A period after Meyer Bell, under the impact of Italian and German operas, French grand operas declined. Fortunately, the comic opera, which has been deeply loved by the French, has maintained the momentum of development, and since the middle of the19th century, two branches have gradually emerged, namely, satirical operetta with popular tunes as the main theme and lyric opera with ordinary people as the theme in daily life. Xi opera became the mainstream of French opera in the second half of the19th century, and most French opera composers in this period were Xi opera composers. Offenbach and Thomas are the main representatives of this period.
Jacques Offenbach
Jacques offenbach (18 19- 1880) is a German-born French composer. Offenbach was born in Germany. His first surname was Eberster, and later his first place of residence was offenbach. His father was the chorus conductor of Cologne Cathedral and became the first music teacher in offenbach. 1833, my father sent 24-year-old offenbach to study at the Paris Conservatory of Music, and he has lived here ever since. Offenbach studied composition from Halevy. He was a performer of the Paris Opera House and a conductor of the French Opera House, and founded the Paris Light Opera House. 1870 The Franco-Prussian War broke out and spread to Italy and Spain. 1876 went to the United States to attend the World Expo and give a visiting performance. 1880, offenbach died while rehearsing The Story of Hoffman.
Offenbach's most important achievement is operetta. By the middle of 19 century, he had composed nearly 100 operettas in more than 20 years, which were very popular in Paris. Offenbach composed the first comic opera Pepito in 1853. 1858 10 2 1 His "Orflo in Hell" was staged at the Paris Opera House. The play is based on ancient Greek mythology, and offenbach adapted it beyond recognition. The authorities accused the work of desecrating ancient literature and alluding to the government. But the audience loved it, and the box office soared, which made offenbach, as a theater manager, more happy than worried.
Offenbach's most famous comedy opera is The Story of Hoffman, which was performed at the Paris Opera House on February 188 10 and was deeply loved by the audience. This comic opera is composed of three independent stories, telling the love experience of Hoffman and three women. The plot is funny and grotesque. The puppet songs, boat songs "Beautiful Night" and "Oh, my God, how charming" in the play are all beautiful.
Offenbach's other favorite operas include Beautiful Helen (1864), Parisian Life (1866), Duchess Geraul Stein (1867) and La Perissol (1868).
Offenbach is the founder and outstanding representative of French operetta. Facing the public, he combined the tradition of stage play, the form of loving opera, the live performance of Linyin Liao's newspaper in Paris with urban folk songs. His tunes are full of popular folk sentiment, and life dances are widely used, such as waltz, galo dance and cancan dance. His operetta is full of ridicule and irony: the political and moral corruption of the imperial authorities. But there is also a side that caters to the tastes of powerful people. It is entertaining, even pornographic, and this duality is the reason why his art can exist in the Second Reich. Offenbach's music influenced Austrian Su Pei, Strauss, Sullivan, Hungarian, Lehar and modern American musicals.
Thomas and his comic opera
Charles luis ahn Brois Thomas (l8 1 1- 1896) was born in a musical family. Thomas studied violin and piano with his father since childhood, and entered the Paris Conservatory of Music at the age of 17, compared with 2 1 in 65432. From 1837, he began to write the first comic opera "Double Ladder", which was praised by Berlioz and soon became a success. 1849, The Governor topped the list of crosstalk composers at that time. However, since then, there have been some failures, and finally the period of new creation has come. Undoubtedly, it was stimulated by Cournot's Faust. From this experience, 1866, also known as "Mi Niang", was born, leaving Thomas' name in the long river of history. Mi Niang premiered at Xi Opera House in Paris on 1866+0 17, and it was an unprecedented success. In the following six months, it was staged hundreds of times. The French script of this play was written by Babier and Carrey. The two famous writers at that time, the most famous drama "Lost Mother" in "Do You Know the South China" was directly translated from the original poem. It is based on Goethe's novel (William Meister's Study Time). The plot outline is: A gypsy female artist who sells art everywhere is fascinated by her mother and falls in love with a rich college student William. Lotario, an old actor in the troupe, also has a crush on Mi Niang. In order to prevent the love between young people, he tried to burn Mi Niang. William is going to take Mi Niang back to her hometown of Italy and sell her a luxurious castle. This castle awakened Lotario's memory. He is the original owner of the castle, and Mi Niang is his daughter. Finally, father and daughter knew each other, and Mi Niang and William finally got married. Its music embodies Thomas' melodious and moving style. There are many wonderful arias in this comic opera, such as Mi Niang's Do you know that place? Filia's I am Titan, and Mi Niang and Lotario's duet The Lightweight Swallow. Mi Niang is a popular comic opera. In the last 30 years of the19th century, it staged more than 1000 performances and always maintained a good attendance rate.
More than a year later, the five-act opera Hamlet, which premiered at the Paris Opera House on March 9 1868, was well received again. This work is not only quite successful in music creation, but also the first opera to introduce saxophone into the band. It is obvious that both Mi Niang and Hamlet are related to Cournot. Because of the success of these two plays, he was able to replace Cournot as the director of Paris music. Thomas wrote 20 operas in his life, which are full of legends with beautiful melody, lyricism and drama, but lack of due depth in performance.
Cournot, an outstanding lyric composer
/kloc-in the second half of the 0/9th century, the lyricism of French opera was strengthened, and the grand opera was gradually weakened. However, the comedy opera form suitable for real life-a concise opera form with few main characters and dialogues-has been combined with Italian style and developed. It is not only used to express comedy content, but also used to express tragedy content. A group of composers with different creative personalities and aesthetic concepts formed the French lyric opera genre with their own works. Cournot is one of the outstanding representatives.
Charles Francois Cournot (18 18- 1893) is an outstanding French opera composer. Cournot was born in Paris, studied music with his mother, and studied composition in severiano reija. /kloc-entered the Paris Conservatory of Music in 0/836. His teachers were the most famous composers at that time, such as Harley, Lexur and Zimmer. In the second year of school, he won the second prize of the Academy Music Award in Rome. Two years later, he won the first prize in Rome by an overwhelming vote. From 65438 to 0839, Cournot went to Rome for further study after winning the prize, and visited Vienna, Berlin, Leipzig and other places to get in touch with famous music works and musicians from various countries. In 1852, Cournot became the conductor of the largest Orphean Chorus Association in Paris. 1858 worked in the lyric theatre in Paris, where he composed the first batch of operas. Cournot's most famous opera is Faust. This typical lyric opera was written in 1859 and staged in the Paris lyric theatre, but the performance effect was not satisfactory. So Cournot revised it in 10. 1869 In March, Faust was staged again at the Paris Opera House, and has since become one of the most popular operas. Become the first model of lyric opera. In the next eight years, the Paris Opera House alone staged 65,438+0,000 performances, while in the first 65,438+00 years of the 20th century, it performed more than 3,000 performances in Germany. Faust is based on Goethe's play of the same name, but the story is far from the original, just adopting the framework of the love story between Faust and Margaret. Faust's music absorbed more tunes from urban pop songs and was very successful in depicting Margaret's inner feelings. Her aria "Song of Jewelry" is an excellent song with beautiful and gorgeous melody, which can fully express the talent of coloratura soprano. In the reenactment, Cournot changed the original dialogue to the narrative tone, and added the favorite ballet scene of the French to make the work shine.
Cournot's other major opera works include Sappho (185 1), Queen Saba (1862), mireya (1864) and Dove (1866).
/kloc-after the Franco-Prussian War broke out in 0/870, his family moved to London to take refuge, and he became a VIP of the British royal family because of his successful creation of Faust. From 65438 to 0874, Cournot returned to France and created a number of excellent works. Such as Porriette (1878), Zamora's tribute (188 1) and so on.
Cournot is an outstanding lyric composer. He wrote 12 operas. Besides Faust, Romeo and Juliet (65,438+0867) is also excellent. Cournot lacks the feeling and experience of theater. Although the melody is beautiful, it lacks the motivation and freshness of development, which affects the charm of traditional Chinese opera.
/kloc-Opera in the second half of the 0/9th century
Romantic opera reached its peak in the second half of the19th century, and all three major European music countries have world-class outstanding composers.
In Italy, Verdi reached the peak of opera and became the greatest opera composer. The most important and greatest composer is Wagner of Germany. If his former romantic composers only made brilliant achievements in one aspect or one field, Wagner is their master. His contribution to opera in the19th century cannot be overestimated. Although French Cournot and Bicai can't be compared with Wagner and Verdi, the influence of their works on the world can never be underestimated. Bicai, in particular, has actually become a relay between the end of romanticism and the rise of realism because of naturalism in his creation.
Verdi's Romantic Opera
Rossini spanned two eras, namely classicism and romanticism. Verdi is an artist belonging to19th century. Born in 18 13, died in 190 1. 19th century is the decisive century of human civilization and culture. Verdi composed for the stage from 1839 to 1893. During this period, he experienced all the fields of romanticism in the19th century.
Verdi's opera works are full of passionate emotional melodies, and his achievements represent the peak of Italian romantic opera. The chorus in his opera was adapted into patriotic songs, expressing the spirit of freedom and independence in the Italian national reunification movement. Verdi paid great attention to the choice of theme and the treatment of stage effect, but sometimes he was too unconventional to pass the test at that time.
Giuseppe verdi (1813-1901year), 18 13 10 June 10 was born in busetto, the principality of Palma in northern Italy. My parents run a small restaurant that doubles as a grocery store. Their taciturn, melancholy and withdrawn character was passed on to Verdi and became the "seed" characters in his life. When Verdi was born, Palma was being invaded by Austria, which wanted to drive out Napoleon's army (1For most of the early 9th century, the European continent was invaded by Napoleon or those who wanted to drive out Napoleon, which was always related to Napoleon). Due to local conditions and family economic conditions, Verdi did not have a good environment for learning music. But this did not hinder his interest in music. 1925, Verdi 12 years old began to be an organist. Verdi's parents wanted to broaden their children's musical horizons, so they sent him to the nearby city of busetto, where he lived with another grocer named Antonio Barrech, who was in charge of the local music club. The young Verdi soon composed marches and other music for the city's bands, but most of them were piano duets for himself and Barrett's lovely daughter Margarita.
Verdi 1828 graduated from busetto Conservatory of Music. He chose music as his lifelong career and tried to create several concertos. He wrote the prelude to The Barber of Seville, which was staged in busetto Theatre and caused a sensation in the small town. During this period, Barrech provided valuable support and funding for Verdi's fame and career, and even his daily life. This support and fatherly care continued until his death.
To 1832 Verdi 19 years old. Barrech decided that he had nothing to teach Verdi in music, so he encouraged him to apply for Milan Conservatory of Music.
1June, 832, Verdi came to Milan. He applied for the Royal Conservatory of Music in Milan with great enthusiasm. The teachers of Milan Conservatory of Music were impressed by Verdi's talent, but the rule is the rule: they said he was only four years old and too old to accept it. Since then, Verdi has never received a formal music education. In addition to learning from the famous opera composer lavinia's private school, he also copied a lot of works by Bach, Handel, Mozart, Beethoven and other music masters, and watched the opera performances of Donizetti and Bei Lini.
Verdi was humiliated by the decision of Milan Conservatory of Music, which he will never forgive. Many years later, when Verdi became a world-famous composer, he returned the favor of Milan Conservatory of Music and flatly rejected their request to name the Conservatory after Verdi. He said: "They didn't accept the young me, so they can't have the old me." That's what happened.
Verdi's early days
1836 In April, Verdi married Margaret, the daughter of Barrett, who had been in love for a long time, and began a difficult creative career. 1839 At the beginning of this year, Verdi and his wife moved to Milan. In June of the same year 165438+ 10, his first opera, Count Aubert of Bonifacio, was staged in Scala Opera House, which was very successful and highly praised by the audience and public opinion. Verdi is a great young opera composer. Although Oberto is not a masterpiece, it has an important influence on Verdi's creative career. Later, the theater manager Barto Nomio Meirelli asked him to write another opera, this time a comedy.
Unfortunately, in the summer of 1840, Verdi's youngest son and his beloved wife, Margarita, were in trouble because of Verdi and died three months later. Faced with a huge blow, Verdi insisted on writing two comedic operas, Fake stanislavski, which was later renamed King of the Day. Regrettably, this cross talk drama was met with a cold reception by the audience, and public opinion also attacked it. Due to the failure of King in One Day, Verdi never wrote another comic opera in the next 50 years.
The death of his wife and children and the failure of The King of the Day made Verdi somewhat depressed. He ran away from home and was unhappy for about three years Merelli finally managed to get him back to work. He attracted Verdi with a novel and opera script written by the promising Italian poet Themistocles Solera. The new opera script is nabucco, which tells the story of a crazy Babylonian king who converted to Judaism. This is an opera with the theme of reflecting Italian nationalism. Verdi made an exciting chorus for the second act of the opera and another aria for the third act-"Fly! Thought has golden wings. "
On March 9th, 1842, nabucco was a great success after its premiere. Objectively aroused the patriotic enthusiasm of Italians, and the hero's resistance under foreign rule aroused the audience's strong sense of * * *. Rossini called Verdi "the only one among us who can write grand operas"; Milan Daily and le figaro spoke highly of Verdi's "great and magnificent creativity" and "the opera shocked the audience, who applauded wildly and cheered constantly". Nabucco has been staged for several months, among which the chorus "Let your thoughts fly and spread your golden wings" is one of the greatest choruses in European opera art, and it was sung by thousands of people at the funeral after Verdi's death. Nabucco's success made Verdi the king of Italian opera.
Verdi's spirit of exploration
While rehearsing "nabucco" on 1842, Verdi began to have a good impression on soprano Giuseppin Trepone who created the role of Abby Kaya, the cunning daughter of the mad king. However, it was not until a few years later that Streboni left the stage and taught in Paris that they began to live together. Finally, they got married. Verdi called her Pei Pi Na.
Later, Verdi wrote one opera after another at an alarming rate. After writing nabucco's opera script, Solera and Verdi collaborated on Lombardy, Atila and Giovanna Dakota. Some are not so good, and he knows it. But these works are very helpful to improve his popularity and make him earn enough money to buy a farm in the rural area of busetto where he once set foot. Every time Verdi finishes another opera, he will plant a tree to celebrate.
1In March of 844, Verdi's powerful opera "Ernane" won its reputation again. This youthful opera is sung by young people. From then on, Verdi could not stop his creative activities amid the honor and the voice of the audience. He almost became a "music convict" and wrote Foscari and His Son (1844), The Girl of Orion (1845), Arghira (1845) and Atina (1845).
1848 At the beginning of the year, under the influence of the Paris Revolution, revolutions broke out all over Italy. Verdi believes that what Italy needs most now is "cannon music", and he should use opera to "send patriotic shells". Therefore, Verdi wrote The Battle of laigna-No, in which the protagonist ferruccio was called by Verdi as "the indomitable image and the greatest victim of the struggle for Italian freedom". 1849 during the carnival, Rome staged the battle of laigna. "People rushed into the hall like a whirlwind, and the theater was packed. Verdi made 20 curtain calls on the stage. The next day, I couldn't buy tickets or programs with opera content-they were all sold out. When the chorus "Long live Italy" sounded in the first act, the audience waved flags and stood up to sing, while the actor who played the occupier was almost knocked down by the audience.
/kloc-from 0/849 to 65438+February, Verdi composed and finished the opera Louisa Miller. Several songs in this opera, such as the tenor aria When the Night Is Dead, are reserved for the concert.
Verdi's Opera Works that Shocked the World
/kloc-at the end of 0/849, Verdi returned to his hometown of busetto. Later, he wrote three operas that shocked the world in succession. Before returning to his hometown, Verdi was deeply attracted and excited by Hugo's play The King's Fun. 185 1 At the beginning of the year, Verdi spent 40 days completing all the music of Ligoletto. One of the most famous arias, "Women are fickle", is in the fourth act of the play. This is an opera about the hunchback clown, the lecherous duke and the professional killer Spalla Foucher. The opera script of Ligoletto is adapted from victor hugo's drama script, which violated the morality of Parisian audience a few years ago. At first, the official censor did not allow Verdi to write this work, but he escaped punishment by changing the names of the characters. On March 3 1, 1, 852, the clown premiered in Venice. In order to surprise the audience at the premiere, Verdi didn't give the score of the famous song "Women are fickle" to the actors until the day before the performance. Sure enough, the premiere was interrupted many times by cheers and applause from the audience. Clowns and fickle women spread all over Italy like wildfire. Rossini said with emotion after watching the performance: "In this work, I finally saw Verdi's genius." Previously, the two opera masters were somewhat estranged.
1853, Verdi had his best year. This year, he composed two of the most successful operas, The Bard and La Traviata. It took him only 28 days to write The Bard. It is in this opera that the chorus of "strike while the iron is hot" appeared in the second act, and the cursing of gypsies was messy. On February 1853, Verdi's romantic masterpiece The Bard premiered in Rome. Its achievement is similar to that of a clown.
Verdi started the creation of La Traviata immediately after finishing the creation of Roaming in the Martial Land. The work only took Will the first month. 1On March 6th, 853, La Traviata premiered in Venice. 1853 The premiere of La Traviata in Venice in March was a complete disaster. The tenor had a bad cold and his voice was hoarse. Most importantly, the audience thought Verdi's tragedy was the most interesting thing they had heard for years. The soprano Salvigni Donatelli, who plays violetta with tuberculosis, is very strong and healthy, so the audience burst into laughter as soon as she opened her mouth. This is not a good sign. Due to the improper choice of actors, the audience did not recognize it. But Verdi is the one who laughs last. A year later, when La Traviata was staged again, it was a great success and soon became popular all over Europe. Performances around the world (including a performance in new york, USA, Verdi wrote in a letter) won great applause.
With the appearance of The Clown, The Wandering Warrior and La Traviata, Verdi quickly surpassed Donetti and Bei Lini in his achievements and popularity in the opera world, and even Rossini came second. Verdi has since become the greatest opera composer in Italy.
Aida, Othello and Falstaff walked up a flight of stairs.
1In June, 868, Verdi visited manzoni, an 83-year-old writer whom he admired for a long time. 1870, the prestigious Verdi was elected as a member of the Italian House of Representatives, but he preferred to stay in his manor and enjoy life, and rarely went to Rome to participate in political activities that he was not interested in. During this period, he lived a lonely life. During this period, Verdi also wrote Mephisto fellers fellers, which revised his previous work The Force of Fate.
1869 at this time, Verdi appeared in front of the world. He paid attention to the script of opera, which made the plot more creative and completely changed the image of opera artists in the past. He accepted the invitation of the Egyptian Khedive (1867- 19 14) and wrote an opera AIDA to celebrate the opening of the Suez Canal. The Suez Canal was opened as scheduled, but the opera was not staged as scheduled: due to the Franco-Prussian War, all the scenery and costumes were placed in Paris. The opera was performed on187165438+February 24th. Aida, a Verdi opera based on ancient Egyptian legends, premiered in Cairo. Strong heroines show their talents. Khedive loves this opera even more. Verdi missed the premiere because of seasickness.
Two months later, Aida premiered in Milan, Italy, and the famous soprano Teresa Stoertz played Aida. Almost everyone thinks AIDA is a wonderful opera. Once again set off a passion for Verdi. The audience was very excited, and 60-year-old Verdi made 40 curtain calls.
1In May, 873, manzoni passed away. Grieving Verdi didn't have the courage to attend his funeral. With infinite reverence, he devoted himself to writing requiem for the dead at home. On the first anniversary of manzoni's death, Verdi personally conducted a requiem in Samako Cathedral. This masterpiece is Verdi's only prestigious work besides opera.
After 13 years, Verdi wrote almost nothing. He relaxes, walks around, watches this opera or that opera, and always combs his beard neatly on the opening night. Things on the farm always keep him busy.
1887 to prove that Verdi's musical life did not end there. Seventy-year-old Verdi took up the pen again and spent several years conceiving Othello. To this end, he devoted all his energy to personally selecting actors, rehearsing, conducting chorus, inspecting costumes and props, and testing every subtle link. 1February 5, 887, Othello premiered at Scala Opera House. The scene of the premiere was exciting. Politicians, cultural celebrities and audiences in some countries were fascinated by the plot, and the cheers and applause were deafening. The curtain call of 74-year-old Verdi and the main actors took 15 minutes. After the rest, the cheerful crowd carried the master back to his residence. Verdi waved goodbye to the people on the balcony several times, until Tamagno, the actor who played Othello, sang "Rejoice" loudly, and the enthusiastic audience gradually dispersed.
1893, seeing relatives and friends passing away one after another, Verdi felt that his time was running out. The old man finished another masterpiece Falstaff with an extraordinary efficiency of working 7 or 8 hours a day. This is not only Verdi's last comic opera, but also the last work in his long and brilliant creative career. After finishing the scores of three thick books, Verdi wrote the word "finished" on the last page, and wrote meaningfully: "Go, go, go forward-go forward! Farewell! ! ! 1February 9, 893, the premiere of Falstaff was as successful as Othello.
In his life, Verdi wrote more successful operas than some of us have ever seen in our lives. He will always be the most famous and favorite opera composer. 190 1 year 65438+1October 27th, Verdi died in Milan. Italy mourned all over the country, and people flocked to the streets to bid farewell to the greatest opera master.
Wagner
For Wagner, romantic opera is by no means a simple opera and musical, but a "grand opera" style that can be seen from its name. "It is a manifestation of behavior, a sacred drama, or nothing." Wagner described his opera works in this way, so there was a reason for betrayal. No one has ever brought such a thorough revolution to the history of music. Wagner is not only a music composer, but also an intellectual, poet, playwright and thinker. His opera works should be the long-awaited mature fruits of the German nation, western music and even the whole human civilization. He successfully conducted and played Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, which is a typical Greek tragedy. He was interested in Webster, and when he inspected Bei Lini's works, he appreciated Gluck's works. He thinks that the best works of traditional Chinese opera are wonderful music. However, the new opera music is not just beautiful music, it should get rid of self-isolated music.
In the past, opera music always considered diversified forms and scripts. Now Wagner weaves philosophy, religion and morality into drama and music. Wagner's new opera is Myth and Religion. Because he shows typical events and figures in ancient times, gods and spirits, vicious and ferocious men and treacherous women, great and touching heroes and great women like saviors. In his works, he showed the audience a series of the highest spiritual realms in the world: life and death, good and bad, salvation and destruction. This is a real test of extraordinary life and has important moral significance.
He occupies an important position in the history of opera development. His early operas belonged to the romantic grand opera style. Later, he gradually became dissatisfied with this opera style, thinking that this opera form should be a combination of various arts, and founded the form of "musical" according to his own aesthetic ideal and theory. He is not only an outstanding musician and opera reformer, but also an active social activist and a famous thinker. His political thoughts and aesthetic works of music and drama had an important influence on the social, political and cultural life at that time. In this respect, he is incomparable to any outstanding musician.
Wilhelm richard wagner (later he omitted "William") was born in a police officer's family in Leipzig on May 22nd, 2003. Born in Leipzig. His mother's original name was Joanna Patz, the daughter of a baker, and her husband, a policeman named Friedrich Wagner, died shortly after Wagner was born. Soon after, my mother remarried the playwright and actor Guy, and the family moved to Dresden. Chad's surname was Guy when he was a child, and he didn't change back to Wagner until he was a teenager. His stepfather played an important role in Wagner's artistic enlightenment. Under his influence, Wagner became interested in ancient Greek mythology, Shakespeare's plays and German folk literature from an early age. Because of his stepfather, Wagner often went in and out of the theater when he was very young, which was of great benefit to his later music creation. Wagner and his stepfather love each other deeply. When he learned that his stepfather wanted him to be a musical genius before he died, he vowed to have ambition to succeed in the world from now on. 1827 14 Wagner spent most of his time writing a long and complicated opera script, which he thought was a Shakespeare tragedy. This shows the young man's talent in drama creation. In this opera, just like in Shakespeare's Hamlet, the protagonist also sees the ghost of his assassinated father. Unlike Hamlet, Lobard took more direct revenge: he killed almost everyone and eventually became a madman. At the end of the fourth act, so many people died that Wagner had to let some people come back as ghosts in the fifth act to let the plot develop.
Wagner listened to a man named Miller's music class intermittently, but Wagner mainly taught himself. Wagner worships Beethoven's music very much, and he has a decisive influence on young Wagner. Wagner once copied almost all the works of this master. Especially after he saw Federico's performance on 1829, he was deeply moved by the music and the singer's singing skills, and said that this performance decided his fate as a professional composer. Even in his sleep, Wagner was crying for Beethoven and Shakespeare. It is these two great figures that laid a solid foundation for Wagner to engage in musical creation in the future.
193 1 year, Wagner entered the University of Leipzig. During this period, he spent six months learning composition theory and skills from composer Wei.
Wagner's Early Opera Works
1833, Wagner got a job in magdeburg: as a chorus conductor in a small opera company. Although he was not suitable for the position, they hired him.