The a - Z of Mozart Opera Classical Opera / Ian Page
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The A - Z of Mozart Opera Classical Opera / Ian Page 6719_CLA_The A-Z of Mozart Opera_BOOKLET_FINAL.indd 1 10/01/2014 16:24 THE A-Z OF MOZART OPERA Page Page 1 Apollo et Hyacinthus – Duetto, “Natus cadit” 5’37 12 10 Die Entführung aus dem Serail – Aria, “Konstanze… O wie ängstlich” 4’37 20 Martene Grimson (Melia), Allan Clayton (Oebalus) Andrew Staples (Belmonte) 2 La finta semplice – Aria, “Amoretti, che ascosi qui siete” 4’50 13 11 Le nozze di Figaro – Cavatina, “Se vuol ballare, signor Contino” 3’12 20 Rebecca Bottone (Rosina) Matthew Rose (Figaro) 3 Bastien und Bastienne – Aria, “Diggi, daggi, schurry, murry” 1’29 13 12 Don Giovanni – Canzonetta, “Deh vieni alla finestra” 2’06 21 Matthew Rose (Colas) Mark Stone (Don Giovanni) 4 Mitridate, re di Ponto – Duetto, “Se viver non degg’io” (original version) 7’47 13 13 Così fan tutte – Quintetto, “Di scrivermi ogni giorno” 2’32 22 Rebecca Bottone (Aspasia), Martene Grimson (Sifare) Anna Leese (Fiordiligi), Cora Burggraaf (Dorabella), Andrew Staples (Ferrando), Mark Stone (Guglielmo), Matthew Rose (Don Alfonso) 5 Lucio Silla – Aria, “Fra i pensier più funesti” 3’13 14 Anna Leese (Giunia) 14 La clemenza di Tito – Duetto, “Ah perdona al primo affetto” 2’52 24 Rebecca Bottone (Servilia), Cora Burggraaf (Annio) 6 La finta giardiniera – Cavatina, “Geme la tortorella” 4’42 15 Klara Ek (Sandrina) 15 Die Zauberflöte – Quintetto, “Hm! hm! hm! hm!” 6’17 25 Klara Ek, Martene Grimson, Jennifer Johnston (Drei Damen), 7 Il re pastore – Finale, “Viva l’invitto duce” 6’26 15 Allan Clayton (Tamino), Mark Stone (Papageno) Cora Burggraaf (Aminta), Rebecca Bottone (Elisa), Anna Leese (Tamiri), Andrew Staples (Alessandro), The Orchestra of Classical Opera Allan Clayton (Agenore) Ian Page (conductor) 8 Zaide – Aria, “Ruhe sanft, mein holdes Leben” 5’59 17 Susan Gritton (Zaide) Produced and edited by Richard Sutcliffe. Engineered and mixed by Andrew Mellor. 9 Idomeneo – Quartetto, “Andrò ramingo e solo” 6’00 18 Recorded at St Jude-on-the-Hill, London. Design by gmtoucari.com. Photographs by Dr Stephen Page (pp.5-6) and Nick White (p.11) Martene Grimson (Ilia), Anna Leese (Elettra), This recording was first released on Sony BMG in 2007 Cora Burggraaf (Idamante), Allan Clayton (Idomeneo) Orchestra playing on period instruments, A=430 Hz 2 THE A-Z OF MOZART OPERA THE A-Z OF MOZART OPERA 3 6719_CLA_The A-Z of Mozart Opera_BOOKLET_FINAL.indd 2-3 10/01/2014 16:24 The Orchestra of Classical Opera Violin 1 Cello Horn Lucy Russell (leader) Joseph Crouch Roger Montgomery Iona Davies Sarah McMahon Gavin Edwards Rodolfo Richter Sarah Sexton Double Bass Mandolin Hannah Tibell Cecelia Bruggemeyer Anthony Robson Daniel Edgar Tim Amherst Harpsichord Violin 2 Flute Steven Devine Jill Samuel Rachel Beckett Oliver Webber Elizabeth Walker Ellen O’Dell William Thorp Oboe Stephen Jones Anthony Robson Nia Lewis Kate Latham Viola Clarinet Katie Heller Jane Booth Lisa Cochrane Guy Cowley Alfonso Leal del Ojo Colin Kitching Bassoon Andrew Watts Katrina Russell 4 THE A-Z OF MOZART OPERA THE A-Z OF MOZART OPERA 5 6719_CLA_The A-Z of Mozart Opera_BOOKLET_FINAL.indd 4-5 10/01/2014 16:24 Apollo to Zauberflöte: The A-Z of Mozart Opera This recording takes its inspiration from the coincidence that Mozart’s first opera begins with ‘A’ and his last with ‘Z’. Considering the almost universal appeal and popularity of his music, it seems extraordinary that less than half of Mozart’s operas command a regular place in the repertoire of the world’s opera houses, and this chronological journey offers the opportunity not only to see how his genius developed between Apollo et Hyacinthus and Die Zauberflöte, but also to appreciate the immense range and versatility of his writing. Of course no one can pretend that the early operas are as accomplished as the masterpieces of his maturity, any more than one would argue that the plays of Shakespeare are all uniformly great, but like Shakespeare, Mozart had a staggeringly profound and compassionate understanding of human nature which, to a greater or lesser degree, shines through in every one of his stage-works. This is even true of the first three operas – Apollo et Hyacinthus (1767), La finta semplice (1768) and Bastien und Bastienne (1768) – all written before Mozart became a teenager, and the first two in particular contain numerous intimations of the beauties and expressive depths to come. The duet “Natus cadit” from Apollo et Hyacinthus, in which father and daughter lament their estrangement from the god Apollo, is symptomatic of the young composer’s unerring ability to capture the mood and emotional truth of a dramatic situation. At the beginning of the 1770s, Mozart’s father took him on three separate trips to Italy – still considered the ideal training ground for aspiring composers and singers – and each trip culminated in the première of a new opera in Milan. These were Mitridate, re di Ponto (1770), Ascanio in Alba (1771) and Lucio Silla (1772), and they each reveal Mozart’s growing assurance and mastery of his craft. In December 1771, though, Archbishop Schrattenbach of Salzburg died, and his successor, Archbishop Colloredo, took a far less favourable view of the Mozarts’ frequent absences. THE A-Z OF MOZART OPERA 7 6719_CLA_The A-Z of Mozart Opera_BOOKLET_FINAL.indd 6-7 10/01/2014 16:24 For the rest of the decade they were required to stay in Salzburg and fulfil their duties as operatic writing onto a new level. They collaborated on three operas, Le nozze di Figaro court musicians, and for Wolfgang the only meaningful exceptions were a trip to Munich (1786), Don Giovanni (1787) and Così fan tutte (1790), and this famous sequence of to supervise the première of La finta giardiniera in 1774-75, and the ill-fated visit to Paris works represents the pinnacle of Mozart’s achievement as an opera composer. in 1778-79, during which his mother died. In Salzburg he was commissioned to write Il re pastore in 1775 in honour of a visiting archduke, but he found his home town parochial By the summer of 1791, though, Mozart was out of favour at the Viennese court, debt- and limiting, and was increasingly frustrated by its lack of a proper theatre. In 1779-80 ridden and in ill-health. He agreed to collaborate with Emanuel Schikaneder on he began work on a new opera in German, Zaide, but he was destined never to finish Die Zauberflöte, a magnificent vaudeville comedy written specifically for the ‘popular’ this intriguing work. audiences at the Theater auf der Weiden, and when this work was almost completed, Mozart received a commission to write a new opera for Prague to celebrate the coronation It was with the composition of Idomeneo, commissioned for the 1781 carnival season in of the new Emperor Joseph II as King of Bohemia. He allegedly wrote La clemenza di Munich, that Mozart really came of age as an opera composer. It received its première Tito in an astonishing eighteen days before returning to Vienna to complete Die Zauberflöte, a couple of days after his twenty-fifth birthday, and remains to this day one of his greatest the première of which he conducted on 30 September, but before the end of the year he and most underrated masterpieces. The work is charged with an elemental energy which was dead. It is tempting to view his tragically short career as a perfect, inevitable whole, drives the drama forward with visceral force, and recitatives, arias and ensembles lead possessing the same symmetry that marks his operatic voyage from A to Z. But one cannot into each other with a seamless flow. Nowhere is this more evident than in the extraordinary help wondering what might have been had he lived as long as such contemporaries as quartet from the final act, where all four characters give vent to their various states of Haydn, Gluck or Salieri. anguish and misery. Ian Page Idomeneo provided Mozart with the acclaim and the confidence to escape at last from his servitude in Salzburg, and in 1781 he made a famously acrimonious break from Archbishop Colloredo and set up as a freelance composer in Vienna. He soon received a commission to write a new German comedy, Die Entführung aus dem Serail, which was first performed at the Burgtheater on 16 July 1782, and the next few years were among the happiest of his life. But while he continued to pour out a seemingly endless supply of new music, he struggled to find the right material for his next opera. He started but failed to complete both L’oca del Cairo and Lo sposo deluso, and in 1786 wrote the one-act comedy Der Schauspieldirektor for a performance in the gardens of Schönbrunn Palace, but it was his collaboration with the librettist Lorenzo da Ponte which took his 8 THE A-Z OF MOZART OPERA THE A-Z OF MOZART OPERA 9 6719_CLA_The A-Z of Mozart Opera_BOOKLET_FINAL.indd 8-9 10/01/2014 16:24 Classical Opera Classical Opera was founded in 1997 by conductor Ian Page to explore the works of Mozart and his contemporaries, and has emerged as one of the leading exponents in its field. Performing with its own acclaimed period-instrument orchestra, the company has attracted considerable critical and public recognition, not only for the high quality of its performances but also for its imaginative programming and its ability to discover and nurture outstanding young singers. Classical Opera has performed regularly at many of London’s leading venues, including Sadler’s Wells, Wigmore Hall, the Barbican and Kings Place, and has mounted staged productions of many of Mozart’s operas, including Apollo et Hyacinthus, La finta semplice, Il re pastore, Zaide, Le nozze di Figaro and Così fan tutte.