The Historical Origin of Opera

Opera (Italian: Opera) is a comprehensive art that integrates music (vocal music and instrumental music), drama (script and performance), literature (poetry), dance (folk dance and ballet) and stage art. Let me introduce the historical origin of opera to you. I hope it helps you. Welcome to read!

The historical origin of opera and its birth.

1. The origin of opera can be traced back to the tragedy of ancient Greece, and this art form is the root of opera art.

2. Some musical forms in the Middle Ages also laid the foundation for the emergence of opera. First, it is a religious drama at the end of 10 century. Later, it was replaced by mystery and miracle, which prevailed in14-16th century. Secondly, pastoral drama, which expresses rural life scenes by means of music, poetry and drama, has been popular until the16th century and has become one of the important origins of drama.

3. Pastoral opera in Renaissance also indicates the birth of opera. Composers use the genre of pastoral to write some dramatic scenes in poems, or use a group of pastoral songs to describe some simple storylines. The latter form is called pastoral opera.

4. The most direct origin of opera is Intermedio at the end of 15. This is some allegorical drama, divine drama or pastoral drama interspersed between the scenes of comedy at that time. In the16th century, the inter-scene drama between scenes has formed a related story in the plot, and decorative melody and simple harmony accompaniment have been added.

5. Opera was finally produced in Florence, Italy at the end of 16. At that time, a group of celebrities in the cultural and artistic circles often got together in the homes of noble Baldi and Colsy. They are keen to restore ancient Greek drama and try to create a vivid art that combines poetry and music. They believe that polyphony destroys the expression of the meaning of lyrics and advocate the use of single-part melody. In practice, they found that the tones freely sung under the accompaniment of harmony can be used not only in the same poem, but also in the whole drama. Then came the earliest opera, which became an idyllic drama.

The characteristics of opera:

Florence Opera House:

1. 1597 The first opera: Daphne, written by Leigh Nuccini and composed by Perry. Because the soundtrack of this work is only a fragment, people usually perform it at 1600, keeping it intact, with Leigh Nuccini writing the script and Perry and Caccini composing the music. [2]

2. Characteristics of early operas: The script was based on Greek mythology, and later historical themes were added. The music part is in the form of basso continuo, and the singing part is mainly in the form of recitation. The range is not wide, the rhythm is free, accompanied by a small number of instruments, and chorus is also used.

Roman opera:

1. Representative figures and works: Roman composer Cavalerie (about 1550- 1602) created "Anima's prayer", which was staged in February 1600, laying the foundation for Roman opera. The incarnation of spirit and flesh is actually regarded as a oratorio by historians, which has the embryonic form of opera and involves religious morality.

2. Features: Pay attention to the pleasure brought by spectacular opera scenes, and add gorgeous stage design, institutional settings and ballet scenes. Each scene ends with chorus and dance.

Venice Opera House:

1. Establishment of the first opera house: Saint Cassiano1637 established the first opera house in Venice, which was the transition of opera from aristocratic salons and courts to citizens.

2. Representative figures and works: 1607, Venetian opera writer Monteverdi completed the creation of the opera Oflo, and the theme of the opera is similar to that of Leo Nuccini's Eurydice. In the play, Monteverdi, with his rich experience in pastoral and religious music creation, combined with the use of various means in the music treasure house of16th century, made Flo the first truly opera in the history of opera.

3. Features: Arias and duets are widely used in opera, paying attention to emotional expression and bel canto, and rarely using chorus. For the first time, the stringed instrument family occupied an important position, thus strengthening the expressive force of music.

Naples Opera House:

1. Develop towards opera: Naples is the last city in the development of Italian opera, which began at the end of 17 and was shaped as 18 th century Celia opera, and its influence continued until 19 th century. Often based on fictional history or heroic deeds, and because of the pursuit of bel canto, those "eunuch" singers who have both strong lung capacity of men and soft and bright timbre of women are very popular.

2. Representative figures and works: aleman Dro scarlatti (1660- 1725), a representative figure of Neapolitan music school, created free-developing arias on the basis of lyricism of vocal music, which gave Bel Canto a broad space to display. The representative figure is Teodora.

3. Characteristics (also the characteristics of opera):

1) In terms of content, ancient myths and historical legends are the theme, and the content is serious, as opposed to comedy.

2) In terms of structural form, the original five-act opera has been changed into a compact three-act structure, and comedy interludes (Intremezzo, performed at the entrance of the stage) are often interspersed between the acts. It begins with a very unique overture (fast-slow-fast three-part form), and the recitation and the aria back to the beginning alternate, rarely using duets and chorus, and there is no dance.

3) Two different recitations: one is dry recitation, which is used for long dialogues or monologues, and the solo part is only accompanied by basso continuo; The other is a recitative with accompaniment, which is good at expressing complex emotions and is also used in dramatic tension scenes. The solo was accompanied by a band.

4) Looking back at the aria: This aria is a three-part form of Aba. Composers usually stop writing the reproduced paragraph A, but only mark da capo at the end of paragraph B, which means to repeat from the beginning, pretend to "go back to the beginning" and mark Fine at the end.

The development of opera

/kloc-At the end of 0/7, the Neapolitan opera school represented by scarlatti had the greatest influence in Rome. The school did not use chorus and ballet scenes in the play, but highly developed the solo technique called "Bel Canto" by later generations. When this style of "focusing only on singers" goes to extremes, the original dramatic expression and ideological connotation of opera are almost lost. Therefore, in the 1920s of 18, the Xi opera school with daily life as its theme, humorous plot and simple music rose. The first masterpiece of Italian comic opera is the Maid as a Housewife by Paglassie (premiered at 1733), which was originally an opera interlude. 1752 was vilified by conservatives when it was staged in Paris, thus setting off the famous "Great Debate on Happy Opera" in the history of opera. Rousseau's first French comedy opera "Village Diviner" was born under the inspiration of this debate and this opera.

Italian opera was first transformed in France and combined with French national culture. Lu Li is the founder of French opera ("lyric tragedy"). He not only created a solo melody closely combined with French, but also took the lead in applying ballet scenes to opera. In Britain, purcell created the first British national opera Didong and Ignace on the basis of his mask drama tradition. In Germany and Austria, Haydn, Dietdorf, Mozart and others developed folk operas into German-Austrian national operas, including Mozart's Magic Flute. By the18th century, Gluck insisted that opera must have profound content, music and drama should be unified, and performance should be simple and natural. His thoughts and works, such as Orflo and Eurydice and Figini of Orid, had a great influence on the development of later operas.

/kloc-After the 9th century, Italian opera masters such as G Rossini, G Verdi, G Puccini, German R Wagner, French G Bizet, Russian M.I. glinka, M.P. Musorgskiy and P.N. Pyotr Il'yich Tchaikovsky all made important contributions to the development of opera. Operas, formed in18th century, have evolved into an independent genre. It is characterized by short structure and popular music. Besides solo, duet, chorus and dance, it also uses popular English. Austrian composer Suo Beier and German composer Owen Bach are the founders of this genre.

Among the opera composers in the 20th century, Richard Strauss was a representative influenced by Wagner in the early days. After World War I, it was Berger who applied the atonality principle to opera creation. Since the 1940s, there have been: Stravinsky, prokofiev, Mi Yue, Manotti, Barbier, Orff, Janus Della, Henze, Moore and the famous British composer Britten.

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