and

whether they interrupt the plot and destroy the unity of the piece.115 He saved his harshest

criticism for dances that did not relate to the opera’s plot. However, he could allow for dances at

the end of an opera.116 In the Leipzig operas, their inclusion at the end also provided segue to the

ballet that often served as an afterpiece to the opera. Regarding divertissements or intermezzos

between the acts of an opera, Rousseau argued that these caused the audience to forget the

opera’s plot and necessitated that the listeners be stirred all over again at the beginning of the

next act.117

The most critically discussed musical element, whether in a solo, ensemble, or chorus,

was melody. In this respect, the writers of these periodicals and treatises mirror what we find in

the WNA. They reserved their highest praise for melody that was flowing or pleasant—what we today might designate galant. Quantz recognized its Italian origins, and in the Unterhaltungen he praised Italian vocal music for being comfortable for the singer and containing pretty ideas and

115 Rousseau, “Von der Oper,” Unterhaltungen 6 (1768), 299–300.

116 Ibid., 302.

117 Ibid., 300–301.

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expression.118 The critics noticed these qualities in German composers as well. Reichardt in his

Briefe called Hiller a master at melody that is “more flowing, more pleasant, and more

comprehensible. It must not be distorted by either an artificial harmony or through piled-on

embellishments of the song.”119 In the AdB Agricola anointed the young Neefe as “a much

promising genius.” Of Neefe’s Die Apotheke, Agricola wrote: “His song is pleasant and yet not

mundane, flowing and easy and yet not hackneyed. His expression is appropriate and witty. His

invention is indeed not in a higher tone than it should be here, but yet also never flat and

despicable.”120 He further noted that Neefe’s Amors Guckkasten is of a somewhat higher style

yet “it has however all of the easiness and flow of song.” Finally, Agricola commended the same

melodic qualities in Wolf’s work, writing in his review of Das Rosenfest that Wolf’s melody is

“pleasant, easy, full of invention, and not poor in ingenious comic and other paintings.”121

Along with a flowing galant-style melody, critics also showed some preference for a

“naïve” expression. The exact parameters of this melodic style were never defined, and it certainly overlaps with the galant, but there seems to have been a distinction among critics between a more elevated, lyrical galant melody and a simplified naïve style more appropriate to humble characters. Thus in his review of Lottchen am Hofe and Die Liebe auf dem Lande,

Agricola observed in both operas Hiller’s “right and naïve expression, just the inventive, easy, flowing, not-seldom-droll melody.”122 A few years later, an anonymous reviewer of Hiller’s Die

118 Quantz, “Abhandlung von der Musik,” Unterhaltungen 10 (1770): 13.

119 Reichardt, Briefe (1774), 152.

120 Agricola, review of Neefe’s Die Apotheke and Amors Guckkasten, AdB 19, no. 1 (1773): 257.

121 Agricola, review of Wolf’s Das Rosenfest, Die Dorfdeputirten, and Die treuen Köhler, AdB 23, no. 1 (1774): 251.

122 Agricola, review of Lottchen am Hofe and Die Liebe auf dem Lande, AdB 13, no. 1 (1770): 84.

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Jagd and Der Aerndtekranz likewise noted, “The music of both has all the soft fire, the naïve and always correct expression, the pleasant flowing song . . . everything that one is already accustomed to in the work of the musical author.”123 All four of Hiller’s operas are set in rural

landscapes, indicating that composers and critics associated this rustic setting with the naïve

style.

While critics tended to praise galant and naïve themes, they disagreed on the value of

virtuosic, melismatic melody. On the one hand, Agricola, whose musical conservatism with

regard to da capo form we have already seen, defended the virtuosic style. In his review of

Gluck’s Alceste, he opposed Gluck’s attempt to rein in vocal excess, calling the inventive powers

of a skillful singer a pleasure. He argued that an aria must have passagien in order to give the

proper detail and scope, “otherwise an aria would become as small as an ode, or overloaded with

unbearably many repetitions of words.”124 For evidence, Agricola drew on a common

eighteenth-century argument, the “justification from nature”: “The human voice is constructed so

that it can produce many fast tones one after another if the singer has the powers and practice to

do it. The human ear is also built so that it can hear these fast tones exactly and well. Thus nature

itself contradicts Gluck’s principles.”125 He also noted Rousseau’s defense of passagien, relaying his claim that “the heart pressed by a very lively feeling expresses this feeling often more lively

through unarticulated sounds than through words.”126 Reichardt, on the other hand, disagreed

and suggested the need to eliminate superfluous melismas from German music since, in the

123 Anonymous, review of Hiller’s Die Jagd and Der Aerndtekranz, AdB 17, no. 1 (1772): 564.

124 Agricola, review of Gluck’s Alceste, AdB 14, no. 1 (1771): 11.

125 Ibid., 10–11.

126 Ibid., 14.

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German language, open vowels seldom occur on long syllables.127 However, Reichardt is the

only German writer to make this claim about the language.

Apart from melodic style, we begin to find at this time a concern for melodic unity. We

have already seen this preference expressed in Wieland’s writings, who praised Gluck for

bringing about a “beautiful agreement” of parts into a unified whole. In his Über die deutsche

komische Oper, Reichardt also left a revealing comment about Hiller’s compositional process in

Die Jagd. He wrote that what other critics regarded as monotony in Hiller’s songs, Reichardt

defended as “a very wise economy of thoughts.” Hiller, he wrote, “draws the theme to his song

out of the poetry and then pulls everything after that from the theme, or more exactly to say,

everything flows to him from the theme.”128 In this comment, we see Reichardt anticipating the

“organic” approach to composition that would become such a priority in German music over the next decades. Subsequently in the same treatise, he complimented Röse’s aria “Die den Bruder

Christel liebt” for its unity, adding that Hiller observes this quality in each of his pieces, that

“each is a whole in itself.”129

In addition to purely aesthetic concerns for flowing melody or naïve expression,

Reichardt, alone among the writers, offered another, more commercial motivation for producing

simple songs. He emphasized the need for melodic simplicity because that was what the German

public could sing. As an aspiring composer himself, Reichardt marveled over the phenomenal

popularity of Hiller’s “Als ich auf meiner Bleiche,” the famous Romanze from Die Jagd:

The entire German nation has already decided it is so completely how Lieder of this type should be. Because every man, from the high to the lowest, sings and plays it and

127 Reichardt, Über die deutsche komische Oper, 8–9.

128 Ibid., 12.

129 Ibid., 73.

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whistles it, and I should almost say, drums it. So much is it used in every possible way throughout Germany. With this and other Hiller songs, as often as I heard them, I have thought to myself, “I would have preferred to have made one little Lied [like Hiller’s] than all the thousand pieces that flowed from my brain or my hand! Because what could be more pleasant than the awareness of having contributed so much to the cheerfulness of an entire nation!”130

Reichardt advised young composers wishing to attain similar popularity to avoid all difficulties

in their songs. He advocated syllabic declamation and an avoidance of chromaticism, noting that

he hears many people sing the D#5 in “Als ich” as a D5. For Reichardt, these simplicities held the key to the Romanze’s popularity.

While melody received the majority of the critical attention in these periodicals and other writings, just as it had in the WNA, the authors, especially those from northern Germany, also paid careful attention to Harmonie. These critics preferred a Harmonie that was both full-voiced and adhered to traditional rules of counterpoint. Agricola discussed the issue more than any other writer. In his review of Maria Antonia’s Talestri, he noted the full-voiced accompaniment of the first aria, with its active second violin and viola parts, and added that this thicker texture differentiated it from most arias of the newest Italian composers.131 Of Hiller’s Lottchen am Hofe

and Die Liebe auf dem Lande, Agricola praised the “regularly connected and well-led Harmonie”

(die regelmäßig verbundene und wohlgeführte Harmonie).132 During his contentious review of

Gluck’s Alceste, Agricola cited Gluck’s willingness to sacrifice the laws of order (i.e., in voice-

leading and rhythm) to good effect, responding that “the laws of true good order, it seems to us,

130 Reichardt, Über die deutsche komische Oper, 60–61.

131 Agricola, review of Walpurgis’s Talestri, AdB 3, no. 2 (1766): 131.

132 Agricola, review of Hiller’s Lottchen am Hofe and Die Liebe auf dem Lande, AdB 13, no. 1 (1770): 84.

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are made precisely on account of good effect.”133 He asked rhetorically if Gluck’s philosophy

would permit even parallel octaves and fifths or clumsy rhythms.

Agricola was not the only critic who could be strict about the rules of Harmonie.

Reichardt also praised the “fully pure harmony and the good course of each voice” in Hiller’s

Die Jagd sinfonia, which, “departs from the current neglectful practice.”134 Reichardt also

deduced that Hiller had clearly studied his Hasse and Graun. Quantz, in his “Abhandlung von der

Musik,” reprinted in Unterhaltungen, wrote approvingly of Italian vocal music and composers

such as Pergolesi and Vinci, but he also observed that most Italian opera composers begin

writing for the stage before they understand the rules of composition. Last, the anonymous

author of the article on serious opera for Unterhaltungen commended Piccini for his musical

charm, the newness of his thoughts, and the well-chosen accompaniment of his instruments, but

he criticized him for having violated the rules of pure Harmonie.135

The latter author’s reference to well-chosen instrumental accompaniment reflects another interest among the critics: novel timbres and instrumentation. Agricola found many things to quibble with in Gluck’s Alceste, but he did praise the composer’s frequent use of various wind instruments in his orchestra. He mentioned in particular the use of three trombones in the sinfonia, choruses, and arias, and he commended also Gluck’s use of horns. Agricola further noted the presence of flutes, oboes, bassoons, English horns, and chalumeaux, and he liked

Gluck’s use of winds-only textures, which omitted the violins and violas.136 On using

instrumental color for programmatic effect, Agricola also approved of Gluck’s use of the horns

133 Agricola, review of Gluck’s Alceste, AdB 14, no. 1 (1771): 17.

134 Reichardt, Über die deutsche komische Oper, 29.

135 Anonymous, “Fortsetzung der musikalischen Bibliothek,” Unterhaltungen 10 (1770): 523.

136 Agricola, review of Gluck’s Alceste, AdB 14, no. 1 (1771): 21–22.

136 with bass trombone to depict subterranean spirits, but he chafed at other atmospheric effects as low and childish, for example, the dark murmuring of the chorus “Che annunzio funesto,” which he called unnatural and beneath music’s worth.137

A musical element that received scant critical attention was rhythm. Infrequently discussed in the WNA, which featured several non-German writers, rhythm was neglected even more by the predominantly north German critics featured in the other writings, which tended to be more preoccupied by matters of melody, Harmonie, affect, and instrumentation. In the AdB

Agricola even conceded this hierarchy of musical elements when he wrote that declamation and affect were more essential than rhythm.138 No other writer in this collective offered a more substantial prescription for rhythmic treatment in operatic music, though this should not be too surprising; rhythm tended to be neglected in critical circles all over Western Europe in the eighteenth century.

Turning now from the musical elements of an opera, we can consider what the critics had to say about performance. There appears to have been unanimous agreement that Germany in the late 1760s and 1770s did not have the singing talent to inspire difficult operas. In the AdB the anonymous reviewer of Wieland’s libretto to Alceste bemoaned that serious opera had never flourished in Germany because of the presence of Italian opera and the customary mediocrity of

Germany’s singing actors.139 In the Unterhaltungen Quantz discussed at length the lack of vocal technique among German singers:

They sing for the most part without light and shadow, in a monotonous strength of tone. They scarcely recognize nose and throat mistakes. They don’t know any more about the

137 Ibid., 22.

138 Agricola, review of Hiller’s Lieder mit Melodien, AdB 21, no. 1 (1774): 200.

139 Anonymous, review of Wieland’s Alceste, AdB 21, no. 1 (1774): 188.

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connection of the chest voice with the falsetto than the French. They content themselves with trills as nature gives them. For the Italian ingratiating [melodies], which are created through sliding notes and through the softening and strengthening of the tone, they have little feeling.140

Reichardt, in his Briefe, also complained about German opera songs sounding bad in the mouths

of bad singers.141 For him, it was not the composers or the quality of their work that held back

German opera: it was the shallow talent pool of singers.

This state of vocal competence necessarily influenced operatic composition in ways that

had nothing to do with purely aesthetic considerations. On the one hand, Reichardt claimed that

Hiller “never forgot that he wrote, not for singers, but for actors, who otherwise hardly would

have sung over wine.”142 Reichardt’s own solution to writing for bad singers was to give the

instruments the faster notes and leave the singer free to focus on enunciation.143 On the other

hand, Wieland thought the situation could be remedied by education. In his “Versuch,” he laid

out his plan: “With the proper encouragement and certain events, it would only take a few years

before we would have singers of the best type, perhaps in such great quantity as the musical

Italians themselves. Well-established singing schools under the supervision of skillful masters would do wonders.”144

Germany’s lack of vocal superstars, coupled with the artistic trend toward simplicity and

melodic naturalness, produced a critical preference for “natural” performance. When the

reviewers considered here praised a particular performance, they often emphasized naturalistic

140 Quantz, “Abhandlung von der Musik,” Unterhaltungen 10 (1770): 27–28.

141 Reichardt, Briefe eines aufmerksamen Reisenden (1774), 147. He also criticizes Germany’s singing talent. Idem, Über die deutsche komische Oper, 5.

142 Reichardt, Über die deutsche komische Oper, 14.

143 Ibid., 33–34.

144 Wieland, “Versuch,” TM 3 (1775): 64.

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singing or acting. Caroline Elisabeth Steinbrecher, the Koch troupe’s leading female singer from

1766 to 1773, received frequent recognition in the press for just these qualities. An anonymous

reviewer of Lottchen am Hofe for Unterhaltungen commended Steinbrecher, who played the role

of Lottchen, for the naturally beautiful song and naiveté with which she played such roles.145 In

Über die deutsche komische Oper, Reichardt also praised her omnipresent “authentic nature”

(wahrhafte Natur) as well as her naiveté, truth, and grace in her portrayal of Röse in Die Jagd.146

The criticisms about German performance represented only a small part of a larger

complaint about the bleak state of contemporary German opera. In the first volume of

Unterhaltungen, an anonymous reviewer expressed his pleasant surprise over Weisse and

Hiller’s recent 1766 revival of Die verwandelten Weiber, noting that original pieces of that type

were lacking among the Germans. Their prior efforts, said the reviewer, amounted to only a

“certain original monstrosity” (eine gewisse Original-Mißgeburt) with no pretty music.147 In the following volume of Unterhaltungen, a reviewer of Schiebeler and Hiller’s original two-act version of Lisuart und Dariolette praised the work’s contents yet still seemed pessimistic about

German opera’s future, “perhaps because we seem to have no hope of German opera again, and

[because] in our concerts even Graun’s and Hasse’s Italian arias must give way to the sweet, fashionable composers from Italy.”148 Reichardt shared in the negative sentiment. He detected

low self-esteem among Germans about their artistic culture and even began his Über die

deutsche komische Oper with the observation, “There is no opinion more common than that the

145 Anonymous, review of Hiller’s Lottchen am Hofe, Unterhaltungen 4 (1767): 651.

146 Reichardt, Über die deutsche komische Oper, 83.

147 Anonymous, review of Hiller’s Die verwandelten Weiber, Unterhaltungen 1 (1766): 547. As described in chapter 1, Weisse and Hiller’s Die verwandelten Weiber represented the revival of German operatic composition following the Seven Years’ War. The reviewer here is not specific about the prior efforts that he condemns.

148 Anonymous, review of Hiller’s Lisuart und Dariolette, Unterhaltungen 2 (1766): 503.

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Germans are only imitators in the arts.”149 Even many Germans themselves, Reichardt wrote, bought into this assumption. His frustration boiled over later in the treatise as he considered

German backwardness and the popularity of Italian music:

It is absolutely true we Germans deserve to have no good composers at all. We treasure foreigners who often are not worthy even to tie the shoelaces of many of our composers any more than they are capable of solving the canons in their title pages. . . . It is irritating to speak of it. Write for the Italian language, my dear Hiller, and at least reap among the foreigners the fame that you deserve. . . . Your country people do not deserve your patriotism. Despise them; that is what they deserve.150

Alongside the despair over the current state of German music, however, there existed a desire for works that could be a credit to the German people. Nicolai, in his review of Weisse’s Komische

Opern, expressed his wish that those productions might serve “the glory of our nation.”151

Agricola wrote that Friedrich Gottlob Fleischer’s setting of Gellert’s Das Orakel “has fire, grace, expression, and many new things. . . . The music to this operetta, taken as a whole, is good and brings honor to a German.”152

Several critics felt that if German operas could just be set alongside Italian works for comparison, everyone would see how wonderful they were. In the AdB Nicolai wrote that

Eschenburg’s libretto to Lukas und Hannchen could serve as a most excellent model of serious opera if it were ever placed beside an Italian work.153 Agricola’s AdB review of Hiller’s Lottchen am Hofe and Die Liebe auf dem Lande expressed a desire to see both compared to the best Italian

149 Reichardt, Über die deutsche komische Oper, 3.

150 Ibid., 94.

151 Nicolai, review of Weisse’s Komische Opern, AdB 11, no. 2 (1770): 1.

152 Agricola, review of Fleischer’s Das Orakel, AdB 22, no. 1 (1774): 534.

153 Nicolai, review of Eschenburg’s Lukas und Hannchen, AdB 11, no. 2 (1770): 6.

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and French operas.154 In the TM Wieland argued that Schweitzer deserved a favorable

comparison to the Italians, pleading, “Believe me, Pergolesi, Galuppi, Sacchini would recognize

this German with joy as their brother.”155 However, not all Germans were so brotherly. In the

Vorrede to his operetta Die Frühlingsnacht, Johann Wolfgang Andreas Schöpfel commended

those German pieces in which a lively musical expression supported a simple plot, writing that

with this formula, “Our Germans can walk confidently beside the foreigners and German comic

opera will heap scorn on Italian opera buffa.”156

Critics advanced various theories about what might be holding back German opera. Some

focused on the perceived flaws of German music. Wieland argued, “The truth is, the most

excellent and most essential part of music, song, is until now the most neglected among us.”157

In the Unterhaltungen Quantz agreed with this assessment. He wrote that Germans have

harmonically correct compositions and have brought instrumental music far, but they lack in

good taste and in beautiful melodies, aside from some old church songs. He called German taste

and melodies “rather flat, dry, meager, and silly,” and added: “Their composition was, as has

been noted, harmonic and full-voiced, but not melodic and charming. They seek to be more complex than comprehensible and pleasing, to compose more for the eye than for the ear.”158

Quantz returned to this accusation again when he criticized German instrumental music for

looking very difficult but sounding “flat and sleepy.” He asserted that composers sought to

154 Agricola, review of Hiller’s Lottchen am Hofe and Die Liebe auf dem Lande, AdB 13, no. 1 (1770): 85.

155 Wieland, “Briefe an einen Freund,” TM 1 (1773): 36.

156 Johann Wolfgang Andreas Schöpfel, Vorrede to Frühlingsnacht (1773), quoted in Renate Schusky, Das deutsche Singspiel im 18. Jahrhundert: Quellen und Zeugnisse zu Ästhetik und Rezeption (Bonn: Bouvier, 1980), 22.

157 Wieland, “Versuch,” TM 3 (1775): 64.

158 Quantz, “Abhandlung von der Musik,” Unterhaltungen 10 (1770): 26.

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awaken admiration more than please listeners.159 In other words, Quantz felt that German music

was too “scientific” and not “natural” enough. However, his words did not embrace an outright

rejection of the German interest in Harmonie, a stance that would set him somewhat apart from

north Germans such as Agricola, but he did call for a shift in emphasis to the simple naturalism

and melodic focus of the galant style.

While some writers focused on the flaws of German music, a larger number of critics indicted German poetry. Not a single critic seemed to think that the late 1760s and early 1770s represented anything close to a golden age for Germany poetry. The author of the article on serious opera for Unterhaltungen contended that Germany had produced several composers of genius, among whom he listed Keiser, Telemann, Stolzel, Handel, and Graun, but he continued,

“Their texts are too miserable, and their German operas not fashionable enough. . . . The only serious good piece that we have in music is Gellert’s Orakel.”160 Reichardt agreed, and in his

Über die deutsche komische Oper, blamed German poetry along with the quality of German

singing for the decline of Telemann’s operas.161

Despite their condemnation of German poetry, several critics pointed out that the language itself was not to blame. This is a significant point because, as we saw in the WNA, disagreement existed about whether German possessed enough beauty for the stage. In the first volume of Unterhaltungen, an unnamed author of an Abhandlung vom musikalischen

Geschmacke insisted, “If only the poet is not too stubborn, our language [i.e., German] can be set to music.”162 The nationalistic Agricola expressed regret in the AdB that the beautiful poetry of

159 Ibid., 28.

160 Anonymous, “Fortsetzung der musikalischen Bibliothek,” Unterhaltungen 10 (1770): 521.

161 Reichardt, Über die deutsche komische Oper, 4.

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Maria Antonia’s Talestri was written in Italian instead of German. Like Hiller and others, he lamented the current state of German writing but anticipated a bright future: “Yet patience!

Perhaps the German courts will again do justice to the German language. This it has long deserved on account of its richness, its flexibility, and its force. And where should this be more hoped than in Saxony since all Germany has long conceded the advantage this land has with regard to true High German.”163 In his “Briefe an einen Freund,” Wieland admitted the advantage of singing in Italian, but he noted that German also becomes musical when in the hands of a master. He argued that it is more the poet than the language that makes poetry.164

Wieland returned to the issue in 1775 in his “Versuch,” writing that, while some of the German- born nobility think that the German language does not lend itself to singing, Charles Burney disagreed and even wrote that German lends itself to singing better than French.165 Granting that the German language lacks the pure vowels of Italian, Wieland claimed that it is nonetheless

“provided with an overflow of the most sound-rich words in order to paint all possible objects of musical imitation, to express all movements of nature, and consequently all feelings and affects of the human heart, . . . both the softest and most tender and the thundering and storming with the greatest truth and strength.”166

In addition to their remarks about German opera, critics also offered their opinions on foreign librettos and their suitability as models for German works. The first German opera of this revival period, Die verwandelten Weiber, had been adapted from Charles Coffey’s ballad opera

162 Anonymous, Abhandlung vom musikalischen Geschmacke, Unterhaltungen 1 (1766): 50.

163 Agricola, review of Walpurgis’s Talestri, AdB 3, no. 2 (1766): 145.

164 Wieland, “Briefe an einen Freund,” TM 1 (1773): 35–36.

165 Wieland, “Versuch,” TM 3 (1775): 66.

166 Ibid., 67.

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The Devil to Pay. However, some critics felt that English sources were too gritty for German

audiences. Ebeling’s review for the AdB of John Gay’s The Beggar’s Opera, produced in

translation as Die Strassenräuber, doubted whether it would meet with success in Germany

because “it fits English customs too exactly.” By “customs,” he meant satires against great

people, satires on Italian opera, the use of dance music for songs, and the focus on lower-class life. Ebeling insisted, “A play about robbers is not a very interesting piece for us.” Displaying a traditional German view of the theater as a vehicle for moral instruction, he noted that the translator had tried to refine the heroine’s character, but she was not quite strong enough: “How good would it be if she throughout showed a better heart and sought to remove her parents and her beloved from the wicked life?”167 Ebeling did approve of the aria texts and noted that many

were full of feeling, yet his comments show that he saw no place in German opera for social or

cultural commentary, or satire. Nicolai agreed with Ebeling that German comic pieces should not emulate English (or Italian) comic pieces, which Nicolai believed spoiled good taste, good manners, and good music in equal measure. Demonstrating his acquaintance with French theater,

Nicolai encouraged Germans instead to imitate the French, who he felt united “a fine ridiculousness” (ein feines Lächerliche) with naïve and sensitive scenes.

However, Nicolai did not support French music as a model for German composers,

writing, “The French often give so little care for what lends itself to music and what does not.”168

Other writers shared Nicolai’s low opinion of French music. Reichardt wrote that the French

wanted chansons simple enough that they can sing along with them on the second time, and he

accused them of going to the opera only to learn new songs to accompany their evening wine.169

167 Ebeling, review of John Gay’s Die Strassenräuber, AdB 14, no. 1 (1771): 207–8.

168 Nicolai, review of Weisse’s Komische Opern, AdB 11, no. 2 (1770): 2.

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In the Unterhaltungen Noverre commented on the difficulty the French have in changing from the “uniform and monotonous melodies” of Lully; he claimed that the Italians are much more reasonable about newness and variety.170

In spite of the general preference for Italian musical styles over French, the most highly praised German works often received high marks for combining various national styles. Hiller was often acknowledged for his skill. A reviewer of Lisuart und Dariolette for Unterhaltungen noted that Hiller “has preferred the manner of the Italian operetta arias to the French, aside from the opening chorus, the Romanze [“Es war einmal ein Königssohn”], and the Morning Song of the Old Woman [“Die schöne Morgenröthe zeigt sich in voller Pracht”]. His arias are in the true

German taste. They have much expression of affect, charming melodies, and a diligently worked-out accompaniment.”171 A year later, another reviewer made a similar observation about

Lottchen am Hofe:

It is from a clever mixture of French and Italian taste. The songs are easy and simple according to their character, the ariettas are short and without too much decoration, and without the coloratura and repetitions that tear the attention away from the comedy too much and are not so natural amidst the prose. The more serious arias of the prince are entirely in the Italian taste, but yet not da capo arias, and splendidly arranged. Expression of affect, a tuneful, pleasing melody, and especially in the comic arias a very speaking declamation (the main ingredient of comic music), we believe are to be met consistently in this operetta, which also has various musical paintings of serious and comic types that are very expressive.172

This quote provides important insight into aesthetic priorities—and a fitting ending to this section of the chapter—as it encapsulates many of the qualities that contemporary critics and writers seemed to prefer in German opera: a mixture of the best of French and Italian styles,

169 Reichardt, Über die deutsche komische Oper, 11.

170 Noverre, “Einige Bemerkungen des Herrn Noverre über die französische Opernmusik,” Unterhaltungen 1 (1766): 261.

171 Anonymous, review of Hiller’s Lisuart und Dariolette, Unterhaltungen 2 (1766): 503.

172 Anonymous, review of Hiller’s Lottchen am Hofe, Unterhaltungen 4 (1767): 651.

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songs and arias according to character, pleasing melody without superfluous decoration, a

primary focus on the plot, clarity in declamation, and vivid musical portrayal.

Taking Stock of the Writings on Opera

Having taken two sizable chapters to survey the critical prescriptions for German opera

found in several journals and other writings, it seems to appropriate to pause here and take stock

of what we have discovered before plunging into the next chapter to survey the music. On many

of the larger questions, the German writers considered in this chapter agreed with the aesthetic

principles outlined by the non-German critics in the WNA. For example, they shared the same concerns for integrating the arts, striving for naturalism and vivid emotion, and prioritizing melody. However, some writers, such as Agricola, showed a distinctly conservative attitude toward opera reform, and in general, the German writers, including Hiller, showed an interest in retaining contrapuntal interest in their music. On other issues, the Germans varied only by degree. For instance, they discussed recitative less than the French and Italians (unsurprisingly given the lack of recitative in German operas at the time), but wrote much more about the importance of composing music that appropriately reflected a character’s social class. Yet despite these differences, aesthetic consensus remained the norm.

For this concluding section, I will provide a point-by-point overview of aesthetic prescriptions distilled from chapters 2 and 3. This summary will highlight the most important prescriptions and give the reader some essential characteristics to bear in mind for the next chapter.

Some of the most important themes emphasized by critics include

• Gesamtkunstwerk: Critics felt that opera should bring together the arts into a harmonious whole.

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• Naturalism in plot, in dialogue, in music, and in acting. It was assumed that naturalism was reflected in outward simplicity and a lack of artifice.

• Vivid emotional depiction in poetry and in music with the goal of arousing the sentiments and stirring the hearts of the audience

• At least in comic opera, critics favored a mixture of character types and musical styles.

Prescriptions for various musical components of opera include

• Melody: Most important musical element. The galant-style melody, of which Pergolesi was often regarded as the most outstanding exponent, was seen as the highest ideal. There was disagreement among critics over the value of difficult, virtuosic melody, and also disagreement between critics and the public.

• Harmonie/Accompaniment: Second most important musical element. Assumed to be subservient to melody, but there was some praise for a “worked-out” accompaniment with interesting middle voices. Critics tended to dismiss accompaniments that seemed superficial or broke contrapuntal rules.

• Form: Critics emphasized the need for flexibility in da capo forms

• Instrumentation: Critics showed some interest in timbral variety and novelty for emotional expression or to maintain a “constant conversation” in the orchestra (Chastellux)

• Rhythm/Meter: Not regularly discussed. There was some call for variety.

• Recitative: Much discussed, especially in the WNA. Critics especially favored expressive accompanied recitative. There was critical disagreement over the suitability of particular languages for recitative. There was also disagreement over the possibility of spoken dialogue in an opera.

• Aria: Not subjected to as much critical dissection as recitative but more highly regarded as music—“a beauty set apart” (Blainville) and “the masterpiece, not only of opera, but of all music” (Rousseau). Strophic arias were praised for fitting music to multiple strophes, though critics acknowledged the difficulty of this.

• Chorus: Treated as a superfluous element in critical discourse. Usually praised if they were “splendid” or “fiery.”

• Sinfonia: Critics shared a general agreement that they should be in the character of the opera and not a generic fast-slow-fast opener.

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• Divertissement/Ballet: Acceptable at the end of an opera but not within.

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Chapter 4

Operatic Music in Leipzig

In his “Essay on Musical Opera,” reprinted in the WNA, vol. 3, Francesco Algorotti argued that the purpose of opera is “to charm the senses, to bewitch the heart, and to produce a pleasant deception.” In the previous two chapters, we have seen what methods critics prescribed to achieve this purpose. In this chapter, the composers themselves will have their say, not through periodicals, but through the music they composed. This chapter will survey a number of musical examples from a wide variety of operas with the goal of providing a representative sample of Leipzig’s musical environment in the late 1760s and early 1770s. I cannot claim to have included in this study every opera performed in Leipzig between 1766 and 1775. A lack of preserved records makes it impossible to know exactly what was performed during these years.

Nevertheless, the fifteen scores discussed here can provide a fairly detailed representation of

what composers valued in their works—and whether they followed the prescriptions described in

the previous two chapters.

Existing Music and Current Locations

The most significant obstacle to studying German opera between 1766 and 1775 lies in

the lack of full scores antedating 1770. Bauman notes that of the sixteen operas composed in

northern Germany between 1766 and early 1770, the music survives for only eight. This

collection includes Hiller’s output through Die Jagd (seven operas, all found in Table 4.1 below)

as well as Wolf’s Das Gärtnermädchen, composed for Weimar in 1769.1 Research on German

operatic music of this time period is thus inevitably “Hiller-heavy.” After 1770 we find more

1 Thomas Bauman, North German Opera in the Age of Goethe (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985), 38.

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composers attempting the genre and more operas have been preserved. In addition to Germany’s

relative paucity of operatic compositions, the disappearance of full-score manuscripts can also be attributed to the era’s assumption about the disposability of comic music. While serious opera still enjoyed greater prestige, no one evidently thought much about preserving copies of a comic opera that was no longer being performed. Meanwhile the appearance of full-score publications for individual study still lay decades in the future.

Leipzig’s operatic music was more likely to be preserved in a keyboard-vocal format.

These editions were produced for domestic entertainment and enabled the public to enjoy songs that had achieved popular status in northern Germany. Such products created winners all around: publishers quickly capitalized on the success of operatic arias, composers saw the widespread dissemination of their music, and impresarios such as Koch benefited from keeping their productions in the public eye.2 While these keyboard-vocal editions were likely arranged by the composers themselves, they nevertheless had limitations.3 Because they were intended for an

audience of amateur musicians, keyboard-vocal editions often had only a two-voice texture, with

the right hand replicating the vocal melody and the left hand providing the bass line. Despite the

occasional addition of thicker chords, right-hand embellishment, or harmonization in parallel

thirds and sixths in the right hand, keyboard reductions greatly diluted the original orchestral

texture. Along with this omission of parts, keyboard-vocal editions rarely specified instrumentation.4 Anyone trying to reconstruct the original score from a keyboard edition will

2 Estelle Joubert has written on the commercial considerations of songs within eighteenth-century German opera. See “Songs to Shape a German Nation: Hiller’s Comic Operas and the Public Sphere,” Eighteenth-Century Music 3, no. 2 (September 2006): 213–30.

3 Not all keyboard-vocal editions have a preface (Vorrede) by the composer, but those that do indicate that the composer also prepared the keyboard-vocal editions. See, for example, the prefaces to Hiller’s Der Dorfbalbier and Neefe’s Die Einsprüche.

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find no indication, for instance, of which wind instruments were used in a particular number or

how. Perhaps for these reasons Reichardt provided a word of caution about relying on keyboard

editions. Calling them “only a meager skeleton,” he wrote that he recognized in them little of

Hiller’s true work, but he at least considered them better than hearing the opera butchered

(verhunzt) by a theater orchestra.5 In spite of these drawbacks, the keyboard editions are in some

cases all that remain today.

All of the operas selected for this study have a connection to Leipzig, though not all

premiered there. I have included operas that premiered in Weimar or Gotha but were later

performed by the Koch or Seyler troupes in Leipzig and therefore still contributed to the operatic

environment in Leipzig.6 By the same token, I have omitted from this study Hiller’s Der Krieg

(1772) and Die Jubelhochzeit (1773) because they premiered in Berlin, and I have yet to locate

records of subsequent performance in Leipzig. I have included Neefe’s Die Apotheke and Die

Einsprüche, both of which premiered in Berlin, because the composer indicated in his own introduction to the keyboard edition to the latter that both were expanded from one act to two, otherwise they “would not have been played at the theater here [i.e., in Leipzig.]”7 In other

4 The sole exception that I found of a keyboard edition indicating instrumentation occurred in the first song of Hiller’s Die Muse, “Schau Jüngling, schau Urania,” where the virtuosic obbligato solo is marked for “oboe or flute.”

5 “Der Auszug ist nur ein mageres Skelet jener schönen Werke; und mich dauert, so oft ich einen solchen Auszug ansehe, die Mühe und der Fleiß, den H. H. [Herr Hiller] auf die Ausarbeitung seiner Arbeiten wendet, und die so wenige erkennen; mehr aber dauert’s mich noch, wenn ich sie in dem Theater-Orchester verhunzen höre.” (The excerpt is only a meager skeleton of that beautiful work, and it is a pity when I often examine such an excerpt and recognize so little of the effort and industry that Herr Hiller applies to the working-out of his compositions. However I pity them even more when I hear them butchered in the theater orchestra.) Johann Reichardt, Über die deutsche comische Oper (1774), 94.

6 See chapter 1 for the activities of the Koch and Seyler troupes in Leipzig.

7 “Vielleicht wird man sich wundern, das Stück hier in zwey Aufzügen zu sehen, da es doch der Dichter nur in Einem geschrieben hatte. Ich glaube, mich deswegen sattsam zu rechtfertigen, wenn ich sage, daß ohne diese Veränderung das Stück auf dem hiesigen Theater nicht würde seyn gespielt worden. . . . Der Dorfbarbier [sic] und Die Apotheke, die ursprünglich nur aus einem Acte bestanden, sind eben deswegen zu zweyen erweitert worden.” (Perhaps one will be amazed to see the piece here in two acts since the poet had written it in one. I believe I am

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words, the expansions were made with Leipzig in mind. Table 4.1 below shows a list of the

operas used in this study along with their premiere dates and locations, and connections to

Leipzig.

Table 4.1. Operas, Premiere Dates and Locations, and Connections to Leipzig

Opera Composer-Librettist Date of Location of Connection to Premiere Premiere Leipzig Die verwandelten Standfuss/Hiller- May 28, 1766 Leipzig Premiere Weiber Weisse Der lustige Standfuss/Hiller- Mid-1766 Leipzig Premiere Schuster Weisse Lisuart und Hiller-Schiebeler Jan 7, 1767 Leipzig Premiere Dariolette (3-act) Lottchen am Hofe Hiller-Weisse Apr 24, 1767 Leipzig Premiere Die Muse Hiller-Schiebeler Oct 3, 1767 Leipzig Premiere Die Liebe auf Hiller-Weisse May 18, 1768 Lepizig Premiere dem Lande Die Jagd Hiller-Weisse Jan 29, 1770 Weimar Koch troupe, 1770 Das Rosenfest Wolf-Heermann Sept 4, 1770 Weimar Koch troupe, 1770 Der Aerndtekranz Hiller-Weisse Early 1771 Leipzig Premiere Der Dorfbalbier 8 Hiller/Neefe-Weisse Apr 18, 1771 Leipzig Premiere Die Apotheke Neefe-Engel Dec 13, 1771 Berlin “Expanded for Leipzig” Amors Neefe-Michaelis May 10, 1772 Leipzig Premiere Guckkasten Alceste Schweitzer-Wieland May 28, 1773 Weimar Seyler troupe, 1774–75 Die Einsprüche Neefe-Michaelis Oct 16, 1773 Berlin “Expanded for Leipzig” Der Benda-Gotter/Engel Apr 26, 1775 Gotha Seyler troupe, Dorfjahrmarkt 1775

Most of the music studied for this project is currently housed in Berlin’s Staatsbibliothek

Preussischer Kulturbesitz. A manuscript of Hiller’s Die Liebe auf dem Lande can be found

sufficiently justified when I say that without this change the piece would not have been played at the local theater. . . . Der Dorfbarbier and Die Apotheke, which originally consisted on one act, were expanded to two for just the same reason.) Christian Gottlob Neefe, Vorrede to Die Einsprüche (Leipzig: Schwickert, 1773).

8 “Dorfbalbier” is an old spelling of “Dorfbarbier.” Barthel is the village barber in the story. Kyoko Kawada, “Studien zu den Singspielen von Johann Adam Hiller (1728–1804)” (PhD diss., University of Marburg, 1969), 70.

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online at the website for the Sächsische Landesbibliothek – Staats- und Universitätsbibliothek

Dresden (SLUB). Keyboard editions of Neefe’s Die Apotheke and Amors Guckkasten can also be

found online at the website for the International Music Score Library Project (imslp.org). Finally,

Hiller’s Die Jagd and Schweitzer’s Alceste are both available in published facsimile by Garland

(1985). Table 4.2 below shows a listing of all the operas discussed in this chapter, the format

(full score or keyboard edition) that I studied, the library sigla (where necessary), and the music’s current location.

Table 4.2. Operas Included in This Project, Format, Library Sigla, Current Location

Opera Format Library Sigla Current Location Die verwandelten Keyboard (J. F. Junius, D-B mus. O. 9016 Berlin Staatsbibliothek Weiber 1770) Der lustige Keyboard (J. F. Junius, D-B mus. O. 9016 Berlin Staatsbibliothek Schuster 1771) Lisuart und Full score D-B mus. ms. 10636 Berlin Staatsbibliothek Dariolette (3-act) Lottchen am Full score D-B mus. ms. 10637 Berlin Staatsbibliothek Hofe Die Muse Keyboard (B. C. D-B mus. O. 9757/1 Berlin Staatsbibliothek Breitkopf & Sohn, 1771) Die Liebe auf Full score D-Dlb mus. 3263 SLUB Dresden dem Lande F/501 Die Jagd Full score D-B mus. ms. 10638 Garland (1985) Das Rosenfest Keyboard (Winter, 1775) D-B SA 1219 Berlin Staatsbibliothek Der Full score D-B mus. ms. 10639 Berlin Staatsbibliothek Aerndtekranz Der Dorfbalbier Keyboard (B. C. D-B mus. O. 9757/1 Berlin Staatsbibliothek Breitkopf & Sohn, 1771) Die Apotheke Keyboard (Junius, 1772) imslp.org Amors Keyboard (Schwickert, imslp.org Guckkasten 1772) Alceste Full score A-Wn mus. hs. Garland (1985) 16.152 Die Einsprüche Full score D-B mus. ms. 16009 Berlin Staatsbibliothek Der Full score D-B mus. ms. 1355 Berlin Staatsbibliothek Dorfjahrmarkt

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Musical Characteristics of the Operas

The previous two chapters surveyed various writings on opera that were produced in or

circulated through Leipzig in the late 1760s and early 1770s. This examination compiled the

critical prescriptions for specific elements of operatic music: melody, harmony, form, texture,

instrumentation, rhythm and meter, recitative, aria, sinfonia, and chorus. In this section of the

chapter, I will again proceed through these musical elements, this time discussing what the music

scores reveal about opera in Leipzig. To facilitate the comparison, where possible, I will provide

brief reminders of what critics said in previous chapters. In cases where critics did not have

much to say, the music can nonetheless give us important information about what the composers

themselves valued.

Given the emphasis placed on melody by German critics of the 1760s and 1770s, it seems appropriate to consider first the various melodic styles found in the operas appearing at Leipzig.

Writers judged melody, often referred to as “song,” to be the most essential part of operatic music, as it played a significant role in communicating feeling and delineating character. In their collective opinion, critics agreed that a good melody conveys beauty and simplicity, and sticks to

a “middle way” that neither flies too close to seria-like virtuosity nor sinks to low farce. It must convey naturalness and a lack of artifice, or as Rousseau put it: a composer should “hide the effort that the invention of [melody] cost him.”9 However, looking at the music, I find that the composers did occasionally stray from this middle course. While the critics never codified a list of melodic types or spelled out their specific characteristics, I have placed the melodies into four main categories: galant, comic, folksong, and seria. These categories arise from my own study

of hundreds of arias within the repertoire. Over time, I noticed that melodies tended to conform

9 Jean-Jacques Rousseau, “Fortsetzung zu dem musikalischen Wörterbuche,” WNA 3, no. 44 (May 1, 1769): 344.

154 to one of these principal classes. Obviously, many melodies will defy easy categorization, but these four types nevertheless provide a framework for examining nearly every melody in the repertoire.

Critics could often be vague about the ingredients of “good song,” but they still left enough clues to suggest that they regarded a lyrical, sentimental galant style to be the melodic ideal. We find an example of this style in the first two vocal phrases of “O Bild, voll göttlich hoher Reize” from Hiller’s Lisuart und Dariolette (see Example 4.1).

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Example 4.1. “O Bild, voll göttlich hoher Reize,” mm. 21–30

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In the story, the knight Lisuart has been ordered to rescue Dariolette, the daughter of Queen

Ginevra. He falls in love with the princess after only seeing her face in a picture, and he rhapsodizes about her in this aria. Its emphasis on vocal beauty appears at the outset, with long notes in the two opening phrases designed to show off the tenor soloist’s voice. Both phrases have the same easily recognizable, goal-directed contour of an opening leap followed eventually by a gracefully winding descent. The second phrase builds on the first by expanding its opening leap from a fifth (A3-E4) to a sixth (A3-F#4), which then pushes upward to the tonic A4—but touches it only briefly—before beginning its second-half descent. These two lyrical phrases are further decorated with two very common signifiers of sentiment: “sighing” suspensions (mm. 22,

24, and 30) and Lombardic rhythms (mm. 22, 24, and 29). The combination of lyricism and sentiment in Lisuart’s aria serves to communicate a mid-eighteenth-century interpretation of chivalric character.

However, not all arias conformed to the sentimental galant type. Despite the critical approval for “good song,” opera composers frequently turned to other melodic types to provide

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necessary musical variety. According to Reichardt, Hiller adjusted the style of his arias to the

social standing of his characters.10 On occasion, he juxtaposed a higher and lower style for comic

effect. Agricola, in the Allgemeine deutsche Bibliothek, had praised exactly this contrast of high

and low in a review of Lisuart.11 With the aria that directly follows “O Bild, voll göttlich hoher

Reize,” we encounter a very different melodic style in Lisuart’s servant, Derwin. In “Bald die

Blonde, bald die Braune,” a German example of the catalogue aria, Derwin mocks his master for the ease with which he falls in love (see Example 4.2).

10 Reichardt, Über die deutsche comische Oper, 22.

11 Johann Agricola, review of Lisuart und Dariolette, AdB 10, no. 2 (1769): 185.

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Example 4.2. “Bald die Blonde, bald die Braune,” mm. 9–32

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Instead of long-held notes and sentimental sighing figures, Derwin sings a stream of patter in which a middle-ground ascending G-major scale skewers Lisuart with each rising step: “Now the blonde one (G3); now the brunette (A3); now the thin one (Magre) (B3); now the thick (Dicke)

(C4).” While stylistically different from “O Bild,” this aria also displays Italian roots, in this case in the pattering comic numbers of opera buffa.12

Hiller was not the only composer to make use of this rapid-fire style. In one of Johann

Standfuss’s arias in Der lustige Schuster, “Ein Philosoph, ein großer Mann, sagt einst,” the patter of the comic cobbler Jobsen undercuts his philosophical pretensions. We can see another example of patter aria in Wolf’s “Lass sie sehn und quäl sie nicht” from Das Rosenfest. Here the bossy Amtmann (Bailiff) conveys his threats through presto triplets.

12 Fans of Mozart may have recognized similarities between the arias discussed in the first two musical examples and some of Mozart’s own works. Lisuart’s “O Bild” aria, sung when the knight falls in love with an image of the abducted princess, Dariolette, bears thematic resemblance to Tamino’s “O Bildnis” aria from Die Zauberflöte, sung when Tamino falls in love with an image of the missing Pamina. Likewise, the servant Derwin’s “Bald die Blonde” catalogue aria recalls Leporello’s famous catalogue aria, “Madamina, il catalogo è questo,” from Don Giovanni. Such similarities illustrate the popularity of certain conventions in opera, not only across different European regions but also across the decades.

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In addition to patter, composers employed other means of injecting humor into their melodies. In “Mein Engelchen, was machst du hier?” from Hiller’s Die Jagd, the country simpleton Töffel alternates between his normal singing voice and falsetto as he imagines a discussion with his fiancé, Röschen. In “Verbietet nur etwas der Frau, ihr guten Herrn!” from

Die verwandelten Weiber, Hiller notates the innocent Lene’s tobacco-induced sneezing (“It-zi”) with ascending fourths and fifths. Neefe’s Die Einsprüche incorporates a well-worn eighteenth- century comic convention in the role of the Schulmeister.13 His tendencies toward syllabic Latin deliveries and ponderous, lightly imitative passages show him to be pedantic and self-important.

Finally, animal mimicry, perhaps an obvious choice for often rurally-centered plots, proved to be a fertile source of melodic humor. Jobsen imitates jackdaws, roosters, and cuckoos in “Um

Kirchthurm schwatzen schon die Dohlen” (Hiller’s Die verwandelten Weiber). Hännschen’s lamb-like “Blä” punctuate “Ich suche, such auch du” as he helps Lieschen search for her lost pet

(Hiller’s Die Liebe auf dem Lande). Barthel’s rising minor-seventh leaps in “Ein Esel ist gestraft genug, dass er ein Esel ist,” which emphasize the bright sound of a closed German “e” on ein

EEE-sel, capture the braying of a donkey (Neefe’s Die Einsprüche) (see Example 4.3).

13 In his review of Michaelis’s libretto to Der Einspruch, J. K. A. Musäus noted that the pedantic schoolmaster role was old, but it never failed to elicit loud laughter from the gallery. AdB 19, no. 1 (1773): 573.

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Example 4.3. “Ein Esel ist gestraft genug, dass er ein Esel ist,” mm. 13–25

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These varied examples demonstrate that a comic, even farcical, style represented an important

component of the operatic repertoire in Leipzig. However, critics rarely praised it and were more

likely to dismiss what Quantz, among others, called “the low and the common.”14

A third melodic style, the folksong style, occupied a middle position between the galant

ideal and the guilty pleasure of comedy. It possessed the sentiment of the galant style but was

often more restricted in range and more repetitive. The folksong style also tends to be very

regular in its phrasing. At the same time, it contained none of the rapid chatter or other vocal

tricks of the comic style. The folksong style appears most clearly in Hiller’s works, a product of

his collaboration with Weisse, who had spent the late 1750s and early 1760s in Paris where he

heard opéras comiques written by Favart, Anseaume, and Sedaine, and viewed the rural simplicity of the genre as a necessary element for German opera. An example of the folksong style can be seen in the most famous aria of the entire era, the Romanze “Als ich auf meiner

Bleiche,” from Hiller’s Die Jagd (see Example 4.4).15

14 Johann Joachim Quantz, “Abhandlung über die Musik,” Unterhaltungen 10, no. 1 (July, 1770): 13.

15 This was the theme that Johann Reichardt wished he had composed instead of “all the thousand pieces that flowed from my brain or my hand.” See chapter 3, pp. 134–35.

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Example 4.4. “Als ich auf meiner Bleiche,” mm. 5–20

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This strophic song is sung by a simple farm girl, Hannchen, to her fiancé’s sister, Röse,

after Hannchen escapes from the nefarious Count von Schmetterling. It lies within an easy range

of an octave (E4–E5). The declamation is generally syllabic with some two-note groupings.

Significantly, the melody contains no melismas, the virtuosity of which would undermine the

presumed humility of the rural folk. Frequent “sighing” suspensions (mm. 6, 10, 14, 15, 17 and

18) add sentiment and generate sympathy for Hannchen’s character. The phrasing is perfectly regular, with four measures in each, and aside from the dotted Lombardic rhythm in m. 17, the rhythmic profile is exactly the same for each phrase.

While other composers did not always have such rural-centric plots with which to work, they occasionally employed a similarly simple, folk-like tone to signify a character’s innocence.

Neefe shows how much he has learned of his teacher Hiller’s style in “Sprach sie nicht noch heute” from Die Einsprüche. This is the first number sung by the young female lover, also named Hannchen. Her melody is musically just as simple as in “Als ich auf meiner Bleiche,” with a range of only a ninth and elementary rhythms (see Example 4.5).

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Example 4.5. “Sprach sie nicht noch heute,” mm. 1–25

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The fourth principal category of melodic style among the operas at Leipzig is a

melismatic, seria-derived style. As with the comic style, the virtuosity of melismatic solo singing

met with mixed critical opinion. Contributors to the WNA generally condemned highly

embellished solos, believing that this “Klingklang” obscured expression. Even the Italian

Algorotti had declared, “Someone must bring order to the musical kingdom and subject the

virtuosos to discipline and authority.”16 On the other hand, audiences enjoyed vocal fireworks,

and perhaps catering to this demand as well as the ability of coloratura to portray mood and

delineate character, composers found room for occasional appearances of the melismatic style.

In Leipzig vocal virtuosity was limited during the late 1760s and early 1770s, not by

aesthetic opposition, but by a lack of trained singers. Nevertheless, Hiller does provide some

demanding seria-like arias in his comic operas, as in “Wie freue ich mich, in meinem Garten”

from Der Aerndtekranz. In this number (see Example 4.6), the aristocratic landowner, Lindford, eagerly anticipates bringing the country girl Lieschen to his court. His long melisma on “freue” makes clear his rejoicing, and the wide leaps with which he concludes his thought (“to see you soon transplanted”) (mm. 62–63) provide the kind of “big finish” that ends countless seria phrases.

16 “Er muss das musikalische Reich, wenn ich mich so ausdrücken darf, in Ordnung bringen, und die Virtuosen, wie vor Alters, einer Disciplin und Obrigkeit unterwerfen.” Algorotti, “Versuch über die musikalische Oper,” WNA 3, no. 50 (June 12, 1769): 389.

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Example 4.6. “Wie freue ich mich, in meinem Garten,” mm. 44–69

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Neefe got around the problem of Leipzig’s mediocre singers in Die Apotheke by composing Vincent’s aria “Mit ehern Pfeilen grub die Liebe tief in mein Herz” in a mostly syllabic, rhythmically unchallenging manner that still preserves other signifiers of the seria style:

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an A-B-A' form, a vocal melody that uses long notes in widely spaced intervals to convey

grandeur, a highly embellished orchestral accompaniment, and finally a text full of highly

dramatic, metaphoric language. Reichardt had prescribed exactly this solution to writing for bad

singers in his Über die deutsche komische Oper and noted that Hiller had made successful use of

it many times. He explained that by giving the instruments the fast notes necessary for the

expression of the piece, the singer was then free to pronounce the words distinctly.17

Such signifiers of seria style could also be used ironically for comic effect, as Hiller

showed in “Der Gott der Herzen findet” from Die Liebe auf dem Lande. Agricola in the

Allgemeine deutsche Bibliothek had called this number “a perfect caricature of the bravura aria

according to the newest Italian style.”18 Hännschen says he is going to teach Lieschen a song that he has heard at court. He launches into an energetic Allegro aria with a long opening ritornello.

The vocal part enters with an arpeggiated melody over half notes that would be entirely at home

in an opera seria. Dotted rhythms eventually give way to coloratura. When Hännschen arrives at

a dominant prolongation and appears to be winding up for a grand cadence, Lieschen abruptly

cuts him off and mocks his lyrics: “Stop! Stop! I’m yawning. What kind of thing is that, ‘the god

of hearts’? And after that, ‘fetters of flowers’? No, I thank you for the little court songs. They

make me appreciate our own.”19 This interrupted aria shows that the melismatic style, while generally played “straight” in the Leipzig operas, also carried upper-class connotations, which

could be exploited and undermined for comic effect.

17 “Indem die begleitenden Instrumente die geschwinderen Noten machen, die zum Ausdrucke des Stücks nothwendig sind, . . . der Sänger kann die Worte deutlicher und mit mehrerem Nachdrucke aussprechen.” Reichardt, Über die deutsche komische Oper, 33–34.

18 “. . . eine vollkommene Caricatur, der Bravur-Arien nach der neuesten Mode aus Wälschland.” Agricola, review of Lottchen am Hofe and Die Liebe auf dem Lande, AdB 13, no. 1 (1770): 88.

19 Lieschen: “Stille! Stille! Ich gähne. Was ist das für ein Ding, der Gott der Herzen?—und darnach, die Blumenfesseln?—Nein, ich danke für die Hofliederchen! Da lob’ ich mir unsre.” Christian Felix Weisse, Die Liebe auf dem Lande, act 1, scene 4.

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While Leipzig’s lack of trained singers limited the use of virtuosic singing, the courts in

Weimar and Gotha, on the other hand, possessed a wealth of financial, and thus musical, resources. The courts could hire capable singers, and resident composers made full use of their abilities. Schweitzer’s Alceste, which sets its story in the world of Greek mythology rather than everyday rural life, calls for coloratura singing in several arias for Alceste and her servant,

Parthenia. Benda’s Der Dorfjahrmarkt demands considerable ability for the roles of the young farmer Lukas, his bride, Bärbchen, and the helpful colonel (Der Obrist). In fact, Bärbchen’s climactic aria, “Mein Retter, mein Befreier,” is perhaps the most dazzling aria in this study’s repertoire, with long melismas on “Befreier,” “Dank,” and “Gesang,” and a range that climbs as high as E6. Both of these works were eventually performed at Leipzig, though not until 1774–75 when Abel Seyler visited with his troupe, including the star sopranos Franziska Koch, who sang the role of Alceste, and Josepha Hellmuth, who played Parthenia and Bärbchen. All of these examples of Italianate virtuosity demonstrate that German opera of this time was much more than simple, strophic songs.

In addition to these four principal melodic styles (galant, comic, folksong, and seria), other minor styles nonetheless appear frequently enough to constitute a type. For instance, one could argue for a “parent/guardian” melodic style that displays the melodic and rhythmic simplicity of the folksong style but with a seriousness that sets it somewhat apart, usually through a slower tempo and admonishing long note-values. In their operas, composers turned to this style when the fathers, mothers, or guardians had proverbs or words of advice for the young.

Examples of the parenting style include Thomas’s Lied to his daughter Lieschen about the wisdom of rising early, “Die Morgenstunde hat Gold im Munde” (Der Aerndtekranz); Michel’s aria to the four young lovers about preparing for worst-case scenarios, “Beim schönsten

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Sonnenschein nimmt deinen Mantel um” (Die Jagd); and Marthe’s Lied about the vigilance with

which one must protect a daughter’s virtue, “Was eine gute Mutter ist” (Das Rosenfest).20 The

serious parent-guardian style constitutes a musical counterpart to the moralizing messages that

often distinguish German opera from Italian or French.

As we saw in chapters 2 and 3, the position just below melody in the hierarchy of musical

elements belonged to the accompaniment, or, to use a contemporaneous term, the Harmonie.

Eighteenth-century music critics articulated their preference for an accompaniment that was both

subordinate and suitable. D’Alembert felt that the French committed an error in emphasizing

Harmonie too much.21 Likewise, Rousseau explained that Harmonie has a secondary role in

supporting the expression.22 In the operas performed at Leipzig, we can see the composers

uniformly followed this prescription. A melody-with-accompaniment texture is the rule in all of the works under consideration. Moreover, in the simple songs, composers often reduced the accompaniment to only bare harmonic scaffolding for the melody. This occurs in two of the most popular songs of the era, Hiller’s “Ohne Lieb und ohne Wein” from Die verwandelten Weiber and “Als ich auf meiner Bleiche” from Die Jagd (seen in Example 4.4), where an unobtrusive accompaniment consisting of only two or three additional parts functions as a supporting framework, clarifying the harmonies implied by the tuneful folk-like melodies.

20 Das Rosenfest actually features two mothers: Marthe, mother of Lottchen, and Lene, mother of Hannchen. The opera includes no singing roles for fathers. This emphasis on the mother-daughter relationship contrasts sharply with Italian opera buffa, in which mothers are quite rare—and almost nonexistent as leading characters. See Mary Hunter, The Culture of Opera Buffa in Mozart’s Vienna: A Poetics of Entertainment (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1999), 62. German opera, on the other hand, included numerous roles for mothers, some of them central to the drama. In the repertoire considered here, in addition to Das Rosenfest, we find them in Lisuart und Dariolette (Queen Ginevra), Die Jagd (Marthe), Der Aerndtekranz (Marie), Die Einsprüche (Anne), Alceste (Alceste), and Der Dorfjahrmarkt (Eva). Incidentally, Hiller’s Die Jubelhochzeit features not only a stepmother (Margarethe) but also a grandmother (Marthe).

21 D’Alembert, “Sechste Fortsetzung über die Freiheit der Musik,” WNA 3, no. 38 (March 20, 1769): 293.

22 Rousseau, “Ueber den musikalischen Ausdruck,” WNA 4, no. 2 (January 8, 1770): 11.

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Even though the mid-century preference for subordinate accompaniments resulted in

much homophonic operatic music, we can still locate some critical and musical support for

polyphonic textures. Particularly among tradition-minded German critics, a feeling persisted that

the counterpoint of composers such as Handel had become something of a lost art. For this

reason, Agricola praised the full-voiced accompaniment, in particular the active second violin

and viola parts, in an aria from Maria Antonia’s Talestri.23 In the repertoire considered here,

imitative counterpoint appears most conspicuously in opening sinfonias, where it can shine

without obscuring a vocal soloist. The second half of Alceste’s French-overture-influenced sinfonia features extensive treatment of a jagged G-minor theme. The comic operas likewise added stretches of imitation to their sinfonias, for instance in the first movements of Hiller’s Der

Aerndtekranz and Neefe’s Die Einsprüche, and the third movement of Hiller’s Lisuart und

Dariolette. The second half of the third movement of Hiller’s Der lustige Schuster (see Example

4.7) even introduces a quasi-learned theme (at m. 33) and stretto-like imitation (mm. 65–72), giving this Allegro di molto gigue an energetic finish.

23 Agricola, review of Talestri, AdB 3, no. 2 (1766): 131.

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Example 4.7. Der lustige Schuster, Sinfonia III, mm. 33–80 (keyboard reduction)

Although the counterpoint in solo numbers and ensembles is not as highly developed as in the sinfonias, one can still locate numerous instances of its use. Composers also applied it for a variety of purposes. Rising scales in imitation at the end of “Gut getroffen, lass er offen!” in

Die Einsprüche fulfill the same function as the aforementioned counterpoint in the sinfonia to

Der lustige Schuster; in this case, they provide a rousing finish to a trio involving Hannchen, her

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mother, Anne, and the idiotic Schulmeister. In other cases, brief counterpoint signals a

character’s elevated social position. Near the end of the princess Dariolette’s aria “Der

fürchterliche Zwerg” (Lisuart und Dariolette), imitative entrances in the orchestra combine with

dotted rhythms to underscore her royal standing. Likewise when Lene (Die verwandelten

Weiber) wakes up in her new aristocratic surroundings, having been transformed into Herr von

Liebreich’s wife, her da capo aria “Das ist der Himmel sicherlich” includes a canonic B section

that suggests in its polyphonic complexity her newly refined status. Hiller finds another use for

counterpoint in “Mein Hannchen war für mich allein” (Die Jagd). In this C-minor solo aria,

Christel despairs that his fiancé has left him for the court. The orchestra’s three-part imitation in the opening ritornello heightens this slow movement’s lamenting tone. Finally, composers frequently used imitative textures to accompany the interactions of characters. In Neefe’s

“Einspruch hin und Einspruch her” (Die Einsprüche), musical imitation portrays contentious interruption as Anne and Märten bicker about the suitability of Barthel to be their daughter’s husband. More often, though, counterpoint symbolizes a harmonious union between lovers.

Examples of this include the climactic knight-and-princess duet “So darf ich dich die Meine nennen” (Lisuart und Dariolette) and Phädria and Monime’s love duet “Vor deiner Reize

Macht” (Die Muse). On an even larger scale, two pairs of lovers sing of their reconciliation in the

quartet “Versöhnte Liebe, ach, wie schön,” the penultimate number in Der Aerndtekranz. The

four-part imitation and general independence of the vocal parts make this ensemble one of

Hiller’s most extensive experiments in bringing vocal polyphony into opera (see Example 4.8).

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Example 4.8. “Versöhnte Liebe, ach, wie schön,” mm. 9–28

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Having addressed issues of accompaniment and texture, we should consider what this repertoire has to offer according to our modern definition of harmony. What can we say observe in these works about individual sonorities, harmonic progressions, modulations, and tonality?

Obviously, we must try to approach this question with pre-Romantic expectations because, in the

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late 1760s and early 1770s, surprising harmonic sequences or unexpected modulations were not

as highly valued as they would be in later years. True to this aesthetic, many of the arias and

Lieder in this repertoire consist of unremarkable diatonic patterns, and modulations move in

highly predictable directions. Nevertheless, critics wrote of the need to “seize the passions and

stir the heart,” and an effective harmonic surprise offered an important means to this end. The

occasional appearance of diminished-seventh or augmented-sixth sonorities to highlight

moments of tension or anguish naturally captures the ear. These chords appear in a humorous

context in “Wenn Lisuart nicht vernünftiger spricht” (Lisuart und Dariolette) when one of the

Queen’s maidservants, Olinde, tells the bumbling servant, Derwin, to prepare for death if he and

Lisuart cannot solve the Queen’s riddle.

The most adventurous harmonic schemes are usually found in minor-key arias, where

they convey fraught emotional states (sadness, heartache, worry, anger, etc.) or enhance atmosphere, as in the spooky nocturnal incantations of the Zauberer’s “Auf naht euch, ihr dienstbaren Geister, hinzu!” from Die verwandelten Weiber.24 A typical example occurs in

“Zwischen Angst und zwischen Hoffen,” the opening aria in Alceste. As the heroine anxiously

awaits news of her ailing husband, Schweitzer makes liberal use of diminished, augmented, and

Neapolitan sonorities to portray her despair. Minor-key arias convey similar emotions in the

comic operas as well. Lene’s aria “Immer Bier und Brandtewein muss den Herrn zu Diensten

seyn” (Die verwandelten Weiber) introduces into its Lento C-minor section chromaticism and

diminished-seventh chords on “weh uns” to illustrate her misery over her husband’s controlling

24 Gretchen Wheelock has written about the gloomy (and presumably feminine) character of minor keys in the eighteenth century. “Schwarze Gredel and the Engendered Minor Mode in Mozart’s Operas,” in Musicology and Difference, ed. Ruth A. Solie (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1993), 201–21. While Wheelock finds a predominance of minor-key arias going to female characters in Mozart’s operas, I have not found a similar correlation in the fifteen North German operas considered in this chapter. In this repertoire, men sing more minor-key arias than women (26 to 23).

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manner. Likewise, Hännchen’s “Ach, meines Mädchens Lämmchen ist gestohlen” (Die Liebe auf

dem Lande), also in C minor, uses a descending chromatic tetrachord in the bass, a familiar

musical symbol of grief, to lament Lieschen’s lost lamb.25

Composers of comic operas also deployed minor-key symbols of anguish ironically, just

as they did with seria-style melody. In one of his contributions to Der Dorfbalbier, “Erst dacht

ich: Ach ein junges Weib,” Neefe uses A minor and descending melodic phrases to foreshadow

the dejected turn the lyrics will take as Barthel reveals that marriage has not delivered the bliss it

seemed to promise. The comedy is made even more obvious through melodic turns on E2 that

mimic his wife’s grumbling and snoring. Neefe turned to minor-key humor again in Die

Apotheke. In “Fast wird der arme Trist erstickt,” the hypochondriac barber Trist sets about

shaving the apothecary, Enoch. As he does so, he complains that his malady stems from his

study of Latin and Greek. Neapolitan and diminished-seventh chords add harmonic color to the

opening and closing lamentoso sections in D minor as Trist sings of the cramps in his diaphragm

and stomach; trudging dotted rhythms and descending chromatic phrases graphically portray his

discomfort. In the middle tumultuoso section, which modulates to F major, an emphatic

augmented-sixth chord and stile concitato accompaniment signal the razor-wielding barber’s

increasing agitation. Hearing all this, Enoch wisely thinks better of a shave and fights Trist off with a shaving-towel.

For all of Trist’s silliness, perhaps the most remarkable parody of minor-key sadness in this repertoire occurs in Hiller’s “Ach, ach, ich arme Frau! Ich bin ganz blau” (Der Dorfbalbier)

(see Example 4.9). In this aria Susanne seeks to fool the eavesdropping school master/landlord,

Ruthe, into thinking that her husband, Barthel, has beaten her. Ultimately she hopes to get a

25 The descending tetrachord had been widely understood as a symbol of lament in opera since the 1640s. Ellen Rosand, “The Descending Tetrachord: An Emblem of Lament,” The Musical Quarterly 65, no. 3 (July 1979): 346–59.

183 break on their late rent. For this C-minor aria, Hiller pulls out every harmonic novelty in the mid- eighteenth-century arsenal, including dense chromaticism and augmented-sixth, diminished- seventh, and Neapolitan chords. The antiphonal exchange of short motives suggests a more elevated, contrapuntal style as well as emotional tumult. Finally, Susanne’s melody features dramatic leaps, halting sigh-figures, and numerous descending phrases. Considered as a whole, this aria musters an overload of musical symbols for pathos, and this exaggeration is the source of its comedy. Such a high concentration of tragic gestures in a serious aria would seem overwrought and ridiculous. Ruthe, however, takes the bait and relents on the rent payment.

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Example 4.9. “Ach, ach, ich arme Frau! Ich bin ganz blau,” mm. 1–18 (keyboard reduction)

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While composers may have linked the major or minor modes in a general way to happy

or sad affects, it appears they never linked specific keys to specific affects with any consistency.

The critics themselves never reached an agreement on this issue either. Recall that one

anonymous French author reprinted in the WNA instructed composers to use D or G major for cheerful and martial songs, C minor for stirring and pathetic songs, and F minor for the somber and sad.26 Rousseau, on the other hand, noted that many composers felt that key was irrelevant.

In this repertoire, I find almost no connection between key and affect in the operas under

consideration. However, there seems to be a peculiar recurrence of Eb major at climactic

moments when characters are overwhelmed by feeling, often romantic. Moreover, this tendency

is not confined to one composer. Hiller used Eb major in Lene’s sentimental da capo aria “Das

ist der Himmel sicherlich” (Die verwandelten Weiber) when she awakens in the palace after

being magically transformed overnight into nobility. He selected it again in “Komm, süße

Hoffnung, senke dich in meine liebesvolle Brust” (Lottchem am Hofe), where Prince Astolph

lyrically pines for the country girl, Lottchen. Eb major is associated with the awed response to

nature in Hiller’s Die Jagd, both in Hannchen’s paean to village life in “Du süßer Wohnplatz

stiller Freuden,” which she sings upon returning home from the court, and in Christel’s flower-

song, “Schön sind Rosen und Jesmin.” Finally, in Der Aerndtekranz, Hiller chose Eb major for

Frau Amalia’s “Lass mich, Lieb’, in stillen Gründen,” an elevated, sentimental aria that she sings

26 Anonymous, “Answer to the Question: What Similarities Exist between Music and Painting,” reprinted in WNA 3 (September 19, 1768): 91.

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upon glimpsing her unfaithful husband whom she nevertheless hopes to win back. Neefe wrote

Vincent’s strophic love song, “Deine Mine spricht Verlangen,” in Eb major (Die Apotheke). He

again used the key in Amors Guckkasten, for Psyche’s “Also schlägt mein Herz für Freuden” and the climactic love duet for Amor and Psyche, “So lang der Himmel Götter trägt.” Last, Eb major is also the key of the climactic love duet between Hannchen and Gustel in Wolf’s Das Rosenfest,

“Blicke mich voll Mittleids an,” a pairing that features all the typical contemporary musical markers of romance: sighing suspensions and retardations, wide leaps, and an intricate orchestral accompaniment with chromatic melodic embellishments. In the end, whether Eb major did in fact hold symbolic significance for these German composers must remain an open question.

None of the critics in the periodicals surveyed ever discussed the matter. Yet the key appears with curious frequency at important moments in a number of operas.

If reviewers could be frustratingly vague at times in their discussions of melody and harmony, they could be much more so with musical form, an element that shows far greater diversity within the compositions than is reflected in the periodicals and other writings. Among solo movements, strophic arias are best represented. With the exception of Schweitzer in Alceste, each composer in this study used them. However, no standard formula exists for the strophic arias, and they varied in complexity. Some could be quite short. Suschen’s “Jede Kleinigkeit reifet durch die Zeit, Mädchen reifen auch” (Der Aerndtekranz) spans all of nine measures, with two four-measure vocal phrases, an antecedent cadencing on the dominant, and a consequent returning to the tonic. Here the small proportions and songlike melody befit the girl’s youthful innocence. Larger strophic forms might also exhibit tonal simplicity. Hannchen’s “Herr, nehm er mich!” (Die Einsprüche) dwarfs Suschen’s kleine aria at twenty-one measures, yet it never leaves its tonic key of D major. On the other hand, the Schulmeister’s F-minor aria “Mancher

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braver Mutter Sohn,” from the same opera, visits multiple key areas, arriving twice at bIII:PAC

cadences and modulating to bVI and V before returning to its tonic key. A strophic aria might

also include multiple meters or tempos. In Wolf’s Das Rosenfest, “Hannchen, siehst du dort den

Bach” has an A-B-A'-B form with an opening meter of 3/4 and placid Lento tempo marking. The

A' and second B sections are reproduced below (see Example 4.10). In the A' section (mm. 44–

57), when a storm enters and the brook begins to churn, the composer maintains the same harmonic structure as the A section (hence its designation as A') but paints the text by changing to an alla breve time signature, a non troppo allegro tempo, and an almost continuous sixteenth- note accompaniment. This aria in particular, with its flowing streams of eighth notes, changing to surging sixteenths, its ominous minor-key shadows, and its contemplative, nature-focused refrain in mm. 58–73 (“Hannchen, come with me to the brook, look at it, and think on it”) anticipates some of the most attractive features of Schubert’s songs. Arias such as this should dispel any modern assumptions that the strophic songs of German opera were always simple, artless ditties.

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Example 4.10. “Hannchen, siehst du dort den Bach,” mm. 44–73 (keyboard reduction)

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After strophic forms, binary forms appear next most frequently, commonly A-B. The composers generally surrounded the two main sections with ritornellos, producing an overall

Ritornello-A-Ritornello-B-Ritornello form. Most often, the A section journeys from the tonic key to a V:PAC or to a bIII:PAC in minor keys. The middle ritornello in the new key precedes a

B section that usually visits other keys before arriving at a PAC back in the tonic. A final, tonic- key ritornello closes the movement. Hiller showed a strong preference for this form, which

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explains its regular recurrence in the limited repertoire of this period. Hännschen’s “Der Strauss,

den ich hier binde” (A major) and Lieschen’s “O wie sehr liebt mein gutes Hännschen mich” (G

minor), both from Act I of Die Liebe auf dem Lande, offer examples of this binary form in major and minor keys.

Other composers adopted this form as well. Standfuss had used it in his arias from the

1750s, as we discover in several numbers included by Hiller in the 1766 versions of Die verwandelten Weiber and Der lustige Schuster.27 From the former, see “Mein schwellend Herz

hüpft mir vor Freude” and “Es war einmal ein junges Weib,” and from the latter, see “Nie werd

ich um Geld das Glücke liebkosen” and “Was hat es für Noth?” Hiller’s student Neefe also relied

on the same format for some of his arias. We can find it among his contributions to Der

Dorfbalbier, for instance in Susanne’s aria “Hast du Geld, so ist Freund die ganze Welt.” He

subsequently used it in his own works. Crönchen’s opening aria in Die Apotheke, “Sonst schlich

mir,” reveals a Rit-A-Rit-B-Rit form. Her “Klug in jedem ihrer Werke” from later in the same

opera shows how the same form could be placed in a strophic context. Finally, Wolf made use of

this binary form, though not as frequently as Hiller. The first act of Das Rosenfest nonetheless

offers two consecutive examples in the Amtmann’s “Was der Hagel in Feldern” and the

Commissarius’s “Wie der Westwind heissen Lüften.”

Binary forms that depart from this common type appear only rarely. Fickfack, the buffo

character in Benda’s Der Dorfjahrmarkt, has a Rit-A-Rit-A'-Rit aria in “Lassen Sie mich immer

spassen.” Hiller uses the same form for the King’s “Eine Flasch’ in Phillis Hand” (Die Jagd) and

the Count’s “Nur in süßer Einsamkeit” (Die Liebe auf dem Lande). Neefe applies it to Psyche’s

aria “Uns alle, so wahr ich hier bin” (Amors Guckkasten).

27 As we saw in chapter 1, Hiller preserved many of Standfuss’s songs from the 1750s in the later versions of Die verwandelten Weiber and Der lustige Schuster. The 1770 keyboard editions indicate the authorship of each song.

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With ternary forms, we can see greater variety in the repertoire. The most common is an

A-B-A' form with intervening ritornellos, with the opening theme returning after the B section

with the reestablishment of the tonic. Sometimes abbreviated, the A' is always altered to avoid

the first A section’s modulation and close in the tonic. The repetition of material makes this

ternary form a dramatically effective choice for the Queen’s lamenting “Gib grausames Geschick

die Tochter mir zurück” from Act 1 of Lisuart und Dariolette. For this C-minor aria, Hiller depicts the Queen trapped in a dungeon of grief over her lost daughter. Sighing suspensions over a dominant prolongation at the end of the B section portray the Queen as stuck in unchanging sadness, and the return of the opening material underscores the inescapability of her pain.

Variations on the A-B-A' form include Reiger’s “Des Richters Frau ein Ohrgehenk” (Die

Apotheke), which changes from A major and a 2/4 meter in the A section to D major and 6/8 in

B. In Der Dorfjahrmarkt, the colonel’s A-B-A' aria “Bald soll der hochzeitliche Kranz” ends

with a coda that prolongs the tonic and provides a cadenza opportunity at the end of a highly

virtuosic solo.

The da capo aria, a close relative of the A-B-A' form considered above, garnered the most attention from critics when they did touch on form. By the late 1760s and early 1770s, critics generally considered the constant use of strict da capo form unsuited to the demands of contemporary drama, which emphasized naturalness and spontaneity over formality. Writers such as Algorotti dismissed its long ritornellos and A-section repetition as unrealistic.28

Nevertheless, the da capo form, or something clearly derived from it, appears in several German

operas, and as with a highly ornamented or melismatic melody, it suggests a character’s elevated

status. Variants of the traditional da capo form included the dal segno aria, which omits the

28 Algorotti, “Fortsetzung des Versuchs über die musikalische Oper,” WNA 3, no. 51 (June 19, 1769): 398– 400.

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return of the opening ritornello while leaving the rest of the aria intact, or a modified da capo that

abbreviates the restatement of the A section. Both of these alterations were praised by critics as

relieving the tedium of too much repetition. Moreover, as Agricola suggested in the Allgemeine

deutsche Bibliothek, departures from da capo form could give composers a chance to show off

their “inventive power.”29

We find an example of a much abbreviated da capo form in Arkadia’s “Und legte Zeus

vor seinem Thron” (Amors Guckkasten). Neefe imbued this aria with the typical elements of

seria style: a very active orchestral ritornello, vocal coloratura, and an elevated subject. Through

the first A and B sections, it reflects common contemporary da capo structure. After the opening

ritornello, the A section is divided into two subsections, a1 and a2, the first of which cadences on

the dominant while the second returns to and cadences on the tonic. The intermediary ritornello

after a1 confirms the dominant, and another after a2 reaffirms the tonic. The shorter B section

modulates to and cadences on the submediant. A short instrumental re-transition arrives at a

I:HC, thus preparing the return of A. However, Neefe then significantly compresses the restatement of the A section, reducing it to a repetition of the opening vocal phrases of a1 and then jumping ahead, by means of a dal segno, to the end of a2. In this abbreviated form, the aria provides the necessary return to tonic, but it removes much text repetition along with the A section’s journey to the dominant and back. Such an abbreviation also curtails the possibility for much ornamentation.

Perhaps not surprisingly, da capo arias in this repertoire turn up most frequently in

Schweitzer’s serious Alceste, where at the beginning of the first act Alceste sings three of them consecutively: “Zwischen Angst und zwischen Hoffen,” “Ihr Götter der Hölle,” and “Parthenia!

29 Agricola, review of Gluck’s Alceste, AdB 14, no. 1 (1771): 13.

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Admet!” Notably, Schweitzer modifies all three to reduce repetition. However, da capo arias also

play an important role in the comic operas, signifying a character’s noble or elevated status. In

Herr von Liebreich’s “Durch glänzendes Geld, erkauft man die Welt” (Der lustige Schuster), conventional da capo form fits with his aristocratic standing. The old woman’s “Entdecke mir, du Trauriger” in Lisuart und Dariolette has a dal segno form. In this case, structure provides a musical clue because it invites Lisuart and the audience to recognize her true identity as the princess Dariolette.

The latter examples raise an important question, especially within comic opera, regarding form and an operatic character’s social status. In “Ueber die deutsche komische Oper,” Reichardt wrote that Hiller preserved “großen Arien” for noble characters;30 however, in my survey of the

repertoire, I have found that Hiller and other composers did not hold fast to this rule. While the

connection between form and status largely applies to Lisuart in Lisuart und Dariolette, where

he sings three da capo arias and a closing da capo duet with the princess, it does not apply to the

King in Die Jagd. Of the King’s four solo arias, two are in binary forms (A-B and A-A'), one is an A-B-A' ternary form, and one, “Was noch jung und artig ist,” is a sixteen-measure strophic song. In these arias, the King conveys enlightened nobility not through form but through the magnanimity of his words and the lyrical galant style of his melodies.

Conversely, “regular people” in the operas will sometimes turn to a da capo or dal segno aria to express themselves at important moments. The village girl Bärbchen’s “Mein Retter, mein

Befreier” (Der Dorfjahrmarkt), cited above for its melismatic virtuosity, is also an abbreviated

30 “Indessen konnte H. H. die großen Arien doch nicht ganz verwerfen, sondern behielt sie nur zum Unterscheidungszeichen edlerer Personen vor, wenn die in der Gesellschaft natürlicher Menschen auftreten.” (Meanwhile Herr Hiller could not yet throw away the great arias, but he reserves them only as distinguishing symbols of noble people when they appear in the company of natural men.) Reichardt, “Ueber die deutsche komische Oper,” 8.

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dal segno form. Like Arkadia’s aria in Amors Guckkasten, it compresses the restatement of the A

section. Bärbchen sings it near the end of the drama as the conflict with her fiancé, Lukas, is

resolved. In Die Apotheke, Vincent, a medical doctor, sings a dal segno aria, “O laß in deinen sanften Blicken,” as his climactic declaration of love to Fieckchen. Only the omission of the opening ritornello on the return to A prevents this aria from being a strict da capo form.

Finally, characters might also sing forms that reflect varying levels of complexity, as

Lene does in act 1 of Die verwandelten Weiber. Her first three numbers, all by Hiller and sung consecutively, include (1) an A-B binary form with two different keys, meters, and tempos

(“Immer Bier und Brandtewein”); (2) a lyrical dal segno aria (“Wir sind ja auch von Fleisch und

Bein”); and (3) a short, two-phrase melody that never leaves the tonic key (“Ohne Müh ist selten

Brodt”). Obviously, with such diversity we cannot draw any conclusions about Lene’s social standing from her musical forms alone. In the end, one should be cautious about generalizing about the correlation between form and character type in this repertoire. For the composers, form appears to have been a product of many dramatic considerations.

Though less common than the A-B-A' and da capo forms, other three-part forms found in this repertoire include Gretchen’s short A-A'-B “Hab’ ich einmal ihn zum Manne” from Die

Liebe auf dem Lande. The A and B phrases present different themes, but both remain grounded in C major. The closing ritornello echoes the ritornello that ended the A' phrase, providing a sense of rounded closure. Herr von Liebreich’s “Gewährt mir, ihr Götter, das einzige Begehren,” another of Standfuss’s compositions in Die verwandelten Weiber, presents a multi-sectional A-

B-C form in which the A and B sections are both divided into adagio and allegro subsections.

The adagio C section briefly tonicizes the subdominant, dominant, and minor tonic before returning to the major tonic (E major) as Liebreich considers living happily apart from his

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shrewish wife and dying peacefully in the arms of freedom. The complexity of this aria’s form

combines with sentimental lyricism and harmonic interest to make it stand out among

Standfuss’s more farcical strophic numbers.

While binary, ternary, and da capo/dal segno forms predominate in the solo arias in this repertoire, composers occasionally turned to other structures as their texts or dramatic situations

demanded. Hiller composes an A-B-A-C form for Röse’s “Ich sah da Töffeln an den Hecken

(Die Jagd), where she sings about sneaking up on her lover and throwing apples at him. Hiller also writes short A-B-C-D forms for Nickel’s “Welch eine Welt! Hat man kein Geld” (Der lustige Schuster), an aria about the difficulties of being poor, and Gretchen’s “Das kleine

Lieschen sticht dem Schösser ins Gesicht” (Die Liebe auf dem Lande), an aria about Lieschen’s

resistance to the hunter’s advances. Neefe writes an A-A-B-C form for one of Vincent’s romantic arias, “Deine Mine spricht Verlangen” (Die Apotheke). Schweitzer includes a rondo

form, the only one I encountered in this repertoire, in Admet’s “Wem dank ich dies Leben”

(Alceste), which he sings after Alceste sacrifices her life for his. The variety of dramatic

circumstances for these forms indicates that they were not reserved for certain situations.

In general, the ensembles present greater challenges in categorizing formal types.

Occasionally, a recognizable form presents itself, such as the A-A' form in Bärbchen and

Lukas’s duet “Glaubest du mit Schmeicheleien” (Der Dorfjahrmarkt); Amalia and Peter’s A-B form duet, “Vielleicht wird es nun Liesen reun [sic]” (Der Aerndtekranz); the A-B-A quartet at the end of Lottchen am Hofe, “Es brennt mein Herz allein für dich”; the A-B-A' ternary form of

Hannchen and Gustel’s “Blicke mich voll Mittleids an” (Das Rosenfest); or the A-B-A-B form in

Marie and Lieschen’s “Vom Puder glänzt sein lockiges Haar” (Der Aerndtekranz). Da capo/dal segno forms appear in the duets “So darf ich dich die Meine nennen” (Lisuart und Dariolette)

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and “Vor deiner Reize Macht” (Die Muse) and in the trio “Fliehst du, O so flieht die Freude”

(Die Apotheke). More often, the ensembles do not follow standard formulas. Composers allowed musical form to be determined by the libretto, and in some cases, they simply linked one musical phrase after another until they ran out of words to set. Hiller provides an example of this in the penultimate number in Der Dorfbalbier, “Herr Barthel, ach! Erbarm er sich.” In this fast-paced alla breve quartet, the older couple (Ruthe and Ursel) and the younger couple (Barthel and

Susanne) all pass around short, syllabic phrases, occasionally combining in duets or a closing trio for Ursel, Ruthe, and Barthel. At no point in this quartet do all four sing together.

This inclination to have the members of an ensemble sing one-after-another occurs with some frequency in the repertoire presented here. In the A-B-A-B duet for Marie and Lieschen mentioned above, “Vom Puder glänzt sein lockiges Haar,” Marie sings in the A sections and

Lieschen responds in the B sections. Rather than alternating short phrases, they trade six-line speeches, creating a slowness of exchange that leaves this duet lacking in dramatic energy. When singers in an ensemble do join together, it usually happens at the climactic moment after first trading longer individual phrases. In “Nein, nein! Es könnte was geschehen” (Die Jagd), Marthe,

Röse, and Töffel each sing one long phrase in turn. Then we hear them all again, one-by-one, this time delivering medium-length phrases. In the trio’s third section, all three sing together and trade short phrases. The gradual shortening of phrase length over the course of the ensemble creates a dramatic intensification. Nevertheless, the relative lack of rapid interaction in German comic ensembles makes them less exciting than their Italian counterparts.

As with musical form, rhythm and meter did not receive much attention from mid- eighteenth-century critics. Thus their few remarks do not allow us to discern consistent aesthetic preferences as we can for galant melody and pleasing Harmonie. Some writers did feel that the

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topic deserved greater exploration as rhythmic variety and metrical change were recognized as

powerful tools for depicting the naturalism valued by contemporary drama. Rousseau and Hiller

both noted that meter and tempo play an important role in portraying mood and emotion; Hiller

went on to complain that composers relied on 4/4 and 6/8 meters too much.31 Nevertheless, the

amount of critical discourse dedicated to rhythm and meter failed to match the concern for it we

see in some compositions.

The operas composed or performed in Leipzig show an interest in metrical and tempo

variety. Such variety could occur in arias or ensembles anywhere in an act and might progress

from slow to fast or vice versa. Generally metrical or tempo change accompanies a change in

mood within the text. Many arias employ two meters in a single number, especially in the da

capo and dal segno arias; others experiment with more. Hiller uses four different meter-tempo combinations for Marie’s short “Ei, nicht doch! Das wäre mir recht!” (Der Aerndtekranz) as she lectures her daughter and schemes to marry her to a courtier. Admet’s Act 4 lament for his lost wife and happier times, “O Jugendzeit, o goldne Wonne” (Alceste) proceeds through five different tempo markings (Maestoso, Con tenerezza, Adagio molto, Allegro molto, Andante) as he quickly passes through emotions ranging from remembrance to despair to resolution.

While composers brought variety to their arias through a manipulation of meter and tempo, they sometimes maintained musical and affective unity through rhythm, particularly the repetition of certain figures. In “Schreibt nur schreibt, ihr Herren, schreibt” (Der Dorfbalbier),

Barthel’s martial dotted rhythms act as a unifying rhythmic motive as he sings about possibly

becoming a soldier in Turkey. The obsessively repeated dotted rhythms in Lottchen’s “Gürge,

nun entsag ich dir; nur am Hof gefällt es mir” (Lottchen am Hofe) not only unify the movement

31 Rousseau, “Fortsetzung über den musikalischen Ausdruck,” WNA 4, no. 6 (February 5, 1770): 43–44; and Hiller, “Ueber den musikalischen Ausdruck nach dem Rousseau,” WNA 4, no. 3 (January 15, 1770): 21.

198 but also signify the regal courtly life that the heroine is considering and perhaps mocking. These rhythms return in the same opera, in the strophic trio “Das ist die Mode so,” as the maidservants

Dorine and Klärchen apply uncomfortable hair, arm, and neck bands to Lottchen in preparation for her appearance at court (see Example 4.11).

Example 4.11. “Das ist die Mode so,” mm. 5–32

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Again, the frequent dotted rhythms carry a symbolic association with courtly culture, although this time Lottchen condemns outright the stifling environment: “Damn your fashion! It annoys me to death!”32 One can imagine the dotted rhythms of her final phrase, “Das ist nicht auszusteh’n” (This is unbearable), being sung with extreme disgust. Hiller is using the connotations of rhythm in the same way he used the melodic conventions of seria style in the interrupted aria, “Der Gott der Herzen findet”—to highlight class tensions within the opera and perhaps poke fun at aristocratic fashion.

32 “Verdammt sey eure Mode! Ich ärg’re mich zu Tode!”

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Despite the popularity of martial or French-derived dotted figures, the defining rhythm of

German operas of this time was the Lombardic rhythm. Sometimes referred to as the “Scotch

snap,” the Lombardic rhythm carried sentimental connotations, perhaps because of its

approximation to a sigh or sob. Since sentiment was so highly valued in all the arts during the

middle of the eighteenth century, this figure appears in a number of arias and ensembles. In Der

Aerndtekranz the violins play long streams of Lombardic rhythms during Amalia’s solo aria

“Lass mich, Lieb, in stillen Gründen” as she observes her philandering husband and hopes that

he might discover tenderness for her again. The sighing rhythms portray her own heartache and

make clear to the audience that Amalia is a sympathetic figure. “Lass mich an deine schöne

Brust,” Standfuss’s climactic trio near the end of Der lustige Schuster, uses Lombardic rhythms

not for romantic anguish but for over-the-top swooning (see Example 4.12). The seamstress Lene and Herr von Liebreich have been scheming for most of the opera to make Lene’s husband,

Jobsen, jealous about his wife and repent his neglectful treatment of her. At the end of act 3,

Jobsen is hiding under a table while Lene and Liebreich declare their pretended love for each other. Musically, the pair expresses all the sentimentality they can through their lyricism, elegantly shaped phrases, and copious Lombardic rhythms. In this case, the rhythms symbolize a mutual sighing, much to Jobsen’s chagrin. Their abundant presence in this ensemble accounts for the comedy of the scene.

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Example 4.12. “Lass mich an deine schöne Brust,” mm. 9–22 (keyboard reduction)

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On a few rare occasions, composers used Lombardic rhythms in non-romantic contexts.

In Die verwandelten Weiber, Herr von Liebreich’s prayer for his own abusive spouse’s reformed

behavior, “Gewährt mir, ihr Götter, das einzige Begehren,” includes an ornate melody decorated

with Lombardic figures. While Liebreich also strikes a sympathy-inspiring pose, the sentiment

here is not so much romantic but pleading; his address is not to his wife but to the gods.

A final issue involving rhythm, meter, and sentiment concerns the meaning of alla

Polacca within German music of the late 1760s and early 1770s. The Polacca, with its 3/4 meter and slow to moderately paced tempo, behaves similarly to the key of Eb major in this repertoire in that it has an odd habit of turning up at significant moments. Reichardt wrote that the Polacca has “a certain serious and decorous course” and “a certain proud spark.”33 Might this dignified

dance also have carried romantic connotations? Its use in these operas suggests this connection.

33 “Um den königlichen Charakter aber auch in diesem Liede nicht aus den Augen zu lassen, wählt H. H. eine Bewegung, die einen gewissen ernsthaften und anständigen Gang hat; ich meyne das alla Polacca. Man hat längst schon die Bemerkung gemacht, daß der Tanz der Polen einen gewissen stolzen Schwung hat, der den Charakter der Nation einigermaßen bezeichnet; und ich finde diese Bemerkung sehr gegründet.” (In order to maintain the royal character also in this song, H. H. [Herr Hiller] chooses a motion that has a certain serious and decorous course; I mean the Polacca. For the longest time, the observation has been made that the Polish dance has a certain proud spark that fairly identifies the character of the nation, and I find this observation well founded.) Reichardt, Über die deutsche komische Oper, 80.

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In Neefe’s Amors Guckkasten, Love (Amor) himself sings a short, strophic Polacca, “Wird man

lange fragen sollen.” With a simple yet lyrical melody, he declares that “one gives maidens what

they want, if you give them kisses.”34

Among Hiller’s arias, the King’s “Was noch jung und artig ist” (Die Jagd), a song about young love, is a Polacca, as is Lottchen’s scolding declaration of faithfulness to Gürge, “Schelm, bessre dich, ich bin dir treu geblieben” (Lottchen am Hofe). Hiller also sets romantic duets as

Polaccas. Following the celebratory chorus at the end of Lottchen am Hofe, Lottchen and Gürge sing one more number together, “Leb wohl mit aller deiner Pracht,” a farewell to the other characters marked Con espressione ed in tempo di Polacca and featuring many sighing figures and melodic movement in parallel tenths and sixths. Romantic lyricism abounds in Lieschen and

Hännschen’s “Unserm Glücke kömmt nichts gleich,” a sentimental love duet in act 1 of Die

Liebe auf dem Lande. This particular alla Polacca also happens to be in Eb major. However, I find no connection between the dance style and the key: of the nine Polaccas I encountered in this study, only two are in Eb major.

Wolf includes three Polaccas among the forty-seven musical numbers in Das Rosenfest.

All of them involve the Commissarius, the public official who is charged with determining the purest, most innocent girl in the village and, in the process, falls in love with the heroine,

Hannchen. The first Polacca, an act 1 duet between the Commissarius and the Amtmann (Bailiff) called “O wie selig ist der Stand,” represents a rarity within this repertoire: two men singing together about the happiness of love. Lombardic rhythms sweeten their melodic parallels as they proclaim that “both hearts must become one heart.”35 In the following act, the Commissarius’s

34 “Mädchen giebt man, was sie wollen, wenn man ihnen Küsse giebt.”

35 “Beyder Herz muß ein Herz seyn.”

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love duet with Hannchen, “Junge Schönen deren Wangen,” is also full of galant phrases and

sighing figures. Act 3 includes the final Polacca from the love-struck Commissarius, “Schenkt

mir Hannchen Herz und Hand,” a solo aria decorated with trills, grace notes, and sighs as he

fantasizes, “If Hannchen gave me heart and hand, O how sweet will be our love’s bond.”36

Wolf’s use of the Polacca for this comic figure shows that this dance style, like the formal and

melodic conventions of opera seria, could also be used ironically for humorous purposes.

Recitative represents yet another element borrowed from the world of Italian opera. Like

the examples of melody, form, and dance style considered above, recitative could be treated

seriously or ironically in the Leipzig repertoire, though it appeared less frequently than those

other markers of seria style. Here we find a discrepancy between the emphasis on recitative in

the critical discourse and its actual appearance in the German operas. In the writings, and

especially in the Wöchentliche Nachrichten, which reprinted the thoughts of numerous French

writers on recitative, we encounter a lively debate on the merits of Italian versus French

recitative, and the verisimilitude of recitative declamation.37 We also read detailed discussions of the wonderful effects produced by the recitatives of Hasse, Graun, and others. Yet all of this critical focus did not lead to much compositional practice. The only opera in this study to apply recitative extensively is Wieland and Schweitzer’s serious opera Alceste, which mixes the simple and accompanied varieties, both clearly Italianate in style. In keeping with tradition, accompanied recitative in this opera is reserved for moments of high drama, such as in the recitative “Sie stirbt, o Gott, sie stirbt.” Here an active orchestral accompaniment graphically portrays the heightened emotion of Alceste’s death scene and dynamically fades as she expires.

36 “Schenkt mir Hannchen Herz und Hand, o, wie süsse wird das Band unsrer Liebe werden.”

37 Besides the WNA, the Unterhaltungen was the only other journal considered here to include many French writers. It reprinted essays by Chastellux, Noverre, and Rousseau.

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We must remember, however, that Wieland’s groundbreaking attempt at German serious opera

was an experiment designed, in part, to show that the German language was beautiful enough to

be presented operatically, a viewpoint that was not universally held in the late 1760s and early

1770s.

With no consensus yet on the legitimacy of German recitative, the composers of comic

operas had greater freedom to incorporate recitative when and how they saw fit. Though it is

commonly assumed today that German comic operas strictly relied on spoken dialogue, we can find instances of recitative in the repertoire—and a variety of reasons for its use. In the duet that closes Act 2 of Die verwandelten Weiber, “Was gleichet, schönster Engel, dir,” Standfuss interrupts the 2/4 Andantino movement and provides Herr von Liebreich with four measures of recitative (see Example 4.13).

Example 4.13. “Was gleichet, schönster Engel, dir,” mm. 49–52 (keyboard reduction)

The nobleman has been overwhelmed by the suddenly benevolent mood of his formerly abusive

wife, who he does not realize is actually Lene, transformed by a magician’s spell. By setting

Liebreich’s line “I found none, yes none of the previous kisses so lovely, so charming, so sweet”

to recitative, Standfuss highlights his words through the change in style and depicts his

amazement by a seeming suspension of time. While this phrase of recitative occurs in a farcical

opera, its purpose here does not seem to be a subtle jab at Liebreich’s social status or a satirical

swipe at a seria convention. Rather Standfuss appears to use recitative in a very traditional way:

to depict a moment of profound feeling.

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Conversely, Standfuss certainly has comedic purposes for two other instances of recitative in the same opera. In “Unter allen Handwerken von Osten bis Westen,” the cobbler

Jobsen Zeckel interrupts his aria and switches to recitative to praise, in all seriousness, the

“laudable shoe-mender, who patches the shoe soles of his worthy neighbors.” Using a declamation borrowed from opera seria to praise such a menial task ridicules Jobsen’s self- importance. At the end of the opera, Jobsen breaks into recitative again during “Heysa, heh! Nun hab’ ich Geld” (see Example 4.14). Once again, the phrase of recitative comes in the middle of the musical number. After receiving money from Frau von Liebreich, he stops in the middle of his 2/4 Allegro to announce, on four measures of an unchanging C-major chord in first inversion, his resistance to becoming a Junker (i.e., a wealthy landowner): “And yet I’m no dummy, no!

Herr von Zeckel, pfui, pfui! No, no!” The intrusion of recitative style here simultaneously mocks the foolish Jobsen and the high-class life that he is rejecting. Meanwhile, the droning, static harmony suggests what the audience already knows: no matter how much money Jobsen gets, he will always be a “Dummkopf.”

Example 4.14. “Heysa, heh! Nun hab’ ich Geld,” mm. 27–30 (keyboard reduction)

Wolf adds a bit of recitative to Das Rosenfest as well. In “Sergeant, halt er heut gute

Wacht,” the Amtmann (Bailiff) gives orders to the sergeant and talks with the Commissarius in a mixture of martial arioso and accompanied recitative. Later, the Commissarius briefly switches over to recitative in “Durch Seufzer spricht das Herz der Blöden” as he flirts with Kätchen: “Yet,

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child, what is naiveté good for? Look at me freshly.”38 Because both of these are comic

characters, recitative in their mouths sounds more pretentious and acts to undermine rather than

enhance their authority.

Finally, Hiller includes a few instances of recitative in his operas. In the duet between

Astolph and Lottchen, “Auf verlaß den finstern Hayn” (Lottchen am Hofe), Astolph attempts to convince Lottchen to leave her grove (Hayn) and join him at court. Lottchen interrupts his 2/4

Allegretto with two short, one-measure statements in recitative, declining his invitation. By themselves, these brief scraps of recitative seem relatively insignificant. Nevertheless, they captured the attention of Agricola, who praised them for expressing the “sense” (Sinn) of the

scene and for being an intelligent setting of lines that depart from the meter of the initial verses.39

In Die Muse Hiller composed for Phädria an elevated accompanied recitative, “Ja, Mutter holder

Zärtlichkeiten,” containing short vocal phrases with interspersed instrumental responses. For the

comical Derwin of Lisuart und Dariolette, however, he wrote in “Zu viele Complimente,” a

movement unlike anything else in this repertoire. Instrumental phrases from the orchestra

alternate with Derwin’s recitative-like interjections as he reacts to the queen’s women who dance

around him and pluck his beard but do not sing themselves (see Example 4.15).

38 “Doch Kind, was soll die Einfalt taugen. Sieh frisch mich an!”

39 “Das Duett S. 32: Auf verlaß etc. ist allerliebst. Die beyden eingeschobnen kleinen Stückchen Recitativ, drücken nicht nur den Sinn ungemein gut aus: sondern der Componist, ist auch dadurch der Schwierigkeit des allzusehr gegen die ersten zwo Zeilen veränderten Versmaßes . . . glücklich aus dem Wege gegangen.” (The duet on page 32, Auf verlaß, is most lovely. The two inserted small pieces of recitative not only express the sense uncommonly well, but through them the composer also happily avoids the difficulty of the completely changed verse-meter from the first two lines.) Agricola, review of Lottchen am Hofe, AdB 13, no. 1 (1770): 86.

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Example 4.15. “Zu viele Complimente,” mm. 25–41

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The prominence of the orchestra in Derwin’s “Zu viele Complimente,” scored for two

horns, two oboes, two violins, viola, and basso, points to the interest that contemporary critics

and composers took in instrumental timbre. In a largely negative review of Gluck’s Alceste,

Agricola nevertheless commended the composer for his prominent and well-combined wind parts.40 François-Jean Chastellux, whose essay on the unification of poetry and music appeared

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in the WNA, praised German symphony composers in particular for their timbral combinations,

comparing the interaction of the instruments to a “constant conversation.”41 Reichardt, however,

was not so charitable to his countrymen and complained that the majority of composers did not

know the instruments well enough, at least not as well as Hiller.42 Regardless of the actual state

of German ability in orchestration, these comments indicate a critical preference for an

intelligent and even creative deployment of orchestral forces.

Surveying the operatic repertoire, we can see that the composers in this study

demonstrated sensitivity to instrumental selection. As a rule, composers scored for a foundation

of two violins, viola, and basso; the one exception is Schweitzer’s Alceste, which adds a second

viola to most of its solo arias. Additional wind instruments (oboes, flutes, horns, and

occasionally bassoons), almost always in pairs, appear sporadically in the various solos and

ensembles of an opera.43 Clarini and timpani appear only rarely, in act 5 of Alceste, and in one

number in Neefe’s Die Einsprüche, the Schulmeister’s “Wer brannt muß er werden mit Wagen

und Pferden.” Hiller also added timpani to the programmatic duet “Siehst du wie jene Wolken

ziehen” and the subsequent storm sinfonia in Die Jagd. The fullest instrumentation usually

occurs in opening sinfonias, closing choruses/divertimenti, entr’actes, and other purely

instrumental numbers.

40 Agricola, review of Alceste, AdB 14, no. 1 (1771): 21–22.

41 Chastellux, “Fortsetzung über die Vereinigung der Poesie und Musik,” WNA 4, no. 11 (March 12, 1770): 84.

42 Reichardt, Über die deutsche komische Oper, 18.

43 Bassoon parts separate from the basso continuo appear in each of the full-score manuscripts included in this study—but only for two or three numbers. When the bassoons receive their own parts, it is because they will be doubling the voices or higher instruments at least part of the time; otherwise they double the basso. Examples 4.8 and 4.11 illustrate how separate bassoon parts are typically handled.

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In their orchestrations, composers sometimes relied on traditional symbolic associations,

as when Hiller used two flutes to accompany the strings in arias by some of his heroines, such as

Die Alte (Dariolette) in Lisuart und Dariolette, Lottchen in Lottchen am Hofe, and Lieschen in

Der Aerndtekranz. Hiller also seized on the horn’s traditional association with majesty in

Lottchen am Hofe, where the instrument, along with French-inspired dotted rhythms and rushing

ascending scales, symbolizes Prince Astolph’s noble status in “Die Liebe fesselt mich.”

Composers also exploited instrumental capabilities for programmatic effects. For instance,

Benda uses pizzicato to portray the heartbeat described in “Anfangs wird das Herzchen dir

pochen” (Der Dorfjahrmarkt). In Die Jagd, when Marthe recounts to her daughter, Röschen, how the girl’s father, Michel, once saw his own father’s ghost, Hiller scores the solo, “Ich bin dein Vater, und bin todt,” for muted strings, solo horn, and solo bassoon, providing a dark orchestral color to a movement that is further enhanced by its minor key and slowly rising melodies over prolonged harmonies. Previously in the same opera, Hiller had used timpani con sordino in the duet “Siehst du wie jene Wolken ziehn” to portray the rolling thunder of an approaching storm.

This use of instruments to illustrate natural events such as storms runs somewhat counter to the prescriptions of critics, who regarded such literalistic imagery as old-fashioned. With their emphasis on realistic depictions of vivid, fluctuating emotional states, critics preferred storm scenes to reflect not the outdoor weather but the inner struggle of a protagonist. The tempestuous music of “Zwischen Angst und zwischen Hoffen” (Alceste) meets this ideal as it represents

Alceste’s agonizing wait for news about her dying husband. In the comic repertoire, Prince

Astolph’s “Vergebens kämpft mit wilden Wogen der Schiffer auf dem Meer” (Lottchen am

Hofe) also satisfies the critical requirement. Here dynamic surges and rushing scales do not

216 portray an actual sailor fighting against the waves, but instead symbolize Astolph’s struggle against the pains of love.

Despite occasional concurrence with critical opinion, the opera composers did not hesitate to use their orchestras for literal programmaticism. After Hiller had announced the approaching storm with muted timpani, he proceeded to a Sinfonie: Allegro di molto that imitates storm music so vividly that it even depicts the storm’s subsiding through longer notes over a tonic pedal. He drew his inspiration perhaps from a storm scene in Philidor’s Le Sorcier, a work that he had reviewed quite positively a few years before for the WNA.44 Wolf’s “Hannchen, siehst du dort den Bach” (Das Rosenfest), the A-B-A'-B strophic aria with the surging sixteenth notes in the A' section that paints the storm-swollen brook, offers another example of literal depiction. In addition to storm music, there appears to have been a minor interest in spinning music. In Der lustige Schuster, Standfuss begins act 2 with Lene sitting at the spinning wheel. A whirring, turning figure in the bass simulates the action of the wheel as Lene sings her melody above, “Die Sonne mag die Felder grüßen.” The motion stops for her yawning, the music settles into a syncopated adagio phrase as she dozes, and then the whirring bass resumes when she awakens. Hiller may have had this aria in mind when he set Röschen’s aria “Mein lobt mir doch nur nicht die Nacht,” which opens act 3 of Die Jagd (sees Example 4.16a and 4.16b). Sixteenth- note triplets in the second violin (mm. 5–12) mimic the quick turning of the spinning wheel.

From m. 48 to m. 56, the action of the wheel is interrupted by syncopated figures in the bassoons and viola as Röschen nods off and struggles to stay awake. The pace slows further after m. 57, with the sixteenth-note triplets becoming halting groups of three eighth notes, as she becomes drowsier and gives in to sleep. All of these examples demonstrate that German opera composers

44 Hiller, review of Le Sorcier, WNA 1, no. 12 (September 16, 1766): 96.

217 placed great stock in the orchestra telling part of the story and providing more than just a simple accompaniment for singers.

Example 4.16a. “Mein lobt mir doch nur nicht die Nacht,” mm. 5–12

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Example 4.16b. “Mein lobt mir doch nur nicht die Nacht,” mm. 49–74

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Another sign of composers’ concern for instrumentation can be found in the way they altered their accompaniments for variety. “Die Felder sind nun alle leer! Die Scheunen alle voll,” a chorus near the end of Der Aerndtekranz, consists of twelve measures played twice, the first

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time by a wind band of two horns, two flutes, two oboes, and bassoon, and the second time with

the addition of the voices and full string orchestra. In the “Chor der Damen” that begins act 1 of

Lisuart und Dariolette, Hiller included pairs of horns, flutes, and oboes among the wind

instruments in the refrain but reduced to only flutes in the verses; likewise the bass reduces to

violoncello solo. For the minor-key B section of the A-B-A' aria “O dass mich noch sein Herze liebte” (Die Jagd), he replaces two oboes with two bassoons, lending a darker color to the timbre while at the same time switching the mode from major to minor. Neefe relied on muted strings in

“Wohl an! So eil ich in mein Glück” (Die Einsprüche) to add severity to the Largo C-minor opening. Removing the mutes in the concluding section, an Allegro 6/8 passage in C major, contributes a brighter timbre to the cheerful close. Benda supplied even more variety for “In unserem ganzen Dorf” (Der Dorfjahrmarkt), a set of strophic variations. Each strophe of this

Romanze offers a different orchestral accompaniment, varying the rhythmic figures and juxtaposing solo and tutti sections as well as pizzicato and bowed string playing.

The most advanced treatment of the orchestra involves passages featuring a true interplay among instrumental groups, a “constant conversation” such as Chastellux observed among

German symphony composers. To be sure, these passages are rare. For the most part, the composers kept the instruments to their roles, with violins providing the melody, the basso supplying the harmonic ground, violas filling out harmonies or doubling the bass, and winds adding color. Every so often, however, a composer would set the instruments against each other in musical dialogue. “Wo Peter ist, da bleib’ ich nicht,” the quartet at the end of act 2 in Hiller’s

Der Aerndtekranz, is notable for the independence of its instrumental parts (see Example 4.17).

In this ensemble, mother Marie is arguing with her daughters, Lieschen and Suschen, about who can and cannot go to the harvest fest. Father Thomas tries to keep his distance but finds himself

221 pulled into the quarrel. This quartet began with longer individual vocal parts (not shown) that have gradually given way to the excitement of shorter, more frequent exchanges. Hiller devotes ample time to back-and-forth interchanges in this ensemble and heightens the tension by also setting instrumental groups against one another. Oboes oppose rather than double the violins

(mm. 97–107), upper and lower strings defy each other within the measure (mm. 102–7), and near the end (mm. 134–35), the first violins briefly challenge the entire orchestra. Throughout, the various sections maintain an unusual amount of rhythmic independence, even between the first and second parts of horn, oboe, and violin. The result is an act-ending movement of satisfying chaos.

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Example 4.17. “Wo Peter ist, da bleib’ ich nicht,” mm. 97–140

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224

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Neefe also showed an interest in orchestral interplay in Die Einsprüche. The contrasting instrumentation in the opening sinfonia can perhaps be interpreted as symbolic of the

“objections” implied by the opera’s title. Like Hiller, Neefe juxtaposed not only string and wind families but also high and low strings, first and second violins, and first and second oboes.

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Between the opera’s two acts, he provided “Zwischen Acts Musick” that also demonstrates his skill in varying instrumentation throughout a movement. Horn, flute, oboe, and high and low strings all play rhythmically independent parts. At the beginning of the secondary-theme group of this sonata-form movement, the violins, flutes, and oboes engage in a three-way call-and- response. At the beginning of the development, shown below in Example 4.18, two flutes answer the opening phrase in the two oboes; for the third phrase, the first oboe and first flute play together. Through all of this, the first violin provides the bass line while all other strings remain silent.

Example 4.18. Die Einsprüche, Zwischen Acts Musick, mm. 51–62

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Such an orchestration stands out within the repertoire, especially for the way it subverts the first violin’s typical role as melodic provider. This movement demonstrates Neefe’s willingness to experiment with different instrumental combinations. Perhaps more than any other composer that

I studied (even more than Hiller), Neefe seemed to view the orchestra as a palette that allowed him to blend instrumental colors in creative ways.

Composers could also highlight the contributions of the instruments through solos, and we can locate a number of difficult ones in the repertoire. Parthenia’s virtuosic da capo aria “O, der ist nicht” (Alceste) features an extended violin solo in its ritornellos. Hiller composed demanding flute solos in “Mit Blumen will ich dich durchwinden” (Der Aerndtekranz) and in

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“Schau Jüngling, schau Urania” (Die Muse), where the flute (or oboe, according to the keyboard

edition) helps to set the scene as Phädria calls on the divine muse Urania to descend from

“sacred Parnassas” and grace his poetic efforts. Neefe included a very lyrical, aria-like oboe solo

in the second movement of his sinfonia to Die Einsprüche. With accompaniment provided by

only a single first and second violin, this chamber-like passage represents another of Neefe’s

creative instrumental combinations.

The most substantial instrumental movements in these operas are the opening sinfonias.

The comic operas follow the Italian tradition, generally beginning with a three-movement

sinfonia with the middle movement in a closely related key, though there are exceptions: Amors

Guckkasten has two movements, Allegro and Andantino, both in D major; Der Dorfjahrmarkt

has only one movement; and Die Muse has no sinfonia at all, though this should not surprise us

given its original function as an afterpiece. Schweitzer’s serious Alceste borrows from the French

tradition with a severe opening Grave movement full of dotted rhythms and tirades followed by

a faster, imitative movement and a final return to the tempo and atmosphere of the opening.

When critics wrote about the sinfonias, they emphasized that these introductions should

match the character of the drama. By the late 1760s and early 1770s, this sentiment transcended

nationality. In the WNA the Frenchman D’Alembert and the Italian Algorotti both called for sinfonias to be in character and prepare the audience for what they would hear.45 The German

Agricola praised the “fiery character” of Maria Antonia’s Talestri overture in the Allgemeine

deutsche Bibliothek and also commended the appropriateness of Neefe’s sinfonia to Die

Apotheke, writing that it “announces the contents of the piece very happily.”46 His countryman,

45 D’Alembert, “Sechste Fortsetzung über die Freiheit der Musik,” WNA 3, no. 38 (March 20, 1769): 298; and Algorotti, “Fortsetzung des Versuchs über die musikalische Oper,” WNA 3, no. 51 (June 19, 1769): 396.

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Reichardt, likewise congratulated Hiller’s sinfonia to Die Jagd for its display of character.47 Of

the cheerful first movement, Reichardt noted that it reflected a rural, comic piece. He praised the

second movement’s pleasing and gentle song.

Composers found a variety of ways to match their sinfonias to the content or mood of the

drama. Schweitzer’s Alceste sinfonia, with its G-minor tonality and sharply angular contrapuntal theme, prepares for the gloomy tone of the opera’s opening, where Alceste is confronted with her husband’s dire situation and the possibility of her own sacrifice. Hiller, not surprisingly, conjured up a pastoral tone for his operas set in the countryside. The second movement of Die Liebe auf dem Lande’s sinfonia (see Example 4.19) decorates nearly every measure with Lombardic rhythms while violins move in parallel thirds or sixths over a drone in the viola and bass, all traditional signifiers of a sentimental, rural tone. The second movement of Der Aerndtekranz

also has a drone, this time in the flutes and second violin, that prepares for the rustic setting at

harvest time. Finally, the closing movement to the Die Jagd sinfonia features a triadic theme in

the strings supported by active horn parts. These melodic and timbral references to the “hunt”

topic prepare the audience for the king’s hunt, which gets underway early in the first act.

46 Agricola, review of Talestri, AdB 3, no. 2 (1766): 129; and idem, review of Die Apotheke and Amors Guckkasten, AdB 19, no. 1 (1773): 256. “Die Sinfonie kündigt den Inhalt des Stücks schon sehr glücklich an.”

47 Reichardt, Über die deutsche komische Oper, 26–33.

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Example 4.19. Die Liebe auf dem Lande, Sinfonia II, mm. 1–14

The composers considered here showed a distinct preference for sonata forms in their

sinfonias, especially in the outer movements. That is to say, they preferred large-scale binary forms in which a two-part exposition, divided by a medial caesura and ending with a cadence in the dominant key (because outer movements in these sinfonias are always in the major mode), is eventually recapitulated with off-tonic material restored to the tonic. Despite the homogeneity suggested by this summary, composers crafted these forms with as much variety as they brought

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to their binary and ternary forms. To discuss them, I will rely on the sonata types proposed by

James Hepokoski and Warren Darcy.48

Of their five sonata types, the German composers most often selected type 3, the sonata

form with a full recapitulation after the developmental rotation. Hiller used the type-3 form for

all three movements of Lisuart und Dariolette’s sinfonia, movements one and three of Der

lustige Schuster and Die Jagd, movement one of Der Aerndtekranz, and movement three of Der

Dorfbalbier, as well as for the instrumental entr’acte music that precedes act 3 of Die Jagd.

Neefe chose the type-3 form for the first movements of Die Apotheke and Amors Guckkasten, and Wolf used it for the first movement of Das Rosenfest. After type 3, the next most popular formal choice for composers was the type 1, the sonata form with no developmental rotation but with a full recapitulation of the exposition. Hiller selected the type-1 form for the first two

movements of the Lottchen am Hofe sinfonia, the first movement of Der Dorfbalbier, and the

third movement of Die verwandelten Weiber. Benda used type 1 for the single movement that opens Der Dorfjahrmarkt. Finally, composers wrote movements that reflect a type-2 construction, with a developmental rotation that leads directly into that part of the recapitulation that resolves the exposition’s off-tonic material. For example, Hiller chose type 2 for the first movements of the sinfonias to Die verwandelten Weiber and Die Liebe auf dem Lande. Neefe

applied the type-2 form to the outer movements of his sinfonia to Die Einsprüche.

While the opening movements of sinfonias, except for Schweitzer’s French-derived

Alceste, always feature some type of sonata form, the later movements sometimes reveal non-

sonata forms. Hiller turned to rounded binary form for the middle movements of Der

Aerndtekranz, Der Dorfbalbier, Die Liebe auf dem Lande, and Der lustige Schuster. Neefe chose

48 James Hepokoski and Warren Darcy, Elements of Sonata Theory: Norms, Types, and Deformations in the Late Eighteenth-Century Sonata (Oxford & New York: Oxford University Press, 2006).

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balanced binary form for movements two and three of Die Apotheke’s sinfonia. He used ternary

forms for the second movements of Amors Guckkasten (A-B-A) and Die Einsprüche (A-B-A'-

Coda). Rondo forms, though rare, do make an appearance; Hiller wrote a five-part rondo (A-B-

A-C-A-Coda) for the third movement of Der Aerndtekranz.

One sinfonia that deserves special mention is Wolf’s for Das Rosenfest. This three- movement overture displays two distinctive features that make it an outlier. Instead of self- contained movements, as all the other sinfonias have, the first movement of Wolf’s elides into the second; that is, the last note of the Allegro is the downbeat of the Commodetto. This relaxed middle movement ends with a half-cadence that prepares for the third-movement Allegro.

Considered as a whole, Wolf’s sinfonia presents a single though multi-sectional form. No other sinfonia in this repertoire has anything comparable to its continuous form.49 Even more unusual, though, is the key scheme of the movements: F major, C major, and then G major. This lack of tonal closure in an eighteenth-century sinfonia demands justification. Agricola speculated that the “wrong-key” ending related to the opera’s comic nature.50 It should also be noted that the

first aria of the first act is in D major. Perhaps Wolf was experimenting with a circle-of-fifths motion (F-C-G-D) in a subtle heightening of tension that would propel the listener into the action. Unfortunately, we have no written explanation by Wolf himself of his rationale.

Having described characteristics of the sinfonias, arias, and ensembles, only the chorus

remains to be discussed. Critics paid little attention to choruses, and when they did, they

commended their overall tone but offered few prescriptions regarding their form or function.

While choruses generally serve as closing movements, they also sometimes appear within the

49 Sinfonias in one, unrepeated section were not uncommon in Italy, even if they were in northern Germany at this time.

50 Agricola, review of Das Rosenfest, AdB 23, no. 1 (1774): 251.

235 opera. These numbers do not advance the plot, nor does the chorus have an important dramatic role within the opera. Its task is to provide the occasional celebration with a full stage of spirited singers. Examples of this type include the hunting chorus, “Der König jagt,” in Die Jagd and the harvesters’ chorus, “Auf, wahre Dirnen, rüst’ge Brüder,” in Der Aerndtekranz. Both of these close the first acts of their respective operas. In Der Dorfjahrmarkt, the farmers’ chorus, “Trinkt, trinkt, trinkt,” follows on the heels of the sinfonia and begins the opera with a rousing drinking song. An exception to the celebratory chorus occurs at the beginning of Alceste’s fifth act. “Ihr heil’gen unnennbaren Mächte,” a prayer to the gods of the underworld, offered by the servants of

Admetus on behalf of Alceste, is more serious than celebratory.

Choruses at the end of the final act provide an opportunity for musical symbolic reconciliation among the dramatic personalities as well as a musically satisfying “big finish.”

These went by a variety of names (Chor/Coro, Divertissement, Vaudeville, Rundgesang) and exhibited highly individualized forms, though each tended to feature alternations between solo singers and a larger ensemble. For example, Die verwandelten Weiber concludes with a

Divertissement and Schlußchor by Hiller, both of which alternate between solo and tutti parts.

The finale of Die Liebe auf dem Lande includes a Divertissement alternating solo and tutti sections, and a strophic Rundgesang for STB choir. Lisuart und Dariolette ends with a da capo

Coro; the A section is for SATB choir while the B section includes only the women. The closing

Coro of Die Einsprüche features a binary form; a Divertissement follows with vocal solos for the

Schulmeister, Märten, and Barthel before the Coro returns for a reprise. The strophic closing

Chor of Die Muse balances solos with a repeating choral refrain. The Divertissement that closes

Die Jagd begins six solo strophes in 2/4 sung by the two parents and each of the four “young

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lovers.” After this, the opera ends with a very tuneful, dancelike canon in 3/8 (see Example

4.20).51

Example 4.20. “Wer wollte nicht sein Gut und Leben,” mm. 63–87

51 Until the last strophe of the Divertissement, each character had sung “Es lebe der König.” The switch to “der Churfürst” in D-B mus. ms. 10638 is curious because there is no Elector role in Die Jagd. Hiller had also published the melody and text (with “Churfürst”) as an eight-voice canon in WNA 4, no. 16 (April 16, 1770): 126, although he included no mention there of its operatic origin. Bauman explains that the “Churfürst” substitution occurs in an early print of the musical text, and that at least some members of the Saxon audience equated the benevolent King of Die Jagd with their own Elector in Dresden. See North German Opera, 45.

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Despite this variety in formal construction, most choruses followed a strophic principle.

That is, they allowed each principal character one last solo on the chorus’s melody, and the composer generated the length appropriate to a satisfying closing number by repeating significant portions of the music. The strophic nature of these ensembles could sometimes make

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them quite long. For instance, the closing Vaudeville of Das Rosenfest, again alternating solo

voices and full chorus, stretches on for ten stanzas. While all of these appear in the keyboard edition, they may not all have been sung in operatic performance. Nevertheless, strophic procedures can make these numbers seem a bit tedious, with each repeated stanza taxing more of the listener’s interest. German composers had not yet incorporated the chain finale into their works, and so their conclusions lack the increasing energy of contemporary Italian comic operas.

Yet this seems to reflect a difference of tradition regarding the closing chorus’s function relative to the drama. Italian opera in the 1760s was developing the chain finale as a way to advance the plot, sharpen its tensions, and bring it to conclusion. On the other hand, the German operas performed in Leipzig generally resolved their dramas in the spoken dialogue before the concluding chorus, and thus allowed the musical numbers to instead act as a celebratory coda.

This treatment of the closing chorus perhaps explains its relative neglect by critics.

The key to appreciating and enjoying the finales, then, is to realize their purpose as a musical “dessert” following the story’s “main course.” Hiller recommended that they be “full and fiery,” and these choruses uniformly meet that standard.52 Harmonically unadventurous and

melodically simple and cheerful, the choruses reinforce the good feelings generated by a

fortunate dramatic outcome. Yet the repertoire does offer one possible exception to a happy

ending in Hiller’s Schlußchor to Der Dorfbalbier, “Jäkel, liebe deine Frau!” The plot of the

opera revolves around a plan to trap an unhappy couple, Ruthe and Ursel, in double infidelity in

the hope that this will somehow produce the money for Barthel and Susanne to pay their rent. By

the closing chorus, the drama has been resolved, but Hiller suggests that relationships have not

been fully restored. Ruthe’s eighth-note melody on the line “In matrimony” (In dem Ehstand)

52 Hiller, “Nachricht von der comischen Oper Lisuart und Dariolette,” WNA 1, no. 33 (February 10, 1767): 256.

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(D-F, F-D, D-B, B-G#) suggests that marital life is one prolonged diminished-seventh chord. The chorus ends in ambiguity as a young couple, Jäkel and Gretchen, declares they will always love each other (“Es wird auch immer so sein”) while the four older, wiser characters insist otherwise

(“Es wird nicht immer so sein”). The six parts end together, creating a rousing musical finish, but also a skeptical take on the traditional comic-opera ending of martial happiness.

Conclusion

One of the difficulties in comparing critical writing to actual music is that many of the critics offering prescriptions for opera were not themselves composers but rather writers and poets. Nevertheless, we can find a correspondence between their preferences for galant melody, subordinate Harmonie, colorful modulations, formal variety, interesting instrumentation, and lively choruses, and the music of this repertoire. Critical opinion by the late 1760s had decided in favor of Italian opera over French, and we can see this trend playing out in the music, with its tendency for three-movement sinfonias, da capo and dal segno forms, lyrical melody, and even instances of Italianate recitative. Yet signifiers of the French style still turn up, most obviously in the sinfonia to Alceste but also in more fleeting references such as dotted rhythms and tirades.

Besides the Italian-French dichotomy, the composers also showed themselves adept at applying high and low styles, uniting together in one work elevated counterpoint with short, simple melodies. Furthermore, any of these styles could be used according to their conventional meanings or subverted for comedic purposes. Perhaps what emerges most clearly from the music of these German operas is how well-versed the composers were in a multiplicity of musical styles.

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Chapter 5

Opera at Das Theater auf der Ranstädter Bastei

As the principal venue for opera in Leipzig during the late 1760s and early 1770s, the

Theater auf der Ranstädter (or Rannischen) Bastei deserves special consideration. The opening

of the new theater on October 10, 1766 represented a significant development in the city’s

postwar cultural rebirth. For the first time, Leipzig had a sizable and praiseworthy venue for

theatrical and operatic performances. During the coming decades, it witnessed the production of

theatrical works by Lessing, Goethe, and Schiller, and operas by Mozart and Weber. The

building received only minor upgrades until its 1817 redesign in an updated Classical style by

Friedrich Weinbrenner. From then on, it was known as the Theater der Stadt Leipzig. After the

construction of a new opera house in 1868, the Ranstädter Bastei was affectionately nicknamed

the “Altes Theater.” The site remained in use until it was destroyed by British bombers on the

morning of December 4, 1943. After the war, the theater was not rebuilt, and today its former

property is occupied by the Richard-Wagner-Platz.1

Following chapters that discussed the aesthetic considerations and musical characteristics

of German opera in postwar Leipzig, this chapter returns to a theme introduced in chapter 1: the

business of opera in Leipzig. In this fifth chapter, however, I will narrow from a city-wide focus to a more detailed examination of the Theater auf der Ranstädter Bastei itself. I will discuss the construction of the theater, its architectural celebration of Enlightenment values, and its use as a venue for opera. I will also present a record of the operatic performances staged at the Ranstädter

Bastei between 1776 and 1795. This catalogue, which derives from a survey of theater programs

1 A description of the Theater auf der Ranstädter Bastei within the context of Leipzig’s operatic history can be found at Grove Music Online, s.v. “Leipzig,” by George B. Stauffer, accessed January 13, 2016, http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/.

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obtained from the Stadtgeschichtliches Museum Leipzig, provides insight into which German

operas continued to be staged beyond the chronological scope of this dissertation, how long they

were staged, and how popular they were compared to operas from France, Italy, and Vienna.2

While the records contain noticeable gaps, they nevertheless allow us to draw some conclusions about the popularity of opera in Leipzig later in the century.

Das Theater auf der Ranstädter Bastei: Construction and Performance

The desire for a new theater in Leipzig had long preceded the construction of the Theater auf der Ranstädter Bastei. Heinrich Gottfried Koch, Leipzig’s impresario, or Prinzipal, detested the cramped confines of the theater located at Quandt’s Court and in 1751 had inquired about land on a hill in the northwest part of town at the Ranstädter Bastei, or bastion, which formed part of the fortifications of the old city wall near the Ranstädter Gate. The Saxon Elector,

Frederick Augustus II, showed interest in the plan, but the Leipzig city council balked over demolishing the old bastion.3 The outbreak of the Seven Years’ War and Koch’s departure for

the safety of Hamburg placed all discussions about a new venue on hold.

After the war, Saxony’s rulers and Leipzig’s merchant class immediately sought to

rebuild their city structurally and economically, and to restore its former commercial importance.

Koch was then lured back to Leipzig with promises of restoration, and he again lobbied for a

new theater at the Ranstädter Bastei. Circumstances seemed favorable that the city would finally

2 Images of these theater programs are available through the online database for the Stadtgeschichtliches Museum Leipzig at www.stadtgeschichtliches-museum-leipzig.de. After entering the “Objektdatenbank” and clicking on “Musik- und Theatergeschichte,” I had the most success by searching for “Theaterprogramme” in the “Objekt” box and restricting the dates to 1766 and 1800. This results in 345 hits that, as I discovered upon visiting Leipzig, largely correspond to the number and ordering of programs in the actual museum. Even with 1800 as a closing date, the final program displayed is that for October 18, 1795.

3 Fritz Hennenberg, 300 Jahre Leipziger Oper: Geschichte und Gegenwart (Munich: Langen Müller, 1993), 19.

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have a new stage. The Elector urged that the commission be granted to the architect Georg

Rudolf Fäsch, who in 1761 undertook major renovations to Dresden’s court theater. Yet again

the city council discovered a problem: according to the Saxon constitution, Fäsch’s Calvinist

faith prevented him from owning the property.4 At this point, Gottlieb Benedict Zemisch, head

of the Leipzig Grosses Konzert, stepped in and obtained the property. According to Christian

Heinrich Schmid’s Chronologie des deutschen Theaters (1775), Zemisch and a collective of

“patriotic merchants” retained Fäsch and financially supported the construction of the new

theater.5 Work began in April 1766 and proceeded quickly. On July 18 Leipzig celebrated the

Richtfest, a topping-off ceremony commemorating the unfinished structure reaching its maximum height, and by early October, actors were finishing preparations for the theater’s premiere performance.

Fäsch’s design for the Leipzig’s theater closely resembled that of the Dresden venue. The

Dresden court theater (see Figure 5.1) had a length-to-width ratio of approximate 3:2, with a distinctive, pear-shaped auditorium in which a long ground floor ran back to a rounded rear wall.

The blueprint thus allows us to visualize the dimensions and layout of Leipzig’s theater.

4 Ibid.

5 Christian Heinrich Schmid, Chronologie des deutschen Theaters (1775; repr., Berlin: Gesellschaft für Theatergeschichte, 1902), 243.

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Figure 5.1. Floor Plan for the Dresden Court Theater (1754/55). (Used by permission of the Stadtgeschichtliches Museum Leipzig)

According to Schmid, the dimensions of Leipzig’s theater were 108 x 64 feet. The stage

was 45 feet deep by 37 feet wide, with a height of 34 feet.6 Whereas Dresden’s theater had four tiers of loges, Leipzig’s Theater auf der Ranstädter Bastei had only three (with fifteen loges each) with a gallery above. Schmid describes the loges as “very roomy” so that even the smallest could accommodate up to six people. He also notes that audience members could see the stage from everywhere and hear even from the furthest loges.7 For those not wealthy enough to afford

a loge, the spacious parterre provided room for standing spectators. In total, the theater had a

capacity of 1,186. Attendees could find additional space for socializing in the adjoining garden,

6 Ibid.

7 Ibid., 244.

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accessible only through an entrance in the theater. Figure 5.2 below shows a reconstructed model

of the interior of the Theater auf der Ranstädter Bastei.8

Figure 5.2. Model Reconstruction of the Theater auf der Ranstädter Bastei Interior. (Used by permission of the Stadtgeschichtliches Museum Leipzig)

The theater’s interior decoration celebrated the Enlightenment values of the day. In a special report entitled “Nachricht von der Eröffnung des neuen Theaters in Leipzig 1766,” Franz

Wilhelm Kreuchauf, an art-loving local merchant, praised the theater’s “regularity, order, correctness in perspective, splendor without the cost of unity, choice and newness in the decoration, intellect and invention in the design, and strength in the execution of the allegorical paintings.”9 Schmid likewise found the decoration “appropriate for a city in which all of the

beautiful arts blossom.”10 Looking upward from the stage, spectators saw the Saxon electoral

8 This reconstructed model, 1:20 of the original size, was designed between 1962 and 1964 by Dr. Gertrud Rudloff-Hille on a commission by the Museum für Geschichte der Stadt Leipzig.

9 Franz Wilhelm Kreuchauf, “Nachricht von der Eröffnung des neuen Theaters in Leipzig 1766,” quoted in Gertrud Rudloff-Hille, Das Theater auf der Ranstädter Bastei Leipzig 1766 (Leipzig: Museum für die Geschichte der Stadt Leipzig, 1969), 14.

10 Schmid, Chronologie, 244.

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coat of arms over the proscenium. Above this, a ceiling painting by Adam Friedrich Oeser,

founder of the Leipizig Art Academy, depicted Apollo and Minerva observing the proceedings from radiant thrones of white clouds. The stage curtain, also painted by Oeser, inspired perhaps the most attention and commentary for its virtuoso depiction of great poets assembled in one

densely packed allegorical image (see Figure 5.3).

Figure 5.3. Theater Curtain of the Theater auf der Ranstädter Bastei. (Used by permission of the Stadtgeschichtliches Museum Leipzig)

For an explication of the curtain’s meaning, we turn again to Kreuchauf:

Two rows of columns in the Doric style encircle the round forecourt of the Temple of Truth, which is in the center at a distance. It is open on all sides so that one can see the uncovered statue of the agreeable goddess, who shows her open arms to those approaching. At the entrance to the forecourt, in the middle of the painting, stand the bronze-cast statues of Sophocles and Aristophanes, the great dramatic poets. The tragic muse devotes herself to the first, who stands on the left, laying a crown of laurels on the pedestal at his feet. Behind her stands Socrates, accompanied by his friend Euripides, whose plays he preferred before all others. One may here deduce the acclaim of the wise

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man and the unification of philosophy with tragic poetry. Amongst the Greek poets [on the left] sits History with her open book. Here one sees the only Latin poet, Seneca, whose tragic works survive, as well as those of their most imminent German and French followers. Aeschylus stoops to History and shows her the mask and the cothurn [a boot worn by actors in ancient Greek and Roman tragedies], which he wants to dedicate to her truths.

Next to him lean theater wings, on which a young boy is painting an adornment that also enriches the stage. On the other side, one sees how the comic muse winds a string of flowers around the statue of Aristophanes, helped in her decoration by the Art of Dance and a small, frolicking cupid. Next to them Plautus leans on a staff and looks attentively at the nearby writings of his predecessors. By him stands the tender Terence, who brings Love with him and lightly takes the torch out of his hand. Before them, Menander sits at the statue of Aristophanes, who purified the older works of personal satire and gave a new shape to the comedy. He writes while a genius pushes the character masks from the book open before him. Behind the old poets, who accompany Satyr [far right], one can find the satirical Greek plays, which arose out of a contrast to the tragic and comic. Behind them stand some of their German and French followers.

In the forecourt, one sees the inimitable Shakespeare, who rushes by the ancients to the temple. In the foreground sits Painting and Music with their spirits. Aristophanes’s gesture shows that he mocks the tragic poet. Sophocles appears to answer him by pointing with one hand toward Truth and with the other to the Graces, who hover in each other’s arms over the temple in the clouds. Out of these clouds, a number of spirits descend, bringing laurel crowns for the new poets like the ones that already adorn the older poets.11

For the October 10 premiere, Koch programmed Hermann, a tragedy by Johann Elias

Schlegel. Like the German-centered operas that soon came to popularity, Hermann told a

German story, in this case a nationalistic drama based on the victory of the ancient German tribes, led by Hermann, over the Roman general Varus and his invading legions. Koch himself played the role of Sigmar, the hero’s father. After the tragedy, the Leipzig audience enjoyed a pastoral ballet, Von vergnügten Schäfern, and a one-act comedy, Die unvermuthete Wiederkunft.

11 Kreuchauf, quoted in Rudloff-Hille, 20–21.

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Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, at the time only seventeen, attended the premiere and described

the “splendor and taste” of the theater in a letter to his sister, Cornelia.12

Over time, the Theater auf der Ranstädter Bastei continued to impress. The actress

Caroline Schulze-Kummerfeld recalled in her memoirs that everything in Leipzig was

“completely new and they rightly praised the splendor and the deceptive perspective of the theater. The transformations were designed according to the rules of optics.”13 The poet and theater critic Johann Friedrich Löwen described the theater’s capabilities for imitating nature and creating a realistic experience for spectators. Commenting on a 1770 performance of

Beaumarchais’s Eugenie, he wrote:

Herr Koch eschewed no costs in making even the inessential things in this play also worthy of praise. The decorations were as beautiful as one is accustomed to in the theater. Oeser worked with his son on them. Before the seventh scene of the second act, the music, which expresses the noise of the storm, was strengthened through machines that imitated the rainstorm. The heavy raindrops with which the storm begins, the fierce downpour that follows when the thunderstorm was already mostly over, and even the ripple with which the rain stops, all these could be imitated so graphically that some women in my loge cried out in complete seriousness, “It’s getting really cold in here!”14

With these resources at hand, Koch was ideally positioned to revive dramatic performances in

Leipzig. The Theater auf der Ranstädter Bastei offered a venue that reflected in its design and

staging the late eighteenth-century’s aesthetic preferences for neoclassical order, tasteful

decoration, and vivid naturalism. Its importance in the re-development of German opera should

not be overlooked.

12 Johann Wolfgang von Goethe to Cornelia Goethe, October 18, 1766, in Goethes Briefe, vol. 1, 1764–71 (Weimar: Hermann Böhlau, 1887), 80.

13 Caroline Schulze-Kummerfeld, “Denkwürdigkeiten,” Riehls Historisches Taschenbuch 3 (Leipzig, 1873), quoted in Rudloff-Hille, Das Theater, 19.

14 Johann Friedrich Löwen, “Ueber die Leipziger Bühne” (Dresden, 1770), quoted in Rudloff-Hille, Das Theater, 18.

250

Record of Operatic Performance at the Theater auf der Ranstädter Bastei (1776–95)

Surviving records of theatrical and operatic performance at the Theater auf der Ranstädter

Bastei are currently stored in the Stadtgeschichtliches Museum Leipzig. With the exception of a program from the October 10 Hermann premiere and three theatrical performances from 1774, the existing programs in the museum’s possession span from 1776 to 1795. Unfortunately, I have been unable thus far to locate records going back to the theater’s opening. Moreover, the existing programs show some apparent gaps in preservation, with far fewer programs for some years in the 1770s and 1780s than in the 1790s. The years 1780 and 1788 left behind only two programs; nothing at all remains for 1781. Nevertheless, the available material does allow us to draw some conclusions about the lasting popularity of the music considered in earlier chapters.

Table 5.1 below presents a catalogue of all available records. For days that featured both a musical and a theatrical performance, I have included both. Under “Genre,” I have given the description from the program itself rather than streamlining the list into a narrow range of modern categories. In the “Librettist/Composer” category, I have provided names that were advertised on the programs. A name in brackets indicates that the name is not listed on the program but is known. In most cases, it is the librettist who is omitted, although in some cases, for instance with Metastasio or Goldoni, the poet was likely more well-known than the composer. To facilitate comparison of the national origins of the musical works, I have added colors to the table. Green corresponds to German works, blue to Italian, purple to Viennese, red to French, and yellow to English. Items in black are spoken plays. To avoid cluttering the table, I have omitted the authors’ names from the spoken works.

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Table 5.1. Programs from the Theater auf der Ranstädter Bastei (1776–95)

Date Title Genre Librettist/Composer

Apr 17, 1776 Der Postzug Lustspiel

Apr 17 Ariadne auf Naxos Duodrama mit Musik Brandes/G. Benda

Apr 21 Der Aerndtekranz Komische Oper Weisse/Hiller

Apr 27 Miß Obre Lustspiel

Apr 27 Die Kornärndte Pantomimisches Ballet Schultz

Apr 28 Der gutherzige Polterer Comödie

Apr 28 Walder Schauspiel mit Gesang Gotter/G. Benda

Apr 29 Der Graf von Alsbach Comödie

Apr 29 Das Bacchusfest Pantomimisches Ballet Schultz

May 5 Der Jahrmarkt Komische Operette Gotter/G. Benda

May 5 Das Bacchusfest Pantomimisches Ballet Schultz

May 11 Der geadelte Kaufmann Lustspiel

May 11 Die blinde Kuh Pantomimisches Ballet Schultz

Sept 25 Robert und Kalliste Operette [Chiari]/Guglielmi

Sept 27 Ein jeder Narr hat seine Lustspiel Kappe Sept 27 Das Bacchusfest Pantomimisches Ballet Schultz

Oct 10 Die Temperamente Lustspiel

Oct 10 Medea Mit Musik vermischtes Gotter/G. Benda Drama Oct 17 Der dankbare Sohn Lustspiel

Oct 17 Piramus und Thisbe Tragisches Singspiel Metastasio/?

Jan 20, 1777 Die Liebe auf dem Lande Komische Oper Weisse/Hiller

Apr 25 Eduard Monstrose Drama

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Apr 25 Die Kornärndte Pantomimisches Ballet Schultz

Aug 18 Der Aerndtekranz Komische Oper Weisse/Hiller

Aug 25 Graf von Esser Trauerspiel

Aug 27 Die Dorfdeputierten Komische Oper Heerman/Wolf

May 21, 1778 Jeannette Lustspiel

May 21 Sephalus und Prokris Melodrama Ramler/Reichardt

June 19 Das Findelkind Lustspiel

June 19 Bastienne Komische Operette von ?/? Kindern July 24 Die unschuldige Frau Drama

July 24 Der Soldat als Zauberer Komische Oper [Anseaume]/Philidor

Aug 7 Paridom Wrankpott Lustspiel

Aug 7 Die Schadenfreude Operette Weisse/[G. P. Weimar?]

Aug 12 Der Jurist und der Bauer Lustspiel

Aug 12 [Title Missing/“aus dem Komische Operette ?/? Französischen”] Oct 17 Clavigo Trauerspiel

Oct 17 Der Alchymist Komische Operette Meissner/Schuster

Nov 23 Lottchen am Hofe Komische Oper Weisse/Hiller

Dec 22 Adrast und Isidore Komische Oper Bretzner/Prey

Jan 18, 1779 Das Grab des Mufti Komische Oper Meissner/Hiller

Apr 30 Der Alchymist Komische Operette Meissner/Schuster

May 21 Der vergrabene Schatz Lustspiel

June 9 Die Bergknappen Original Singspiel Bock/Umlauf

Oct 5 Die eifersüchtige Ehefrau Lustspiel

Oct 5, 1780 Nicht mehr als sechs Familiengemälde Schüsseln Dec 21 So denkt der Patriot Vorspiel mit Musik ?/?

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Dec 21 Sophie Schauspiel

July 15, 1782 Il matrimonio per inganno Komisches Singspiel [Bertati]/Anfossi

July 22 Il pittor parigino Komisches Singspiel [Petrosellini]/Cimarosa

Aug 2 Andromeda Komisches Singspiel [Cigna-Santi]/Gazzaniga

May 30, 1783 Johann von Schwaben Schauspiel

Aug 1 Il pittor parigino Komisches Singspiel [Petrosellini]/Cimarosa

Aug 17 La scuola de gelosi Komisches Singspiel [Mazzolà]/Salieri

Aug 26 Isabella und Rodrigo Dramatisches Singspiel [Bertati]/Anfossi

Sept 21 Il conte di bell'umore Komisches Singspiel ?/Marcello aus Capua

Oct 13 Otto von Wittelsbach Original-Trauerspiel

Jan 5, 1784 La serva padrona Komisches Zwischenspiel [Federico]/Pergolesi

Jan 26 Il giuocatore ravveduto Zwischenspiel Luchesi/Piccini

Apr 20 Circe und Ulysses Heroisches Drama

Sept 23 Hanno, Fürst in Norden Schauspiel

Sept 27 Zemire und Azor Oper Marmontel/Gretry

Oct 12 Kabale und Liebe Trauerspiel

Oct 14 Der deutsche Hausvater Original-Schauspiel

Jan 3, 1785 Melinda und Melidor Pantomimisches Ballet ?

Jan 3 Die Zusammenkunft der Charakteristisches Ballet ? Hexen Feb 7 Die Zigeuner Pantomimisches Ballet ?

Apr 16 Graf von Esser Trauerspiel

Apr 19 Hamlet, Prinz von Däenmark Trauerspiel

Apr 22 Die abgedankten Officiers Lustspiel

Apr 23 Stolz und Verzweiflung Schauspiel

May 20 Coriolan Trauerspiel

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June 3 Die Spieler Original-Schauspiel

July 5 Der Adjutant Schauspiel

July 8 Das Räuschgen Lustspiel

July 12 Karl und Louise Bürgerliches Schauspiel

July 26 Der argwöhnische Liebhaber Lustspiel

Aug 5 Die drei Pachter Ländliches Schauspiel mit Monvel/Dessaides Gesang Aug 14 Die Jäger Ländliches Sittengemälde

Aug 16 Die Lästerschule Lustspiel

Aug 30 Der Barbier von Sevilla Lustspiel mit Gesängen Beaumarchais/F. L. Benda Sept 6 Der tolle Tag Lustspiel

Sept 9 Athelstan Trauerspiel

Apr 18, 1786 Der Geist des Widerspruchs Komisches Singspiel [Mazzolà]/Schuster

May 13 Fra i due litiganti il terzo Komisches Singspiel [Goldoni]/Sarti gode July 26 Il serraglio di osmano Komisches Singspiel [Bertati]/Gazzaniga

Aug 7 Der Barbier von Sevilla Lustspiel mit Gesang Beaumarchais/F. L. Benda Aug 9 Der lustige Tag Lustspiel

Sept 21 Um sechs Uhr ist Verlobung Lustspiel

Apr 29, 1787 Die Nebenbuhler Lustspiel

Apr 29 Ariadne auf Naxos Duodrama mit Musik Brandes/G. Benda

May 7 Die Lästerschule Lustspiel

May 13 Lanassa Drama

June 17 Polixena Musikalisches Drama [Bertuch]/Wolf

Oct 13 General Schlensheim und Original-Schauspiel seine Familie Oct 13 Der Theaterunternehmer Gelegenheitsstück mit ?/Schuster Gesang June 15, 1788 Don Giovanni Großes Singspiel [Da Ponte]/Mozart

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Oct 19 Der Revers Original-Lustspiel

Apr 24, 1789 Tancred Trauerspiel

May 1 Offene Fehde Lustspiel

May 9 Otto von Wittelsbach Original-Trauerspiel

May 16 Kaspar der Thorringer Schauspiel

Sept 21 Hanno, Fürst in Norden Schauspiel

Oct 11 Zieh aus, Herr Bruder! Lustspiel

Oct 18 Menschenhass und Reue Schauspiel

Oct 26 Giannetta San Fiorenzo Schauspiel

Dec 28 Verstand und Leichtsinn Ehestands-Gemälde

Jan 6, 1790 Die Todtenerscheinung Lustspiel

Jan 6 Die drei Pachter Ländliches Lustspiel mit Monvel/Dessaides Gesang Jan 10 Liebesproben Original-Lustspiel

Feb 5 Die Sympathie Lustspiel

Feb 5 Die drei Pachter Ländliches Lustspiel mit Monvel/Dessaides Gesang Feb 10 Kunz von Kauffungen 5-act Historisches Schauspiel Feb 19 Die Zigeuner Lustspiel

Apr 18 Keiner hat Recht Lustspiel

Apr 20 Die Macht der Kindesliebe Schauspiel

Apr 22 Die Indianer in England Lustspiel

Apr 27 Agnes Bernauerinn Trauerspiel

Apr 29 Menschenhass und Reue Schauspiel

May 11 Alderson Trauerspiel

May 13 Die Schule der Damen Original-Lustspiel

Sept 17 Die Entführung Original-Lustspiel

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Sept 19 Das Portrait der Mutter Original-Lustspiel

Sept 27 Der Ring Lustspiel

Oct 3 Des Ringes zweyter Theil Lustspiel

Oct 4 Die Strelitzen Schauspiel

Oct 5 Lilla (nach Una Cosa Rara) Singspiel [Da Ponte]/Martín y Soler Oct 8 Graf Wiprecht von Groizsch 4-act National Schauspiel

Oct 9 Das Portrait der Mutter Original-Lustspiel

Oct 15 Das Kind der Liebe Original-Schauspiel

Oct 24 Die Indianer in England Lustspiel

Oct 27 Die Eifersucht auf der Probe Oper Eschenburg/Anfossi

Nov 3 Der Diener zweyer Herren Lustspiel

Nov 7 Die Lügnerin aus Liebe Komische Oper Bellomo/Salieri

Nov 14 Die Lügnerin aus Liebe Komische Oper Bellomo/Salieri

Nov 21 Der Jahrmarkt Komische Oper Gotter/G. Benda

Nov 21 Die Übereilung Lustspiel

Nov 24 Die Jagd Komische Oper Weisse/Hiller

Nov 28 Das Herbstabentheuer Komische Oper

Dec 23 Die Dorffeyer Schauspiel mit Gesang ?/Pitterling

Dec 23 Die Lügnerin aus Liebe Komische Oper Bellomo/Salieri

Dec 27 Robert und Kalliste Oper

Dec 28 Die Jagd Komische Oper Weisse/Hiller

Jan 2, 1791 Saturns Geburtsfeyer Allegorisches Vorspiel mit ?/Schuster Gesängen und Tänzen Jan 2 Das Herbstabentheuer Komische Oper Bock/Agosti

Jan 3 Der Verschlag Lustspiel

Jan 10 Der Bürgermeister Lustspiel

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Jan 13 Diego und Leonore Trauerspiel

Feb 6 Zemire und Azor Singspiel Marmontel/Gretry

Feb 20 Das gute Mädchen Operette Eschenburg/Piccini

Feb 23 Das Ehrenwort Lustspiel

Feb 27 Die verwandelten Weiber Komische Oper Weisse/Hiller

Mar 7 Der Fürst und sein Volk Teutsches Nationaldrama

Mar 7 Der Eifersucht auf der Probe Oper Eschenburg/Anfossi

May 3 Friedrich von Oestreich Schauspiel

May 15 Friedrich von Oestreich Schauspiel

May 20 Bruder Moritz der Sonderling Original-Lustspiel

May 22 Felix und Hannchen Lustspiel

May 27 Die Sonnen-Jungfrau Schauspiel

Oct 6 Frauenstand Original-Schauspiel

Oct 8 Hamlet, Prinz von Däenmark Trauerspiel

Oct 23 Hieronimus Knicker Komisches Singspiel [Dittersdorf?]/Dittersdorf

Nov 4 Der Apotheker und der Komisches Singspiel [Stephanie]/Dittersdorf Doktor Nov 27 Die Entführung aus dem Singspiel Bretzner/Mozart Serail Dec 27 Betrug durch Aberglauben Komisches Singspiel [Eberl]/Dittersdorf

Jan 5, 1792 Die Schule der Freundschaft Familiengemälde

Jan 7 Offene Fehde Lustspiel

Jan 20 Der Jahrmarkt Komische Oper Gotter/G. Benda

Jan 22 Das Kind der Liebe Schauspiel

Jan 29 Die Lügnerin aus Liebe Komische Oper Bellomo/Salieri

Feb 21 La villanella fortunata Komisches Singspiel ?/Monti

Feb 24 Das rothe Käppchen Komische Operette Vulpius/Dittersdorf

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Apr 15 Die Geschwister vom Lande Lustspiel

Apr 17 Der seltne Onkel Original-Lustspiel

Apr 24 Liebhaber und Nebenbuhler Ritter Lustspiel in einer Person Apr 29 Der Sonderling Lustspiel

May 1 Er mengt sich in alles Lustspiel

May 2 Mathilde, Gräfin von Schauspiel Griesbach May 4 Bürgerglück Lustspiel

May 12 Maske für Maske Lustspiel

May 14 Eine große musikalische Concert Akademie July 13 Die Dame als Soldat Komische Oper Mazzolà/Naumann

July 27 Una Cosa Rara Komisches Singspiel Da Ponte/Martin y Soler

Aug 5 Zenobia di Palmira Ernsthafte Oper [Sertor]/Anfossi

Sept 18 Gutherzigkeit und Eitelkeit Original-Lustspiel

Sept 20 Oda, Die Frau von zween Original-Trauerspiel Männer Sept 25 Der Pasquillant Schauspiel

Oct 11 Das Ehepaar aus der Provinz Original-Lustspiel

Oct 21 Der Geist des Widerspruchs Komische Oper [Mazzolà]/Schuster

Nov 18 Unter zween Streitenden siegt Komische Operette Goldoni/Sarti der Dritte Nov 30 Die beiden Savoyarden Singspiel Schmieder/Dalayrac

Dec 27 Der Schiffspatron Komisches Singspiel [Jünger]/Dittersdorf

Jan 3, 1793 Nicht mehr als sechs Familiengemälde Schüsseln Jan 4 Lilla (nach Una Cosa Rara) Singspiel [Da Ponte]/Martín y Soler Mar 1 Die Zauberflöte Große Oper Schikaneder/Mozart

Apr 5 Das Scheinverdienst Original-Schauspiel

Apr 10 Der Weg zum Verderben Schauspiel

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Apr 16 Der Wechsel Original-Lustspiel

May 3 Clavigo Trauerspiel

May 4 Die Indianer in England Original-Lustspiel

June 3 Gli equivoci Komische Oper [Da Ponte]/Storace

July 21 La locanda Komisches Singspiel [Tonioli]/Paisiello

Aug 6 Il Re Teodoro in Venezia Heroisch-komisches [Casti]/Paisiello Singspiel Aug 26 Le nozze di Figaro Komisches Singspiel [Da Ponte]/Mozart

Sept 22 Weiberehre 5-act Sittengemälde

Sept 24 Der Maytag 4-act Ländliches Gemälde

Sept 27 Die Familie Spaden Original-Schauspiel

Sept 29 Die neugierigen Lustspiel Frauenzimmer Sept 30 Wenzikopf Trauerspiel

Oct 10 Graf von Esser Trauerspiel

Nov 27 Unter zwey Streitenden siegt Komische Operette Goldoni/Sarti der Dritte Dec 23 Die eingebildeten Komisches Singspiel [Bertati]/Paisiello Philosophen Dec 27 Hauptmann Sturm und seine Familiengemälde Kinder Dec 27 Der Schauspieldirektor Lustspiel mit Gesang [Stephanie]/Mozart

Dec 29 Zwei Onkels für einen Lustspiel

Dec 29 Die eingebildeten Komisches Singspiel [Bertati]/Paisiello Philosophen Dec 30 Der Apotheker und der Komisches Singspiel [Stephanie]/Dittersdorf Doktor Jan 3, 1794 Liebhaber und Nebenbuhler 4-act Ritter Lustspiel in einer Person Feb 11 Der Irrwisch Oper Bretzner/Kospoth

Feb 23 Der Aerndtekranz Komische Oper Weisse/Hiller

Mar 5 Liebe unter Handwerksleuten Komische Oper Goldoni/Gasmann

Apr 22 Edelsinn und Armuth Original-Lustspiel

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May 6 Die Schauspielerschule Original-Lustspiel

May 9 Er mengt sich in alles Lustspiel

May 10 Siri Brahe Schauspiel

May 15 Der Deserteur aus Schauspiel Kindesliebe May 18 Maske für Maske Lustspiel

May 23 Agnes Bernauerinn Trauerspiel

May 29 Minna von Barnhelm Lustspiel

June 15 La Principessa di Amalfi Komisches Singspiel Bertati/Weigl

June 29 Die Zauberflöte Große Oper Schikaneder/Mozart

July 8 Il matrimonio segreto Komisches Singspiel [Bertati]/Cimarosa

July 11 L'incanto superato Komisches Singspiel Bertati/Sießmayr

Aug 1 Il musulmano in Napoli Musikalisches Lustspiel [Mazzolà]/Sießmayr

Aug 3 Pyrrhus Großes ernsthaftes Singspiel [De Gamerra]/Paisiello

Aug 17 Nannerina e Pandolfino Komisches Singspiel Bertati/Duttilieu

Aug 21 La maga Circe Komische Oper ?/Anfossi

Aug 26 Don Giovanni Komisches Singspiel Da Ponte/Mozart

Aug 28 Axur, Re D’Ormus Tragi-komische Oper Da Ponte/Salieri

Aug 29 Così fan tutte Große Oper [Da Ponte]/Mozart

Aug 31 La Molinara Komisches Singspiel [Palomba]/Paisiello

Sept 4 Der Triumph der Liebe über Oper mit großen Chören ?/Schuster die Zauberey Sept 14 Weltton und Herzensgüte Familiengemälde

Sept 15 Der wiedergefundene Sohn Original-Lustspiel

Sept 16 Das Landmädchen Lustspiel

Sept 21 Die Aussteuer Original-Schauspiel

Sept 23 Der Portrait der Mutter Original-Lustspiel

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Sept 25 Das Findelkind Original-Lustspiel

Sept 26 König Lear Trauerspiel

Sept 28 Ludwig der Springer Vaterländisches Schauspiel

Sept 29 Die Reise nach der Stadt Original-Lustspiel

Oct 4 Konrad von Starkenberg Historisches Schauspiel

Oct 5 Graf Benjowski Historisches Schauspiel

Oct 10 Die Sonnen-Jungfrau Schauspiel

Oct 11 Die Spanier in Peru Trauerspiel

Oct 13 Die Jäger Ländliches Sittengemälde

Oct 19 Er mengt sich in alles Lustspiel

Oct 24 Der Geisterseher Oper Großmann/Müller

Oct 29 Der Barbier von Sevilla Singspiel Beaumarchais/Paisiello

Nov 5 Adelheid von Veltheim Schauspiel mit Gesang Großmann/Neefe

Nov 9 Die Zauberzither Große Oper [Perinet]/Müller

Nov 11 Liebesabendtheuer Komische Oper [Großmann]/Bierey

Nov 12 Die Entführung aus dem Singspiel Bretzner/Mozart Serail Nov 16 Leichtsinn und gutes Herz Lustspiel

Nov 16 Liebesabendtheuer Komische Oper [Großmann]/Bierey

Nov 19 Das Sonnenfest der Braminen Heroisch-komisches Hensler/Müller Singspiel Nov 26 Der schwarze Mann Lustspiel

Nov 26 Der Faßbinder Komisches Singspiel Gotter/Audinat

Dec 9 Die christliche Judenbraut Komische Oper Girzik/Panek

Dec 22 Weibertreue Komisches Singspiel Bretzner/Mozart

Dec 27 Das rothe Käppchen Komische Oper Vulpius/Dittersdorf

Dec 29 Der schwarze Mann Lustspiel

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Dec 29 Der Faßbinder Komisches Singspiel Gotter/Audinat

Jan 1, 1795 Die Jagd Komische Oper Weisse/Hiller

Jan 2 Der Irrwisch Operette Bretzner/Kospoth

Jan 6 Die Zauberflöte Große Oper Schikaneder/Mozart

Jan 8 Scheinverbrechen Original-Schauspiel

Jan 11 Zufall und Laune Lustspiel

Jan 11 Die schöne Schusterin Komisches Singspiel Stephanie/Umlauf

Jan 12 Die Dichterfamilie Original-Schauspiel

Jan 18 Zufall und Laune Lustspiel

Jan 18 Die Wäschermädchen Komische Oper Bock/Zanetti

Jan 21 Der Taubstumme Lustspiel

Jan 21 Der Schauspieldirektor Lustspiel mit Gesang [Stephanie]/Mozart

Jan 23 Die Indianer in England Lustspiel

Jan 27 Keiner hat Recht Lustspiel

Jan 28 Romeo und Julie Schauspiel mit Gesang Gotter/G. Benda

Jan 30 Das Sonnenfest der Braminen Heroisch-komisches Hensler/Müller Singspiel Feb 1 Weibertreue Komisches Singspiel Bretzner/Mozart

Feb 2 Romeo und Julie Schauspiel mit Gesang Gotter/G. Benda

Feb 2 Der Diener zweyer Herren Lustspiel

Feb 6 Oberon, König der Elfen Romantisch-komische Oper Giesecke/Wranitzky

Feb 11 Hieronimus Knicker Komische Oper [Dittersdorf?]/Dittersdorf

Feb 13 Das Kästchen mit der Chiffer Komische Oper ?/Salieri

Feb 15 Lilla (nach Una Cosa Rara) Komische Oper [Da Ponte]/Martín y Soler Feb 17 Oberon, König der Elfen Romantisch-komische Oper Giesecke/Wranitzky

Feb 18 Die Dorfdeputierten Komische Oper Heermann/Wolf

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Apr 7 Selim, Prinz von Algier Trauerspiel

Apr 8 Die Aussteuer Original-Schauspiel

Apr 10 Was seyn soll, schickt sich Original-Lustspiel wohl Apr 12 Die Sklavenhandel Historisch-romantisches Gemälde Apr 16 Wenzikoff und Natalia Trauerspiel

Apr 19 Der Krug geht so lange zu Original-Lustspiel Wasser Apr 20 Die Jäger Ländliches Sittengemälde

Apr 22 Die Entführung Original-Lustspiel

Apr 23 Die Dichterfamilie Original-Schauspiel

May 1 Abellino, der große Bandit Trauerspiel

May 8 König Lear Trauerspiel

May 10 Dienstpflicht Original-Schauspiel

May 17 Die unvermuthete Wendung Lustspiel

May 22 Die Folgen einer einzigen Original-Schauspiel Lüge May 26 Die unglückliche Ehe durch Lustspiel Delikatesse May 29 Mariane Trauerspiel

May 31 Otto der Schütz Historisches Schauspiel

June 5 Clavigo Trauerspiel

June 7 Das Vermächtnis Original-Schauspiel

June 9 Das Räuschgen Original-Lustspiel

June 14 Der Schwätzer Original-Lustspiel

June 16 Die Vormünder Lustspiel

June 19 Othello, der Mohr von Trauerspiel Venedig June 21 Er mengt sich in alles Lustspiel

June 24 Die Schach-Maschine Lustspiel

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June 26 Der Husarenraub Schauspiel

June 28 Die Zwillingsbrüder Lustspiel

July 2 Die Sonnen-Jungfrau Schauspiel

July 6 Der Wechsel Original-Lustspiel

July 10 Der Kerkermeister von Schauspiel Norwich July 12 Die Advokaten Original-Schauspiel

July 13 Klara von Hoheneichen Ritterschauspiel

July 27 Curd von Spartau Original-Schauspiel

Aug 3 Das Mädchen im Eichthale Ländliches Hochzeitspiel

Aug 7 Bürgerglück Original-Lustspiel

Aug 9 Romeo und Julie Trauerspiel

Aug 10 Die Strelitzen Schauspiel

Aug 14 Das Portrait der Mutter Original-Lustspiel

Aug 16 Das Kind der Liebe Original-Schauspiel

Aug 17 Der Universalfreund Lustspiel

Aug 21 Das Testament Original-Lustspiel

Aug 23 Beverley/Der englische Schauspiel Spieler Aug 28 Die Tochter der Natur Familiengemälde

Aug 30 Otto der Schütz Historisches Schauspiel

Sept 4 Die Ehrenklärung Schauspiel

Sept 7 Der Herbsttag Original-Schauspiel

Sept 10 Maske für Maske Lustspiel

Sept 13 Elise von Dalberg Original-Schauspiel

Sept 14 Keiner hat Recht Lustspiel

Sept 17 Der Vormund Original-Schauspiel

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Sept 18 Frauenstand Original-Schauspiel

Sept 20 Die Verläumder Original-Schauspiel

Sept 21 Der Revers Original-Lustspiel

Sept 24 Das Mädchen von Fürstliches Marienburg Familiengemälde Sept 28 Othello Trauerspiel

Oct 1 Die Entführung Original-Lustspiel

Oct 2 General Schlensheim und Original-Schauspiel seine Familie Oct 3 Das Landmädchen Lustspiel

Oct 4 Barbarey und Größe Trauerspiel

Oct 6 Was seyn soll, schickt sich Original-Lustspiel wohl Oct 6 Medea Mit Musik vermischtes Gotter/G. Benda Drama Oct 8 Verbrechen aus Ehrsucht Familiengemälde

Oct 11 Die Advokaten Original-Schauspiel

Oct 12 Alte Welt und Neue Welt Original-Schauspiel

Oct 13 Stille Wasser sind betrüglich Lustspiel

Oct 15 Der Krug geht so lange zu Original-Lustspiel Wasser Oct 15 Medea Mit Musik vermischtes Gotter/G. Benda Drama Oct 16 Die Geflüchteten Original-Schauspiel

Oct 17 Der Lügner Lustspiel

Oct 18 Weltton und Herzensgüte Familiengemälde

The 367 items listed in Table 5.1 can be grouped into the following subcategories: 223 spoken-theater pieces, 135 musical works, and 9 ballets. Among the musical works, we find operas, operettas, Singspiels, intermezzos, and melodramas. I have also included in the music category works that involve music only as an supplement to an otherwise spoken piece, for

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instance, So denkt der Patriot, a Vorspiel mit Musik, and Saturns Geburtsfeyer, an Allegorisches

Vorspiel mit Gesängen und Tänzen. Finally, the music category also includes a May 14, 1792 potpourri concert titled “eine große musikalische Akademie,” which featured, among other things, a symphony by the Electoral Kapellmeister in Dresden, Joseph Gottlieb Naumann, and solo piano variations by Mozart.

One of the most prominent characteristics to notice in Table 5.1 is the variety of generic designations among the performances involving music. In some cases, adjectival descriptors likely had more to do with advertising than a desire for precise classification; labels such as

“tragisches Singspiel,” “heroisch-komisches Singspiel,” or “romantisch-komische Oper” told audiences what their money was buying. Other labels, however, pose difficulties for modern understanding. Whereas a theatrical piece involving comedy was often simply designated as a

“Lustspiel,” a comedic piece with music might be called “Komische Oper,” “Komische

Operette,” or “Komisches Singspiel.” Occasionally, labels such as “Musikalisches Lustpsiel” or

“Lustspiel mit Gesang” imply a hybrid connection of spoken and music theater, “Lustspiel” being the usual designation for a spoken comedy. Another difficulty appears with eighteenth- century generic designations that run counter to designations we use today. For instance, Hiller’s works, which occurred with some frequency between 1776 and 1779, are all labeled as

“Komische Oper.” On the other hand, Mozart’s Don Giovanni, performed on June 15, 1788 and

August 26, 1794, and Le nozze di Figaro, performed on August 26, 1793, are both subtitled

“Komisches Singspiel.” Thomas Bauman has already discussed the difficulty of applying labels to eighteenth-century German operas because of the imprecision and inconsistent use of the term

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“Singspiel.”15 For our purposes here, the task is not to untangle the meaning of these labels, but

to simply note their variety.

This table also allows us to study the distribution of musical and spoken-theater

performances. Fritz Hennenberg writes that musical items made up 20 percent of Koch’s

repertoire between 1766 and 1771, but then rose as high as 50 percent by 1775.16 The existing

records show that musical entertainments remained popular into the mid-1780s—well after Koch

had permanently departed Leipzig for Berlin in 1773. In fact, the records until 1784 include

thirty-one musical performances, twenty-six spoken-theater pieces, six ballets, and one Vorspiel mit Musik. Over time, however, spoken works began to make up a larger share of the theater’s offerings. Of the 303 total performances from January 1785 to October 1795, two hundred were spoken works (66 percent); between February and October 1795, the Theater auf der Ranstädter

Bastei produced spoken works almost exclusively. Nonetheless, some seasons offer notable exceptions, such as the summer of 1794 or the winter of 1794–95, where music dominated the schedule.

Just as the balance between musical and theatrical works shifted over time, so did the balance of nationalities represented by musical works. If we subtract the ballets and the “große musikalische Akademie,” we are left with 134 dramatic musical works. Of these, the period

1776–95 witnessed the production of forty-seven works of German origin, forty-five of

Viennese, thirty-two of Italian, nine of French, and one of English. In the table, we can see how public tastes likely shifted away from German works to Italian and Viennese over time. While

15 Thomas Bauman, North German Opera in the Age of Goethe (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985), 9–14.

16 Fritz Hennenberg, 300 Jahre Leipziger Oper: Geschichte und Gegenwart (Munich: Langen Müller, 1993), 21.

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numerous programs from the late 1770s and 1780s appear to be missing, the surviving programs

indicate a strong preference for German works up until 1780. Of the twenty-one musical works listed between 1776 and 1780, sixteen are of German origin; Italy and Vienna are represented by only one apiece. After 1780, however, German and Italian music dramas appear with equal frequency—thirty-one pieces for each. The 1790s clearly belonged to the wave of operas coming north from Vienna. Of the forty-five Viennese operas in Table 5.1, forty-two of them were

staged in 1790 or later. While these works—by composers such as Mozart, Salieri, Dittersdorf,

Martín y Soler, and others—dominated the Ranstädter Bastei stage, and largely pushed aside the

German tradition, they did not completely bury public interest in German works, as shown by the

1795 revivals of such favorites as Hiller’s Die Jagd, Benda’s Romeo und Julie and Medea, and

Wolf’s Die Dorfdeputierten, and the appearance of north German operatic conventions in early

Romantic operas.17

The topic of nationality naturally leads to the question of language. Much of the Leipzig audience did not speak fluent Italian, and so non-German works were often provided with

German translations. In many cases, the theater programs list the translator. For example, an operatic performance by the Deutsche Schauspieler Gesellschaft on October 27, 1790 featured

Die Eifersucht auf der Probe, a translation by Johann Joachim Eschenburg of Pasquale Anfossi’s

Il geloso in cimento. At other times, the Theater auf der Ranstädter Bastei hosted touring groups of Italian singers performing Italian-language works. During the summers of 1782 and 1783, the programs show that a troupe of Italian “Opera-virtuosen” led by “Herr Entrepreneur Bondini” staged works by Anfossi, Cimarosa, and Salieri, among others. For the performance of these

17 The use of an uncomplicated folksong style and melodrama in Carl Maria von Weber’s popular Der Freischütz are commonly cited as proofs of the endurance of the north German opera tradition in the early nineteenth century.

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operas, the programs specify that librettos in Italian and German would be available for the price

of six Groschen. Spectators could then follow along with the libretto during the performance.

Among the German composers listed on Table 5.1, Johann Adam Hiller’s works appear, not surprisingly, with relative frequency. Moreover, the featured works reflect various facets of his output. Hiller’s first attempt at German opera, Die verwandelten Weiber, was revived on

February 27, 1791, perhaps somewhat to the composer’s chagrin given its low-brow, farcical

content. However, the theater also restaged the idealizations of rural life that represented some of

Hiller’s greatest achievements: Der Aerndtekranz (three times), Die Liebe auf dem Lande,

Lottchen am Hofe, and Hiller’s most popular work, Die Jagd (also three times, including New

Year’s Day, 1795). Besides Hiller’s first operatic work, the theater also presented his final

completed opera, Das Grab des Mufti (1779), a romantic comedy with a libretto by August

Gottlieb Meissner that transposes its tale of bourgeois lovers from a pastoral milieu to a more

exotic locale in Spanish Smyrna. Perhaps the only notable omission from Hiller’s oeuvre among

the later Ranstädter Bastei performances is Lisuart und Dariolette. Hiller had entertained such

high hopes for his first attempt at a German opera elevated both in poetry and music. As we saw

in Chapter 3, however, at least one critic did not look favorably on Lisuart’s fairy mythology

(see p. 107), and the opera’s lack of revival between 1776 and 1795 indicates that the public also

preferred Hiller’s rustic settings.

Even though Georg Benda’s works arrived on the Leipzig stage a few years after Hiller’s,

they proved to be just as popular as Hiller’s during the final quarter of the eighteenth century— his music has eleven entries on Table 5.1 compared to Hiller’s ten. The multiple performances of

Ariadne auf Naxos (4/17/76 and 4/29/87) and Medea (10/10/76, 10/6/95, and 10/15/95) demonstrate the ongoing German interest in melodrama. Benda’s comic opera Der Jahrmarkt

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also proved to be a hit with three separate revivals.18 His serious Schauspiele mit Gesang Walder

(1776) and Romeo und Julie (1776) received one and two performances, respectively.

Outside of Hiller’s and Benda’s works, few of the operas composed during the period

1766–75 survived into the last quarter of the century. Ernst Wilhelm Wolf’s Das Rosenfest does

not appear among the programs, but his Die Dorfdeputierten (1772) received two performances

(8/27/77 and 2/18/95). The Theater auf der Ranstädter Bastei also put on Wolf’s secular cantata

Polyxena (1776) in June 1787. Christian Gottlob Neefe’s early attempts at opera, Amors

Guckkasten, Die Apotheke, and Die Einsprüche, do not appear among the surviving theater

programs, but his Adelheid von Veltheim (1780), a Schauspiel mit Gesang with a libretto by

Großman, received a production on November 5, 1794. Anton Schweitzer’s ambitious Alceste, so highly promoted by its librettist, Christoph Martin Wieland, as a breakthrough in German serious opera, seems to have been forgotten.

Glancing over the changing colors and composer names listed on Table 5.1, one cannot help but notice the change in Leipzig’s operatic tastes and a shift away from the tradition established by Hiller. The preference for southern styles in Leipzig mirrored national trends, and emerging German composers could not ignore them. The Dresden-based Joseph Schuster borrowed from the Viennese style in Der Alchymist (1778), performed twice at the Ranstädter

Bastei (10/17/78 and 4/30/79), and Friedrich Ludwig Benda, son of Georg, included virtuosic

Italian-style da capo arias in his Der Barbier von Sevilla (1776), also staged twice in Leipzig

(8/30/85 and 8/7/86). Both operas remained popular into the nineteenth century. Nevertheless, revivals of favorites such as Hiller’s Die Jagd on New Year’s Day, 1795 suggest a willingness to

18 As mentioned in chapter 1, Benda’s Der Jahrmarkt was originally a one-act comic opera later expanded to two and retitled Der Dorfjahrmarkt when it first came to Leipzig in 1775. For the three documented performances after 1775, Der Jahrmarkt is referred to as both a “Komische Operette” (5/5/76) and a “Komische Oper” (11/21/90 and 1/20/92). However, the programs for all three indicate that Der Jahrmarkt is a work in two acts. I have not yet accounted for the reversion to the original name in these post-1775 performances.

271 celebrate the older tradition. The records of the Ranstädter Bastei show us that, as opera in

Germany continued to evolve, it balanced an embrace of the new with occasional recollections of the past.

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Conclusion

The decade separating the mid-1760s and the mid-1770s represented a period of momentous change for public opera in Germany. To appreciate the magnitude of this transformation, one needs only to consider the state of operatic affairs at the beginning and end of this timespan. In the mid-1760s, many German regions were still recovering from a decade of war, and citizens, such as those in Leipzig, were only just beginning to think about resuming their former artistic and cultural activities. Even before the war, German public opera failed to attract much serious artistic consideration. Occasional farcical works, such as Koch’s 1752 experiment with Weisse and Standfuss on Die verwandelten Weiber, made up the lean years between the closing of Hamburg’s theater in 1738 and the postwar revival in Leipzig in 1766.

German opera was ignored in aristocratic circles and attacked by intellectuals, such as Johann

Gottsched, for its lowbrow humor.

The vibrancy of the mid-1770s thus provides a stark contrast. By this time, German operatic works had taken hold on stages throughout the north, including in Prussia and its provinces, Saxony, Lower Saxony, and Thuringia. Whereas Frederick II (“The Great”) had once said he would rather listen to his horse than a German soprano, Johann Gottfried Herder, in his

Treatise on the Origin of Language (1772), now exhorted German artists to embrace their native linguistic heritage. Librettists and composers alike sought to push opera in more ambitious directions. For instance, Goethe brought the emotional turbulence of the Sturm und Drang trend to his libretto Claudine von Villa Bella (1776). In the same year, Georg Benda produced the first operatic setting of Shakespeare when he composed the music for Weisse’s Romeo und Julie.

The development of German opera and its aspiration for new artistic heights inevitably brought about the neglect of the Leipzig repertoire that had reignited the genre. In his 1774

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Briefe eines aufmerksamen Reisenden, die Musik betreffend, Reichardt noted the decline in

popularity of Hiller’s and Wolf’s operas; already contemporary audiences were calling the

innocent, rustic plots “unnatural and childish.”1 Likewise, Weisse reported in the Vorbericht to

his second edition of Komische Opern (1778), “For some time, they have sought to remove the little songs from the comic operas and replace them with arie di bravura with all possible coloratura. They have even looked down on Hiller’s sublime music with a contemptuous eye because he did not set his arias for a [Gertrude] Mara or [Josepha] Helmuth.”2 As the theater

records for the Ranstädter Bastei indicate, Neefe’s and Benda’s comic operas from the early

1770s fared no better.

Despite the gradual disappearance of the earlier repertoire, the aesthetic ideas that shaped

these operas continued to resonate through the coming decades. Subsequent writers and

composers, much like Hiller in the WNA or Wieland in Der Teutsche Merkur, viewed German opera as a vehicle for nationalistic expression and pride. They promoted the German language as a viable means of operatic communication, and adapted their stories to suit German audiences.

The creators of German opera also maintained their concern for balancing the dramatic and

musical dimensions of the work. Finally, they sought to make their operas a harmonious union of

all the arts, with the ultimate goal of stirring the emotions of the listener. Many of these ideas

will be familiar to enthusiasts of nineteenth-century German opera, as scholars have written

much more on this period than on the eighteenth century. However, as I have shown, these ideas

did not originate in the nineteenth century. On the contrary, they were circulating in Leipzig at a

1 Johann Reichardt, Briefe eines aufmerksamen Reisenden, die Musik betreffend (Frankfurt & Leipzig, 1774), 145.

2 “Seit einiger Zeit hat man die kleinen Lieder wieder aus den komischen Opern zu verdrängen, und sie durch Arie di Bravura mit allen möglichen Coloraturen zu ersetzen gesucht; ja, mit einem verächtlichen Blick auf die vortreffliche Hillerische Musik herabgesehen, weil er seine Arien nicht für eine Mara oder Helmuth gesetzt hat.” Christian Felix Weisse, Vorbericht to Komische Opern (Carlsruhe: Schmieder, 1778), n.p.

274

time when German opera enjoyed little more than a regional reputation. By pushing the

discourse back to an earlier time, I have drawn attention to the aesthetic views that shaped the genre from its rebirth.

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Voss, Paul. The Growth of the Leipzig Fair. Leipzig: Leipziger Messamt, 1930.

Warrack, John Hamilton. German Opera: From the Beginnings to Wagner. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001.

Weisse, Christian Felix. Komische Opern. Leipzig: Dyck, 1768.

———. Komische Opern. Carlsruhe: Schmieder, 1778.

———. Selbstbiographie. Leipzig: [s.n.], 1806.

Wesseler, Karl. “Untersuchungen zur Darstellung des Singspiels auf der Deutschen Bühne des 18. Jahrhunderts.” PhD diss., University of Cologne, 1954.

Wheelock, Gretchen. “Schwarze Gredel and the Engendered Minor Mode in Mozart’s Operas.” In Musicology and Difference, edited by Ruth A. Solie, 201–21. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1993.

Wieland, Christoph Martin. Der Teutsche Merkur. Weimar: Verl. der Ges, 1773–89.

Witkowski, Georg. Geschichte des literarischen Lebens in Leipzig. 1909. Reprint, Leipzig & Berlin: B. G. Teubner, 1994.

Wustmann, Georg. Geschichte der Stadt Leipzig. Leipzig, Hirschfeld, 1905.

———, ed. Quellen zur Geschichte Leipzigs. 2 vols. Leipzig: Duncker & Humblot, 1889.

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Music Manuscript Sources

Benda, Georg Anton. Der Dorfjahrmarkt (1775). Mus. Ms. 1355. Staatsbibliothek Preussicher Kulturbesitz, Berlin.

Hiller, Johann Adam. Der Aerndtekranz (1771). Mus. Ms. 10639. Staatsbibliothek Preussischer Kulturbesitz, Berlin.

———. Der Dorfbalbier (1771). Keyboard edition. Leipzig: B. C. Breitkopf & Sohn, 1771.

———. Die Jagd (1770). Photo-reproduction of the Ms. in the Staatsbibliothek Preussischer Kulturbesitz, Berlin, Musikabteilung (Mus. Ms. 10638). New York: Garland, 1985.

———. Die Jubelhochzeit (1773). Ms. F/12. Bibliothek und Museum Löbau, Dresden.

———. Die Liebe auf dem Lande (1768). PM 684. Musikbibliothek der Stadt, Leipzig.

———. Lisuart und Dariolette (1766). Mus. Ms. 10636. Staatsbibliothek Preussischer Kulturbesitz, Berlin.

———. Lottchen am Hofe (1767). Mus. Ms. 10637. Staatsbibliothek Preussischer Kulturbesitz, Berlin.

———. Der lustige Schuster (1766). Keyboard edition. Leipzig: J. F. Junius, 1771.

———. Die Muse (1767). M. 360.16. Public Library Music Department, Boston, MA.

———. Die verwandelten Weiber (1766). Mus. Ms. 1190. Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Munich.

Neefe, Christian Gottlob. Amors Guckkasten (1772). Keyboard edition. Leipzig: Schwickert, 1772.

———. Die Apotheke (1771). Keyboard edition. Leipzig: J. F. Junius, 1772.

———. Die Einsprüche (1772). Mus. Ms. 16011. Staatsbibliothek Preussischer Kulturbesitz, Berlin.

Schweitzer, Anton. Alceste (1773). Photoreproduction of the Ms. in the Oesterreichische Nationalbibliothek, Vienna, Musiksammlung (Ms. 16152). New York: Garland, 1985.

Wolf, Ernst Wilhelm. Die Dorfdeputierten (1772). Photo-reproduction of a Ms. score in the Staatsbibliothek Preussischer Kulturbesitz, Berlin, Musikabteilung (Mus. Ms. 20240) New York: Garland, 1985.

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———. Das Gärtnermädchen (1769). Staatliche Hochschule für Musik und Darstellende Kunst, Berlin.

———. Das Rosenfest (1770). Keyboard edition. Berlin: Winter, 1771.

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Appendix A: German Texts for Chapter 2

1. Da ich mit den täglichen Bedürfnissen besser versorgt war, geht auch hier die Epoche an, wo ich meine Kenntnisse in der Musik zu erweitern, meine bisher noch geringe Fertigkeit zu vermehren, meinen Geschmack zu bilden, und kurz, ein Componist und Musikus, wenn ich nun eins von beiden seyn soll, zu werden Gelegenheit fand.

3. Ich habe einmal in einem Vierteljahre, von Weihnachten bis Ostern, sieben Partituren von Hassischen Opern, doch ohne Recitative, weil ich sie nicht anders bekommen konnte, für mich abgeschrieben. Da ich nun den Tag über, der Schulstunden und Chorarbeiten wegen, wenig schreiben konnte, so blieben mir nur die Stunden nach dem Abendgebete, und wenn die andern Schüler zu Bette waren, dazu übrig; da ich dann manchmal bis gegen 4 Uhr, von Kälte erstarrt, über meinen Partituren saß.

4. Es war nie meine Absicht, mich ganz der Musik zu widmen.

6. Mehr aber glaubte ich aber mir zu nützen, wenn ich auf meiner Stube mit einer kleinen Anzahl guter Bücher mein Lehrer selbst würde.

8. Zwar verbarg ich mich einmal drey Wochen lang vor dem Geräusche der Messe, und componirte Gellerts Orakel; jetzt aber sehe ich diese Arbeit für nichts, als den rohen Stoff zu einer guten Composition dieses Stücks an . . . .

10. Für diese schrieb ich eine Abhandlung über die Nachahmung der Natur in der Musik, die ganz auf den Batteuxischen Horizont gestellt ist.

14. Ich begleitete mit Mühe und Noth meinen Grafen in einige Collegia, zu einigen Besuchen, arbeitete mit ihm noch ein Paar Stunden auf der Stube, und brachte meine übrige Zeit, theils unter meinen Büchern, deren ich einen ziemlichen Vorrath hatte, theils mit Componiren verschiedener Sachen zu.

17. Unsere Absicht gehet bloß auf das, was, so zu sagen, vor unsern Augen geschieht, auf gesammelte Nachrichten, aus denen sich vielleicht die Geschichte der heutigen Musik zusammen setzen liese . . . .

20. Die theatralische Muse nimmt sie so an, und bringt sie auf die Bühne mit aller Pracht des Wunderbaren zurück. . . . Da sie die Musik, den Tanz, die Mahlerey zu Hülfe nimmt, zeigt sie uns durch eine neue Zauberkraft die Wunder, welche ihre Nebenbuhlerinn nur unsrer Einbildung vorgestellt hatte.

25. Die Musik macht darinnen den Reiz des Wunderbaren, das Wunderbare aber die wahrscheinlichtkeit der Musik.

27. Es liegt nichts daran, ob der Inhalt fabelhaft oder historisch ist; aber daran liegt unendlich viel, dass alle interessante Situationen, alle pathetischen Ausdrücke, alle schreckliche oder angenehme Bilder von dem Dichter als das wahre Gebiete der Tonkunst angesehen warden.

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28. Eine Vermischung von schmerzhaften und tröstlichen Situationen von Augenblicken der Unruhe und der Furcht, der Ruhe und der Hofnung, dem Charakter des pathetischen Gesanges sowohl, als des angenehmern und leichtern abwechselnd Platz machen.

29. Man kann mit Grunde behaupten, dass alles, was Poesie, Musik, Pantomime, Tanz und Mahlerey reizendes haben, sich in der Oper glücklich vereinige, die Sinne zu reizen, das Herz zu bezaubern und eine angenehme Täuschung hervorzubringen.

30. Von einem guten Schauspiele verlangen wir allemal, dass es das Herz rühre, den Verstand beschäfftige, und den Sinnen schmeichele, freylich nicht alles in gleichem Grade; findet sich diese dreyfache Wirkung bey der Oper sowohl als bey der Tragödie, warum soll sie schlechter seyn?

31. Sie müssen es empfinden, dass der Uebergang von der Declamation zur Musik nur durch einen Anwachs des Interesse oder Leidenschafft gut gemacht werden kann, welche von selbst einen neuen und stärken Ausdruck zu fodern scheint; sie müssen sich hüten, bey frostigen Situationen Arien anzubringen, und dieselben nur mitten im Dialog brauchen, ehe die Handlung sehr lebhaft geworden ist; endlich müssen sie die Musik nicht misbrauche, und die Arien in ihren Stücken nicht zu sehr häufen. Dann wage ich es denjenigen berühmten Componisten unter uns noch größern Ruhm zu versprechen . . . . Besonders muss man sich vor den beyden Fehlern hüten, die Musik bloß auf die Divertissements zu verweisen oder sie durch die unächten Arien, durch die geschmacklosen Rondeaux zu entweihen, womit man gewöhnlich die Handlung unterbricht.

33. Nichts streitet mehr gegen das Gesetz der Continuität—ein Gesetz, das heilig ist in der Natur, und welches ihrer Nachahmerinn der Kunst eben so heilig seyn sollte. . . . Man braucht eines gesehen zu haben, und man hat sie alle gesehen. Die Kleider der Tänzer verändern sich; der Character der Ballette niemals.

34. In der französischen Oper müssen die Feyerlichkeiten wenigstens als Zwischenfälle, die wahrscheinlich sind, mit der Handlung zusammen hängen; und es ist gleich, ob sie am Anfange, in der Mitte, oder am Ende des Acts stehen, wenn es nur am gehörigen Ort ist.

35. Doch muss ich dabey bemerken, dass man die Poesie dieser Stücke, nicht aus dem Lesen, sondern aus dem Effecte den das Stück auf dem Theater macht, beurtheilen müsse.

37. Der edelmütige und menschenfreundliche Bagode, nach der 2ten Scene des ersten Acts, und nach der ersten des zweyten; seine Klugheit, seine Treu vor das Wohl der Staaten seiner Königinn, seine reinen Regungen und nun, in der 4ten, 5ten und 6ten Scene des 2ten Acts, theils al sein Narr, ein Stolzer, als ein feiger und meuchelmördischer Niederträchtiger?—Ey, das stimmt gar nicht mit einander überein. Ist es nicht eine der ersten Regeln eines Scribenten vor das Theater, daß sich die Personen, vom Anfang bis zum Ende eines ganzen Stücks hindurch in allen ihren Handlungen immer gleich seyn müssen?

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38. Die andern Rollen, als die des Stallmeisters Derwin, und der Hofdamen, sind comische Rollen; doch fallen sie nicht in das groteske comische.

39. Die Musik zeigt ihre größte Gewalt, wenn sie eine Gehülfinn der Poesie ist.

40. Eine andere Hauptursach des jetzigen Verfalles der Musik, ist die eigne und besondre Herrschaft, der sie sich bemächtigt hat, und die jetzt zu einer so außerordentlichen Höhe gestiegen ist. Der Compositeur stellet sich darinn als ein Despot. Er will nur für sich arbeitet, nur als Musicus gefallen. Um aller Welt will es ihm nicht in den Kopf, daß er subordiniert seyn soll, und daß die Musik einen größern Effect thue, wenn sie eine Dienerinn und Gehülfinn der Dichtkunst ist.

41. Es ist wahr, dass ein Dichter, um ein gutes musikalisches Gedicht zu verfertigen, bis auf einen gewissen Grad selbst Musicus, selbst Componist seyn müsse.

42. Ich gestehe, dass alles das, was das Sylbenmaaß und den Einschnitt der lyrischen Verse betrifft, in allen französischen Opern, meiner Meynung nach so sehr vernachläßigt wird, dass man beynahe glauben sollte, dass alle die, welche diese Gedichte geschrieben, nur sehr schwache Begriffe von der music gehabt haben.

43. Man sollte glauben, sie hätten selbst jedes Thema ihrer Arien erfunden, und dem Componisten bloß die Mühe überlassen, das Accompagnement dazu zu verfertigen.

44. Welcher Wohlklang in den Versen! voll von Gedanken, von starken und zärtlichen Empfindungen, von edlen und wohlgewählten Bildern, machen sie überall auf das Herz der Leser den lebhaftesten, den angenehmsten Eindruck. Man muss sie um so viel höher schätzen, je weniger sie Copien von andern, sondern selbst originelle Nachahmungen der schönen Natur sind. Und diese poetischen Schönheiten in Töne gekleidet, in die auserlesensten meisterhaftesten Töne, was für eine Wirkung sind sie alsdann zu thun nicht erst fähig!

45. Ehrfurcht und Liebe sind in allen seinen Reden sehr wohl angebracht. Seine Verlegenheit in Bekanntmachung seiner schönen Leidenschaft ist in den Worten Nò-ma-poetri—Sai, che fedel son io auf das beste getroffen; worauf alsdann, in der gleich darauf folgenden Arie des Bagode, seine Zärtlichkeit in das stärkste und schönste Licht gesetzt wird.

46. Es ist wenigstens gewiss, dass, wenn man die Dichtkunst als das Mittel zwischen der Natur und Kunst betrachtet, deren Pflicht es ist, jener nachzuahmen und dieser zu folgen, die Sprache zu wählen, welche mit dieser am besten übereinkommt, und jene am schönsten mahlt . . . .

48. Wir Deutschen sind immer noch so unglücklich, dass wir keine Singspiele oder Opern in unserer Muttersprache haben. Woran liegt die Schuld? Gewiss weiter an nichts, as dass das Genie der Deutschen night genug geachtet, nicht genug hervorgezogen und aufgemuntert wird. Die Italiäner und ihre Sprache haben sich der meisten Höfe in Deutschland und ihrer Singbühnen bemächtigt, und wenn auch an einigen Höfen ein deutsches Genie das Glück erhalten hat, die Stelle eines Kapellmeisters mit Ruhm zu bekleiden, so kommt doch immer das wenigste seiner Arbeiten der deutschen Sprache zu statten. “Ja, sagt man, die deutsche Sprache schickt sich nicht

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zur Musik.” Diese Beschuldigung beruhet auf einem sehr schwachen Grunde. Höchstens kann sie mit Zuverläßigkeit nichts weiter sagen, als: die deutsche Sprache ist zur Musik nicht völlig so bequem, als die italiänische. . . . Die Unbequemlichkeiten der Sprache werden ziemlich wegfallen, wenn die Dichter aufmerksam und behutsam genug seyn werden, nicht alles gleich für musikalische Verse zu halten, was sich in einen Vers zusammen schrauben läßt. Alle Sprachen haben ihre Verbesserung den Dichtern zu danken, und es liegt den unsrigen ebenfalls ob, unsere Sprache von einem Vorwurfe zu befreyen, der, wenn er gegründet wäre, alle ihren Gedichten zum Nachtheile gereichen würde.

49. Eine von den größten Unbequemlichkeiten unserer Sprache ist, dass so viele Sylben sich nicht mit Vocalen, sondern mit Consonanten endigen; aber kann ein geschickter Sänger, der eine geläufige Zunge und leichte Aussprache hat, diesen Fehler nicht sehr dadurch verbessern, wenn er den Vocal immer sehr deutlich und gedehnt ausspricht, dagegen die zusammen laufenden Consonanten desto geschwinder herausbringt? Kurz, wenn er sich vorstellt, es endigten sich alle Sylben mit dem Vocale, und alle darauf folgende Consonanten gehörten zur folgenden Sylbe. Die verzärtelten und verführten Ohren der Zuhörer würden zu dieser Verbesserung der Sprache gleichfalls etwas beytragen können, wenn sie weniger das Glänzende und Schimmernde im Gesange verlangten, und dagegen mehr für das Rührende und Ausdrückende eingenommen wären. Des letztern ist unsere Sprache in der Musik allemal vollkommen fähig; des erstern aber nicht so sehr, als die italiänische. Es ist wahr, wir verliehren dadurch bisweilen eine Schönheit; aber wir werden auch weniger musikalischen Unsinn hören dürfen.

52. Die Ungleichheit der Verse schadet dem simplen Recitativ nichts, da seine Modulation freyer ist; aber man muss dabei eine doppelte Ausschweifung eines zu weitschweifigen und zu sehr gedrängten Styls vermeiden. Die Verse, deren Styl weitschweifig ist, sind langsam, schwer zu singen, und von einem monotonischen Ausdruck.

54. Die Personen einer Oper niemals auf der Bühne erscheinen, um witzig zu reden. Die Musik kann mit dem Witze nichts Machen; sie fodert Bilder und Leidenschaften. Es giebt keine Art von dramatischen Vorstellungen, welche nicht ein getreues Gemälde der Leidenschaften fodert. Ein starker Schmerz drückt sich niemals durch an einander hängende Redensarten und Perioden aus. Seine Gedanken sind ohne Zusammenhang und Ordnung, seine Uebergänge schnell und unerwartet. So muss die Leidenschaft auf der Bühne, und selbst in der epischen Poesie erscheinen. . . . Es scheint der allgemeine Fehler unsrer Schriftsteller zu seyn, dass sie zu viel Witz haben, und zu methodisch, zu erheblich seyn wollen. Die Dichter wollten den Ausdruck der Leidenschaften zu sehr verbinden, und in Ordnung stellen; die Componisten geriethen auf denselben Fehler; indem sie ihre Modulationen zu sehr vorbereiten wollten.

55. Metastasio könnte ihnen zugleich zum Muster dienen; und dieses um so vielmehr, da seine Versarten sich sehr leicht im Deutschen nachahmen lassen.

56. Metastasio besaß Kenntnis und Gefühl des wahren musikalischen Gesanges.

57. Da die musikalische Periode eine gewisse Symmetrie und Verhältnis habe, das Sylbenmaaß der Verse auch gleich und symmetrisch seyn müsse. Man veränderte demnach die Gestalt des singenden Drama, und erfand Worte zu dem, was die Italiäner eine Arie nennen. Der Verfasser

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kommt nun auf den berühmten Abt Metastasio zu reden, der die Reize der lyrischen Poesie so glücklich mit dem Starken und Rührenden des Trauerspiels zu vereinigen gewußt hat.

59. Herr Rousseau fodert mit Recht die jungen französischen Componisten auf, nach Italien zu gehen. Sie müssen den Metastasio lesen, sich mit seiner Sprache bekannt machen, dann die Musik eines Hasse und Pergolesi hören.

60. Herr Goldoni verbindet mit seinem sehr bekannten Talente eine Gemütsart und Sitten. . . . Ein Plautus, ein Terentius, ein Moliere, Machen seine ganze Büchersammlung aus. Die Welt und die Menschen sind diejenigen Bücher, welche er am meisten studiert. Aus dieser unerschöpflichen Quelle trägt sein geschäfftiger und geübter Blick, ohne sonderliche Mühe, in seine Aufsätze stets wahre Charactere, die feinsten Schattierungen, welche die Leidenschaften in jedem Character hervorbringen. . . . Niemals hat ein Schrifftsteller eine Leichtigkeit gehabt, die der seinigen gleich gekommen wäre.

61. Die französischen Poeten sind weit weniger gute Muster für einen musikalischen Dichter: Wenn es ihnen auch nicht an Empfindung fehlt, so ist doch immer zu viel Mahlerey und epigrammatischer Witz in ihren Gedichten.

62. Möchten nur einige Dichter, welche jetzt für das komische Operntheater arbeiten, besonders derjenige [Sedaine], welcher sich in dieser Art, durch seine reizenden Gemählde vorzüglichen Beyfall erworben hat, sowohl durch das Komische der Situation, als durch die Naivetät der Sitten.

63. Wenn man diese Muster [Quinault] studiert, wird man das, was ich nicht erklären kann, empfinden: die schöne und leichte Wendung, die Genauigkeit, der Anstand, das Natürlich . . . eines solchen Styls dass es scheint, als habe der Dichter selbst bey dem Singen geschrieben.

67. Wir glauben den Liebhabern, denen die Pergolesische Composition des Stabat Mater bekannt ist, einen Gefallen zu thun, wenn wir ihnen folgende, vom Herrn Klopstock verfertigte Parodie mittheilen. Die Empfindungen der Musik sind in dieser weit glücklicher erreicht und ausgedrückt, als in dem lateinischen Texte; und wenn Pergolesi lebte, deutsch verstünde, und seine Musik mit dem deutschen Texte absingen hörte, würde er sich vielleicht selbst bereden, er habe sie für diesen, und nicht für den lateinischen, componirt.

68. Guter Gesang, der weder ins Schwülstige und Gesuchte, noch ins Platte und Gemeine fällt . . . .

69. [Die Melodie] geräth nie besser, als wenn sie die Mittelstraße halt. . . . Was die Uebergänge betrifft, so giebt die gesunde Vernunft schon genugsam an Hand, dass sie nirgends hin passen, als wo die Worte eine Leidenschaft oder Bewegung ausdrücken. Sonst kann man sie für nichts als Hemmungen und Unterbrechungen des musikalischen Verstandes ansehen. Und wie langweilig und unerträglich sind nicht endlich die ewigen Wiederholungen und Aufhäufungen der Worte, die nur bloß der Musik zu gefallen geschehen, und nicht den mindesten Verstand haben?

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70. Diese Mittelstraße gefällt uns am besten: denn gar nichts für den Sänger thun wollen, ist Eigensinn; zu viel für ihn zu thun, ist Sclaverey.

71. Der musikalische Geschmack bestehe in einer Beurtheilung der in unsere Sinne gebrachten Töne. Die Regeln, wornach die Musik und der Geschmack in derselben beurtheilt werden müssen, nimmt der Verfasser aus der Nachahmung der Natur her. Aus den durch die Kunst verschönerten natürlichen Tönen fließt die Musik.

73. Eine große Schönheit der Melodie ist Leichtigkeit und ein fließender Gang, hinter welchem der Componist die Mühe versteckt hat, die ihm die Erfindung derselben gekostet.

74. Man lernt sie nicht durch die mathematische Theorie der Musik kennen, noch weniger erreicht man sie durch dieselbe, wie alle die frostigen Componisten bezeugen können, die sich überreden, das seine arithmetische Genauigkeit das vornehmste Verdienst eines Componisten sey. Die Verachtung und der Fall ihrer Compositionen zeigt ihnen sattsam, dass die Strenge des Calculs nicht die Regel des Geschmacks sey.

75. So wenig ein großer Redner es durch Logiken und Rhetoriken geworden ist; eben so wenig wird ein Componist durch Regeln groß im Ausdrucke der Leidenschaften werden.

76. Ein Endzweck der Musik ist, Vergnügen zu verschaffen; allein ein weit edlerer und größerer ist, sich der Leidenschaften zu bemächtigen und das Herz zu rühren.

77. Was hat nun der Componist eigentlich auszudrücken? Oder welches sind die Gegenstände, mit denen sich die Musik am meisten beschäfftiget? Die Leidenschaften sind es; diese zu stillen oder zu erregen, und dem Gemüthe dadurch ein angenehmes Vergnügen zu verschaffen, das ist die Foderung, die man an alle Musik, und an jeden Componisten thut. . . . Genug die Musik hat ihren Endzweck erreicht, wenn sie etwas dergleichen erregt hat; das Herz bedarf keiner weiten Erklärung: wenn es gerührt worden ist, so hat es alles, was es verlangte.

79. Ferner, wo man nachahmen will, so muß dieses größtentheils den begleitenden Instrumenten überlassen werden, als welche wegen ihres größeren Umfanges und ihrer Verschiedenheit geschickter sind, die Nachahmung zu bewerkstelligen, und es muß der Stimme indessen Freyheit gelassen werden, die Empfindung auszudrücken.

80. Es kommen Gelegenheiten vor, wo der Componist, anstatt der Leidenschaften gewisse natürliche Dinge nachahmen soll; die meisten Arien, die Gleichnisse enthalten, gehören hieher. Wie nun überhaupt in dergleichen Fällen dem Componisten eine große Vorsichtigkeit und Mäßigung zu rathen ist, um die Sache nicht ins Abgeschmackte und Lächerliche zu treiben, so ist es auch fast immer besser, wenn er dergleichen Nachahmungen den Instrumenten überläßt, und die Singstimme damit verschont.

81. Ich nehme mir aber die Freyheit ihnen zu sagen, dass es seine Dissonanz des Ausdrucks sey, die kein vernünftiger Mann ertragen kann; dass man nicht den Sinn einzelner Worte ausdrücken müsse, sondern was sie zusammengenommen enthalten . . . .

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83. Man siehet ihn [Pergolesi] insgemein als den Stiffter des guten Gesanges an; es mag auch wohl andem seyn, dass er mit seinen zur damaligen Zeit vorzüglichen Gaben zu einer leichten und gefälligen Melodie Aufsehen machte . . . .

84. Ich sahe die Serva padrona des Pergolesi vorstellen. Man weis, wie sehr die Arien . . . haben sogar auch unsern Beyfall erhalten, und es ist in der That schwer, die Nachahmung der Natur und die Wahrheit des Ausdrucks im Gesange höher zu treiben.

85. Ich führe dieses Duo an, als ein Muster des angenehmen Gesangs, der Einheit der Melodie, der simplen, glänzenden und reinen Harmonie, des wahren Accents, des Dialogs und des Geschmacks.

86. Die musikalische Declamation würde sehr armselig seyn, und bald ermüden, wenn sie so eingeschränkt wäre, dass sie jeder Sylbe oder jedem Worte nicht mehr als einen Ton geben dürfte.

90. Die Beurtheilungskraft in der Musik zeigt sich in der Erfindung derjenigen harmonischen Begleitung der Melodie, welche derselben Mannichfaltigkeit ertheilet, ohne ihrer Einfalt zu schaden; in der Vorbereitung und Auflösung der Dissonanzen, und den geschickten Fortschreitungen von einer Tonart zu einer andern.

92. Mit einem Worte, niemand hat die Harmonie besser verstanden, als dieser gründliche Componist; aber er ist in der Melodie von vielen übertroffen worden.

93. Die Harmonie thut aber noch mehr: sie verstärkt den Ausdruck selbst, indem sie den Intervallen der Melodie mehr Deutlichkeit und Bestimmung giebt.

94. Unsere französischen Componisten sehen auf nichts, als Stimmen auf Stimmen zu häufen; sie suchen die Wirkung in der starken Ausfüllung; die Singstimme wird von ihrem Accompagnement bedeckt und erstickt. . . . Es ist, als ob man zwanzig Bücher auf einmal vorlesen hörte, so wenig ist unsere Harmonie in ein Ganzes zusammen gebracht. Kann man sich da wohl wundern, wenn die Italiäner sagen, dass wir die Musik nicht zu schreiben wissen? Der Ursprung dieses Fehlers liegt in dem Vorurtheile, mit welchem unsere Künstler mehr in der Harmonie, als in dem Gesange suchen, worinne sie einen großen Irthum begehen.

98. Es giebt zwar Tonkünstler, die in Ansehung der Tonarten keinen Unterschied einräumen wollen, sondern der Meynung sind, dass eine jede Leidenschaft in allen Tonarten ausgedrückt werden könne.

99. Selten dürfte der erste Theil der Arie Da Capo gemacht werden; denn auch dies ist eine Erfindung der Neuern, ganz wider den natürlichen Lauf der Rede und Leidenschaft, die nie in sich selbst zurück kehren . . . .

103. Diese Arie schickte sich zu keinem Dacapo; der Componist hat sie demnach sehr glücklich nach einem andern Plane bearbeitet. Er läßt den zweyten Theil zweymal auf den erstern folgen, und wechselt jedesmal die 4/4 Tactart mit 6/8 ab; die erste Bewegung ist geschwind, die andere

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langsam und sanfter; der Gesang ist auf diese Weise den Worten so richtig angemessen, dass jede andere Ausführung gewiß schlechter als diese gewesen seyn würde.

105. Unsre besten Meister sind der Meynung, dass der Contrapost . . . zwar eine gewisse Temperatur hervorbringe, die den Kirchenmusiken eine so große Würde und Feyerlichkeit giebet, dass er aber zur Erweckung der Leidenschaft ganz und gar nicht geschickt sey.

107. Unsere Arien-Componisten wissen sich öfters die Arbeit ziemlich leicht zu machen; sie erfinden Melodie und einige gekräuselte Passagien, machen einen Baß, und höchstens noch eine Mittelstimme dazu, so ist das Meisterstück fertig; aber haben sie es auch mit Duetten, Terzetten, Quartetten u.s.w. versucht?

109. Welches Feuer in der Erfindung, welche Kraft und welcher Ausdruck in den ausfüllenden Mittelstimmen! Waldhörner und Oboen begleiten diese Arie, wie billig . . . Die Arbeit der Mittelstimmen besteht in Triolen und Sechzehnteln, und nichts konnte der Sache angemessener seyn, als diese Art des Ausdrucks.

112. Die Flöte ist zärtlich, die Oboe munter, die Trompete kriegerisch, das Waldhorn sonor, majestätisch und zu großen Ausdrücken geschickt. Es ist aber kein Instrument, worauf man so vielerley herausbringen könnte, und das allgemein brauchbarer wäre, als die Violin.

113. Die deutschen Symphoniensetzer, zum Beyspiele, sehen nicht sowohl darauf, ein simples Thema zu erfinden, als schöne Wirkungen durch die Harmonie hervor zu bringen, welche sie durch die große Menge der verschiedenen Instrumente erhalten, die sie anbringen, und durch die Art, mit welcher sie dieselben nach einander arbeiten lassen. Ihre Symphonien sind eine Art von Concerten, wo die Instrumente sich wechselsweise zeigen, wo sie sich auffodern und antworten, mit einander streiten, und sich wieder vereinigen. Es ist gleichsam eine anhaltende Unterredung. Indeß wird man bey allem diesem Contraste doch allemal, und besonders in guten Arbeiten, ein Thema entdecken, welches die Grundlage des ganzen Gebäudes ist. Eine jede Stimme beschäfftigt sich freylich wechselsweise damit. Diese Stelle ist für das Horn, jenes für die Hautbois bestimmt. Es ist eine musikalische Periode, welche unter allen Stimmen des Orchesters vertheilt ist; ein Satz, wovon jedes Instrument eine kleine Erweiterung macht.

114. In Absicht auf die Rhythmik ließen sich bey diesem Duett noch verschiedene Anmerkungen machen; da man aber das ganze Stück vor Augen haben müßte, so überlassen wir es denen, die der Sache kundig sind . . . .

118. Der Natur der Sache nach ist die musikalische Declamation keine redende, sondern eine singende Declamation. . . . Der Tonkünstler bringt demnach das, was die redende Declamation unbestimmtes hat. . . . Er verstärkt, er schwächt den Ton, aber alles auf eine empfindlichere und ausdrückendere Art.

119. Das Recitativ ist eine nach gewissen Regeln der Melodie und Harmonie in Noten gesetzte Declamation; da es seine singende Declamtion ist, so braucht sie sich nicht auf den sehr kleinen Umfang von Tönen der redenden Declamation einzuschränken. . . . Darf sie aber auch nicht in den eigentlichen numerirten und cadenzirten Gesang ausschweifen; der einzige Fall, wo man es

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ihr erlauben kann, ist in gewissen Augenblicken der Leidenschaft, wo die stimme der redenden Declamation selbst die Gränzen überschreiten würde, und daraus entstehet so dann das begleitete Recitativ oder höchstens ein Arioso. Der geringste Fehler des Lulli ist es demnach, dass er mit der Stingstimme im Recitative die Gränzen der redenden Declamation überschreitet; mit Recht aber tadelt man ihn darüber, dass sein Recitativgesang überhaupt zu nahe an den Ariengesang gränzt.

120. Die Art der Begleitung ist sehr mannichfaltig und abwechselnd; aber alles ist so stark, so empfindbar ausgedrückt, dass man es ohne Bedenken ein Meisterstück der Declamation und des Ausdrucks nennen kann. An ein paar Orten ist es mit Ariosensätzen vermischt, und die Worte gegen das Ende . . . können sowohl der Tonart als der Melodie nach in der Musik gewiß nicht rührender gesagt werden.

121. Seine Recitative sprechend, und das Accompagnement nicht eine bloße Anstimmung, oder eine müßige Ausfüllung des Zwischenraums, sondern ein wesentlicher Theil des Ausdrucks, da sie den ganzen Inhalt faßlich, und die Worte beynahe entbehrlich machen.

122. Kenner tragen so gar kein Bedenken ihm [dem obligaten Recitativ] den Vorzug vor den Arien zu geben, weil der Ausdruck der Empfindung darinne weniger überladen, simpler, und folglich wahrer ist.

126. Die Ariette [Hiller adds in a footnote that the French ariette corresponds to the Italian aria] ist eine abgesonderte Schönheit; sie ist ein artiger Blumenschmuck, das Flittergold, oder wenn man lieber will das gländzendste und artigste an einer Oper.

127. Die Arien der Opern sind so zu sagen, die Leinwand oder der Grund, worauf die Gemälde der nachahmenden Musik gemahlt werden: die Melodie ist die Zeichnung, und die Harmonie das Colorit. Alle mahlerischen Gegenstände der schönen Natur, alle studierten Empfindungen des menschlichen Herzens sind die Muster, welche der Künstler nachahmt; die Aufmerksamkeit, das Interesse, der Reiz der Ohren, und die Rührung des Herzens sind der Endzweck dieser Nachahmungen. Eine gute und schöne Arie, eine Arie vom Genie erfunden, und vom Geschmacke ausgeführt, ist das Meisterstück der Musik; eine schöne Stimme erregt hier Aufmerksamkeit, eine schöne Begleitung der Instrumente macht sie noch reizender, und die Leidenschaft bemächtigt sich unvermerkt der Seele vermittelst der Sinne. Man ist zufrieden, wenn man eine schöne Arie gehört hat; das Ohr verlangt nichts weiter; sie bleibt in den Gedanken, man nimmt sie mit sich, man wiederholt sie wo man will.

130. Besonders aber muss man sich hüten, nach dem Beyspiele unsrer Dichter, diejenige Gattung zu versäumen sollten, welche in Ansehung der Action, des Spiels und der Musik für die Oper am fruchtbarsten ist; die affectvollen Duette.

131. Es ist unmöglich, dass in einem Stücke nicht zwo liebende Personen vorkommen sollten, welche von einer blinden Eifersucht gemartert, oder über die Trennung trostlos sind; eine schmerzenvolle Mutter und Tochter, welche über das Opfer seufzen, welches die eine auflegt, und die andere versprochen hat; eine unglückliche Familie, welche ihre Stütze und ihren Trost verliehren soll.

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132. Wenn drey oder vier von den redenden Personen in einerley Situation kommen können, so wird man eine von den größten theatralischen Wirkungen hervorbringen, und jedesmal Thränen ablocken, so oft sich einige Liebhaber um ein Clavecin versammeln, diese Arbeit aufzuführen.

135. Denn was ist eine Ouvertüre? Es ist ein musikalisches Stück, womit eine Oper angefangen wird, und welches den Zuhörer auf das vorbereiten soll, was er weiter hören wird. Der Character dieser Stücke muss demnach verschieden seyn, so wie es die Gegenstände selbst sind, die man dem Zuschauer vorstellt.

136. Warum muss nun eine Ouvertüre . . . allemal aus einem Allegro, Andante und Menuettentempo bestehen? Besonders ist das Menuettentempo, welches seiner Natur nach zum Tanze bestimmt ist, hier sehr am unrechten Orte.

137. Ihre Hauptabsicht ist in gewisser Weise die Handlung anzukündigen, und den Zuhörer zu dem Eindruck des Affects vorzubereiten, der aus dem ganzen übrigen Drama entstehen soll. . . . Heutiges Tages sieht man aber die Symphonie für ein Ding an, das ganz und gar zum Drama nicht gehöret, für ein Trompeter- und Paucker-Stückchen so zu sagen, womit man die Ohren der Zuhörer vorläufig einnehmen und betäuben muss.

138. . . . als ob Herr Hasse die ganze Geschichte schon in der Sinfonie habe mahlen wollen.

139. Es ist für einen Acteur der Oper nicht genug, ein vortrefflicher Sänger zu seyn, wenn er nicht auch zugleich ein vortrefflicher Pantomim ist. . . . Wenn er einen Augenblick die Person, die er vorstellt, in Vergessenheit bringt, und man den Sänger gewahr wird, so siehet man auch weiter nichts, als einen Musicus auf dem Schauplatze; er ist kein Acteur mehr.

142. Seine Action ist gut und meisterhaft; ohne alles gekünstelte gefällig und einnehmend, sie ist natürlich.

145. Ein Kind erzählet eine Geschichte mit allen natürlichen Reizungen und Schönheiten der Aussprache . . . .

146. Es ist unglaublich, wie vortheilhaft und bequem ein solcher ungezwungener, voller und überdachter Vortrag ist, und zwar für alle Musiker.

147. Die leichteste und natürlichste Art sich im Reden auszudrücken, sowohl im Tone der Stimme als in der Manier der Sprache, lernt man su Beobachtungen im gemeinen Leben.

148. Die Geberde der Bernasconi folget nur den Bewegungen des Herzens, und ihr Herz führet sie beständig auf den angemessensten, und nicht selten auf den feinsten Ausdruck.

149. Gemeiniglich also sind die Sängerinnen, so bald ihre Arie vorüber ist, ganz nicht mehr in der Scene: ihre Augen jagen entweder nach neuem Raube, oder besprechen sich mit denen, welche bereits in ihren Netze sind.

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150. Aber konnte die gesunde Kritik der Tonkunst je ungeahndet zusehen, dass der Ausdruck diesen mechanischen Geschicklichkeiten, dass die edleren Reizungen der Empfindung, der sinnlichen Wollust des Gehörs geschlachtet wurden?

151. Was wir von den Läufern sagen, gilt noch mehr von den Cadenzen, in welchen sich der Sänger auf Kosten des Geschmacks und der Natur zu zeigen sucht.

155. Er muss das musikalische Reich . . . in Ordnung bringen, und die Virtuosen . . . einer Disciplin und Obrigkeit unterwerfen.

156. Unsre [i.e., the Italian] Virtuosen machen aber die schönste ernsthafteste Musik nur zu oft zu einem ausschweifenden zuckersüßen Undinge.

157. Wir würden ihnen [den Italiänern] aber eine hinlängliche Anzahl guter Tenorstimmen entgegen setzen, und es ist gewiß, dass ein guter Tenor allemal dem besten Soprane gleich zu schätzen ist; diese Stimme würde sich auch zu den meisten Rollen in der Oper weit besser schicken, als jene pipende Castratenstimmen. Wie viel Ehre für die Deutschen, wenn sie der musikalischen Welt zeigen dürften, dass man, um schönen Gesang zu haben, nicht Grausamkeiten gegen die menschliche Natur zu begehen nöthig hätte!

158. Kurz, um gut zu singen, muss man gut declamiren können, weil der Gesang nichts, als eine melodische Declamation ist, welche durch die Harmonie noch mehr verschönert wird.

159. Denn warum klingt . . . öfters die deutsche Sprache so schlecht, wenn sie gesungen wird? Gewiss aus keiner andern Ursache, als weil der Sänger sie nicht zu declamiren weis.

162. Aber warum singt man in deutschen Landen und vor deutschen Ohren nicht lieber deutsch? Warum haben wir noch keine deutsche Oper? Warum läßt man die vortrefflichsten Componisten der Deutschen sich immer noch mit italiänischen Texten beschäfftigen?

163. Woran liegt die Schuld? Gewiß weiter an nichts, als dass das Genie der Deutschen nicht genug geachtet, nicht genug hervorgezogen und aufgemuntert wird. Die Italiäner und ihre Sprache haben sich der meisten Höfe in Deutschland und ihrer Singbühnen bemächtigt, und wenn auch an einigen Höfen ein deutsches Genie das Glück erhalten hat, die Stelle eines Kapellmeisters mit Ruhm zu bekleiden, so kommt doch immer das wenigste seiner Arbeiten der deutschen Sprache zu statten.

165. Die kleinen Versuche, die bisher auf dem leipziger Theater mit Singspielen . . . sind gemacht worden, dienen allenfalls dazu, die Möglichkeit besserer und vollständiger Opern zu zeigen.

167. Wünschen wir sie verdrungen zu sehen, so wäre es von Opern in der eigenen Sprache des Landes; ein Wunsch, dessen Ausführung den patriotischen Gesinnungen eines Volks gewiß Ehre machte, und der nirgends eher und leichter ausgeführt werden könnte, als unter den Deutschen, wenn nur . . .

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168. Kurz, Pergolesi übertrifft die andern durch eine Simplicität, deren eigenthümlicher Character es ist, die Leidenschaften in Bewegung zu setzen.

171. Der Gesang ist vollkommen italiänisch; aber die Begleitung der Instrumente weit anders eingerichtet, als sie in den italiänischen Arien insgemein zu seyn pflegt. Die Leser werden es sogleich einsehen, wenn wir ihnen sagen, daß außer den gewöhnlichen Instrumenten, noch eine Hoboe, ein Waldhorn und ein Fagott concertirend eingeführt werden.

174. Sie [Philidor, Monsigny, Duni] haben dagegen in der Wahl der Instrumente, um den Ausdruck zu befödern, und in der sorgfältigen Ausarbeitung des Accompagnements gewisse augenscheinliche Vorzüge vor den italiänischen Componisten.

175. Es sollte manchem italiänischen Componisten sauer genung werden, diese mannichfaltigen und schwer zu erreichenden Bilder der Natur in Noten vorzustellen; und eigentlich ist dieses das Feld, worinne die französischen Componisten den italiänischen sehr oft überlegen gewesen sind.

178. Das Vorurtheil demnach, das bisher immer den Deutschen im Wege gestanden, und sie den Italiänern weit nachgesetzt hat, dauert gewissermaaßen noch . . . .

179. Wir verehren die Italiäner, worinne sie zu verehren sind; wir räumen ihnen den Vorzug gern und willig ein, wo sie ihn haben: aber wehe der armen Musik, wenn alles sogleich schön seyn muß, weil es ein Italiäner gemacht hat, und alles schlecht, weil es von einem Deutschen oder von einem andern herrührt!

180. Rousseau macht unter dem Titel Accent eine Anmerkung, die vielleicht nicht völlig richtig ist: “der Deutsche,” sagt er, “schreyet, wenn er zornig ist, stets aus einem Tone in der Höhe; der Italiäner hingegen modulirt seine Stimme auf tausenderley Art.” . . . Sollte diese Beobachtung nicht eben so wahr und richtig seyn, als die, die Herr Rousseau gemacht hat? Sie kömmt unserm Grundsatze zu statten, daß der natürliche Ausdruck der Leidenschaften bey allen Völkern einerley sey . . . .

182. Seine Einbildungskraft ist ungeheuer: daher sind ihm die Schranken aller Nationalmusiken zu enge: er hat aus der wälschen [i.e., Italian], aus der französischen, aus den Musiken aller Völker eine Musik gemacht, die seine eigne ist; oder vielmehr: er hat in der Natur alle Töne des wahren Ausdrucks aufgesuchet, und sich derselben bemächtiget.

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Appendix B: German Texts for Chapter 3

10. Die Oper ist ein dramatisches und lyrisches Schauspiel, in welchem man, in der Vorstellung einer affektvollen Handlung, alle Reize der schönen Künste zu vereinigen sucht, um durch Hülfe angenehmer Empfindungen Theilnehmung und Täuschung hervorzubringen.

11. Die Theile, die eine Oper ausmachen, sind das Gedicht, die Musik und die Verzierung. Durch die Poesie redet man dem Verstande, durch die Musik dem Ohre, durch die Mahlerey den Augen, und alles dies muß sich vereinigen, um das Herz zu bewegen, und durch verschiedne Sinne den nämlichen Eindruck in demselben hervorzubringen.

13. [I]n der Oper Poesie, Musik, Deklamation, Tanzkunst, und Mahlerey, alle ihre anziehendsten Reizungen vereinigen müßten, um den Sinnen zu schmeicheln, das Herz zu entzücken, und die Seele durch die angenehmsten Täuschungen zu bezaubern.

14. [D]aher, daß die Täuschung, die blos durch das Zusammentreffen aller dieser Theile hervorgebracht werden könnte, gänzlich wegfällt, und also diese Oper, die das Meisterstück des Menschlichen Schöpfergeistes seyn sollte, in ein nervenloses, ungereimtes, groteskes Ungeheuer ausgeartet ist . . . .

15. Wenn die Musik mit der Poesie zusammenkömmt, und den Vorrang haben will, so vernichtet sie die Poesie, und vernichtet sich selbst.

Meine Stücke werden in ganz Italien unendlich besser aufgenommen, wenn sie schlechthin deklamirt werden, als wenn man sie auf dem Operntheater singt. Stellen Sie einmal die beste Musik ohne ihren Text auf eben diese Probe; glauben Sie wohl, sie werde sie ausstehen?

Nun hörte man auf der Bühne nichts, als ihre Arien di Bravura; und dadurch veranlaßte sie die Verwerfung des Stücks, und den Verfall der Bühne.

Die Musik, diese aufrührerische Sklavinn, muß sich entweder aufs neue den Gesetzen ihrer Gebieterinn unterwerfen, welche ihr so viel Anmuth und Schönheit zu geben weiß; oder sie muß sich ganz und gar von ihr losmachen, und sich künftig mit ihrer eignen Melodie begnügen. Indeß mag die Musik die Harmonie eines Concerts oder die Bewegungen eines Ballets besorgen, und sich niemals in die Sachen des Cothurns mischen.

16. Andere sehen den Dichter blos als ihren Handlanger an; Er als seinen Gebieter. Er weiß zu schweigen, wo der Dichter allein reden muß; aber wo jener an den Gränzen seiner Kunst ist, da eilt er ihm mit der ganzen Allmacht der seinigen zu Hülfe. . . . Er verliehrt sich in seinen Dichter, er wird mit ihm zu Einer Person; Ein Genius, Ein Herz scheint beyde zu beseelen.

17. Und was kann dabey herauskommen, wenn er die Farben auftragen, Schatten und Licht vertheilen will, u.s.w. ohne die Zeichnung und die Gedanken des Erfinders zu Rathe zu ziehen? Musik und Action sind im Singspiel bloße Organen, durch welche die Poesie auf unsre Seele würkt.

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18. Wenn man aber die Musik als einen wesentlichen Theil der lyrischen Scene betrachtet, deren vornehmster Gegenstand die Nachahmung ist, so wird sie zu einer der schönen Künste, ist fähig alle Gemählde der Natur vorzustellen, jede Empfindung zu erwecken, mit der Poesie zu wetteifern, ihr eine neue Stärke zu geben, sie mit neuen Reizen zu verschönern, und indem sie sie mit Lorbeern bekränzt, über sie zu triumphiren.

19. Wir wissen es wohl, dies, was Hr. Gl[uck] sagt, ist seit langer Zeit die Sprache derer gewesen, welche die Musik nicht lieben und nicht verstehen, folglich keinen Geschmack daran, und keine Empfindung davon haben . . . .

20. . . . auch wohl die Sprache mancher Operndichter, denen an nichts weiter gelegen ist, als daran, daß ihre Poesie allein die Aufmerksamkeit und das Wohlgefallen der Zuhörer an sich ziehe.

21. Das Theater gehört ihr [der Musik] zu. Die Poesie hat nur den zweyten, und die Tanzkunst den dritten Rang. Die Verse sollen dem Gesange folgen, und ihm nicht vorgehen. Die Worte . . . sind in diesem Falle nichts al seine Verstärkung, die man dem musikalischen Ausdrucke giebt, um den Sinn desselben deutlicher und verständlicher zu machen.

23. Es ist also weder der Mangel an musikalischen Genie bey der teutschen Nation, noch die Unsingbarkeit unsrer Sprache . . . im Wege steht. Es ist ein anders Vorurtheil, . . . nemlich, die beynahe allgemein herrschende Meynung, daß die sogenannte Opera seria ein Werk der Feerey seyn müsse, worinn all schönen Künste mit einander in die Wette eifern, die vollkommenste Befriedigung der Augen und Ohren äußerst sinnlicher und verzärtelter Zuschauer hervorzubringen . . . .

27. Unter den Deutschen kennen wir keinen Dichter der so viel Beruf hätte, für die Musik zu schreiben als Hr. S[chiebeler]. Man sieht, daß er den Metastasio studiert, und ihn, wenn er will, so weit unsre Sprache es irgend leidet, im harmonischen und in der Wahl musikalischer Sylbenmaaße nachzuahmen weis.

28. Für die ernsthafte Musik hat er viel Empfindung, einen ziemlich kurzen Ausdruck, eine edle Sprache, und hält ein glückliches Mittel zwischen dem hohen Fluge der Ode, welchem die Musik nur selten sich nachschwingen kann, und dem Tone des Liedes, wobey sie nichts auszudrücken findet.

29. Von schönen, edeln Gesinnungen, schön und edel ausgedrückt, ist das ganze Stück voll . . . .

30. Dem ungeachtet hat diese Operette doch viel Verdienst, besonders in Ansehung des ungemeinen natürlichen Dialogs . . . des schicklichsten Ausdrucks redlicher Gesinnungen der unverderbten Landleute . . . .

31. Der Sprache fehlt es auch an Kürze und Feuer der Ausdrücke; die Perioden sind nicht die des gemeinen Lebens, sondern des Buchs.

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32. Wir glauben daher, man müsse dem Dichter . . . rathen, den Dialog und die Sprache des menschlichen Lebens sich bekannter zu machen, oder doch in Lessings, Molierens, u. a. Werken zu studieren.

33. Der Dialog ist hier nicht selten etwas steif und ohne Leben, besonders in den ernsthaften Scenen.

34. Er [Schiebeler] verachtet die Possen, welche in den komischen Opern der Franzosen und Italiäner oft bis zum Eckel hören muß . . . .

35. Dafür giebt er Anlaß zu komischen stark markirten Deklamationen, zu lebhaften Mahlereyen und zu drolligen Zergliederungen der Worte, worinn vornehmlich die Stärke der guten komischen Musick besteht, wenn sie nicht blos die lebhafte Sprache des lustigen Affekts redet.

36. Dank sey es dem Kochischen Theater, für welches diese Oper eigentlich zugerichtet wurde, daß es dem V[erfasser] Anlaß zu gewissen Nebenabsichten, in Beziehung auf dasselbe gegeben hat, die ihn vermocht haben, einige Arien etwas mehr auszuführen, und in denselben von dem ganz komischen Tone abzuweichen.

38. Der Dichter muß aber sein Sylbenmaß so eingerichtet haben, daß der Componist es in einen guten musikalischen Rythmus bringen kann.

42. Ueberhaupt aber finden wir in denen aus dem französischen nachgeahmten die französischen Naivetäten zu oft in deutsche Einfältigkeit verwandelt, das bäurische in dem Charakter und der Sprache der Personen paßt oft nicht zu einzelnen Einfällen und Situationen, welche in Deutschen beybehalten worden.

45. So bald die Musik malen und reden gelernt hatte, die Reize der Empfindung, daß man bald das Blendende der Zauberruthe nicht mehr achtete, das Theater ward von dem mythologischen Geschwätze gesäubert, Theilnehmung trat in die Stelle des Wunderbaren, die Maschinen der Dichter und der Verzierer wurden zerstöret, und das lyrische Schauspiel bekam eine edlere und minder ungeheure Gestalt. Alles was das Herz rühren konnte, wurde mit glücklichem Erfolge angewandt . . . .

46. Die irrende Ritterschaft wird an sich wenig unterhalten, weil wenige Zuschauer sich so in die Zeiten versetzen können . . . .

47. Die Meynung, daß das Subjekt des Singspiels aus der Region des Wunderbaren hergenommen seyn müsse, und zwar aus Ursache, weil im Singspiel alles Musik ist, scheint mir nicht viel mehr Grund vor sich zu haben, als wenn man den Kupferstecher auf wunderbare Gegenstände einschränken wollte, weil in seinen Blättern alles schwarz oder weiß ist.

48. [W]as ist uns darin angenehmer als diese lachenden Gemählde von Ruhe, Unschuld, Liebe und Glückseligkeit, dieses mehr zum Vergnügen als aus Noth beschäftigte, sorgenfreye Leben im Schooße der Natur?

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49. Diese selige Gleichheit, diese von Wildheit und Verkünstelung gleich weit entfernte schöne Einfalt und Güte der Sitten, wovon uns unser Herz sagt . . . .

50. Die Energie aller Empfindungen, die Heftigkeit aller Leidenschaften sind also der vornehmste Gegenstand des lyrischen Drama . . . .

51. Die Musik ist die Sprache der Leidenschaften.

52. Stücke, in welchen vermöge der Natur des Subjects viel Staatsinteresse räsonnirt wird, oder wo die Personen lange Dialogen oder Reden zu halten haben, um einander durch die Stärke ihrer Gründe zu überzeugen, oder durch den Strom ihrer Beredsamkeit hinzureißen, sollten also vom lyrischen Theater gänzlich ausgeschlossen werden.

53. Die möglichste Einfalt im Plan ist dem Singspiel eigen und wesentlich. Handlung kann nicht gesungen, sie muß agirt werden; je mehr Handlung also je weniger Gesang.

54. Das dem Dichter eines Singspiels . . . die Wahl des Dichter nur auf solche fallen müße, welche der musikalischen Behandlung fähig sind. Daß er also fürs erste alle diejenigen bey Seite legen müße, die, entweder wegen der Natur der Handlung, oder weil sie gar zu verwickelt und mit zuviel Begebenheiten beladen sind, sich beßer zu Tragödien als zu Singspielen schicken. Sodann, daß er, in der Wahl selbst, für solcher Character, Leidenschaften und Situationen sich entscheiden müße, die durch die musikalische Verschönerung nichts von ihrer Wahrheit verliehren. Ferner, daß er den Plan so einfach anlagen, und auf so wenige Personen als möglich einschränken, und schlechterdings alle Episoden vermeiden müße, die das Hauptinteresse, anstatt es zu erhöhen, schwächen würden. Endlich, daß er vornehmlich dahin zu arbeiten habe, seine Personen mehr in Empfindung und innerer Gemüthsbewegung als in äußerlicher Handlung darzustellen.

55. Zwar bringen die Italiener in ihre großen komischen Opern immer wenigstens 2. ganz ernsthafte Rollen mite in. Aber, wie oft sind nicht diese Rollen mit dem übrigen so wenig zusammenhängend, daß sie ohne sonderlichen Schaden des Ganzen gar weggelassen warden können.

58. Wie aber nun Michel und der König zum Duetto zusammen kommen, das weis der Mann im Monde. Ich weis aber, daß ich es in der Stelle des Herrn Hillers nicht componirt hätte. An Beobachtung der Characktere ist da gar nicht zu denken: der König singt wie der Bauer, und der Bauer wie der König.

61. Komus, ein Gott, der sich durch die Gabe des seinen Spottes charakterisiren sollte, ist mit seiner Leckerey hier eine zu fade Personage und der Sprache nach, sollte man ihn eher für einen Bauer als für einen Gott halten.

63. Wir merken aber bey dieser [Arie] an, und geben darüber unsern vollkommenen Beyfall, daß der V[erfasser], ungeachtet aller musikalischen Züge, bey denen man schwerlich sich des Lachens enthalten kann, doch immer ein gewisses edles Wesen beybehält, welches niemals in niederträchtige Tiefe versinkt.

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66. Unser Publikum sieht diese Possen gerne, und möchte doch gerne das Ansehen haben, als wenn es sie verachtete: es lacht von Herzen über die Goldonischen Stücke, und zuckt die Achseln darüber, wenn sie aus sind.

68. . . . als ein lateinischer Pedant ist der Schulmeister für das Theater eben so abgenutzt, als die zerzauste Perucke desselben, womit hier aller mögliche Unfug getrieben wird, der freylich nie unterläßt, die Gallerie durch ein überlautes Gelächter zu erschüttern.

70. Hier, wo die Sprache der Musen allein geredet wird, muß alles warme Empfindung oder glühender Affect seyn. Ein Liebhaber, der in schmelzenden Tönen seine Gefühle ausathmet, rührt uns; ein Sophist, der uns Vernunftschlüsse vorsingen wollte, würde uns ungehalten machen, oder einschläfern.

71. Aber auch nicht alle Leidenschaften schicken sich gleich gut dazu, durch Gesang und Musik charakterisirt zu werden.

72. Alles zu verschönern, was sie [Musik] nachahmt, ist ihre Natur. Der Zorn, den sie schildert, ist der Zorn des Engels, der den aufrührischen Satan in den Abgrund stößt; ihre Wuth ist die Wuth der Liebesgöttin über den eifersüchtigen Mars, der ihren Adonis getödtet hat; die Wuth des Oedip, der sich in seiner Verzweiflung die Augen ausreißt, und dem Tage seiner Geburt flucht, ist ihr untersagt. Alle Gegenstände, die keine gebrochene Farben zulassen, alle wilden, stürmischen Leidenschaften, die nicht durch Hofnung, Furcht oder Zärtlichkeit gemildert werden, liegen außer ihrem Gebiet.

73. Die Musik eines Volkes . . . steht immer in sehr enger Beziehung mit den öffentlichen Sitten.

75. [U]nd das größte Wunder einer Kunst, die nur durch ihre Bewegungen wirken kann, ist, daß sie sogar das Bild der Ruhe darzustellen fähig ist. Der Schlaf, die Stille der Nacht, die Einsamkeit, selbst das Stillschweigen, gehören unter die mannichfaltigen Gemälde der Tonkunst.

76. [Der Musikus] stellt nicht unmittelbar die Sache vor, sondern er erweckt in unsrer Seele die nämliche Empfindung, die bey dem Anblicke der Sache in uns erzeugt wird.

79. Es ist so viel feine Illusion des brausenden Sturms des nahen Donnerwetters, ohne in abgeschmackte Malereyen zu verfallen; Es drückt vielmehr nur die Empfindung des Grausens aus, welches bey solchem Aufruhre der Natur in der menschlichen und besonders in der weiblichen Seele entstehet, und erregt sie.

81. [W]ir wollen es seinen Gegnern gern einräumen, daß wir unsere Erhohlung, unser Vergnügen dabey mit zum Hauptzwecke Machen, und wenn sie es nicht für Pflicht halten, sich zu vergnügen, so werden wir nicht eins werden.

82. Jede Schauspielart setzt einen gewißen bedingten Vertrag zwischen dem Dichter und Schauspieler und den Zuschauern voraus . . . .

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83. Kein vernünftiger Mensch, der die Musik liebt, und einen Begriff davon hat was ein Singspiel ist, wird sich darüber ärgern den Alexander, oder den Porus in einem Singspiel singen zu hören. Aber ärgern wird er sich nicht über die Oper, sondern über die Ungeschicklichkeit des Komponisten oder über den Eigensinn der Sänger und die Tyrannie der Mode, denen oft die größten Meister seufzend nachgegeben haben, wenn Alexander und Porus nicht so singen, wie es der Größe ihres Charakters anständig ist.

85. Die Vinci, die Leo, die Pergolese, die gezwungen waren, den Helden Empfindungen und dem menschlichen Herzen eine Sprache zu geben, verachteten die knechtische Nachahmung ihrer Vorgänger, eröfneten sich eine neue Bahn . . . .

91. Eine Reyhe von Glucken . . . würde dazu erfodert, um diese Oberherrschaft der unverdorbenen Natur über die Musik; diesen einfachen Gesang, der wie Merkurs Schlangenstab die Leidenschaft erwekt oder einschläfert . . . diese schöne Zusammenstimmung aller Theile zur grossen Einheit des Ganzen, auf dem lyrischen Schauplatze herrschend und fortdaurend zu machen.

94. Ich weiß sehr wohl, was der Italiener dafür zu sagen hat. Er sagt: die Symphonie diene nur bloß, den Zuhörer ruhig und aufmerksam zu Machen. Dies ist völlig gut gesagt; man verstehe es nur recht. Man mache den Zuhörer nicht bloß auf das Aufziehen der Gardiene aufmerksam; er merke auch schon auf den Inhalt des Stücks; er werde vorbereitet auf die Handlung, die nun kommen soll; damit er, wo möglich, mit der ersten handelnden Person, die da auftritt, schon in einerley Lage des Gefühls sey.

97. Bey jeder dieser zwo Opern findet man auch eine eigene, dem Inhalte sehr angemessene Sinfonie, im Auszuge.

98. Die Sinfonie kündigt den Inhalt des Stücks schon sehr glücklich an.

100. Daher die gewöhnliche Vernachläßigung des Recitativs, über welches gemeiniglich Komponist und Sänger, als über etwas ihrer Aufmerksamkeit und Kunst unwürdiges, so schnell als möglich weggiengen, und die man meistens nur als eine Art von Ruheplätze betrachtete, wobey Sänger und Zuhörer Athem schöpfen, jener seine Kräfte zu einer herrlichen Aria di bravura sammeln, diese nach Herzenslust plaudern, lachen, liebäugeln, oder schlafen könnten, bis sie wieder durch das prächtige Geräusch oder zärtliche Getöne eines Ritornells erinnert wurden, daß eine Arie im Anzug wäre, die, wenigstens um der schönen Läuffer, Triller und Cadenzen des Sängers willen, Aufmerksamkeit verdiene.

104. . . . daß alle diese Vorwürfe, welche Algarotti dem welschen [i.e., Italian] Singspiel macht, nicht überhaupt weitbekanntermaaßen, nur zu wohl gegründet seyn sollten.

108. Der Gott der Herzen findet, welche Hänschen auf dem Schlosse gehöret hatte, und nun nachsingt, ist eine vollkommene Caricatur, der Bravur-Arien nach der neuesten Mode aus Wälschland [i.e., Italy].

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112. Hiervor gehört dem Dichter das Lob, der bey diesen liebreichen Versen auch daran gedacht hat, sie in aller Absicht musikalisch zu machen, und die Einheit der Empfindung, und die Gleichheit der Abschnitte und Worte, durch alle Strophen, so genau beobachtet hat, daß dieses Lied ein vollkommenes Muster in der Art ist.

113. Die meisten Chöre, werden verschiedentlich und glücklich, durch Recitative, oder Ariose kleine Sätze, oder Arien, u.s.w. unterbrochen.

119. Es wird ein fliessender, angenehmer und faßlicher Gesang dazu erforderlich seyn, der weder durch künstliche Harmonie noch durch überhäufte Verzierungen des Gesanges entstellt werden muß.

120. Sein Gesang ist angenehm, und doch nicht alltäglich: fliessend und leicht, und doch nicht erborgt, auch nicht abgedroschen. Sein Ausdruck ist passend und witzig. Seine Erfindung ist zwar nicht in höherm Tone als sie hier seyn sollte: aber doch auch niemals platt und verächtlich.

121. Die Melodie des Hrn. Wolf in diesen Operetten ist angenehm, leicht, erfindungsvoll und nicht arm an sinnreichen komischen und andern Malereyen . . . .

122. Eben den richtigen und naiven Ausdruck, eben die erfindungsvolle, leichte, fließende, nicht selten drollige Melodie . . . treffen wir auch in diesen beyden komischen Opern an.

123. Die Musik beyder hat alle das sanfte Feuer, den naiven und immer richtigen Ausdruck, den angenehmen fließenden Gesang, . . . kurz, alles das in sich, was man an der Arbeit des musikalischen V[erfasser] bereits gewohnt ist.

124. Ueberdieses sind auch die Passagien, das beste Mittel, einer Arie die gehörige Ausführlichkeit und den gehörigen Umfang in der Modulation und Tonführung des Componisten zu geben, den ein ausgeführtes Stück haben muß. Widrigenfalls würden die Arien so klein wie Oden, oder mit unausstehlich vielen Wiederholungen der Worte überladen werden.

125. Ist die menschliche Stimme dazu eingerichtet, daß sie, viele geschwinde Töne nach einander gut vorbringen kann, wenn anders der Sänger Kräfte und Uebung dazu hat; und ist das menschliche Ohr so gebauet, daß es diese geschwinden Töne genau und gut hören kann: so widerspricht die Natur selbst dem Grundsatze des V[erfasser].

126. Das von einer sehr lebhaften Empfindung gepreßte Herz, drückt diese Empfindung oft lebhafter durch unarticulirte Klänge als durch Worte aus.

128. Man wirft dem Herrn H[iller] die Einförmigkeit im Gesange vor. Klügere Leute finden hierinnen eine sehr weise Oekonomie seiner Gedanken; und schätzen ihn von dieser Seite ganz besonders hoch. Wenn er das Thema zu einem Liede oder Arie, gleichsam aus der Poesie herausgezogen hat, so zieht er hernach alles aus dem Thema, oder eingentlicher zu sagen, es fließt ihm alles aus dem Thema zu.

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129. Sehr gut ist es, . . . theils wegen des muntern Ausdrucks dieses Liedes, theils aber auch der Einheit des Stücks wegen: die H[err] H[iller] überhaupt so gut in allen seinen Stücken beobachtet, daß jedes für sich ein Ganzes ist.

130. Ueber das folgende Lied: Als ich auf meiner Bleiche darf ich nichts mehr sagen; die ganze deutsche Nation hat schon darüber entschieden, daß es völlig so ist, wie die Lieder von der Art seyn müssen. Denn jeder Mann, vom hohen bis zum niedrigsten, singt und spielt es und pfeift es, und fast sollte ich sagen und trommelt es, so sehr wird es in ganz Deutschland auf alle nur mögliche Art gebraucht. Ich habe bey diesem und einigen andern Hillerischen Liedern, so oft ich sie so hörte, immer bey mir selbst gedacht: “wollte ich doch lieber das kleine Lied gemacht haben, als alle die tausend Stücke, die aus meinem Gehirne oder meiner Hand geflossen! Denn was kann wohl angenehmer seyn, als das Bewußtseyn, zu der Fröhlichkeit einer ganzen Nation so vieles beyzutragen!”

133. Die Gesetze der wahren guten Ordnung, sind, deucht uns, eben der guten Wirkung wegen gemacht. Und Hr. Gl[uck] will jene dieser aufopfern? Vielleicht will er hiermit sehr großmütig verbitten, daß man in seiner Composition nicht etwan verbotene Oktaven und Quinten, und holperische Rythmen aufsuchen solle?

134. Daß H[err] H[iller] es auch nicht an Fleiß hat fehlen lassen, zeigt die völlig reine Harmonie, und der gute Gang jeder Stimme an, worinnen H. H. ganz von der itzt gewöhnlichen, nachläßigen Schreibart abweicht. Man sieht es hieran am deutlichsten, daß er beyde, Hasse und Graun studiert hat.

140. Sie singen daher meistentheils ohne Licht und Schatten, in einerley Stärke des Tones. Die Nasen- und Gurgelfehler kennen sie kaum. Die Vereinigung der Bruststimme mit dem Falset ist ihnen eben so unbekannt, als den Franzosen. Mit dem Triller begnügen sie sich so, wie ihn die Natur giebt. Von der italiänischen Schmeicheley, welche durch geschleifte Noten und durch das Vermindern und Verstärken des Tones gewirket wird, haben sie wenig Empfindung.

142. Und dann bedenke man auch, wie sehr H[err] H[iller] durch den elenden Zustand unsrer Singetheater eingeschränkt wurde. Er wußte es ja, und was ich an ihm bewundere, er hat es nie aus den Augen gelassen, daß er nicht für Sänger, sondern für Schauspieler schrieb, die es sich sonst kaum hatten einfallen lassen, beym Weine zu singen.

144. [E]s nur auf die gehörige Ermunterung und auf gewiße Veranstaltungen ankäme, um in wenigen Jahren Sänger und Sängerinnen von der besten Art, vielleicht in so großer Menge zu haben, als das musikalische Italien selbst. Wohleingerichtete Singschulen, unter der Aufsicht geschickter Meister, würden Wunder thun; . . . .

147. Man führt zwar noch auf eben diesem Theater eine gewisse Original-Mißgeburt auf; wir würden gar keine Ursache wissen, warum sie sich noch immer so gut erhielte, wenn sie nicht artige Musik hätte, und dieser wollen wir lieber die Schuld ihrer Erhaltung geben, als dem Geschmacke der Schauspieler und Zuschauer.

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148. Vielleicht, weil wir doch wohl keine deutsche Oper wieder zu hoffen haben, und in unsern Concerten sogar Grauns und Hassens italienische Arien schon den süßen Modekomponisten aus Italien weichen müssen.

149. Es ist wohl keine Meynung allgemeiner, als diese, daß die Deutschen in den Künsten nur Nachahmer sind.

150. Es ist wahrhaftig wahr, wir Deutsche verdienen gar keinen guten Componisten zu haben. Wir schätzen Ausländer, die oft eben so wenig werth sind, die Schuhriemen vieler unsrer Componisten aufzulösen, als sie die Canons ihrer Titelblätter aufzulösen im Stande sind; . . . Es ist ein Aergerniß, davon zu reden. Schreiben Sie für die italienische Sprache, mein lieber Hiller, und erndten Sie wenigstens bey Ausländern den Ruhm ein, den Sie verdienen; und den unter uns der Pöbel nur klug genug ist, zu erkennen. Ihre Landsleute verdienen Ihren Patriotismus nicht: verachten Sie sie; das ist ihr Theil.

151. Einem Weiße wäre es gewiß eine Kleinigkeit gewesen, selbst eine Fabel zu ersinnen, die einer naiven und angenehmen Ausführung fähig gewesen wäre, und wir wünschten, daß er es zur Ehre unserer Nation gethan hätte.

152. Diese feine Musik hat Feuer, Anmuth, Ausdruck, und auch manche Neuigkeit. . . . Kurz, die Musik dieser Operette ist, im Ganzen genommen, gut, und macht einem Deutschen Ehre.

155. Denn, glauben Sie mir, die Pergolesi, die Galuppi, die Sacchini, würden diesen Deutschen mit Freuden für ihren Bruder erkennen.

156. Und mit Stücken von solcher Art, in denen außer der simplen ungeschminkten Natur der Handlung auch lebendiger musikalischer Ausdruck das Herrschende ist, kann unser teutsches Theater immer getrost an die Seite der Ausländer treten, und unsre komische Oper der italiänischen Opera buffa Hohn sprechen.

157. Wahr ists, der vornehmste und wesentlichste Theil der Musik, der Gesang, ist bisher am meisten unter uns vernachläßiget worden . . . .

158. Vom guten Geschmacke aber, und von schönen Melodien findet man . . . wenig Merkmaale; sondern vielmehr, daß sowohl ihr [the Germans’] Geschmack, als ihre Melodien, länger als bey ihren Nachbarn, ziemlich platt, trocken, mager und einfältig gewesen. Ihre Composition war, wie gesagt, harmonisch und vollstimmig; aber nicht melodisch und reizend. Sie suchen mehr künstlich, als begreiflich und gefällig, mehr für das Gesicht als für das Gehör zu setzen.

160. Ihre Texte sind zu elend, und ihre deutschen Opern zu wenig nach der Mode; die letztern haben auch nachher bessere in andern Sprache geliefert. Das einzige ernsthafte gute Stück welches wir in Musik haben, ist Gellerts Orakel.

162. Es kommt nur darauf an, daß der Dichter nicht zu eigensinnig ist, so läßt sich unsere Sprach schon auch zur Musik bearbeiten.

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163. Doch Geduld! Vielleicht wird der deutschen Sprache an den deutschen Höfen, noch einmal die Gerechtigkeit wiederfahren, die sie wegen ihres Reichthums, ihrer Biegsamkeit, ihres Nachdrucks schon längst verdienet hätte. Und wo sollte dies eher zu hoffen seyn, als in Sachsen, da diesem Lande ganz Deutschland, in Absicht auf die wahre hochdeutsche Sprache, den Vorzug längst eingeräumet hat.

166. Dann werden Philosophen kommen, und untersuchen, wie das zugehe: und werden—zu großer Verwunderung der ehrlichen Teutschen—finden, daß ein Theil dieser Würkungen auf Rechnung ihrer Sprache selbst zu setzen sey; die—zwar nicht so weich, nicht so voll reiner Sylben in A, E und O, als die welsche, aber, trotz irgend einer andern Sprache—mit einem Ueberfluß der klangreichsten Worte versehen ist, alle mögliche Gegenstände der musikalischen Nachahmung zu mahlen, alle Bewegungen in der Natur, und (folglich) alle Empfindungen und Affekten des menschlichen Herzens . . . die sanftesten und zärtlichsten sowohl als die donnernden und stürmenden, mit der größten Wahrheit und Stärke auszudrucken.

167. Wir zweifeln, daß sie in Deutschland eben so viel Glück machen werde. Alles paßt zu genau zu den englischen Sitten. . . . In Deutschland hingegen kann das Stück keine gute Wirkung thun, ohne sehr verändert zu werden. Nicht blos deswegen, weil eine Diebesbande die Hauptrollen darinn hat, . . . sondern weil es an sich kein für uns sehr interessantes Stück ist. . . . Wie gut wäre es, wenn sie durchgehends ein besseres Herz zeigte und ihre Eltern und den Geliebten aus dem bösen Leben herauszuziehen suchte?

168. Die Franzosen geben oft so wenig Achtung, was sich zur Musik schickt, und was nicht . . . .

170. Herr Lany läßt die Tanzmelodien im wahren Geschmacke vortragen, und neue Musik zu den alten Opern spielen; er setzt Stücke voll Ausdruck und Abwechslung an die Stelle der einförmigen und monotonischen Melodien von Lully. Die Italiäner sind in diesem Stücke weit vernünftiger gewesen, als die Franzosen.

171. Herr Hiller hat die Arien in die Musik gesetzt; er hat die Manier der italienischen Operrettenarien der französischen vorgezogen, das Anfangschor, die Romanze und das Morgenlied der Alten ausgenommen. Seine Arien sind in dem wahren deutschen Geschmacke, sie haben viel Ausdruck des Affekts, reizende Melodien, und eine fleißig gearbeitete Begleitung.

172. Sie ist aus einer klugen Mischung vom französischen und italiänischen Geschmacke entstanden, die Lieder sind ihrem Charakter gemäß leicht und simpel, die Areitten kurz, ohne allzu vielen Schmuck, ohne die Coloraturen und Wiederholungen, welche die Aufmerksamkeit zu sehr von der Komödie selbst wegreissen, und mitten unter der Prosa nicht so natürlich sind. Die ernsthaftern Arien des Fürsten sind ganz im italiänischen Geschmacke, aber doch keine Dakapo Arien, und vortreflich bearbeitet. Ausdruck des Affekts, eine singbare gefällige Melodie, und in den komischen Arien besonders eine sehr redende Deklamation, die Hauptingredienz zur komischen Singmusik, glauben wir in dieser Operette durchgehends anzutreffen, die auch verschiedne musikalische Gemälde von der ernsthaften und komischen Art hat, welche sehr ausdrückend sind.

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Appendix C: German Texts for Chapter 5

9. Gelobt werden “Regelmäßigkeit, Ordnung, perspectivische Richtigkeit, Pracht ohne Kosten der Einfalt, Wahl und Neuheit in der Decoration, Geist und Erfindung in dem Entwurf, und Stärke in der Ausführung allegorischer Gemälde.”

10. Die Auszierung des Gebäudes ist, wie es sich für eine Stadt schickt, in der alle schönen Künste blühen.

11. Zween Säulengänge, nach dorischer Ordnung, umstellen den runden Vorhof des Tempels der Wahrheit, welchen man entfernt in der Mitte siehet. Er ist von allen Seiten offen, und läßt, die von aller Bedeckung entblößte Bildsäule der gefälligen Göttin, sehen, die den Herzutretenden die offenen Arme zeigt. Beym Eingange des Vorhofs, mitten auf dem Gelände, stehen die in Bronze gegossenen Bildsäulen des Sophokles und Aristophanes, der größten dramatischen Dichter. Die tragische Muse weihet dem erstern, welcher zur Linken steht, einen Lorbeerkranz, den sie ihm zu Füßen auf das Piedestal niederlegt. Hinter ihr stehet Sokrates, von seinem Freunde Euripides begleitet, dessen Schauspiele er allen andern vorzog; er läßt hier den Beyfall des Weisen, und die Vereinigung der Philosophie mit der tragischen Dichtkunst errathen. Mitten unter den griechischen Dichtern, bey welchen man den Seneca, den einzigen lateinischen Dichter, von dem tragische Werke ganz übrig geblieben sind, auch einige ihrer vornehmsten deutschen und französischen Nachfolger sieht, sitzt die Geschichte mit aufgeschlagenem Buche. Aeschylus bückt sich zu ihr nieder, zeigt ihr die Maske und den Cothurn, den er ihren Wahrheiten leihen will.

Neben ihm lehnen Theaterflügel, an welchen ein Knabe malt; eine Zierde womit er zugleich die Bühne bereicherte. An der andern Seite siehet man, wie die komische Muse die Bildsäule des Aristophanes mit einem Blumengehänge umwindet; bey welcher Verzierung ihr die Tanzkunst, und ein kleiner scherzender Liebesgott behülflich sind. Darneben lehnt sich Plautus auf seinen Stab, und blickt aufmerksam in die umherliegenden Schriften seiner Vorgänger. Bey ihm steht der zärtliche Terenz, welcher den Amor mit sich bringt, und ihm die Fackel sanft aus der Hand nimmt. Vor ihnen sitzt Mänander an der Bildsäule des Aristophanes, welcher die älteren Werke von der persönlichen Satyre reiniget, und dem Lustspiele eine neue Gestalt giebt. Er schreibt, und ein Genius schiebt die persönlich charakterisirte Maske von dem vor ihm aufgeschlagenen Buche. Hinter den alten Dichtern, welche der Satyr begleitet, die satyrischen Spiele der Griechen, die aus einem Contrast des Tragischen und Komischen entstanden sind, errathen zu lassen, stehen einige ihrer deutschen und französischen Nachahmer.

Im Vorhofe sieht man den unnachahmenden Shakespeare, welcher die alten (an den alten) Originalen vorbeygegangen ist, gerade dem Tempel der Wahrheit zu eilen. Auf dem Vorgrunde sitzen die Malerey und die Musik mit ihren Genien. Die Geberde des Aristophanes zeigt, daß er über die tragischen Dichter spotte. Sophokles scheint ihm zu antworten, indem er mit der einen Hand auf die Wahrheit, und mit der andern auf die Grazien zeigt, die mit in einander geschlungenen Armen, über dem Tempel auf den Wolken schweben, von denen eine Menge Genii herabstürzen, welche Lorbeerkränze für die neuern Dichter bringen, womit die alten bereits geschmückt sind.

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12. Vor einigen Tagen ward das neue Komödienhaus, das mit vielen Pracht und Geschmack auf der Ranstädter Pastey angelegt ist, eingeweyet.

13. In Leipzig war alles “ganz neu und man rühmte mit Recht die Pracht und die täuschende Perspective des Theaters; die Verwandlungen waren nach optischen Regeln entworfen.”

14. Herr Koch hat keine Kosten gescheut, dieses Stück auch in außerwesentlichen Dingen des Beifalls würdig zu machen. Die Dekorationen waren so schön, als man sie auf einem Theater gewohnt ist, für das ein Oeser mit seinem Sohne arbeitet. Vor der siebenten Scene des zweiten Ackts . . . wurde die Musick, die das Geräusch des Gewitters ausdrückt, durch eigene Maschinen, die den Regenguß nachmachten, verstärkt. Das starke Tröpfeln, mit dem die Gewitterregen anfangen, der heftige Guß, welcher erfolgt, wenn das Gewitter schon meistens vorüber ist, und selbst das Rieseln, mit dem der Regen aufhört, alles dieses konnte dadurch so sinnlich nachgeäft werden, daß einige Damen, mit denen ich in einer Loge saß, in vollem Ernste ausriefen: Wird es doch ganz kühle!

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