Libretto

“ This truth is that the writer of the libretto, having at his disposal the clear, idea-suggesting word, can bring up a pathetic situation before the mind; that the singer, having at his command the physical apparatus for producing an effect on the nerves, can sensuously awaken emotion; while the composer, possessing neither the arbitrary idea-suggesting word, nor the nerve-moving sound, but only the artistic form, can please to the utmost, but move only to a limited degree. ”

“ With regard to this superiority of the music, and also because it stands to the libretto and the action in the relation of the universal to the particular, of the rule to the example, it might perhaps appear more fitting that the libretto should be written for the music than that the music should be composed for the libretto. ”

“ Let it be admitted that as a rule no opera is intelligible without a libretto; but is a drama always intelligible without a play-bill? A libretto, for general use, need really be no larger than an ordinary programme ”

“ Here are several young persons doomed to spend the flower of their years in mechanically repeating the silliest libretto in modern theatrical literature, set to music which must pall somewhat on the seven hundred and eighty-eighth performance. ”

“ Higher tragedy than that can hardly be conceived—the effect upon the audience of the combined music and action is as powerful as though they had been listening to the greatest masterpiece of Shakespeare. But take the libretto of Norma—divest yourself of the musical association—study it in the closet—and we answer for it that no exercise of imagination on your part will enable you to endure it. ”

“ The quotations we have made will serve to show the absurdity of the “libretto,” and awaken commiseration for the composer, that he should be compelled to link his music with such intolerable trash. New music ought to demand new words—new musical pieces new dramas. It is unpardonable that so much exquisite music should be dressed in so mean a garb, and the whole splendour of Italian opera be depreciated by a set of scribblers who know so little of the rudiments of letters. It is time that some change should be effected. ”

“ Since writing the above I find that the greatest of French poets describes an admirable libretto of his own as "un canevas d'opéra plus ou moins bien disposé pour que l'œuvre musicale s'y superpose heureusement;" and again, "une trame qui ne demande pas mieux que de se dérober sous cette riche et éblouissante broderie qui s'appelle la musique." (Preface to Victor Hugo's Esmeralda.) ”

“ Few fashionable novels—happily defunct at the end of the season—have been more gladly welcomed, or more calmly tolerated; and the libretto-system has only escaped some very rough handling, out of consideration for the music with which it is eternally wedded.
We have heard of persons who maintain that a knowledge of Latin and French is equivalent to a knowledge of Italian, and that by their joint means an opera may be thoroughly mastered without the aid of a translation. We confess such a feat appears to us Herculean. ”

“ In a fourth Libretto, more carefully constructed than either of the three we have mentioned, he has given us an Italian illustration of Goethe's 'Faust.' This famous Libretto he has himself set to Music. And here we have to grapple with one of the greatest difficulties with which the later Schools of Dramatic Music are called upon to contend. Their demands upon the individual are excessive. How can one man shine, in the first rank, as a Poet and a Musician, a Philosopher and a Machinist, a Maestro di Canto and a designer of Scenery? ”

“ The entire purpose of an opera seemed to be to tell a story which should serve as a basis for the setting of certain sentiments to songs in aria form. The art of libretto construction was to arrange the succession of sentiments in such a way that the proper series of solos, duets, choruses, and ensembles should be made, and that the arias of different character should enter in such a way as to provide variety of style, and give the singers opportunities to display all their accomplishments. In short, everything was made tributary to that marvelous art of song in which these singers excelled. ”

“ Therefore, concludes the syllogism, it matters nothing as to the character of the libretto or poem to whose words the music is arranged, so long as the dramatic framework suffices as a support for the flowery festoons of song, which drape its ugliness and beguile attention by the fascinations of bloom and grace. On the other hand, the apostles of the new musical philosophy insist that art is something more than a vehicle for the mere sense of the beautiful, an exquisite provocation wherewith to startle the sense of a selfish, epicurean pleasure ”

“ It is very difficult at present to find a good libretto for an opera. The old ones, which are the best, are not written in the modern style, and the new ones are all good for nothing; for poetry, which was the only thing of which France had reason to be proud, becomes every day worse, and poetry is the only thing which requires to be good here, for music they do not understand. ”

“ Though nominally dramatic—inasmuch as each Solo Singer is invested with a representative personality—the Libretto is really epic throughout, for the principal singers are never employed for any other purpose than that of describing, either the beauties of the 'new-created world,' or the wonders attendant upon its mysterious birth. ”

“ But apart from these considerations, the writer has little but praise for the singularly lucid libretto.
"The first and all important remark to make concerning the music," he proceeds, "has to do with its Italian character. There is very little that can be regarded as common to it and to the typical German opera. ”

“ For this reason the art of music cannot rest satisfied, even where we are dealing with the more sharply defined features of the libretto proposed, with such recitative of declamation; nor in general can it remain content [Pg 412] with the unmediated difference between the pure melody, which, in comparison with it and as above explained, floats over the particularity of the words, and the recitative, whose task it is so far as possible to identify itself with it. On the contrary we must look for some mode of mediation between these extremes. ”

“ It has ever been my contention that the conscientious artist should carefully read and re-read the whole libretto, so as to inform himself of the poet's purpose and meaning in the construction and development of the plot, as well as to ever bear in mind his conception of the composer's idea of how the poetry and the various aspects of mind of the characters should be aptly and effectively musicked and interpreted so as to awaken a kindred, or appreciative, feeling in the minds of his hearers. ”

“ In addition to the human interest and the truth of passion which a libretto must share with every dramatic poem, there ought to be a strong infusion of the lyrical element, not to be mistaken for the tendency towards 'singing a song' too rampant amongst tenors and soprani. ”

“ The libretto-part and the melodies, taken together, constitute a new romantic ideal, consistent with experience, but realised with the intensity and universality whereby art is distinguished from life. Don Juan was a myth before Mozart touched him with the magic wand of music. ”

“ The hearer's attention is tired by too much and divided by lack of unity. Nevertheless the composer has understood how to make the most of a somewhat weak libretto, and the manner in which the musical interest increases from scene to scene is admirable in a beginner. ”

“ This opera is half romantic half lyric, neither does it lack the humorous elements. It abounds in melody, a great rarity in our times, and the romance (Lied) is its best part.
Though the music is not precisely overpowering, it is very sweet and pleasing; one sees that a great talent has been at work, if not a genius.
The libretto is very nice on the whole, in some parts even charmingly poetical and melodious. ”

“ All the charm of Italian melody is still to be found in this composition, but it is blent with real feeling, united to great strength of expression and its value is enhanced by a total absence of all those superfluous warbles and artificial ornaments, which filled the Italian operas of that time. The libretto, taken from the old and beautiful Greek tragedy, is as effective as the music. ”

“ For an opera libretto that successfully meets the requirements of a lyric work of this class, which is primarily for and of the stage, in the way of dramatic interest, development and climax, a poetic knowledge of the possibilities and limitations of the English language when sung, and those visual and picturesque qualities in the story which alone can make the unreal conditions of opera, per se, either plausible or intelligible, is about as rare as the proverbial white crow—as many gifted composers have found to their cost. ”

“ To take only one out of innumerable examples, the new subject-matter of Wagner's music-dramas, of an immeasurably higher order than the usual libretto, created a new form of music, based on motifs, not melodies. Other examples can easily be discovered. ”

“ A composer casts about for a subject, either being guided in his choice by consideration of what is in some manner appropriate to the particular occasion, or simply taking a story from the Bible that has not been used before, or not too frequently before, for musical purposes. He then either obtains the services of a librettist or himself arranges a libretto setting forth the chosen story. ”

“ In the drawing up of the libretto the most important matter is the engineering of "opportunities" for the composer—here an effective air for the principal personage, there a chorus with scope for effective contrapuntal writing, everywhere due regard for the well-varied interest which the [109] public loves, and, at the end of a part, provision for an effective Finale. But some recognised kind of musical opportunity is always the chief matter. No one cares much about the subject except in so far as it provides the musical opportunity of an accepted kind. ”

“ And then the same writer goes on to point out that the best "libretto is one which tells its story to the eye," as in the case of 'Carmen,' for example. "No one with eyes to see can fail, for instance, to follow the career of 'Carmen,' from her flirtation with the young officer to the scene before the bullring where he stabs her."
It was an acute French dramatic critic who once asserted that "the skeleton of every good play is a pantomime," and the assertion is more emphatically true when applied to the skeleton of a libretto. ”

“ I would go farther, and assert that, while a merely mechanical musician may set inappropriate melodies to words, and render music inexpressive of character, what constitutes a musical dramatist is the conscious intention of fitting to the words of his libretto such melody as shall interpret character, and the power to do this with effect. ”

“ They gather these as they want them, from the hidden friend in his hutch at their feet. The occupants of the proscenium boxes at the opera-houses must be familiarly acquainted with the tones of the prompter's voice, as he delivers to the singers, line by line, the matter of their parts; and occasionally these stage whispers are audible at a greater distance from the foot-lights. In operatic performances, however, the words are of very inferior importance to the music; the composer quite eclipses the author. A musician has been known to call a libretto the "verbiage" of his opera. ”

“ THERE was once a Woman who Thoroughly Understood and appreciated Grand Opera. She was Accustomed to Purchase a Libretto Weeks Ahead, and she Played the Score through on her Piano Before she Went to a Performance. ”

“ In a word, they suggest the work of a preacher casting his sermon notes into lyrical form, an impression which is strengthened by the fact that the libretto invariably opens with a Scripture passage and frequently blends the Gospel and Epistle for the Day in one harmonious teaching. ”

“ For mixed choruses and classroom use in school, college, or university; or mixed vocal ensembles and choral societies, amateur and professional.
Price, in cloth, $2.00
OLIVER DITSON COMPANY, INC.
Standard Opera Librettos
All librettos have English text. Additional texts are indicated by Italic letters, as follows: I, Italian; G, German; F, French. Those marked with (*) contain no music. All the others have the music of the principal airs. ”

“ There were sonatas, or rather veiled symphonies; songs whose poetry might be understood without words; piano pieces both of a demonaic nature and of the most graceful form; sonatas for piano and violin; string quartets, each so different from every other that they seemed to flow from many different springs. Whenever he bends his magic wand, there, when the powers of the orchestra and chorus lend him their aid, further glimpses of the magic world will be revealed to us. May the highest genius strengthen him! ”

“ Thus from the definite number of twenty-four notes, varied in different degrees, by sharps, flats, semi-tones, &c., are produced all that is so magical, enthusiastic, and transporting in the empire of omnipotent music. Like as the alphabetic characters may be varied into myriads of forms suitable to every multifarious species of conversation or composition; in a word, a few musical notes in the hands of a master may be made by his skill to produce, from agreeable interchanges of time, harmony, &c., every variety of musical sentiment which can affect the human soul. ”

“ The chief component parts of the opera were the recitative and the song, or aria.12 Recitative, intended for the rendering of conversation, approaches in rhythm and intervals as near as possible to ordinary speech, and leaves the singer ample scope for an animated and expressive delivery. This is assisted by a simple harmonious accompaniment, the basses giving the fundamental, the clavier the harmony. The simplicity of the musical treatment lends itself to characteristic declamation, and impressive situations are thrown into relief generally by sudden changes of harmony ”