1. Chapter 6
Baroque Opera

2. Baroque Culture
Use of arts to celebrate the Church and to support those in political power
Grand churches and palaces richly decorated with ornamentation
Ornamentation reflected in visual arts
Laborers created buildings and art for the Church and ruling class

3. Baroque Music Purposes/Performers
Music composed for and performed for or by aristocracy
Music for aristocracy performed in homes and in public
Songs and dances also performed in alehouses and streets for average citizens
Characteristics
Constant motion
Use of ornaments (melodic decoration)
Use of contrasts (loud then quiet phrase)
Songs performed by average citizens not written down

4. Opera Origins Began in Italy, circa 1600
Florentine camerata (society of scholars and musicians)
Added melodies to Greek dramas
Emphasized clarity of text
Rhythm followed textual accents

5. Early Opera Vocal Style
Monody
Solo singer
Accompaniment
Homophonic texture
Basso continuo (also called continuo)
Accompanied monody
Bass instrument (cello or bassoon) + chordal instrument (lute, harpsichord, or organ)
Figured bass – bass line with numbers indicating harmonies for chordal instrument to improvise

6. Baroque Opera Vocal Styles
Recitative
Speech-like, served as dialogue
Rhythm flexible, based on text
Usually limited accompaniment
Early operas were mainly recitatives
Arioso
More lyrical than recitative
Melodies were more distinct and expressive than recitative
Aria
Expansion of arioso style
Song-like, focus of operas
Can stand alone outside of the opera
In da capo arias (ABA form) singers embellish the repeat of the A section

7. Opera Chorus Opera Firsts Included to represent groups of people
Often homophonic texture so that audience can understand text
Repetition of text by opera chorus was common
Opera Firsts
Jacopo Peri
Eurydice (circa 1600)
earliest surviving opera from the camerata
almost entirely recitative
Francesca Caccini
first known female opera composer
La Liberazione di Ruggerio first opera to be performed outside of Italy

8. Baroque Italian Opera Composer: Claudio Monteverdi
Life spanned from Renaissance into baroque ( )
Composed madrigals and opera
First master of opera
Opera Orfeo (1607) introduced opera as a major art form including:
Costumes
Staging and lighting
40 instrumentalists, chorus, dancers

9. Listening Guide Excerpt
Listening Guide: “Tu se’ morta” (“You Are Dead”) from Act Two of Monteverdi’s Orfeo
Based on Greek legend of Orpheus
The libretto (literally, “book” or the text) changed from original legend to operatic version to provide happy ending
Homophonic texture
Tenor soloist with continuo
Non-metric recitative from opera
Listen to the ending of this recitative sung by Orfeo he descends to the underworld to find his wife:
Text Translation
Farewell earth, farewell heaven and sun, farewell.
Listening Guide Excerpt
from CD 3, track 15, p. 72

10. Opera Audiences Italy Across Europe Originally for aristocracy
Public opera houses by 1637
Entertainment for middle classes and nobility
Across Europe
Opera spread
Works composed and performed in vernacular and in Italian

11. Henry Purcell (1659-1695) Composed sacred and secular music
Composed vocal and instrumental works
Organist at Westminster Abbey and Chapel Royal
Composed funeral music for Queen Mary
Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas considered first English opera

12. Listening Guide Excerpt
Featured Listening: “Thy Hand, Belinda” and “When I am Laid in Earth” from Act Three of Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas
Adapted from Virgil's Aeneid
Operatic recitative and aria
Homophonic texture
Solo soprano with string accompanmiment
The aria employs a five-measure ground bass (repeating bass melody)
Listen to the ground bass and the first iteration of sections A and B of this aria sung just before Dido’s death:
When I am laid in earth, may my wrongs create no trouble, no trouble in thy breast.
Remember me, remember me, but ah! Forget my fate.
Listening Guide Excerpt
from CD 1, track 4, pp

13. Other Baroque Opera Composers
George Frederic Handel
Italian-style opera in England
Jean-Baptiste Lully
French opera
simple arias, similar to recitatives
use of dances and chorus
Handel