Italian Opera Audiences and the Emotional Turn of the 1830s

Twenty or thirty years ago singers sang: now they declaim. Then they overindulged in agility and coloratura: now all they aspire to do is to be moving and expressive. La moda, 18431 Between 1825 and 1840, the world of Italian opera shifted rapidly and radically. In a few short years, Gioachino Rossini’s operas, which had dominated the repertoire to an unprecedented degree, were supplanted by those of Vincenzo Bellini (starting with Il Pirata, Milan, 1827) and Gaetano Donizetti, soon followed by Giuseppe Verdi. Rossini’s operas were chiefly appreciated for their richly ornamented singing and for their abstract, brilliant musical style. By contrast, according to observers of the time, what attracted audiences to Bellini and Donizetti was their attention to the emotional and semantic aspects of the text, and their ability to elicit the spectators’ strong empathy with the characters and circumstances of the story. Statistics confirm that the change was dramatic. In the 1820s, Rossini accounted for over forty percent of all performances (nearly fifty percent in 1822, 1823, 1827 and 1828). In 1830, there were 227 productions of Rossini’s operas in Italy—about half of the total2—followed, at a distance, by Giovanni Pacini (46), Donizetti (29), Saverio Mercadante (28), and Bellini (22)—composers who, with the exception of Bellini, had already been active for several years. In 1833, Rossini’s predominance was still clear with 157 productions, but a series of triumphs had improved the position of Bellini (84) and Donizetti (82). Then, suddenly, the dam broke: in 1834 Donizetti dominated the market (148), followed by Bellini (114); Rossini dropped to third place (105), followed by Luigi Ricci (75, thanks to the success of his Chiara di Rosenberg). In 1835, Bellini and Donizetti led the field (138 each), followed by Ricci (105); Rossini had fallen to 97.3 In an operatic system that thrived on variety and novelty, and in which the repertoire had a limited lifespan, a certain amount of turnover was inevitable; moreover, Rossini had stopped composing for Italian theatres in 1823 and withdrew entirely from opera in 1829. It must be pointed out, however, that the collapse of the Rossini empire was so abrupt that it stunned even his contemporaries, who found it impossible to believe that the Italian public had suddenly discovered, as if it were an absolute novelty, a new form of operatic experience based on empathy and emotion. Drafting Bellini’s obituary in 1836, Berlioz noted that his music had been hailed by Italian audiences as a revolution in operatic expressiveness: “it seemed that the tears shed at Il pirata and La straniera were the first that lyric drama had ever caused anyone to shed.”4 This article seeks to explore the reasons for what immediately appeared to be a sudden, surprising change in the tastes, expectations and practices of Italian opera audiences. It is partly based on the research that led to the publication of a book in which we explored the relationship between opera and society in nineteenth-century Italy, primarily from the point of view of the audience, discussing its attitudes, sensibilities and styles of behaviour during performances, as well as its role in determining the choices of managers and artists.5 This article draws on the extensive research on nineteenth-century Italian opera produced in recent decades, including some recent studies that have begun to shift the focus toward the audiences, their practices, and their motivations.6 In our research, as far as possible, we used “non-professional” sources and testimonies: diaries, correspondence, memoirs, etiquette books, fiction. These are sources that are usually produced in the upper ranks of society. Two documents of this kind, written fifteen years apart, illustrate the radical change in audiences’ attitudes and “affective style” during the 1830s. The first is by a twelve-year-old aristocrat, Teresa Thurn, daughter of the Austrian prefect of Venice, who writes to a peer—Maria Teresa d’Este, daughter of the Duke of Modena Francesco IV—to tell her about the upcoming 1828-29 Carnival season at the Teatro La Fenice in Venice: As for the singers, I fear they won’t be very good, the leading prima donna hasn’t been chosen yet, so God knows what they’ll give us. The two maestri who will write the operas are Mr. Generali and Mr. Coccia. Generali is known as a very good composer; he will write the first opera entitled Francesca da Rimini and you can see that if the singers aren’t there, it’s a loss because you go to the theatre to delight your ear …. I won’t describe the subject of this opera to you because you know it having read Dante. I think that this subject is too serious for an opera … Count Pola, a relative of ours, is writing the libretto; he is a good poet.7 From an adolescent’s perspective, this letter quite faithfully reflects what an aristocratic family that had a box at La Fenice generally expected from an operatic experience. Teresa assigns a certain importance to new scores and librettos, and evaluates composers’ reputations; however, she believes that the quality of the performance is key. If the singers are bad, it is not possible to “delight the ear,” which is the audience’s main reason for attending. Similar turns of phrase were frequent in the 1820s: we can quote an impresario, Angelo Petracchi, according to whom people go to the opera to “soothe the mind and heart with sweet melody”;8 or the singer Geltrude Righetti Giorgi (the first Rosina in Rossini’s Barbiere), who stated that “Italians desire an expressive music, which softly penetrates their hearts.”9 Italian audiences thus tended to consider delight and pleasure as the main purpose of listening to music, and they seemed to empathize only to some extent with the feelings of the characters on stage. Their “emotions” can be interpreted today as “aesthetic emotions,” defined by Winfried Menninghaus as “full-blown discrete emotions that, for all their differences in affective nature … always include an aesthetic evaluation/appreciation of the objects or events under consideration” and associated “with subjectively felt pleasure or displeasure.”10 Foreign travellers attending opera performances in early nineteenth-century Italy usually remarked on this hedonistic dimension. The Swiss politician George Mallet states that “the subject of the drama interests no one, and those who have seen it performed twenty times still do not know it”;11 according to Berlioz, “music for Italians is only a pleasure of the senses”;12 for Franz Liszt, opera for Italian audiences “is nothing more … than a concert in costume” and “the coherence between situations and music does not interest them.”13 Theresa Thurn’s letter, in fact, demonstrates that these judgments were excessive (we will address the value of foreign observers as historical sources later); however, it confirms that dramatic subjects entailing strong emotional participation were thought to be unsuitable for the operatic genre: Theresa sees the pathetic story of Francesca da Rimini as “too serious for an opera.” In 1844, Countess Faustina Capranica attended the first performance of Verdi’s Ernani, again at La Fenice: The dramatic situation of that trio, taken from Victor Hugo’s drama, is so heartbreaking that it hurts, and Guasco enters into his role so well, gives such an expressive accent to his sympathetic voice that a person who truly feels the music will leave the theatre out of sorts, and this happened to me; I went home with a heavy heart.14 Same city, same theatre, same social and cultural milieu (only the age is different: the writer is a young lady in her late twenties). Far from considering Victor Hugo’s Hernani “too serious” for an opera, Faustina is entirely caught up in a process of emotional identification: her reaction is even deeper than we could imagine. Not only does she find the dramatic situation “heartbreaking” when she witnesses it, but she is also affected by it: the end of the show, the applause, the conversations exchanged do not prevent her from leaving the theater “out of sorts” and “with a heavy heart.” The intensity of her reaction was not an isolated case: in the preceding years, there were increasingly frequent reports of strong emotional responses from spectators. In 1829 Bellini proudly notes that in Genoa a duet in Bianca e Fernando had aroused intense reactions in the audience: “last night the duet made everyone there cry.”15 Three years later he writes that in the second production of Norma (Bergamo 1832), the tenor Reina “makes people cry.”16 In 1833, at the Teatro Valle in Rome, Donizetti presented Il furioso all’isola di S. Domingo, a semi-serious opera that was to of the Italian of the the that two from the and had to be out of the In at the Teatro in Bellini’s di so that the season the to nothing but however, the the leave the theatre to the emotions that and have caused to From the also with characters with operatic characters and this a In the by lady in her with a dramatic Bellini’s on the in the distance, and her with that of the main of La The and Bellini’s of what and you are the a voice the story of the the of that in the the duet e the of a young during a performance of Bellini’s I is in an in the had not been In the short story e by Vincenzo a who believes he been a of on his he her to all the performances of Verdi’s an opera based on a story of used by Faustina Capranica in the letter demonstrates an change in audiences’ expectations and value writes that tenor Guasco a sympathetic voice that you his on that this which had been used with to music, frequent in the decades, in with such as and e or e The of that this out to be a of for were by their ability to emotional The singer the first in Verdi’s a her of the music, and she from from the of theatre and It two documents of interest to In the young a of the Italian to her with these I thought I had La in Milan, and I was to of it with a as I to so very were I listening to that I was and that it was only in that I had truly the and of that sympathetic and few years later the had in the as an of operas, a to her young a time, I had not felt an as strong as the you into when you interpreted the notes of the in La I and yet, I felt that intense pleasure that a times I desire to well you the and the end of that and thanks for having and its the new of these two are also because of their by the performance was generally a who who leave the theatre in to strong an and a was not at all to from and his emotional moreover, was a This that singers not only to moving and as La had as they also the same attitudes when attending a who to writing good operatic music with the of a strong emotional with and the subject Donizetti in “the heart the the few years later who by was far from to that when he is in the process of “the heart tears from the and the and are tended to this of revolution as the of and choices made by who to their on Bellini and Donizetti, who what “the in Italian opera, had in 1834 Bellini up these new by writing that drama must people and characters in the of composers’ attitudes and the of this in public In Count an writer on music and a based in a of Rossini’s could have been supplanted so he Bellini’s he not go so far as to consider his to he that the new because it was more and “the which I will must and the of its as soon as that of and The of the new all a and a of voice with a and no a as the young well to such a the the change only and so Italians to leave the opera in as Berlioz had been people shed tears for operas such as had made Italian audiences in the certain and musical in Rossini’s (the third of including the in were to elicit strong emotional and were the in his they were to the who was always to his audience’s write an opera in this emotional and at as as he for Italian theatres was to do so later with but for to what seemed to Italian audiences of the Rossini were not to the the aesthetic of they had to be by the this the of years composing for theatres and and the that have to from and dramatic he a success with di Teatro di 1828). in this was the first opera by Donizetti that in Italy and for several The for the opera was the dramatic that in the of the first this the public and that such usually on the and between the intense of the Luigi in the role of to the Donizetti was only half to an opera with a but still had to by the of the which was strong at when it was thought that the the to the of a and the the of in the and is with his a The was primarily a social and operas for the theatre had to be and a of the by the Donizetti are of the letter he to his on I will the first with a and the second with a in I to the of from now on I will again first with a everyone that if I were to into and be I could again I of however, is the that immediately this of the first is a and is very for the …. see it and it: it applause, and tears from Donizetti was of having made the I of the Two shed he this as an and the of the of from and to a dramatic with emotional including in a Donizetti seemed to the tears as a for the aesthetic he was to on in the years. of was no and the of the that Italian opera was not only by and public but also by social and this letter also the extent to which composers’ aesthetic revolution on the and responses of the operatic The of the thus seemed to on a on the of the Italian opera been the subject of intense research in recent decades, audiences’ and practices have not always the attention they this it is to go an of the and aspects that Italian that have attracted attention the if not into the and that and value to on of and the social of audiences on the of operatic as social and and the for of the expectations and sensibilities of audiences. In our recent research we have primarily to the role and of opera in the and experience of Italians at the As a we have also the of the and the from it the theatre and in of society. that the of the can be at in by that Italian opera of this from and social practices of and Italian opera the was in the in of and of all and that were to in in the same as a social thus from what was it only the as a very and opera to according to the theatre, the the the and expectations of audiences could be even in the same on the same this the opera can be a of and opera be as a system that went the theatres and public and the of and of the of the that not only tastes, but also their of affective This of for a of the of the main in attitudes in the by the by foreign of the that an opera in Italy was a social that no was in what happened on and only to the singing of a on the what they as and audiences, who their or to this of the of what they thus aspects that are from those they are to in their are by the of their of which were not the same for a a writer or a tended to from the few events they were to In nineteenth-century Italy, opera even and performances and audiences were not the same at the first or the in the Carnival season at La or for a performance at the Teatro in of the we have today were written by travellers or aristocratic who usually only the main theatres such as La in Milan, La Fenice in Venice, in These were only the of the The operatic experience also place in of in the same or Venice, or theatres were in at time, with than the main and in and very by no more than or have these but they could tell as if not about what the experience of opera was in Italy in or The Italian opera it was the of opera performances, which a of the followed and a place of of of of It was also a a of the all by the people tended to on their social and to in attention to the were or for an and went to the theatre so they had the to the same opera, or at a of it, or fifteen times in two This of the of a strong with the story The in the on the on there for the and only a It was made up of people from the who were usually more on what happened on even those who had a in the to go to the if they to the performance The which could be for a very was by people from the their who from opera was with social as a for the of the theatre not always we have several to the between in the to on the and those in the their to their to The were not all the some and had an and and on such no to the in attention was with of absolute these the appeared from the as a of performance to that which place on the on however, he followed the opera from a box in the the stage. The in the Carnival more and had a more of social those in the or were more and were This social to what to be a change in emotional in Italian audiences of the Rossini’s absolute over Italian opera had about it could to of those the historical that, according to at as This however, a too abstract, at for a of attended by people of all age and all social the that had the and opera was in but not from opera all at It is that for listening had already been in that in the same and even in the same but not always in the of their from those of the those who the Carnival from those of the those of the theatres from those of the opera with of social behaviour led to of and and to between a and a the pleasure they was in to the and the of the two that to their and their in the to focus on the opera from to to be and by the story and the music associated with In an intense emotional with the situations and characters on was as and behaviour of the and of the aristocratic that and listening was a of their social As late as the and that the theatre in for opera was not the Teatro but a one, the not only because its had but also because of the who it: only Verdi’s find an and In the associated emotional listening and if by he the he opera as the form by the of because of its ability to he that Italian of his to emotional listening also society fifteen years having made the of Donizetti for the same the of the of the on the in the we can out in the social of the at La theatre Bellini’s revolution there were styles of listening and in aristocratic and audiences As early as the Rossini and were by the that music must with the to the of the the and of Rossini’s music, the that it not you The value of these in the that were but aristocratic who a of participation in the It is possible, in fact, that theatres such as and such as the to two styles of can thus the theatres of as emotional emotional for In this a new when a but of aristocratic to “the of to the of a listening that had because it was too This was the at La we know that the of Bellini and were to the of a but very of the who for what the half a had for the young his The new also a new of that found tears not only but a truly form of we must not the of that the audience’s only its experience. are on the of they experience according to affective that are in social but also in the of the new is the of the on had always found in and for the of the in the early however, were to the and in to musical theatre of This that for a of the musical drama as such was truly the of the The same the in thanks to the in which they were the of a of moving the had of the aesthetic at years in read for from which they a of and attended In the of in which historical and were in attitudes that the spectators’ intense emotional to the of a for the of and This can be by an article a in in a for from who singing and in the during family It is for the she is a young of she the she the of her music she a her to the her on her on a the the of an The singer her or it is the same as as and even when to with the she the Then you see who out the to the you read in the you in the the of and This is this is the serious of In this a young her she an the she to all the of her she the The of the were at those of there is and at the same are no or no in there is no dramatic to … As as are of will have the of than they in from the loss of for we had for music, as they now we have only the of the of to the third about it, nothing must be in the of These are which a the and be certain that with these your will a than if they were to with and from the of this the of cultural the this young music and to of that even her the she is to the same emotional to listening in her theatre the such it is that it had and Italians to leave the opera in but this the opera the new of opera is a new of only and music as their emotional now in and in performances in the family As the this young can be seen as an emotional which the could not have into is of at the Modena and with the Fenice at the Teatro La Fenice in research on Italian music, nineteenth-century music, and opera the of Bellini’s include La da e and e Rome, is at the of research on the musical of the and on musical and on opera from the to the is of the of the of Bellini and recent include a on Gaetano Donizetti a on the role of opera in nineteenth-century Italian society entitled e Rome, a of the historical and sources of the of Rossini’s and a on