MUSICAL LIFE IN EUROPE 1600_1900

CIRCULATION, INSTITUTIONS, REPRESENTATION

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Christoph-Hellmut Mahling, Christian Meyer, Eugene K. Wolf t

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Italian Operain Central Europe

1 614 -1780

Volwme 2:Italianità: Image and Practice

edited byCorinna Herr, Herbert Seifert,

Andrea Sommer-Mathis and Reinhard Strohm

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Cover illustration:

JacoPo AMIGONIItalian 1682-l'152

Portrait group: The singer Farinelli and friends c.1'750-52

oil on canvas

172.8 x245.1 cm

National Gallery of Victoria, MelbourneFelton Bequest,1949

detail

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o 2008

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Dedicated to the Memory of

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XIV

- for this volume esPeciallY

tive team of the EuroPean

possible.

Preface

- Christian Meyeq together with the administra-

Science Foundation, for making this publication

This volume is dedicated to the memory of our dear colleague Eugene K. Wolf,

who co-directed the ESF programme right up to his death, on 12 December

2002.

('orinnu llerr. Herbcrt S§ifert, Anclrca Sommcr-Mathis, Reinhard Strohm

llocltttnt, Viettrtrt. attd Oxford, 7 April2008

'l'ablc of Contents

('ttrinno II<,rr, Herbert Seifert, Andrea Sommer-Mathis, Reinhard StrohmI rt t rocl uction/Einleitung

I'AIìT I _ ITALIANIT,,ì AS RECEPTION OF CLASSICALI'IIXTS AND TOPICS

llainhard StrohmRttntunità and ltalianità: Ancient Rome in the Dramma per Musica,c. I660-c. 1730 ............

llul'luele MellaceAchilles'Mirror: Renaissance Italy behind Classical Topics on the( );rcratic Stage...........

lllclania Bucciarelli( 'lrrssical Tragedy in the Italian Manner: The Case of Polidoro..

.ll.lred Noe( icschichte und Fiktion in Nicolo

IART II - DRAMMA PER MUSIC,4 AND ITALIANITAAS PERCEIVED IN LOCAL CENTRES

,\igrid T'HooftItuliunitìt in Brussels around 1650: The Opera Ulisse nell'isola di Circelry Giuseppe Zamponi.....

li',vna MlakarVrrtt der comedia cantata zum dramma per musica. Die Anfànge derilirlicnischen Oper in Mùnchen

Alury E. FrandsenM trsical Internationalism and Italianità in Mid-Seventeenth-CenturyI )rcsden

('tttrduce Marles( )pcra in Hannover: The German Synthesis of National Styles..............

ll

4t

55

69

85

87

103

115

r41

XVI lirlrle ol ('otrlr'rrls

Milada Jonaiov[tItalienische Opernarien irn Dom zu St. Vcit in Prag........ .... 163

PART III - IMAGE AND TRANSFORMATION OFITALIANITA THROUGHOUT EUROPE.............. ....... 201

Jér6me de La GorceLa résistance à l'opéra italien en France au XVIIe siècle......................... 209

Christine StreubùhrDie Darstellung der italienischen Oper in deutschsprachigenReiseberichten des 17. Jahrhunderts.............. ...................... 219

Alina Zéraw s ka- Witkow skaZur Rezeption der drammi per musica von Pietro Metastasio in derpolnischenKulturdes18.Jahrhunderts.................. ............243

Corinna HewThe Castrato Voice as a Paradigm of the manière italienne:French Discourse on Italian Music and Compositional Practicearound 1700............ .................... 263

Monika Woitas

Wandertruppen und Starsolisten: Italienische Tanzer in Deutschlandim 18. Jahrhundert......... ............. 287

Dorothea SchrÒderItalienbild und Italiensehnsucht im Norden: Zu einigenBùhnenbildentwiìrrfen von Johann Oswald Harms und ihren Quellen..... 303

List of used (RISM) Library Sig1a........... ....... 323

Bibliography ........... 325

List of Contributors.................. ...................... 345

40 Reinhard Strohm

and yet I am an unfortunate shepherdess"). Thus the two alternative forms ofpolitical status and living campagna and city are allegorically and visually

represented in foreground and distance. In I,9 of the same opera, the stage-

set is identified as the campagna near the river Sebeto'

Sunrises in pastoral surroundings are sometimes used to represent politi-

cal content such as peace missions with the presentation of olive branches.

One of the most frequent stage attractions was the cutting of trees or whole

forests in preparation for a siege. This has already happened at the outset ofonori.o in Roma (Giannini, 1692, see above) I,1: "Vasta campagna ingombra-

ta da selva già recisa, con Roma in lontano". In any case the archaeological

vista and the generic pastoral or battlefleld-set are combined'

r. Transferability of Roman items

La.forza elella virtù (David/C. Pollarolo, S. Giovanni Grisostomo, 1693), has

the following scene: in Tole{o at the time of Pedro the Cruel, a spectacle of

the Battaglia tJelle Amazzoni sul Termodonte is performed in an amphithea-

tre. Thus the Greek mythological spectacle, a meta-theatrical performance,

happens in a pseudo-Roman stage-set. The location of an amphitheatre in

Tole<lo is historically more probable, however, than the enactment of Ama-

zon battles in the Mid«lle Ages: amphitheatres can be used everywhere in

opera, as they do exist 'everywhere', but in this case their use is placed in the

wrong saeculum.

Achilles' Mirror:Renaissance ltaly behind Classical Topics on the Operatic Stage'

Raffaele Mellace

Specchio kt scudofia2

From its very beginning, the repertoire of opera has been inspired by classi-

cal civilisation, originally mythology and then ancient history.3 As a result,the theatres ol Europe were filled with classical heroes and characters untilthe romantic age. Howevet these classicising productions were very far liomdepicting the ideologies and cultures of the Mediterranean civilisations ofancient times. In fact, opera producers of the seventeenth and eighteenthcenturies had no interest in demonstrating the values of ancient myths. Itmight be appropriate to look at Jean Starobinski's eighteenth-century dis-tinction between 'fable'and 'mythologie'. The former, anti-historical, helpedthe educated person to communicate and understand the common languageof contemporary culture, extensively expressed through mythology; the latterconsistcd of erudition, genuine historical knowledge of ancient mythology,and was strictly reserved for specialists and scholars.a

Classical topics are rather used as 'masks'which the modern scholar andopera-goer must lilt in order to appreciate the authors'actual ideological mes-

sage. The result may be surprising: the face hidden behind the ancient maskis in fact the civilisation of Italian Renaissance courts, as mirrored by Ital-ian literature ol the late sixteenth century. lts fundamental moral and socialdilemmas continued to be faced in eighteenth-century courtly life: dreamsand anxieties explored by intellectuals under the guise of classicism.

There could be no better perspective from which to examine this pheno-

menon than the works of the most celebrated eighteenth-century librettist,Pietro Metastasio. who lived in Vienna from 1730 until his death in 1782.

With his libretti, the use of classical subjects in opera became a true dramaticproject, fulfilling the needs of the Habsburg Court and, at the same time,

I I anr most gratelul to Roderick Swanston, Royal College of Music, London, for his pre-cior-rs initial help with the English version of this article.:' l'rtrl<r ll<tlli, D a i do nt i a, Ill,2.tSco l.rrrcrrztr lliarrcor-ri, Music in thc Seventeenlh Century (Cambridge, 1987), pp. 174,

I ti6- ll(9.I | 'r'cctlorrr ol' irrvontion w:rs ullowccl 1o thc point that the works of seventeenth- and eight-t'crrllrtcrrlurvrrrrllrors,srrchlrsl.lrl"onlirincorlìrrrssclLt,"peuventètreconsidéréscommerlr's ri'irrtt'r pr'('l;rliorrs tlcs grrrrtls llri'rrrcs rrryllritlrrr:s". wltcro artists crtulcl fìnd "l'occasion.l'urr lilrrt' jr'rr tlt'lcurs lrrerrlles". st'r'.li':rrr SllrtrrlrinsLi. "l.e Irrylhc lru XVlllo siòclc". (-rr-

tttlttt . \\ ( l')//1 lrI t)/(' ')/(). ()r'/ ()r()

Ir

42 Raflaele Mellace

conveying a precise interpretation of human society' For more than forty

y"urr, r.À nz+ to 1165, all of Metastasio,s dramas took ancient topics as

their subject. However, he used all his classical sources' even those outside the

onesheacknowledgesinhisargomenti,withapoet,sfreedom.Attheheightof his fame, he did not try to hide this licence as he boasted to a younger col-

league ,.how little [his major masterworks] owed to their historical sources"'5

Morethanthirtyyearsearlierhehadstatedthesameindependencefromanysource inttre argomento of Achille in sciro,the festive opera staged for such a

prominento".u,io,astheweddingoftheheirtothethrone,thearchduchessivturia Theresia, with Franz Stephan, Duke of Lorraine' in 1736:

Incontrasiquestofattopressocheintuttigliantichiemodernipoeti;maessendo essi tantà air"oiai fra loro nelle circostanze, noi senz' attenerci più

all'uno che all, altro abbiam tolto da ciascheduno ciò che meglio alla con-

dotta della nostra favola è convenuto'6

Eight years later, the qrgomento of a newdrama' Antigono' written for the

polish_Saxon court of òresden, closes with the following, very telling note:

,.I1 fondamento istorico è di Trogo Pompeo. Ma la maggior parte si flnge'"7

ThisdeclarationcanbefoundinboththedifferenteditionspublishedinDresdenin|l44forthepremièretomusicbyHasse,andlaterintheRettinelli(V"ri"., 1745), Quillaujfaris, 1755) andReale (Turin'1751) editions' How-

àr"r, *h., Metasìasio came to deliver the final complete edition of his dramas,

ùy Herissant (paris, l7g0), the poet decided that the word "ma" ("however")

connecting the two conflicting statements could simply be omitted' without

generating any contradiction' To the old Metastasio' looking back on his

frf,y-y.u.*"u.elr, this seemed perfectly right' and he felt no need even to hide

5 ,,si compiaccia [. . .] di esaminare alcuna delle più fortunate opere mie (come l' Artaserse

p", ""Ài""

d'es"mpio, i;oii*pioa' o tt Demofoon.l:).:il"otuà Tl?llt^*':'t di quanto

;;.; ;;""" esse deùitrici alle istoriche loro sorgenti". ("Please examine some of my most

celebrated works, e.g., Artaserse, L'Olimpiade or Demofoonte: you'r.e ggTg P be amazed

at how little they owe to tfr.ir historical iources"l, Letter to Luigi Pio (12 February 1770)'

in: pietro Metastasio, ru-tin tn np*n,ed. by Bruno Brunelli (Milan, 1943-54)'vo1' 4' p' 802'

Metastasio *u. -iri*i.irg ,ti i*por,u""e of the choice ol topic to the success ol a

drama. still, the admissioi of the minor importance of 'historical' sources in the great

masterpieces ol Metastasian theatre is telling'6.,This episod. -uV U.ìourrOin nearly all aicient and modern poets; but since they disa-

gree so much on the lacts, we did not iollow anyone more than any other and rather took

fromeachofthemwhatsuitedtheintrigueofourplot,,,PietroMetastaslo,Drammipermusica,ed. by Anna f-urr* S"ttirru, 3 vils (Venice, 2002-2004), vol' 2, pp' 446-44'7 ' (Al1

translations from the r,"ii"" uv the authoi unless stated otherwise.) Metastasio made

no change fiom the..igìr"i ri:o libretto (vienna) in the compiete edition of his works

(Ptris, 1780).7.,.1.hc historicirl basis is pourpcius Trogus. But most [of the plot] is invented'" The refèr-

t.nce is lo l,orrr,r:irrs lìog,us. lli.ttrtritrc i'ltili1,1,irrtc.ol'which only the Epitttme by Justintrs

,lrrt t,ivr':r

I{cllrisslrrrct. Illrly lrelrrrrrl ('llrssrtrtl'lìrprts ott llte ( )pt'rlttlt'Slltlit' 'l ì

this apparcr-rt corltraclictiot.l: "ll ltlrldanlcrtto istorico c di 'l'rogo l)tlttlpctl' ['it

maggior parte si flnge."8io U" àUt" to judge Metastasio's behaviouq we should take note of the fact

that a 'literal' restoration of ancient drama on the operatic stage met with a

powerful obstacle, namely that opera never embraced the cathartic require-

ment described in Aristotle's Poetics.Instead, it set itself up from the start as

the genre opposed to classical tragedy. The best evidence of this is that the

earliest op"iu* did not use the topics of ancient tragedies.e Moreover, Metas-

tasio demonstrates the long life of this attitude very clearly in the tight, some-

times sarcastic argument he uses rnthe Estratto dell'arte poetica d'Aristotile

to denounce the ethics and aesthetics of Aristotle and the classical tragedians,

which he felt were incomprehensible, arbitrary and inadequate. He devotes

most of chapter Six to this topic. His judgment on oedipus, the ttagtc hero,

demonstrates this. For Metastasio, some of Aristotle's characters are

[...]buoniinfelicissimi,comelosventuratofigliodiLaioincui(conpaceài Èlotu."o e de'suoi dotti seguaci) non si trova altro vero delitto che quel-

1o d'aver così ingiustamente ed inumanamente punito un innocente in se

stesso. lo

Totally uninterested in the archaeological restoration of values connected

with ancient myths and historical exempla in setting classical topics, Metas-

tasio allowed much more recent literary memories to operate with great free-

dom.1l This process might be clarifled with a crucial example, the pivotal

scene of Achille in Sciro'. completely neglected by literary historians for two

8 Metastasio, Drammiper musica, voi. 3, p. 67.e Lorenzo Bianconi notices that, in its first phase, opera avoids completely the celebrated

myths ol Greek tragic theatre (Aeschylus, sophocles, Euripides) and their Latin coun-

teipart (Seneca), pre-ferring "più dolci affetti" ("more tender feelings"), as it is put in the

frotogrre to Rinuccini's Z*iiirn,l600. Opera existed "not under the banner ol the tragic

cathaisis ol heroic and sacrificial mythology [...] but on the lertile - indeed, enchanted

terrain of a mythology of metamorphoses and origins"; see Bianconi, Music in the seven-

teenth Century, P. 174.l0 ,,virtuous but wretched, like the unfortunate son of Laius, who - no matter what Plu-

tarch or his learned lollowers thought about it is not guilty of anything other than

having so unjustly and cruelly punished a man who was innocent in himse1f", Metastasio,

Tutte le opere,vol.2, P. 1031.It A numter of rich textual relerences throughout Metastasio's dramas, which conflrm the

thesis discussed in this papel, ale found in Alberto Beniscelli, Felicità sognate. Il' teatro di

Metastasio (Genova, 2000i; partly anticipated by the paper "Luci del1a pastorale ed ombre

della tragedia ne1 trittico viennese: Demetrio, Olimpiade' Demofoonte", in:_Cont'egno

per il teio centenario dellu nascita del Metastasio, Rome, 2-5 December 1998 (Rome,

)OOt;, pp. 233-265). On the relationship between Metastasio and his classical sources, see

in partìcular paragraph IL2, "Spazi d'Arcadia", pp. 64-86. Costantino Maeder, Metasta-

,ri,,, ,,f'Oli*pìodr';

" i'opnro tleliettecento (Bologna, 1993), notices that the poet, turning

both to anCient and modern sources eighteenth-century libretti included operated

thc "breaking off of a mosaic into pieces and the reassembling of a new mosaic", "a pro-

$:

14 l{rrllìrelc Mcll;tt'c

centuries. this drama has attlactccl thc attcntion ol'a lìunlbol'ol'sclrolur.s ilt

recent years.12 The crucial scene takes place at the heart of the dramit, irl thc

middle of Act ll. Achilles has been concealed on the island of Skyros and

dressed as a woman to avoid his destiny, death at Troy. Prompted by Ulysses

and Arcas, he decides to give up his female disguise and take up his vocationas a warrioq replacing lyre and female clothing with shield and sword. lt is

no coincidence that exactly this scene, the fatal moment of Achilles' deci-

sion,13 has been chosen as the frontispiece of Achille in Sciro (engraved byPietro Antonio Martini) in the Hérissant edition authoriscd by the poet him-

self. The engraving shows Ulysses and Arcas looking at Achilles in female

dress, as he takes up sword and shield, having thrown his lyre to the ground.

Even more tellingly, volume 2 of Drama and other poems; oJ the Abbé PietroMetastasio. Translated from the ltalian by John Hoole (London, 1800) shows

as its frontispiece (and the only engraving in the volume) the dramatic ges-

ceeding typical of classical literary practice" (p. 182), and that exactly these "intertextualstrateg:ies" greatly affect the inventio of the dramas (p. 178).12 Achille in Sciro was taken into consideration only about 200 years after Metastasio'sdeath and became the object of considerable critical interest during the following decade;

see Elena Sala Di Felice, Metastasb. Ideologia, drttmm.aturgia, spettacolo (Milan, 1983),

pp. 37-38 and passim; Mercedes Viale Ferrero, "Le didascalie sceniche del Metastasio",in'. Convegno indetto inoccasione del II centenario dellamorte di Metastasio..., Roma25-27 maggio 19B3 (Rome, 1985; Atti dei nmvegni dei Lincei,65), pp. 143-144; Jacques Joly,

"Le didascalie per la recitazione nei drammi del Metastasio", in: Convegno indetto, pp.

280-83; Helmut Hucke,"L'Achille in Sciro di Domenico Sarri e f inaugurazione del Teatro

di S. Carlo", in: Bruno Cagli and Agostino Ziino (eds), Il teatro di San Carlo 1737-19B7.

L'opera, il bullo (Naples, 1987), pp.21-32;. Raffaele Mellace, 'Achille in Sciro" di PietroMetastasio: tre intonazioni a t:on;fronto (Caldara, Leo, Hasse) (Dissertation, Universitàdegli Studi di Milano, Academical Year 1992193); idem, "L'Achille in Sciro di Pietro Me-tastasio", Studi italiani, 7 (1995), 2, pp. 55-77 (at p. 60 a short discussion of the subject's

success until 1736); idem, "Tre intonazioni dell'Achille in Sciro a confronto: Caldara, Leo,Hasse", Il Saggiatore musicale,3 (1996), pp. 33-701 Reinhard Strohm, Drumma per Mu-sica: ltalian Opera Seria o/ the Eighteenth Centttry (London and New Haven, 1997), pp.

108-117; Wendy Heller, "Relorming Achilles: Gender, Opera Seria and the Rhetoric of theEnlightened Hero", Early Music 26 (1998), pp. 562-581; Armando F. Ivaldi (ed.). AchilleinSciro. Parodiaintreatti(Gerrua, 1998); Beniscelli, Felicitàsognate,pp. 131-133; Andrea

Sommer-Mathis, " Achille in Sci.ro eine europiiische Oper?" ìn: Andrea Sommer'-Mathisand Elisabeth Theresia Hilscher (eds), Metastasio - uomo universale ( 1698-1782) (Wien,2000), pp. 221-250; Teresa Maria Gialdroni, "soggetti metastasiani nel ballo pantomimotra Sette e Ottocento", in: Elena Sala di Felice and Rossana Caira Lumetti (.eds\, Il me-

lodramma di Pietro Met($tasio: la poesia, la musica, la messa in ,scena e I'opara italiananel Settecento (Rome,200l), pp. 569-607; Francesca Menchelli-Buttini,"Achille in Sciro:

Drama and Ceremony", in: Melania Bucciarelli, Norbert Dubowy and Reinhard Strohm(eds), Italian Opera in Central Europe, vol. I'. Instittttions and Ceremonies (Berlin, 2006;

Musical Life in Europe 1600-1900), pp.253-274. On the subject of Achilles on the isie ofS§ros see also Lorenzo Bianconi and Thomas Walker, "Dalla Finta puzza alla Verentrtn-

da: storie di flebiarmonicl", Rivista italiana di musicologia, l0 (1975). pp. 380-454, and Lo-renzo Bianconi, " Lu finta pazza ritrovata" , in'. La.finta pazza (Venice, 1987), pp. 967 -81 .

r3II,8, in Metastasio, Tutte le opere,vol. l, pp.783-785.

llt'rrrissrurtr' ll;rly lrt'lrrrrrl ('lirssiclrl lirpit's orr llrt'( )pcllrlic Sllrgc 4.5

Irrrc rll'Aclrillcs tlrirwiug his sworcl.l'r Mctastasio tr.rrns without hcsitatìonto'lbrcluuto'l-usso's l'uoclcl to write this scene: in particulaq the celebratedpage I'rom Gcrusulemmc liheratu where Rinaldo, thanks to the intervention ofhis fellow crusaders Carlo and Ubaldo, awakens from the idleness to whichhe has been allured by Armida.l5 Exactly in the same way, Achilles is takenaway from Deidamia by the clever Greeks, according to a dialectic betweenduty and pleasure.16 The dramatic 'scene' invented by Tasso for the poem isimported by Metastasio into his drama through a simple change of the char-acters'names and the exploitation of all the symbolic potential of the scene.

In the drama, we lìnd again the armours and swords which had awakenedthe dormant warrior rage of Rinaldo/Achille; again the furious gesture oftearing off feminine garments;17 again, above all, that coup de thédtre as thehero mirrors himself in the shield, experiencing a powerful surge of self-con-sciousness. The trick had been suggested to the two crusaders by the wizardof Ascalona: "e d'adamante/ un scudo, ch'io darò, gli alziate al volto;/ sì

ch'egli vi si specchi, e 'l suo sembiantei veggia, e l'abito molle onde fu invol-to:/ ché a tal vista potrà vergogna e sdegno/ scacciar dal petto suo l'amoreindegno".ls The early baroque game of the shield converting itself into a mir-ror is situated by the sixteenth-century poet at the beginning of the episode,while Metastasio employs it as the dramatic climax of the scene. However,the value and function of the gesture do not change from one author to theother. The image mirrored by the shield/mirror accomplishes the transitionof Rinaldo/Achille from the world of eros to that of yirtus.te In the century

ra In Hoole's translation: 'Achilles: This hand debas'd/ Shal1 wield the ponderous buck-ler's honour'd weight,/ And this the gleaming sword. (takes the shield and sword) Ah! nowI feel/ I know mysell Achilles Lead me, Gods!/ To rneet the glorious labours of the fleld,/And dare with single lorce a thousand foes." (fbid., p. 5l .)1s Torquato Tasso, Ia Gerusalemme liberata, ed. by Lanfranco Caretti (Torino, 1993),p.479-482, canto XVI, l8-26.16 Francesco De Sanctis, commenting in 1866 on Tasso's page, noticed that "the idea itselfof the warrior kept in idleness away from war goes back to Achille in Sciro"; see Franc-esco De Sanctis, Saggi critici (Milan, 1971), p. 143. The comparison, howeveq had beenestablished long beforehand by Angelico Aprosio, member of the Venetian Accademiadegli lncogniti , inhis Lo scudo di Rinaldo (Venice, I 646); see Heller, "Reforming Achilles",p. 581, fln. 30.17 "Squarciossi i vani fregi" ("he tore off his vain ornaments"), writes Tasso (canto XVI,p. 34): those same "fregi" are pointed out by Ulysses to Achilles in order to convince him,successfnlly in fact, to react to his idle state (Tasso, Gerusalemme liberatu, p.484, cantoxvr,34).18 "Lift/ in front of his lace a diamond shield I'11 give you,/ so that he might mirrorhimself in it and see his look/ and the effeminate clothing he has been wearing:/ at thatsight shame and rage/ are going to chase from his heart that shameful love" (ibid., p. 445,canto XIV, 77). Tasso had also devoted to the mirror's wonderlul power a celebratedmadrigal, Donna, il bel vetro tondo.le Laura Benedetti suggests an intriguing interpretation: 'As soon as Rinaldo defines hisidentity in comparison with (and in opposition to) the debased one seen in the mirror, the

46 Raffaele Mellace

and a half between Tasso and Metastasio, both literary situations were enor-

mously popular subjects for painters throughout Europe - from Annibale

to luàovicà Carracci, from Domenichino to Guercino, from Mattia Preti to

JacopoAmigoni,fromPietrodaCortonatoNicolasPoussin,fromSimonVouÉt to Luca Giordano, from Frangois Boucher to "il Baciccio", from Pom-

peo Batoni to Giambattista Tiepolo, from Angelika Kauffmann to the Prado

"u.rru, of 'Achilles discovered'ipainted by Anton van Dyck and reworked by

Peter Paul Rubens.2o

Both themes enjoyed a similar popularity on the stage' The subject of

Achilles in skyros was exploited in opera already in Giulio Strozzi's and

Francesco sacrati's La finta pazza of 1641. Latet operatic versions included

Domenico Scarlatti's retide in sciro (1712,on a libretto by Carlo Sigismondo

Capece) and Handel's last opera, Deidamia (1741, on a text by Paolo Rolli);

Metastasio,s libretto received more than thirty settings. There were various

otherspectacularplayssuchas ballet-opéras,balladoperas'tragédies-lyriques'

pantomimes and ballets. The number of operas dealing with the character of

Armida may be even greater: the series starts with Benedetto Ferrari's Armida

(1639)-roughlyatthesametimeastheAchillesubject,andlikewiseinVen-ice - and continues, most notably, with the operas by Jean-Baptiste Lully

(1686),TommasoTraetta(1761),NiccoloJommelli(|110),ChristophWilli-bald Gluck (1171)and Joseph Haydn (1784), until Gioachino Rossini (1817)'

as well as works of smalleisize, such as George Frideric Handel's dramatic

cantata Armida ab b an do na t a (" Dietro 1' orme fu gaci"' l'1 0T'21

Renaissance Itaty behind classical 'ftipics on thc ()pc|iltlc S(ilgc 41

The image reflected by the shieldimirror is therefore not the lace ol a le-

gendary Greek hero, but Rinaldo's, as created by Torquato Tasso in the 1570s.

This is not an isolated case. A number of textual signs clearly show strong

links between Metastasio's dramas and another precise ideological literary

area: the tragicomic genre of the pastorale, the development of which

paralleled opera from the start, as it was popularised during the last years ofthe sixteenth century (the 'autumn' of the Renaissance)22 by the great poet

Tasso.23

It is beyond the scope of this article to explore all the relationships

between Metastasio's drammi per musica and this literary tradition, a rela-

tionship which began with Metastasio's tragedy Giustino, written when he

was a young man.24 The thematic and textual references to Tasso's work are

certainly numerous: Metastasio was an attentive and sympathetic reader

both of Gerusalemme liberata and Amintq. Consider for example, in some

pivotal moments of Achille in sciro, the precise reduplication of the scene

of Hercules in lemale clothing beside Iole from the bas-relieves of the gate

in Armida's palace (Tasso had devoted an entire octave to this scene, canto

XVI,3). Metastasio transforms this scene into a sculptural group, cunningly

commented upon by Ulysses, while Achilles is listening, standing aside ("in

disparte", II,2). The chorus "Lungi lungi fuggite fuggite", which introduces

the banquet in honour of the Greek guests in the "Gran sala illuminata",

and thus the pivotal change of the dramatic action (II,7) sounds as if it were

quoting the inscription written on the entrance of Aurora's cave, "Lungi, ah

lungi ite, profàni", which Dafne mentions to Silvia in the opening scene ofTasso's Aminta (I,l). The latter, in fact, already quotes a real inscription, in

Latin, on the entrance of the famous hall with frescoes by Dosso Dossi in

the Castello Estense of Ferrara. The hyperbole of Ulysses's statement, as he

invites Lycomedes to war against Troy, saying that "Tutta Europa v'accorre"

metamorfosi transalpine di Armida: opere su soggetti tasseschi in Germania ed Austria

nel Sei-Settecento". in: Alberto Colzani and others (eds), Il melodramma italiano in ltalia

e in Germunia nell'età harocca, Proceedings of the 5th International Conference on Seven-

teenth-century ltalian music, Loveno di Menaggio (como), 28-30 June 1993, (Como,

1995), pp.8l-104.22 I borrow this expression frorn Carlo Ossola, Autunno del Rinascimento. "Idea del Tem-

pio" tlell'arte nell'ultimo Cinquecento (Florence, 1971). My thanks are due to Giuseppe

Dalla Palma for pointing it out to me.lt On Aminttis musical quality and its availability to musical settings, see Maria Grazia

Acccrrsi, Aminra: ritorno a Saturno (Catanzaro, 1998). The pastoral's lortune in the

r:ightcenth century is witnessed by such works as the Gobelins tapestries on drawings by

lrnrnqois Boucher on "stories ol Aminta and silvia", now in Paris, collection du Mo-

biliol Nalional.' r Scc lìcn iscoll i, llalit'ità sognute, pp. 14,18. De Sanctis commented that after the death ofIris st,vclc rìlcut()r. Vinccnzo Gravina, Metastasio "threw himself on the prohibited fruit:(;t,ltyttl(lttttt, liltrt'trltr, ,4rtrinltr. l\r,s'tor.fido", FrancescO De Sanctis, Storia della letteratura

ttttlitttttt. itl. by Mltlilr'li'r'cslr l.ltttzlt (Millttl, 1964), vol. 2,p.764.

authority of the mother must give way to the law of the father", see Laura Benedetti, lasconfitta di Diana. Ltn percorso'per la i'Gerusalemme liherata" (Ravenna, 1996), p' 73' The

i.p"", ,r the shielcl/mirror metaphor is documented in the quoted book by Angelico

Aprosio, Lo scudo di Rinuldo. The power of this metaphor is still present-in twentieth-

cerrtu.y'"r-rltrre, as seen in Jacques Lacan, "Le stade du miroir' Théorie d'un moment

structurant et génétique de 1a constitution de 1a réalité, congu en relation avec fexpérience

et la doctrine fsychoanalytique", paper read at the fourteenth International Congress olpr,.fr.u"uf,.ir in Uarientaà urd publith.d as "The Looking-Glass Phase" in the Inter-

nitional Journal oJ P sychoanal1sls, I 8 (1931 ), pp' 1 6-1 9)'20 A number ol less well-kno*n uitit,., srrch us Ale.sandro Tiarini, Paolo Domenico Fi-

noglia,DomenicoFiasella,GiovanniBonati,andGiuseppeMazzola'alsoworkedonthe."6:."i of Rinaldo and Armida. Together with episodes connected with rancredi and

òtoilrau, and with Erminia u*orrg ih. shepherds, the episode of Rinaldo and Armida

is one of the most popular f nolthe mosi popular in European paintings of Tasso's

poelr.eo.o.rr.r"yorrthepopularityofthetoPicsinpainting'seeSandorPigler'Barock'tltemen: eine AuswahL,on'Veìreichiissen zur lkonographie des 17. und lB' Jahrhunderts

(Budapest,1956),vol.1I,pp.263-466and-448-45l.andAndreaBuzzoni(ed')'TorquatoTasso tra letteratura, *uriro, teatro, e ttrti.figurative (Bologna, 1985)' See also Arnaldo Di

Benedetto, .'Lo sguardo di Armida (Un'icona della Geru.solemme liberata)", in: idcnr' 7'rrr

RinosrittrL,nt, e l)uxtt,rtt. Dul pct.rurthisrrtu t.r'litrrlutrltt Zr,rso (Florence,2007). pp 99-lll'll ln iìrklition to thc s1'rccilìc'frihliogrltllhy oll cltclt opcta ltttcl comp()scr' scc'l'inr ('itr-

tcr.. Ar.t. "Ar.,ritl:r". ,t. (irr4,t, l, v,'1. i. 111',' l()(r-l()7: (iiovlttttti Morclli illlil lrlvitlio Stttirtrl'

(,t)illtuli,l"lt.rttirht, irr: lìrrzzotti, litrrltutltt /ir.\\i,. 1)l). 1 \l (r5. ltrrtl lìollcll l' l(clrtlritk.''l'c

48 Raffaele Mellace

(,A11 of Europe is going there", II,7) becomes clear in connection with Tas-

so,s model. Ubaldo's decisive speech to Rinaldo (canto xvl,32) begins, in

fact: .,va l'Asia tutta e va l'Europa in guerra" ('All of Europe and all of

Asia go to war") a statement justifled by the chronological location of the

poem (the first crusade). A flnal example: Deidamia, desperately trying to

ietain Achilles,25 follows Armida's model: she threatens to witness faithless

Achilles's future punishment as "ombra seguace" ("a ghost following him"),

an expression using some of the same words and rhymes as Armida's similar

appeal.26 Armida serves as a model not only for Deidamiain Achille in Sciro

but also for Dido;27 Demetrio and L'Olimpiade owe their thematic and narra-

tive texture to two of the most celebtated pastorali, Il pastor fido by Guarino

Guarini and La Filli di Sciro by Guidubaldo Bonarelli, and Demofoonte takes

as its model Tasso's tragedy Torrismondo.2s It was not an accident that Giaco-

mo Leopardi, with remarkable literary sensitivity, remarked (on27 February

1821) that Metastasio was the only true Italian poet after Tasso'2e

In order to put the story of Achilles in Skyros on stage, Metastasio turned

to the episode concerning Rinaldo and Armida, which represents the "climax

of the process of melodramatisation o f Gerusalemme liberata's epic texture",30

in pariicular to the moment in the poem when Rinaldo finds in himself the

"orrrug. to resist evil temptation and to lead his fellow crusaders to victory.

25 This scene is the other pivotal moment in the drama: it is no coincidence that several

composers set just this scene and Il,B,inrecitativo accompagnato'26 Càmpare Aimida's famous stanza 59 ol canto XVI, "Vattene pur, crudel, con quella

pacel cÀe lasci a me: vattene, iniquo, omai./ Me tosto ignudo spirto, ombra seguace/ In-

àivisibilmente a tergo avrai" with Deidamia's "Va', scellerato,/ va pur; fuggi da me; ['..]Ombra seguace,/ presente ovunque sei,/ vedrò le mie vendette" ([I,3)'27Beniscelli, Felicità sognate, pp.30-31. The derivation of Enea's and Dido's dialogue

in Metastasio (Didone'abbanioiata,l,lT) lrom the conflictual dialogue between Rinal-

do and Armida in Tasso is shown by Anna Laura Bellina in her edition ol Metastasio,

Drammi per musica,vol. 1, p. 588. See already De Sanctis, Storia della letteruturd italiana,

vol. 2, p. 339.28 See Èrancesca Menchelli-Buttit"t, Pietro Metdstasio's Drammi per Musica in their Musi-

cal settings ( 17i0-1745 )(D. Phil. diss. University of oxford, 1999), pp. 152-161, and the

complex argumentation in Beniscelli, Felicità sognate' pp' 69-86, 89-94'2e The connection between the two names, if made somewhat hesitantly, is probably not

coincidental: "si può dire [...] che un uomo degno del nome del poeta, se non forse ilMetastasio, non.iu nato in Italia dopo il Tasso" ("it could be said [".] that no one born

in Italy after Tasso deserved the name of poet, if not perhaps Metastasio"). See Giacomo

Leopardi, Zibaldone, in: idem, Tutte le opere, ed. by walter Binni and Enrico Ghidetti

(Florence, 1969), vol. 2,P.216.ì0.,L upi". del processo «li melodrammattzzazione del tessuto epico de1la Liberata": Be-

niscelli, Felicità sognate, p. 30. Even Armida's garden was to become a metaphor of the

operatic show. In iB26 Victor-Joseph-Etienne de Jouy wrote: "Je me représente la muse

.ià l,opera sous la lìgure cle l'enchanteresse Armide, dans un séjour magique où la nzrture

cnticrc r:st sournisc ir scs lois": scc.lotty's "Essiti srtr l'opéra franqais", ed. by Anselm Cer-

lrrrtrl, irt: llttlltltirrtt tful rcttlrtt rtt't't'irtittttrt tli ";lrtli' l9t{7. l-3, P' (r4'

Iì.crririsstrlcc ltirly [clrirrtl ('lrrssicrrl 'lirlrir:s ott lltc ( )pert itlic Slitgc 49

The handling of'that part of the poem must havc lttscinatsd Mctastasio, cort-

vincing him to adopt Tasso's model. Unlike Virgil in the Aeneid, Tasso delays

reason;s revenge on the passions, allowing an analysis of those same passions

- as demonstrated in the dramatic dialogue between Rinaldo and Armida,

which Metastasio imitated in both Didone and Achille'3|

The question discussed concerns the dialectics between Nature and Reason,

between man's original and natural disposition and its control by an ethical

and religious law which corrects its intemperance, allowing an harmonious

developirent not only of the individual conscience, but also of the entire

social iabric. The question Tasso deals with in his poem is "the making of

society, the possibiùty of transcending a natural world perceived as chaos, in

orderio live according to a cultural pattern inspired by God".32 We must read

in this way the efforts made by Rinaldo and Tancredi to distance themselves

from the pagan women, Armida and clorinda, and their discovery that "the

enemy is not only outside ourselves, but also inside ourselves, and that nature

coincides with our own nature". 'The threatening other'is actually "the dark

side of ourselves: the knights must face their own irrationality, weakness, fear'

and show they are able tò control them".33 The story about the fi.rst crusade

aims to offer an up-to-date solution to contemporary problems of living: a

solution followed by the itleology expressed in Metastasio's dramas, the pri-

mary audience of which, from 1730, was the lmperial court - which, in turn,

aimed to become a model for society.

Metastasio's interpretation of the classical is therefore flltered through a

sensibility which he perceived as similar to his own. This sensibility is marked

by ideological questions typical of Italian courtly society of the late Renais-

sance, a society deeply influenced by the counter-Reformation. The conflicts

experienced by the knights in Tasso's Gerusalemme liberata or by nymphs

anà shepherds in the pistorati translate into poetic language the tensions of

a countiy, Italy, divided between the hetlonism of the Renaissance and the

Catholic Reform. For this reason' both Tasso and the pastorale proposed a

relationship between Reason and Nature which, 150 years lateq was still con-

temporaryìnd fltted the Imperial Court's ideology; an ideology characterised

by a decline in aristocratic values and a striving towards cultural restoration,

the heir to both Renaissance courtly civilisation and counter-Reformation.

The direction of this striving, indeed its intention, is an incipient enlightened

absolutism, which finds perfect expression in a kind of handbook for the

perfect prince: Metastasio's Il re pastore'

31 A comparison between virgil's model and Tasso's imitation can be lound in claudio

Scarpati, .,Enea e Didone, Rlàtao e Armida", in: Luigi Belloni, Guido Milanese ancl An-

tonietta Porro (eds), studia classica lohanni Tarditi oblata (Milan, 1995), vol. 2, pp. 1327-

1343:1330-1335.12 Benedetti, La sconfitta di Diana, p. 122.:ìr Ibid., p. 122.

50 Raffaele Mellace

The solution proposed by late Renaissance models does not owe its effec-

tiveness to the rhetoric of a virtuous 'ancient' heroism, or to a generic clas-

sical or Roman heroism deprived of its 'holiness'. The rational control ofoneself, which coincides with the recovery of a unitary perception of one's

identity, does not in fact exclude the prolonged and deep experience of pas-

sion. This is demonstrated much more by Metastasio's libretti than by those

of Zeno, his predecessor in Vienna.34 The unitary concept of identity derives

exactly from the laborious assumption of a modern, hard and problematic

interior conflict, which must be resolved through a moral process, necessarily

in dialectic relationship with the ideas of Counter-Reformation. The out-

come is therefore an unstable, dynamic balance, which is tellingly exemplifled

by Tasso's conscience and life. Neither Tasso nor the genre of the pa.storale

censure passion's disruptive side, making use of it as an essential aspect ofan instructive sentimental novel. In the eighteenth century, these uses of pas-

sion were still perceived as shameful by some of the most illustrious critics:

according to Gerolamo Tiraboschi, for example, " Pastor fido should not be

reacl nor seen on the stage in the most frail and sensitive age".35 Metasta-

sio's open-minde<1 exploration of passions is nowadays also recognised by

critics of his theatre, which is crowded with restless characters who reveal

their hearts'tormented contradictions on the way towards a rational control(which is, in fact, not always completely acquired). As in the works of late six-

teenth-century authors, these passions are given considerable space, showing

the difficult situation ol characters for whom ancient virtus rs a distant model

which must be newly conceived in a completely translormed context. The vic-

tory ol ethos is not going to fail, but will succeed only through the laborious

and dialectic encounter with eros. The allegory of Virtue itself, Aretéa, sug-

gests to the reluctant protagonist of Alcide al bivitt (alias the future emperor

Joseph II) a suitable reconciliation between the opposite principles of pleas-

ure and reality (Alcide al bivio, scene I l):

Del Cielo un dono,/ non men che la ragione,/ è il desio del piacer; ma i doniuniti/ separar non convien. Denno a vicenda/ secondarsi fra lor. Quella,

3a A famous text by Metastasio can be found, not by chance, in the quoted chapter devo-

tecl to catharsis in ancient tragedy: "Son pur le umane passioni i necessari venti co'qualisi naviga per questo mar della vita; e perché sien prosperi i viaggi non convien già pro-

porsi 1'artà impossibile d'estinguerli; ma quella bensì di utilmente valersene, restringendo

àd alargando le vele ora a questo ora a quello, a misura de1la loro giovevole o dannosa

efficacia ne1 condurci al dritto cammino o nel deviarcene." ("Human passions are like the

winds, necessary to sail in the sea which is life; and in order to secure a smooth journey.

it is pointless to aim at the impossible task of extinguishing them; on the contrary, one

shoutd usefully take advantage of them, tightening or releasing the sails to tl-ris or tl-rat

one, accor6ingly to their uselul or noxious eflect in leading us to the right path or in cli-

vcrlirrg rrs lront it."), Mctitslitsio. Tirttt la opL'rc.v<tl.2. p. 103 l.r5 "ll /,allol fitlo nol tlovlchbc cssclc lcllo tt('sui tcrrtti vctlrrto ncgli alrni piir liirgili ctl

:rt cr'rrsilrili". tlttolctl ltl lr't llt'rriscelli. li lir ilrr 'trt.tlttrttr'. p. il5.

Renaissance ltaly behind Classical Topics on the Operatic Stage 51

prudente,/ sceglie e misura; anima l'altro: e quindi/ stimolo han le bell'opre,/soccorso e premio. Ed a gran torto i1 Cielo/ di tirannia s'accusa,/ quando ildono è castigo a chi ne abusa.36

Both Armida and Deidamia must yield to their lovers'virtuous fate, but onlyat the end of many pages devoted to them,37 and alter a conflict the result ofwhich remains difficult to predict until the very end.

The case of the protagonist of Adriano in Siria is telling: the Roman emper-or shows a fragmented personality, torn apart by a multitude of impulseswhich cause a disruption of any solid and statuesque Roman spirit. Reason's

triumph comes, finally, as recovery from a disease * the prevalence of pas-

sions that dominates the emperor for the entire drama.3S The settings ofcomposers such as Pergolesi illustrated the poet's point of view and helpedgreatly in making the audience aware of such hidden implications. As Adria-no is addressing Farnaspe, the hancé of Emirena, the girl with whom he

himself has secretly fallen in love (I,1), he cannot help revealing, in an aside,

his own fatal involvement. The line "e la mia sorte ancor" in Adriano's firstaria "Dal labbro che t'accende" is given a powerful pathetic setting in Per-golesi's score, revealing to the audience that the emperor's words conceal apainful dilemma. Faithful to this modern interpretation of the classical mind,Metastasio modified even a legendary hero such as Attilio Regolo: as the poetexplained to Hasse, who was to set the drama to music, he had "painted theprotagonist as receptive to all the legitimate passions of humanity, but supe-

rior to each one of them".3e The character of Titus is deeply indebted to theChristian idea of forgiveness,a0 and elements of pity soften Cato's inflexible

36'A boon from Heaven,/ not less than Reason,/ is the desire of Pleasure;/ but the twoconnected boons/ should not be separated. They must support one another. The former,cautious,/ chooses and estimates; the latter gives iife: 1ì'om that/ good deeds take impulse,/l-relp and prize. Unjustly is Heaven accused of tyranny,/ when the boon becomes a punish-ment lor those who abuse it." Metastasio, Tutte le opere. vol. 2, p. 411. This recitative isimmediately lollowed by the quartet, in Hasse's magnificent setting: "La ragion se dàlegge agli affetti,/ la virtù se ministra i diletti/ Che serena, che placida calma,/ che sincero,che vero goder!" ("Il Reason governs passions,/ il Virtue gives pleasures,/ what a serene, apeaceful calm,/ what a sincere, a true delight!")17 Armida in the twentieth and last canto of Gerusalemme Liberata, Deidamia in the lastscene of the drama. Their'conversion'is absolutely necessary to the ideology of bothtexts. "Armida's conversion allows femininity, now educated and conscious ol its limits,to be situated in the perlect society dreamed of by the poet. The city does, in fact, needwomen.", Benedetti, La sconfitta di. Diuna, p.74.18 See .lacclues .loly, "Metastasio e le sintesi della contraddizione. Dall'Enea negli Eli,tiall' ldriono in Siriu" , in: iden'r, Dugli Elisi all'in/èrno. Il melodramma tra ltalia e Franciatltrl 17.10 a/ /,\-5(/ (lrlorcrtcc, lc)90), pp. 59,63.r" '"1... I scrrsibilo ir luttc Ic pcnncssc passioni clcll'r"rmanità; ma superiore a ciascuna", Me-lirslirsio, 'lirl lc lt ()/)('r'(', v()1. ). 1't. 421 .

'rr) M'u( l rrrlrrrrli llrs lllrcerl t'llrssic:rl vlrlrrcs irr lircnclr thcirlrc succcssivc to the Coun-lr'r lìr'lirrn;rli()n in "l'lri'r'riisrrrc torni'licrr cl l'itli'lrl tlc lir rturgrtirttiurité", in: (ìcolgcs

*

52 Raffaele Mellace

rigidity in the second version of Catone in (Jtica.at The classical is therefore

reduced to an "empty shel1",42 an illustrious stage mask, the content of which

is the fight for control of a modern distress. It might even be converted into

an allegory of christian heroism, as happens in the late Trionfo di cletia.a3

To return to our main example, Achille in sciro, it must be acknowledged

that an interpretation in line with modern Christian moral values would have

been appropriate to the Habsburg wedding taking place in vienna on Sunday

12 February 1736 which the drama was intended to celebrate. Achille in Sciro

deals with the typical topics of love and glory: no later than 1742, Metastasio

wrote the cantata Il trionfo della gloria ("Dell'oziosa Sciro"), based on the

same myth of Achilles on the isle on Skyros.aa The dramatic choice between

these two paths is solved in Achille in Sciro in a supreme conciliation: the

young couple, who one day will sit on the imperial throne (quite soon, in

fact, since Charles VI died suddenly four years later) must experience passion

and still aspire to glory. The more glorious Achilles, a brave warrior who is

not deaf to feminine attractions, is on the battlefield, the more worthy he

is of being loved. To give strength to this message, Glory, Love and Time

descend from the clouds in the final Licenza, declaring that love between the

two youngsters has originated from the reciprocal knowledge of the glorious

past of both families and the aspiration to glory which unites them.45 The

teautiful soprano voice of Felice Salimbeni (whom Metastasio strongly re-

commended to his brother in Rome), even if singing in female attire and play-

ing a lyre at a Greek banquet, would in fact be dealing with something which

had to do much more with the hard moral and political - choices waiting

for the new couple than with the exotic landscape of ancient Skyros'

To sum up, this interpretation of the classical through the literature, sen-

sibility and values of the late Renaissance produced a virtuous circle. The

main cultural operation of arts and literature in sixteenth-century Italy was

of course the imitation of the classics. In the eighteenth century, it was pos-

sible to use Renaissance literature as a fllter to stage classical topics, precisely

Livet and Noémi Hepp led.), Héroisme et création littéraire sous les règnes d'Henri IV et

de Louis XIIL Colloque organisé par le Centre de philologie ed de l.ittératures romanes de

l'(Iniversité des sciences humaines de Strasbourg et la Societé d'étude du XIIIe siècle (Patis,

1974), pp. 53-7 6; ital. tratsl. Eroi e oratori. Retorica e drammaturgia secentesche (Bologna,

1990), pp. 137-168.ar See Mariasilvia T'atti. "La romanità rivisitata dei melodrammi di Metastasio", in:

Elena Sala di Felice and Rossana Caira Lumetti,Il melodramma di Pietro Metastasio,

pp.267 -303:289-295.iiI o*" the image to Jo1y, "Metastasio e le sintesi della contraddizione", p' 63'a3 See Tatti, "La romanitèr rivisitata", pp. 298-302.a Metastasio, Tutte le opere,vol.2,p.703.a5 see Mellace .,,L'Achille in sciro di Pietro Metastasio", pp. 6l-66, and Andrea sommer-

Mathis. Tu felix Austriu nuha. Hochzci.tsfe,rte det Habsburger im 18. Jahrhundert (Yienna,

1994; rlrutnnrtt pcr rrrrr.';it'tr,4). pp. (r8-74.

l{crlrisslutcc lltrly bt:lrilrrl ('lirssiclrl 'lirltics ott lltc ()pctlttic Sllrgc 5l

bocausc pools sttcl.t tts'lìtsso ancl Ctrarini had alrcacly becn writing irr ernula-

tion ol' and on the samc wave length as the classical authors. Eighteenth-

century opera, however, realises a sort of 'squared'imitation of the classical,

heavily conditioned by intermediate contributions. The process of imitation/inspiration/emulation is not without consequences: each successive passage

creates a new stratiflcation of values over the centuries between model and

imitation.Finally, Metastasio himself apparently reveals in his last drama - for the

first time, not based on an ancient topic _- that Renaissance civilisation is at

the heart of his inspiration. Composing 1/ Ruggierct, oyyero l'Eroica grati-

tudine, the poet goes back to one of the great Renaissance poems: Orlando

furioso, a text which has been used, and abused, by opera since the seven-

teenth century. However, the episode Metastasio chose for his drama is very

interesting. He chose not the spectacular, magical and romantic aspects ofthe poem which had fascinated libretto writers and composers alike (the sor-

ceress Alcina, Atlante's castle, Astolfo riding the Hippogryph), but a second-

ary episode, which occurs at the end of the long poem (the last two cantos).46

The only interest in the chosen episode is the heroic exercise of moral virtues:

primarily, Ruggiero's gratitude towards his rival in love, Leone. The protago-

nist experiences the typical distress of Metastasian heroes, a dilemma of the

utmost ditlculty which brings back to the stage, in a sort of self-quotation,

the poetic ghosts of L'Olimpiade, indeed the core of that masterpiece: the

debt of friendship which dramatically requires the hero to subjugate his own

feelings and even to Iìght against them.aT This episode from Ariosto's poem

is a kind of Metastasian topic in itself, which flts the overriding theme ofthe imperial poet's work without change. Surprisingly enough' thirty years

before Il Ruggiero was written, the relationship between Ariosto's subject and

Metastasio's drama was noticed by Charles de Brosses inhis Lettres d'Italie

a6 Canti XLV and XLVI, even if Metastasio indicates as his source the entire episode,

wlrich begins one canto earlier (.Tutte le opere, vol. 1, p. 1337). By then the poem's story is

nearly over, as Calvino puts it: "We must hurry to loosen every knot: Orlando has recov-

ered his wits, Carlo has won the war, only the marriage between Bradamante and Rug-

giero is left," see c. Minoia (ed.'|, Italo Calvino racconta I'orlando furioso (Milan, 1995),

p. 115. See also Raffaele Mellace, "Il Ruggiero o vero Metastasio e Hasse tra Ariosto e

Mozart", in: Michael Jahn and Angela Pachovsky (eds), Feslscftrift Leopold M. Kantner

:um 70. Geburtstag (Tutzing, 2OO2; Studien zur Musikwissenschaft,49), pp. 341-361 and

i<lem, L'autunno del Metastasio. Gli ultimi drammi per musica di Johunn Adoll' Hasse (Flo-rcnce, 2007; Historiae Musicae Cultores, 1 l0), pp. 65-80.a7 Alberto Beniscelli flnds the same dramatic mechanism in both libretti, where "a char-

Irctcr breaks the erotic balances, falling in love with the wrong person" (Felicità sognate,

p. I 51). Anna Laura Bellina has even detected textual concordances in both dramas (Anna

l,irr-rra Bellina, "Mitridate, Ruggiero e Lucio Silla.Tre allestimenti intorno a Parini", in:(i. Ilarbarisi et al. (eds), L'amabil rito: società e culturanella Milano di Parini (Bologna,

)ll(\0; tJniversità degli Studi di Milano - Quadetni di Acme,45'), vol. 2, pp. 751-766.

54 Raffaele Mellace

of 1739t40: "Le sujet [of Metastasio's L'Olimpiade) est tiré de l'histoire de

Léon et de Roger dans l'Arioste."48Even without a classical subject in the case of Il Ruggiero, Metastasio,

with the help of the Renaissance poet, restated the two-sided formula of his

writing for the theatre: an interior conflict which, on the one hand, can be

investigated in all its subtleties, showing the contradictions that passions gen-

erate in human hearts; and, on the other, offers a chance for the virtuous exer-

cise of reason, which can control these passions, even if moved and upset by

their influence. This question was once again prompted by the 'reagent'of the

extraordinary Renaissance period of Italian literature, which continued tospeak to European courts for two more centuries after its end, often and, inMetastasio's dramas, very subtly - disguised under the mask of classicism.

.r8('lrirrlcstlr:llr6sscs, l,(1r(s(l'lt4li( ll7.ì9-401 (lrrrris, l92lì),vol.2,gt.253

Classical Tragedy in the Italian Manner:The Case of Polidovo

Melania Bucciarelli

Polydorus, one of the early operas that Carl Heinrich Graun composed forBraunschweig, highlights an unusual link with the Italian classical tradition.First staged in l73l,t Polydorus was subsequently revived, unmodified, inHamburg in 1735-36.2 Johann Samuel Mùller, the author of the poetic text,translated and adapted the libretto, Polidoro, of the Venetian Agostino Pio-vene. The Italian poet had made use of an early seventeenth-century tragedy,of the same title, by Count Pomponio Torelli. The libretto which resultedfrom the reworking of Torelli's tragedy was set to music by the Venetian com-poser Antonio Lotti and staged at the Teatro Santi Giovanni e Paolo in Veni-ce during the Carnival of 1715 (l714mv). How Piovene's text migrated tonorthern Germany remains unclear. It is possible that Lotti might have takena copy of the score with him when he left for Dresden inl7l7, and it is inDresden, where Lotti remained until 1719, that Polidoro might have becomeknown to Graun, then a talented young singer and composer, and a pupil atthe Dresden Kreuzschule.3

The fact that Piovene's original libretto was modelled on a spoken dramawas not unusual. By 1715, the year of Polidoro's Italian performance, thepractice of adopting models from spoken theatre had become, if not common-place, less exceptional. Piovene himself had experimented with Jean-NicolasPradon's Tamerlan ou la Mort de Baiazet for his own libretto Tamerlano of1710, and numerous librettists in Venice and elsewhere in Italy had been usingthe French dramas of Pierre and Thomas Corneille, Jean Racine, Jacques

Pradon, Georges de Scudéry, Frangois Joseph Lagrange-Chancel, Jean-Gal-bert de Campistron, Gautier de Costes de La Calprenède and Jean de Rotrou

I Albert Mayer-Reinach, "Carl Heinrich Graun als Opernkomponist", Sammelbcinde derinternationalen Musik-Gesellschaft, | (1899-1900), pp. 446-529, suggests that Polydorusmight have been performed as early as 1726. The earliest extant libretto, the one I haveused in this study, dates back to 1731 (D-Hs, 1297). This is identical to the libretto for the1735 Hamburg performance (GB-Lbl, Hirsch IV1339). Renate Brockpàhler, Handbuchzur Geschichte der Barockoper in Deutschland (Emsdetten, 1964), p.95, confirms the un-certainty about the first performance of Polydorus in Braunschweig.2 Hans Joachim Marx and Dorothea SchrÒdeq Die Hamburger Gdnsemarkt-Oper. Kata-Iog dar Tc.xtbùchcr ( l67tì-174B) (Laaber, 1995), p. 317. According to Marx and Schròder,l\tl.trloru,r wirs pcrlìrrnrecl in Harnbr.rrg on 23 November 1735,2 December l'735, 12 Jarlt-rrry I 7.ì(r luttl l() .ltrrrc I 7.1(r.rli. lirrgcrrcllulrrr,All."(ilrrrn,('rrll lKirlllllcinlich".in'.(ìxtvcl,vol.2,pp.5l9-520.