© Copyright by Timothy M. Dueppen December 2012 THE TROMBONE AS SACRED SIGNIFIER IN THE OPERAS OF WOLFGANG AMADEUS MOZART _______________ A Dissertation Presented to The Faculty of the Moores School of Music University of Houston _______________ In Partial Fulfillment Of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Musical Arts _______________ By Timothy M. Dueppen December 2012 THE TROMBONE AS SACRED SIGNIFIER IN THE OPERAS OF WOLFGANG AMADEUS MOZART ____________________________________ Timothy M. Dueppen APPROVED: ____________________________________ Jeffrey Sposato, Ph.D. Committee Chair ____________________________________ Andrew Davis, Ph.D. ____________________________________ Noe Marmolejo ____________________________________ Brian Kauk ____________________________________ John W. Roberts, Ph.D. Dean, College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences Department of English ii THE TROMBONE AS SACRED SIGNIFIER IN THE OPERAS OF WOLFGANG AMADEUS MOZART _______________ An Abstract of a Dissertation Presented to The Faculty of the Moores School of Music University of Houston _______________ In Partial Fulfillment Of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Musical Arts _______________ By Timothy M. Dueppen December 2012 iii Abstract The Trombone as Sacred Signifier in the Operas of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Timothy M. Dueppen The trombone was understood during the eighteenth century and earlier in Germany as an instrument with important sacred significance. This association developed because of its appearance in German translations of the Bible by Martin Luther and Catholic theologians and its presence in encyclopedias and treatises of the period. This, along with the trombone’s vast use in church music of the period, helped it to be understood as an instrument of sacred significance by the German musical public. It was this social understanding of the sacerdotal qualities of the trombone that propelled Mozart to use the instrument in his operas Idomeneo, Don Giovanni, and Die Zauberflöte to enhance some of the most important sacred elements of each work. The trombone’s use by German composers in opera began with Gluck, who used the instrument mainly to double the voices of the choir and other instruments. Mozart, however, used the trombone in more innovative ways, which included borrowing compositional ideas from German church music (including his own) and incorporating them into his operatic use of the instrument. Mozart used the trombone to enhance certain moments of drama within Idomeneo, Don Giovanni, and Die Zauberflöte with specific harmonic treatment of sacerdotal sections of the text, certain dynamic and expression markings, and an emphasis on creating moments of tension and release through the harmonies used. These, along with the trombone’s understood sacred significance, aurally aided the audience in associating the moments the instrument was used in each opera as having spiritual implications in the drama. iv Acknowledgements There are several people who have helped contribute to the completion of this doctoral document. First and foremost, I would like to thank Dr. Jeffrey Sposato for his omniscience on many subjects discussed in my dissertation, his critical candor, consistent support and availability, and for inspiring me along the way with new and different ideas and approaches. Without Dr. Sposato’s constant encouragement, I certainly doubt that this document would be something I would be proud of to represent the literary culmination of my doctoral studies. Next, I would like to thank Professor Brian Kauk for further assisting me to continually grow musically and artistically within the trombone repertoire. Then, thanks goes to Professor Noe Marmolejo for supporting me throughout my degree candidacy with his witty charisma, love for all things music, and inspiring leadership, emboldening me to direct a Jazz band as well. Also, I would like to thank Dr. Andrew Davis for his theoretical help, in the musical sense only, which allowed me to arrive at more concrete conclusions through the analyses of the musical examples used in this dissertation. I would also like to thank a few other professors not on my doctoral document committee, who nonetheless helped to inspire different aspects of this project: Dr. Barbara Lange, Dr. Matthew Dirst, Dr. John Marcellus, and Dr. Paul Bertagnolli, who first planted the seeds for some of the ideas discussed here, which later grew into this dissertation, much like the miraculous blossoming of the Pope’s staff in Wagner’s Tannhäuser. Finally, I wish to thank my beautiful wife, Abbie, for being my whole-hearted supporter throughout not only this document, but throughout my entire doctoral candidacy. Through hurricanes, international tours, cross-country moves, and living in the mountains, you’ve been my indefatigable cheerleader. v Table of Contents Signature Page . ii Abstract Title Page . iii Abstract . iv Acknowledgements . v Table of Contents . vi List of Musical Examples and Tables . vii Chapter Page Introduction . 1 A) The Trombone’s Sacred Significance: Literary and Biblical Evidence . 3 I) The Trombone in German Sacred Music . 15 A) The Italian Influence on the Use of the Trombone in Germany . 16 B) The Civic Influence on the Use of the Trombone in Germany . 18 C) German Catholic Composers . 19 D) German Lutheran Composers . 26 E) Mozart’s Use of the Trombone in his Sacred Music . 29 II) Gluck’s Orphée et Euridice and Alceste, and Mozart’s Idomeneo . 47 III) Don Giovanni . 77 IV) Die Zauberflöte . 105 Conclusion . 137 Bibliography . 143 vi List of Musical Examples and Tables Chapter I Page 1.1: Alme Ingrate, mm. 24-30 . 22 1.2: Tuba mirum from Reutter’s Requiem, mm. 24-33 . 25 1.3: Jener Donnerworte Kraft from Die Schuldigkeit des Ersten Gebots, mm. 151-156 . 33 1.4: Agnus Dei from Missa solemnis in C Minor (“Waisenhauskirche”), mm. 1-12 . 35 1.5: Credo from Missa in C (“Krönungsmesse”), mm. 65-69 . 37 1.6: Sanctus from Missa in C Minor, mm. 12-17 . 40-41 1.7: Tuba mirum from Mozart’s Requiem, mm. 1-18 . 44 Chapter II 2.1: Orphée et Euridice Act I, Scene 1, mm. 15-22 . 51 2.2: Orphée et Euridice Act II, Scene 1, mm. 131-134 . 53 2.3: Alceste Act I, Scene 3, mm. 37-48 . 57 2.4: Idomeneo Act III, Scene 10, mm. 1-6 . 68 2.5: Idomeneo Act III, Scene 10, mm. 21-30 . 69 2.6: Idomeneo Act III, Scene 10, mm. 4-10 . 71 2.7: Idomeneo Act III, Scene 10, mm. 45-52 . 72 2.8: Idomeneo Act III, Scene 10, mm. 57-70 . 74 vii Chapter III 3.1: Don Giovanni Act II, Scene 11, mm. 51-54 . 86 3.2: Don Giovanni Act II, Scene 11, mm. 59-63 . 88 3.3: Don Giovanni Act II, Scene 15, mm. 433-440 . 93 3.4: Don Giovanni Act II, Scene 15, mm. 487-501 . 95 3.5: Don Giovanni Act II, Scene 15, mm. 523-527 . 97 3.6: Don Giovanni Act II, Scene 15, mm. 538-545 . 99 3.7: Don Giovanni Act II, Scene 15, mm. 549-553 . 100 3.8: Don Giovanni Act II, Scene 15, mm. 563-570 . 101 Chapter IV 4.1: Die Zauberflöte Overture, mm. 1-3 . 117 4.2: Die Zauberflöte Overture, mm. 97-102 . 118 4.3: Die Zauberflöte, Act II, Scene 1, mm. 1-6 (Between Marsch der Priester and O Isis und Osiris) . 120 4.4: Die Zauberflöte Act II, Scene 1 (No. 9), mm. 1-8 . 121-122 4.5: Die Zauberflöte Act II, Scene 1 (No. 10), mm. 1-7 . 125 4.6: Die Zauberflöte Act II, Scene 1 (No. 10), mm. 21-24 . 126 4.7: Die Zauberflöte Act II, Scene 1 (No. 10), mm. 34-37 . 128 4.8: Die Zauberflöte Act II, Scene 10 (Finale), mm. 190-195 . 130 4.9: Martin Luther’s melody from Ach, Gott, vom Himmel sieh darein, mm. 1-6 . 131 4.10: Die Zauberflöte Act II, Scene 10 (Finale), mm. 206-215 . 132 viii 4.11: Die Zauberflöte Act II, Scene 10, (Finale) mm. 362-371 . 134 Table 4.1: The Trombone’s Presence in Die Zauberflöte . 113-114 ix Introduction When the average music listener is asked to identify how they understand the trombone’s use in opera, they often turn to the works of composers like Richard Wagner (1813-1883). Many are drawn to Wagner’s handling of the trombone in his opera Die Walküre, from his epic cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen. In the famous opening of this opera’s third act, “The Ride of the Valkyries,” the trombone section plays the extremely loud and strongly accented entrance and the battle-cry music for the warrior demi-goddess Brünnhilde and her band of lady warriors. In this case, the trombone section helps to heighten the image of the strong Walküren as they gather to carry fallen soldiers to Valhalla. Martial passages such as this present how the majority of our twenty-first century ears understand the trombone’s role, but this was not how the trombone was understood musically in eighteenth- century German-speaking Europe (what I will henceforth refer to, for simplicity’s sake, as “Germany”). Beginning in the middle ages, the trombone was strongly linked to sacred music, an association that endured throughout the eighteenth century.1 Johann Phillip Eisel (1698- 1763) and Christian Friedrich Schubart (1739-1791), among other eighteenth-century German literary figures, described how the trombone is specifically appropriate for church music due to its traditional use as a doubling and obbligato instrument in that genre, a role that did not fully disappear until the nineteenth century.2 Moreover, German biblical translations from the sixteenth century through the eighteenth century, beginning with Martin 1 Trevor Herbert, The Trombone. Yale Musical Instrument Series (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2006), 111-112. 2 Johann Phillip Eisel, Musicus autdidactos, oder der sich selbst informirende Musicus (Erfurt: Johann Michael Funcken, 1738), 70.