The Great Musicians: Rossini and His School. Edwards Henry Sutherland

opera by Paisiello. Paisiello, like Scarlatti, Logroscino and Durante, was professor at the Conservatorio of Naples; and under his guidance were formed Jomelli, Piccinni, Sacchini, Guglielmi, and Cimarosa. The particular innovations due to Piccinni and Paisiello have already been mentioned. Cimarosa composed the best overtures which, up to his time, the Italian school could boast of, and he was the first to introduce quartets and other concerted pieces in the midst of dramatic action; not, that is to say, as ornaments at the end of an act, which hitherto had been the place conventionally assigned to them, but as integral parts of the musical drama. This innovation occurs for the first time in Il Fanatico per gli antichi Romani, which Cimarosa composed in 1773. It was not until nineteen years afterwards that this master produced his Matrimonio Segreto. But meanwhile Cimarosa had been completely distanced by Mozart, who, himself a great inventor, and, so to say, anticipator, adopted moreover everything that was worth adopting in the methods of all his contemporaries and predecessors.

      To resume, in as few words as possible, the history of opera in Italy up to the time of Rossini, this form of art was at first nothing but recitative, or recitative with a chorus at the end of each act. Then occasional airs were introduced, then duets; and it is not until the middle of the eighteenth century that we find an example of an operatic trio. Quartets and dramatic finales followed in due course; and while the Italians had been developing new methods of employing the solo voices, Gluck had given prominence to the chorus as a dramatic factor, and had cultivated choral writing with the happiest effect. Other Germans, with Haydn foremost among them, had produced new orchestral combinations, until at last Mozart joined to the vocal forms of the Italians the instrumental forms of the Germans, while developing and perfecting both. Rossini introduced quite gradually into Italian opera those reforms which are particularly associated with his name; and perhaps in no other way could he have got them accepted. But he might, had he felt so disposed, have borrowed them one and all in a piece from the works of Mozart.

      Let it be remembered, however, as a matter of fact, that when in 1813 Rossini produced Tancredi, which marks the commencement of the reforms introduced by him into serious opera, he had enjoyed no opportunity of seeing any of Mozart's works on the stage. Probably he had studied the music of Mozart, as we know him to have studied that of Haydn, in score; but it was not until 1814 that Don Giovanni, nor until 1815 that the Marriage of Figaro, was performed for the first time in Italy at the Scala theatre.

      Rossini's success, due above all to the fascinating character of his easily appreciable melodies, was instantaneous; and it spread like wild-fire from Italy all over Europe. More than a quarter of a century, however, passed before Mozart's great works made their way from Vienna to the chief cities of Italy, and to the capitals of France and England. This tardy recognition of Mozart's dramatic genius may be explained in part by the outbreak of the French revolution soon after their production, and by the wars which distracted Europe from the time of the French revolution until the pacification of 1815.

      CHAPTER IV.

      TANCREDI

      Tancredi, composed a year after La Pietra del Paragone, was Rossini's first serious opera. It was also the first opera by which he became known throughout Europe.

      To amateurs of the present day its melodies appear of old-fashioned, or at least of antique cast. The recitatives seem long, and they are interminable compared with those by which Verdi connects his musical pieces. But when Tancredi was first brought out opera seria consisted almost entirely of recitative, relieved here and there and only at long intervals by solo airs. For much of this declamation Rossini substituted singing; for endless monologues and dialogues supported by a few chords, concerted pieces connected and supported by a brilliant orchestral accompaniment.

      Rossini, in fact, introduced into serious opera the forms which comic opera already possessed. The parts were at that time differently distributed in opera seria and opera buffa; and in the latter less restricted style the bass singer was not as a matter of course kept in the background. Tancredi was the first serious opera in which a certain prominence was given to the bass, though it was not until some years later – in Otello, 1816, in La Gazza Ladra, 1817, and in Mosè, 1818 – that Rossini ventured to entrust bass singers with leading parts. Opera seria, when Rossini was beginning his career, was governed by rules as strict, as formal, and as thoroughly conventional as those which gave so much artificiality and so much dulness to the classical drama of France. The company for comic opera consisted of the primo buffo (tenor), prima buffa, buffo caricato (bass), seconda buffa, and ultima parte (bass). The company for serious opera was made up of the primo uomo (soprano), prima donna, and tenor, the secondo uomo (soprano), seconda donna, and ultima parte (bass); and in serious opera the ultima parte was not only kept in the background, but, except in concerted pieces, was scarcely ever heard.

      As a solo singer, the bass in serious opera had no existence. Gradually Rossini brought him forward, until he became at last as prominent as the tenor, or even more so. In Semiramide, for instance, the principal male character is Assur. In Tancredi, from which Semiramide is separated by an interval of ten years, the bass has little to do. He already, however, possesses an importance which was denied to him in the serious operas of Rossini's predecessors.