Page 97 - ESSENTIAL LISTENING TO MUSIC

Perhaps because opera originated in Italy, that country continued to nur- ture the genre, through the operas of Verdi and Puccini (see Chapter 13), and down to the present day. Indeed, operas have most frequently been written in the Italian language, not only because of the genre’s Italian origins, but also be- cause of the pleasing, evenly spaced vowels of this “mother tongue.” But early on, opera began to spread from Italy over the Alps to German-speaking coun- tries, to France, and eventually to England. The first English opera worthy of no- tice is Henry Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas.
An Opera in English: Henry Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas (1689)
Henry Purcell (1659–1695; Figure 5.10) has been called the “greatest of all English composers.” Indeed, only the late Baroque composer George Frideric Handel (who was actually German-born) and pop songwriter Paul McCartney can plausibly challenge Purcell for this title. Purcell was born in London, the son of one of the king’s singers. In 1679, the younger Purcell obtained the position of organist at Westminster Ab- bey, and then, in 1682, he became organist for the king’s Chapel Royal as well. But London has always been a vital theater town, and Purcell increasingly devoted his attention to works for the public stage.
One of Purcell’s stage works that still enjoys public favor today is
his opera Dido and Aeneas, written not for the royal family, but rather
for a private girls’ boarding school in the London suburb of Chelsea.
The girls presented one major stage production annually, something
like the senior class play of today. In Dido and Aeneas, they sang
the numerous choruses and danced in the equally frequent dance numbers. All nine solo parts save one (the role of Aeneas) were written for fe- male voices. The libretto of the opera, one appropriate for a school curriculum steeped in classical Latin, is drawn from Virgil’s Aeneid. Surely the girls had studied this epic poem in Latin class, and likely they had memorized parts of it. Surely, too, they knew the story of the
soldier-of-fortune Aeneas, who seduces
proud Dido, queen of Carthage, but then
deserts her to fulfill his destiny—sailing
on to found the city of Rome. Betrayed
and alone, Dido vents her feelings in an
exceptionally beautiful aria, “When I am
laid in earth,” and then expires. In Virgil’s
original story, Dido stabs herself with the
sword of Aeneas. In Purcell’s opera, she
dies of a broken heart: her pain is poison
enough (Figure 5.11).
Figure 5.11
A detail from the painting The Death of Dido by Guercino (1599–1666). The servant Belinda bends over the dying Dido, who has fallen on Aeneas’s formidable sword.
watch . . . three portions of Monteverdi’s opera Orfeo, online.
Figure 5.10
Henry Purcell, by an anonymous painter
early baroque opera 75 Copyright 201 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part. Due to electronic rights, some third party content may be suppressed from the eBook and/or eChapter(s).
Editorial review has deemed that any suppressed content does not materially affect the overall learning experience. Cengage Learning reserves the right to remove additional content at any time if subsequent rights restrictions require it.
56797_ch05_ptg01.indd 75 29/08/14 3:33 PM
<
<
© Scala/Art Resource, NY
© Bildarchiv Preussischer Kulturbesitz/Art Resource, NY