Education Guide The Flying Dutchman by ... - Edmonton Opera

A Short History of Opera
Opera as an art form began with the inclusion of incidental music performed during the tragedies and
comedies popular during ancient Greek times. The tradition of including music as an integral part of
theatrical activities expanded in Roman times and continued throughout the Middle Ages. Traditional
view holds that the first completely sung musical drama (or opera) developed in Florence in the 1570s by
an informal group of composers, musicians and artists known as the Florentine Camerata, which led to
the musical setting of Rinuccini’s drama, Dafne, by composer Jacopo Peri in 1597.
In the 17 th century, Italian masters Giulio Caccini and Claudio Monteverdi developed a kind of musical
entertainment where a story – including the events, conversations, and characterizations – is told through
singing and orchestral accompaniment. Two key components of these entertainments became hallmarks
of opera: recitative sections and arias. Recitatives are song-speech, and the words are sung but with little
or no recognizable melody, and with a rhythm that imitates those of speech. Recitatives function to
further the storyline of the drama. Arias (Italian for “air”) are main songs that reveal both the emotion of
the characters, and the qualities of the soloists’ voices. Additionally, there were groups of singers called
the chorus, who played background characters of the story. Their songs were usually a comment on the
action, much like the chorus from ancient Greek drama.
Opera gained popularity throughout Europe in the late 17 th and 18 th centuries and Italian composers
dominated the field (this is why operatic terms are often Italian words). German opera followed the lead
of Italian opera through much of the 18 th century, with composers actually producing operas to be sung
in Italian. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, an Austrian composer, wrote some of the first German-language
operas in the mid 18 th century, and also brought the technique of singspiel (“sing play” where spoken
dialogue is used instead of recitative) to greater attention. Giaochino Rossini was the most popular
composer at the turn of the 19 th century, and his best-known works were comic operas (known as opera
buffa). Giuseppe Verdi, the most prolific and influential operatic composer in the 19 th century, emerged
from the Italian bel canto and opera buffa styles to a new kind of opera, which focused on great emotion
and dramatic portrayal of character, and began the path to realism in operatic stories.
Also in the 19 th century, German composer Richard Wagner introduced the idea of through-composed
operas, in which the distinctions between aria and recitative were to be blurred entirely. He also used
leitmotif (wherein musical motives and phrases represent characters, ideas, or themes, and are reintroduced
throughout the work as a way of musically telling the story). At the turn of the 19 th century,
Giacomo Puccini followed his hero Verdi into the world of verismo opera, and told stories of common
people with a depth of emotion and transcendence of musical lines that has not been surpassed. In
France, George Bizet’s operas likewise focused on realistic characters and plots. Also at the turn of the
20 th century, Austrian, British, and Spanish composers were extremely popular for their light operas (and
operettas).
Today opera continues to grow, both in new staging and productions, and in the creation of new works.
American composers such as John Adams and Philip Glass are credited with breathing new innovation
into the art form, and Aaron Copeland took American history for the sources of his operatic works. John
Estacio, an Edmonton composer and John Murrell (an Albertan playwright) recently created an opera
called Filumena, which tells the story of the last woman executed in Alberta, and it was performed by
Edmonton Opera in 2005. Opera may be 500 years old, but it continues to captivate audiences and tell
important stories today!
Education Guide
The Flying Dutchman
by Richard Wagner
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