Drama-Music Communication in Opera Performance

The study “Drama-Music Communication in Opera Performance” builds on my 35-year experience of lyric drama in opera production. In my career as a director, which spanned from Baroque opera to contemporary opera, I was intrigued by the multiple connections between the musical dramaturgy, vocal expressiveness, stage image and impact on the audience. Consequently, I realised that all these elements which rely on musical scores are connected by something similar to the principle of communicating vessels: with genuine and intense musical-dramatic communication, the artistic emotion may reach the same level in all the components of the connections mentioned above.

Opera Dilogy der Beglückte Florindo (“Florindo Made Happy”) and Die Verwandelte Daphne (“Daphne Metamorphosed”) by G.F. Handel / Problem of Plot Formation

In line with the interest of domestic researchers in libretto of vintage operas and Baroque music theatre, this article turns over a new leaf of the G.F. Handel’s operas of his early period, and also puts them into the context of the performance traditions of the Hamburg State Opera at the turn of the 17th and 18th centuries. Der beglückte Florindo (“Florindo made happy”) and Die verwandelte Daphne (“Daphne metamorphosed”) are the operas, which were performed on the stage of the Hamburg Theatre at the Gänsemarkt square (lit. Geese Market) and became not only the first G.F. Handel’s try on the genre of pastorals, but also a prime example of a Baroque opera dilogy. As the composer’s music sheets have been almost completely lost, the author is focused on the preserved texts of the libretto and sets an objective to identify their specificity in the context of plot formation of a Baroque opera. This article makes an attempt to analyze Handel’s opera dilogy in fine detail. Thus, the author reveals the underlying dramatic conflict between two gods – Phoebus and Cupid, determines the number of pairs of characters involved in the love dramaturgical line and provides schemes depicting their relationships. In addition, there are enlisted key plot motifs such as mutual/unrequited love motif, motif of suffering, death motif, hatred motif, revenge motif and guile motifs. The identification of the role of each of these motifs in the plot contributes to the confirmation of the hypothesis that Handel’s dilogy belongs to the traditional samples of the early 18th century operatic texts, which are distinguished by the complex intrigue, the intricate love relationships of characters, the typical plot and situational schemes

From the Medieval to the Baroque

This chapter is the first of the authors’ two substantial investigations into the post-classical reception of Cyclopean mythology. The account begins in the European Middle Ages, with representations of ‘races’ of Wild Men, some of whom are one-eyed. A more explicit echo of the classical Cyclopes occurs in numerous allegorical readings of the Ulysses–Polyphemus and Polyphemus–Galatea–Acis encounters. For all the apparent implausibility of such readings, it is important to realize that in allegory myths constitute a site for the allegorist’s display of interpretative prowess. The myths’ continuing relevance, and indeed their very survival, are thereby enhanced rather than reduced. The next section of the chapter looks at some virtuoso painted Polyphemuses from major Renaissance artists; after that the argument turns to some early modern one-eyed ogres, and then to the blacksmiths, returning to the theme of fire. There follows a detailed look at some Cyclopes sculpted in grottoes—a development of the ancient motif of the cave. The chapter concludes with studies of some major literary reworkings within the framework of European pastoral, ranging from the poetry of Dante (Latin eclogues) Marino, and Góngora, through baroque opera, to the contrasting Spanish dramas of Juan Pérez de Montalbán and José de Cañizares.