Grove's dictionary of music and musicians

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244 SOAELATTI SCARLATTI
what great height he was ciipable of .rising at
this stage inay be seen in the opera Mitridate
'
Eupatore,' composed for Venice in 1707. Although
the interest is not equally sustained all
through, the work is a very remarkable example
of the classical manner at its grandest. The
libretto is also remarkable, as depending entirely
upon its political interest. There are no lovesoenes
at all ; but the devotion of the heroine
for her lost brother is expressed with a passionate
sincerity that far transcends anything that
violin-playing,' and as time went on he allotted
to the strings a more important share of the
work, stimulated, no doubt, by the influence of
Oorelli, who was thought by his contemporaries
(1707) we may observe the tendency to reverse
the principle of the earlier work ;
it is the
strings (generally without double-basses) that
accompany the voice, and the harpsichord that
is reserved to add power and brilliance to the
Moreover, Scarlatti's whole outlook
ritornelli.
becomes gradually less and less aggressively contrapuntal,
the harsh dissonances of his boyhood
are soon smoothed away, and the general scheme
of his musical thouglit tends more to melody
supported by harmony, although he showed to
the end of his life that he regarded free counterpoint
as the most inteUeetual style of expres-
Scarlatti had written before. J. S. Baoh at his
best has hardly surpassed the dignified recitative
' Mitridate mio,' followed by the magnifiicent
aria Cara tomba ' ' in Act IV.
his instrumentation, and causes his later scores
sion. This point of view naturally influences
With his return to Naples in 1709 Scarlatti to have much more aflSnity to the modern style
entered upon yet another stage of development. of treating the orchestra.
The deep poetic intention of Mitridate ' ' is indeed
seldom apparent ; but the experience of series of operas written for Kome that began
A fifth and final period is exemplified in the
former years had given the composer command with 'Telemaco' and ended with 'Griselda.'
of every resource, and the honour in which he Twenty years earlier -Scarlatti had bitterly
was held at the Austrian court enabled him to lamented the impossibility of producing operas
write in a style more worthy of himself. We in the city that had witnessed his first triumphs.
may regret the loss of that tender charm so But the passion for opera, which had attacked
characteristic of his early work, but we must Rome, no less than other Italian cities, during
admit the wonderful vigour and brilliance of the baroque period, was too serious to be stifled
such operas as 'La Prinoipessa Fedele' (1710), by the protests of clerical prudery, and Rome
'II Giro' (Rome, 1712), Soipione '
nelle Spagne' now showed him that here at last was an audience
which could appreciate the full maturity
(Kaples, 1714), and above all 'Tigrane' (1715).
In these operas we may notice not only the of the genius which she had been the first to
more extended development of the ternary ariaforms,
but also an advance towards a more only the furthest development of technical re-
encourage. In these latest operas we see not
modern treatment of the orchestra. Scarlatti's source, but also the ripened fruits of emotional
early operas are generally scored for a band of experience. Here at last is the whole Scarlatti,
ptrings, supported, of course, by the harpsichord here at last he was able to place upon the stage
and other harmonic instruments, such as the something of that passionate tenderness and
lute, playing from the basso continuo, which in serious musical reasoning that he had for so
many years brought to utterance only in the
this case we can hardly call the figured bass,
since Italian accompanists were so fluent in improvisation
intimacy of his chamber-cantatas, and exhibit
that the composer could generally the whole in all the glory of variegated orches-
spare himself the trouble of indicating the harmony
tration, lighted up by the blaze of vocal colora-
in the conventional shorthand. To this tura.
band are added occasionally trumpets, flutes, Scarlatti has been remembered in modern
oboes, and bassoons, not as regular constituents times chiefly on account of his operas ; but we
of the orchestra, but treated more as obbligato cannot understand his complete development
instruments, with a view to special colour effects. without a study of his chamber-music. The
The burden of the accompaniment rested on chamber-cantata was to the age of Rossi and
the harpsichord. Violin - playing was at the Scarlatti what the pianoforte-sonata or violinsonata
was to the age of Beethoven and Brahms
plose of the 17th century still so primitive
that the strings of an opera band could seldom —the most intimate and the most intellectual
Jbe trusted with the delicate task of supporting form of mu^ic that could be produced. The
^ singer. In most cases they enter only to play degraded age of vocal virtuosity had not yet
the final noisy ritornello at the close of an air ;
sometimes they are given a share in the accompaniment,
arrived ; the singers were not merely the most
but treated as a group antiphonal
to the harpsichord. Scarlatti, however, was
evidently interested in the development of
agile performers upon the most perfect of instruments,
but the most intellectual exponents
of the art of music. Scarlatti, the greatest
and almost the last of the great writers of
chamber -cantatas, practised in this form, as
Beethoven did in the pianoforte-sonata, from
his earliest years to that of his death. Over
five hundred of his cantatas have come down
to us, representing every period of his life, and
to be distinguished more as a conductor than as
3. composer. As early as ' Mitridate Eupatore we may often see that for any given period, as