Handel’s last opera premiered in 1741, and his final oratorio (Jeptha) premiered in 1752. And then ….? Notoriously, English opera went silent.
So what else was happening in opera from mid-eighteenth to end of the nineteenth century? Just Gluck, Mozart, Beethoven, Rossini, Donizetti, Bellini, Verdi, Berlioz, Gounod, Wagner, Mussorgsky, Borodin, Tchaikovsky, Rimsky-Korsakov, Pucchini, Dvojak, Janacek, Strauss… to name a few. Not very English names. And some at least were very popular with the London audiences.
Check out this timeline from ENO. Or this fuller one from San Francisco. Or this list of the premieres of a galaxy of great operas we know so well – and none of them in English. Here’s Wikipedia’s summary of the stars.
So English audiences were flooded with European operas. But the summaries don’t mention the only two English composers of English operas that have survived in the repertoire, between Handel and Britten – Thomas Arne and Ralph Vaughan Williams. And they don’t allow the Savoy operas of Gilbert and Sullivan.
Rule Thomas Arne!
When Handel ruled London, also there was Thomas Arne. He’s now best known for Rule, Britannia, as sung (with muffled words) by the huge patriotic audience every Last Night of the Proms. It was from his masque titled Alfred, presented for the prince of Wales who was keen to appear British in 1740, then as an oratorio in 1745 and an opera in 1753. (Alfred is mustering forces after defeat by the Vikings, haughty tyrants indeed.) Here's 'Rule Britannia' in a recording from the opera – with the words! The voices are of Alfred and his wife Altruda.)
But his work lost favour, and while he produced sonatas for royalty and musical afterpieces and incidental music for theatre it was almost twenty years before more big successes – the most celebrated being Artaxerxes
He’s credited with revived interest in opera in the 1730s – post Beggar’s Opera - partly because he pointed Handel to the commercial possibilities of large-scale works in English. But also because he produced the first English opera seria in English, Artaxerxes, which premiered in 1762.
Sound familiar? Remember Handel’s flop, Serse (1738)? The king who serenaded a plane tree also fathered Ataxerxes. (Yes I checked; his mother was Amastre, whose belated reunion with Serse ends Handel’s opera. Whew!)
Artaxerxes was a seriously seria opera, apparently evading the audience preference for John Gay’s variety of humour. It has an over the top classic plot about royalty distant in time and place, splendid arias starring great singers. So why did it succeed in England at the time Handel’s operas were failing?
Ah – but it was in English! It was set to an English translation (probably by Arne himself) of a libretto by Metastasio, the most productive librettist of the 18th century – and possibly of all times – his output was 800 librettos. His libretto for Artaxerxes was written for Leonardo Vinci , whose Artaserse premiered in February 1730 and some 90 other composers then used it!!
It also has absolutely gorgeous music. This review of Arne’s and Hasse’s versions includes lots of extracts illustrating “the grace and imagination of Arne's writing”. Little remains on current recordings of Arne’s other works, apart from the lovely trio sonatas he wrote in the 50s. It’s hard to understand the long years when he produced nothing of else of note. His rickety personal life may explain some of this puzzle. Here’s a splendid account of the man, the marriage and the music from Tim Ashley.)
Arne’s version of Artaxerxes was, and remained for a century, hugely successful despite a riot over theatre pricing marring the second run, and the requirement of three roles for castrati voices proving a challenge in later years. Here’s Wikipedia.
There’s no DVD recording of a performance, but several recordings of splendid extracts.
They are – yes – in English but if you want the exact words here’s the full libretto.
And here’s Marilyn Horne singing ‘Oh! too lovely!’ in 1963.
Summary from Chandos recordings: ‘Arne’s early melodic style was natural and elegant, owing something to Scots, Irish, and Italian sources. His later music became more Italianate and ornamented, though in his final years there emerged an opera buffa style that anticipates Sullivan. As the composer of such melodies as “Rule, Britannia,” “Blow, Blow, Thou Winter Wind,” and “Where the Bee Sucks,” Arne, like Henry Purcell, added substantially to the English heritage of song. He is generally regarded as the most important English composer of the 18th century.’
Ralf Vaughan Williams
And after Arne? If we jump the Savoy Operas (we’ll celebrate them next week), the next English opera (in English) of note was in Sir John in Love, libretto by William Shakespeare, and delightful music written between 1924/1928 by Ralph Vaughan Williams.
Here’s a short intro to this very English composer. He produced five opera-like works. Here they are with links to descriptions. But Sir John in Love was the only one he called an opera. It was written between 1924 and 1928.
‘I consider it to be of high musical value and that is also the view of Vaughan Williams’ biographer, Michael Kennedy, who considers the work to be most mellifluous and sweet. He finds it inexplicable why this high-spirited piece has failed to find a place in the repertory. Beautiful and exciting music abounds throughout.’
The story of the man informs his music. A good account from conductor Andrew Manze is here. 'Cultural roots lie deep and old. Dig deep enough, as Vaughan Williams did, and you find the roots of music entangled, shared even with other cultures, on a bedrock of pentatonics, ancient modes, hymns, chorales and folk dance. Perhaps for that reason Vaughan Williams had so much respect for Sibelius, the great Finnish composer to whom he dedicated that marvellous fifth symphony “without permission”. Their music sounds and feels totally different but they were both mining the same deep cultural seam.'
Never mind that Verdi had already done Falstaff, (in Italian) and there were other operas from The Merry Wives. Vaughan Williams by contrast just set Shakespeare (in English) to music. And it's great music, a mix of very English melodies and folk songs with fine drama scenes - the finale being the famous one. There’s a thoughtful discussion of the opera and its Englishness in Bachtrack’s review here; in summary ‘a rich and wonderful concoction that deserves to be in the repertoire of opera houses in this country, but also internationally’.
It included his fantasia on Greensleaves, later often played as a concert piece in its own right. Listen to the fantasia at the Proms here.
In the opera, "Vaughan Williams revives the style of Tudor polyphony he revered so much alongside the folk tunes ‘Greensleeves’ and ‘Lovely Joan’, encased in his signature glistening, vibrant musical style. There’s a peaceful and serene quality to this score, yet it is steeped in a strong, patriotic spirit." More about his most famous pieces, with recordings - yes, including that lark – here.
‘One of the charms of the score is the way Vaughan Williams not only, and characteristically, quotes folksongs and draws upon a folk idiom – ‘Greensleeves’, which is mentioned twice in the play, is sung by Mistress Ford before Sir John’s wooing and then forms an instrumental interlude which later became the well-known Fantasia – but how he also creates opportunities for songs to arise within the drama – love songs, satirical songs, ceremonial songs, drinking songs, French chansons, metrical psalms.’ Read more here.
Like Artaxerxes, this opera disappeared for a long while, but has recently been revived – in odd corners of the English-speaking world. We’ll watch segments from a production by Bronx Opera – it’s in full on YouTube here.
