History of the Opera from its Origin in Italy to the present Time

Lord Mount Edgcumbe, during a visit to Paris, heard Madame Mara at one of the Concerts Spirituels, in the old theatre of the Tuileries. She had just returned from the Handel Commemoration, and sang, among other things, "I know that my Redeemer liveth," which was announced in the bills as being "Musique de Handel, paroles de Milton." "The French," says Lord Mount Edgcumbe, "had not the taste to like it."

The first opera in which Madame Mara appeared at the King's Theatre was Didone, a pasticcio, in which four songs of different characters, by Sacchini, Piccinni, and two other composers, were introduced. She afterwards sang with Miss Cecilia Davies (L'Inglesina) in Sacchini's Perseo.

At this period Handel's operas were already so much out of fashion, though esteemed as highly as ever by musicians and by the more venerable of connoisseurs, that when Giulio Cesare was revived, with Mara and Rubinelli (both of whom sang the music incomparably well), in the principal parts, it had no success with the general public; nor were any of Handel's operas afterwards performed at the King's Theatre. Giulio Cesare, in which many of the most favourite songs from Handel's other operas ("Verdi prati," "Dove sei," "Rendi sereno il ciglio," and others) were interpolated, answered the purpose for which it was produced, and attracted George III. two or three times to the theatre. Moreover (to quote Lord Mount Edgcumbe's words), "it filled the house, by attracting the exclusive lovers of the old style, who held cheap all other operatic performances."

THE PANTHEON

In 1789 (the year in which the supposed sexagenarian, Madeleine Guimard, "still full of grace and gentility," made her appearance) the King's Theatre was burnt to the ground – not without a suspicion of its having been maliciously set on fire, which was increased by the suspected person soon after committing suicide. Arrangements were made for carrying on the Opera at the little theatre in the Haymarket, where Mara was engaged as the first woman in serious operas, and Storace in comic. The company afterwards moved to the Pantheon, "which," says Lord Mount Edgcumbe, "in its original state was the largest and most beautiful room in London, and a very model of fine architecture. It was the chef-d'œuvre of Wyatt, who himself contrived and executed its transformation, taking care not to injure any part of the building, and so concealing the columns and closing its dome, that it might be easily restored after its temporary purpose was answered, it being then in contemplation to erect an entirely new and magnificent opera-house elsewhere, a project which could never be realised. Mr. Wyatt, by this conversion, produced one of the prettiest, and by far the most genteel and comfortable theatres I ever saw, of a moderate size and excellent shape, and admirably adapted both for seeing and hearing. There the regular Opera was successfully carried on, with two very good companies and ballets. Pacchierotti, Mara, and Lazzarini, a very pleasing singer with a sweet tenor voice, being at the head of the serious; and Casentini, a pretty woman and genteel actress, with Lazzarini, for tenor, Morelli and Ciprani principal buffos, composing the comic. This was the first time that Pacchierotti[58 - A celebrated male soprano, and one of the last of the tribe.] had met with a good prima donna since Madame Lebrun, and his duettos with Mara were the most perfect pieces of execution I ever heard. The operas in which they performed together were Sacchini's Rinaldo and Bertoni's Quinto Fabio revived, and a charming new one by Sarti, called Idalide, or La Vergine del Sole. The best comic were La Molinara, and La bella Pescatrice, by Guglielmi. On the whole I never enjoyed the opera so much as at this theatre."

The Pantheon enterprise, however, like most operatic speculations in England, did not pay, and at the end of the first season (1791) the manager had incurred debts to the amount of thirty thousand pounds. In the meanwhile the King's Theatre had been rebuilt, but the proprietor, now that the Opera was established at the Pantheon, found himself unable to obtain a license for dramatic performances, and had to content himself with giving concerts at which the principal singer was the celebrated David. It was proposed that the new Opera house should take the debts of the Pantheon, and with them its operatic license, but the offer was not accepted, and in 1792 the Pantheon was destroyed by fire – in this case the result, clearly, of accident.

At last the schism which had divided the musical world was put an end to, and an arrangement was made for opening the King's Theatre in the winter of 1793. There was not time to bring over a new company, but one was formed out of the singers already in London, with Mara at their head and with Kelly for the tenor.

MR. MARA

Mara was now beginning to decline in voice and in popularity. When she was no longer engaged at the Italian Opera, she sang at concerts and for a short time at Covent Garden, where she appeared as "Polly" in The Beggars' Opera. She afterwards sang with the Drury Lane company while they performed at the King's Theatre during the rebuilding of their own house, which had been pulled down to be succeeded by a much larger one. She appeared in an English serious opera, called Dido, "in which," says Lord Mount Edgcumbe, "she retained one song of her Didone, the brilliant bravura, Son Regina. It did not greatly succeed, though the music was good and well sung. This is not surprising," he adds, "the serious opera being ill suited to our stage, and our language to recitative. None ever succeeded but Dr. Arne's Artaxerxes, which was, at first, supported by some Italian singers, Tenducci being the original Arbaces." It is noticeable that in the aforesaid English Dido Kelly was the tenor, while Mrs. Crouch took the part of first man, which at this time in Italy was always given to a sopranist.

Madame Mara's husband, the ex-violinist of the Berlin orchestra, appears never to have been a good musician, and always an idle drunkard. His wife at last got disgusted with his habits, and probably, also, with his performance on the violin,[59 - Some writers speak of Mara as a violinist, others as a violoncellist.] for she went off with a flute-player named Florio to Russia, where she lived for many years. When she was about seventy she re-appeared in England and gave a concert at the King's Theatre, but without any sort of success. Her wonderful powers were said to have returned, but when she sang her voice was generally compared to a penny trumpet. Madame Mara then returned to Moscow, where she suffered greatly by the fire of 1812. She afterwards resided at some town in the Baltic provinces, and died there at a very advanced age.

The next great vocalist who visited England after Mara's début, was Banti. She had commenced life as a street singer; but her fine voice having attracted the attention of De Vismes, the director of the Académie, he told her to come to him at the Opera, where the future prima donna, after hearing an air of Sacchini's three times, sang it perfectly from beginning to end. De Vismes at once engaged her; and soon afterwards she made her first appearance with the most brilliant success. Although Banti was now put under the best masters, she was of such an indolent, careless disposition, that she never could be got to learn even the first elements of music. Nevertheless, she was so happily endowed by nature, that it gave her no trouble to perfect herself in the most difficult parts; and whatever she sang, she rendered with the most charming expression imaginable. Lord Mount Edgcumbe, who does not mention the fact of her having sung at the French Opera, says that Banti was the most delightful singer he ever heard (though, when she appeared at the King's Theatre in 1799, she must have been forty-two years of age[60 - Banti was born at Crema, in 1757.]); and tells us that, "in her, genius supplied the place of science; and the most correct ear, with the most exquisite taste, enabled her to sing with more effect, more expression, and more apparent knowledge of her art, than many much better professors."

BANTI

It is said of Banti, that when she was singing in Paris, though she never made the slightest mistake in concerted pieces, she sometimes executed her airs after a very strange fashion. For instance: in the allegro of a cavatina, after singing the principal motive, and the intermediary phrase or "second part," she would, in a fit of absence, re-commence the air from the very beginning; go on with it until the turning point at the end of the second part; again re-commence and continue this proceeding, until at last the conductor warned her that next time she had better think of terminating the piece. In the meanwhile the public, delighted with Banti's voice, is said to have been quite satisfied with this novel mode of performance.

Banti made her début in England in Bianchi's Semiramide, in which she introduced an air from one of Guglielmi's oratorios, with a violin obbligato accompaniment, played first by Cramer, afterward by Viotti, Salomon, and Weichsell, the brother of Mrs. Billington. This song was of great length, and very fatiguing; but Banti was always encored in it, and never omitted to repeat it.

At her benefit in the following year (1800) Banti performed in an opera, founded on the Zenobia of Metastasio, by Lord Mount Edgcumbe, the author of the interesting "Reminiscences," to which, in the course of the present chapter I shall frequently have to refer. The "first man's" part was allotted to Roselli, a sopranist, who, however, had to transfer it to Viganoni, a tenor. Roselli, whose voice was failing him, soon afterwards left the country; and no other male soprano made his appearance at the King's Theatre until the arrival of Velluti, who sang twenty-five years afterwards in Meyerbeer's Crociato.

Banti's favourite operas were Gluck's Alceste, in which she was called upon to repeat three of her airs every night; the Iphigénie en Tauride, by the same author; Paisiello's Elfrida, and Nina or La Pazza per Amore; Nasolini's[61 - Nasolini, a composer of great promise, died at a very early age.]Mitridate; and several operas by Bianchi, composed expressly for her.

Before Banti's departure from England, she prevailed on Mrs. Billington to perform with her on the night of her benefit, leaving to the latter the privilege of assuming the principal character in any opera she might select. Merope was chosen. Mrs. Billington took the part of the heroine, and Banti that of "Polifonte," though written for a tenor voice. The curiosity to hear these two celebrated singers in the same piece was so great, that the theatre was filled with what we so often read of in the newspapers, but so seldom see in actual life, – "an overflowing audience;" many ladies being obliged, for want of better places, to find seats on the stage.

Banti died at Bologna, in 1806, bequeathing her larynx (of extraordinary size) to the town, the municipality of which caused it to be duly preserved in a glass bottle. Poor woman! she had by time dissipated the whole of her fortune, and had nothing else to leave.

MRS. BILLINGTON

Mrs. Billington, Banti's contemporary, after singing not only in England, but at all the best theatres of Italy, left the stage in 1809. In 1794, while she was engaged at Naples, at the San Carlo, a violent eruption of Mount Vesuvius took place, which the Neapolitans attributed to the presence of an English heretic on their stage. Mrs. Billington's friends were even alarmed for her personal safety, when, fortunately, the eruption ceased, and the audience, relieved of their superstitious fears, applauded the admirable vocalist in all liberty and confidence. Mrs. Billington was an excellent musician, and before coming out as a singer had distinguished herself in early life (when Miss Weichsell) as a pianoforte player. She appears to have been but an indifferent actress, and, in her singing, to have owed her success less to her expression than to her "agility," which is said to have been marvellous. Her execution was distinguished by the utmost neatness and precision. Her voice was sweet and flexible, but not remarkable for fulness of tone, which formed the great beauty of Banti's singing. Mrs. Billington appeared with particular success in Bach's Clemenza di Scipione, in which the part of the heroine had been originally played in England by Miss Davies (L'Inglesina); Paisiello's Elfrida; Winter's Armida, and Castore e Polluce; and Mozart's Clemenza di Tito– the first of that master's works ever performed in England. At this time, neither the Nozze di Figaro, nor Mozart's other masterpiece, Don Giovanni (produced at Prague in 1787), seem to have been at all known either in England or in France.

After Banti's departure from England, and while Mrs. Billington was still at the King's Theatre, Grassini was engaged to sing alternately with the latter vocalist. She made her first appearance in La Vergine del Sole an opera by Mayer (the future preceptor of Donizetti), but in this work she succeeded more through her acting and her beauty than by her singing. Indeed, so equivocal was her reception, that on the occasion of her benefit, she felt it desirable to ask Mrs. Billington to appear with her. Mrs. Billington consented; and Winter composed an opera called Il Ratto di Proserpina, specially for the rival singers, Mrs. Billington taking the part of "Ceres," and Grassini that of "Proserpine." Now the tide of favour suddenly turned, and we are told that Grassini's performance gained all the applause; and that "her graceful figure, her fine expression of face, together with the sweet manner in which she sang several simple airs, stamped her at once the reigning favourite." Indeed, not only was Grassini rapturously applauded in public, but she was "taken up by the first society, fêted, caressed, and introduced as a regular guest in most of the fashionable assemblies." "Of her private claims to that distinction," adds Lord Mount Edgcumbe, "it is best to be silent; but her manners and exterior behaviour were proper and genteel."

BRAHAM

At this period 1804-5, the tenors at the King's Theatre were Viganoni and Braham. Respecting the latter, who, in England, France and Italy, in English and in Italian operas, on the stage and in concert rooms, must have sung altogether for something like half a century, I must again quote the author of "Musical Reminiscences," who heard him in his prime. "All must acknowledge," he says, "that his voice is of the finest quality, of great power and occasional sweetness. It is equally certain that he has great knowledge of music, and can sing extremely well. It is therefore the more to be regretted that he should ever do otherwise; that he should ever quit the natural register of his voice by raising it to an unpleasant falsetto, or force it by too violent exertion; that he should depart from a good style, and correct taste, which he knows and can follow as well as any man, to adopt at times the over-florid and frittered Italian manner; at others, to fall into the coarseness and vulgarity of the English. The fact is, that he can be two distinct singers, according to the audience before whom he performs, and that to gain applause he condescends to sing as ill at the playhouse as he has done well at the Opera. His compositions have the same variety, and he can equally write a popular noisy song for the one, or its very opposite, for the other. A duetto of his, introduced into the opera of Gli Orazj, sung by himself and Grassini, had great beauty, and was in excellent taste. * * * * Braham has done material injury to English singing, by producing a host of imitators. What is in itself not good, but may be endured from a fine performer, becomes insufferable in bad imitation. Catalani has done less mischief, only because her powers are unique, and her astonishing execution unattainable. Many men endeavour to rival Braham, no woman can aspire to being a Catalani."

When both Grassini and Mrs. Billington retired, (1806), the place of both was supplied by the celebrated Catalani, the vocal queen of her time. She made her first appearance in Portogallo's Semiramide, (which is said to have been a very inferior opera to Bianchi's, on the same subject), and, among other works, had to perform in the Clemenza di Tito, of Mozart, whose music she is said to have disliked on the ground that it kept the singer too much under the control of the orchestra. Nevertheless, she introduced the Nozze di Figaro into England, and herself played the part of "Susanna" with admirable success.

CATALANI

"Her voice," says Ferrari (Jacques Godefroi, a pupil of Paisiello), "was sonorous, powerful, and full of charm and suavity. This organ, of so rare a beauty, might be compared for splendour to the voice of Banti; for expression, to that of Grassini; for sweet energy, to that of Pasta; uniting the delicious flexibility of Sontag to the three registers of Malibran. Madame Catalani had formed her style on that of Pacchierotti, Marchesi, Crescentini;[62 - All three sopranists.] her groups, roulades, triplets, and mordenti, were of admirable perfection; her well articulated execution lost nothing of its purity in the most rapid and most difficult passages. She animated the singers, the chorus, the orchestra, even in the finales and concerted pieces. Her beautiful notes rose above and dominated the ensemble of the voices and instruments; nor could Beethoven, Rossini or any other musical Lucifer, have covered this divine voice with the tumult of the orchestra. Our virtuosa was not a profound musician; but, guided by what she did know, and by her practised ear, she could learn in a moment the most complicated pieces."

"Her firm, strong, brilliant, voluminous voice was of a most agreeable timbre," says Castil Blase; "it was an admirable soprano of prodigious compass, from la to the upper sol, marvellous in point of agility, and producing a sensation difficult to describe. Madame Catalani's manner of singing left something to desire in the noble, broad, sustained style. Mesdames Grassini and Barilli surpassed her on this point, but with regard to difficulties of execution and brio, Madame Catalani could ring out one of her favourite airs and exclaim, Son Regina! She was then without a rival. I never heard anything like it. She excelled in chromatic passages, ascending and descending, of extreme rapidity. Her execution, marvellous in audacity, made talents of the first order pale before it, and instrumentalists no longer dared figure by her side. When Tulou, however, presented himself, his flute was applauded with enthusiasm after Madame Catalani's voice. The experiment was a dangerous one, and the victory was only the more brilliant for the adventurous young artist. There was no end to the compliments addressed to him on his success."

On her way to London, in the summer of 1806, Catalani, whose reputation was then at its height, passed through Paris, and sang before the Emperor at St. Cloud. Napoleon gave her 5,000 francs for this performance, besides a pension of 1,200 francs, and the use of the Opera, with all expences paid, for two concerts, of which the receipts amounted to 49,000 francs. The French emperor, during his victorious career, had acquired the habit of carrying off singers as captives, and enrolling them, in spite of themselves, in his musical service. The same dictatorial system, however, failed when applied to Catalani.

"Where are you going, that you wish to leave Paris?" said Napoleon.

"To London, Sire," answered the singer.

"You must remain in Paris," replied Napoleon, "you will be well paid and your talents will be better appreciated here. You will have a hundred thousand francs a year, and two months' leave of absence. That is settled. Adieu, Madame."

Catalani went away without daring to say that she did not mean to break her engagement with the manager of the King's Theatre. In order to keep it she was obliged to embark secretly at Morlaix.

CATALANI

I have spoken of this celebrated vocalist's first appearance in London, and, having given an Italian and a French account of her singing, I may as well complete the description by quoting the remarks made by an Englishman, Lord Mount Edgcumbe, on her voice and style of execution.

"It is well known," he says, "that her voice is of a most uncommon quality, and capable of exertions almost supernatural. Her throat seems endued (as has been remarked by medical men) with a power of expansion and muscular motion by no means usual, and when she throws out all her voice to the utmost, it has a volume and strength that are quite surprising, while its agility in divisions, running up and down the scale in semi-tones, and its compass in jumping over two octaves at once, are equally astonishing. It were to be wished she was less lavish in the display of these wonderful powers, and sought to please more than to surprise; but her taste is vicious, her excessive love of ornament spoiling every simple air, and her greatest delight (indeed her chief merit) being in songs of a bold and spirited character, where much is left to her discretion (or indiscretion) without being confined by accompaniment, but in which she can indulge in ad libitum passages with a luxuriance and redundancy no other singer ever possessed, or if possessing, ever practised, and which she carries to a fantastical excess. She is fond of singing variations on some known simple air, and latterly has pushed this taste to the very height of absurdity, by singing, even without words, variations composed for the fiddle."

Allusion is here doubtless made to the air varié by Pierre Rode, the violinist, which, from Catalani to Alboni and our own Louisa Pyne, has been such a favourite show-piece with all vocalists of brilliant executive powers, more especially in England. The vocal variations on Rode's air, however, were written in London, specially for Catalani, by Drouet the flute-player.

Catalani returned to Paris in October, 1815, when there was no longer any chance of Napoleon reproaching her for her abrupt departure nine years before. She solicited and obtained the "privilege" of the Italian theatre; but here the celebrated system of her husband, M. Valabrèque (in which the best possible operatic company consisted only of ma femme et trois ou quatre poupées) quite broke down. Madame Catalani gave up the theatre, with the subvention of 160,000 francs allowed her by the government, in 1818, M. Valabrèque having previously enunciated in a pamphlet the reasons which led to this abandonment. Great expenses had been incurred in fitting up the theatre, and, moreover, the management had been forced to pay its rent. The pamphlet concluded with a paragraph which was scarcely civil on the part of a foreigner who had been most hospitably received, towards a nation situated as France was just then. It is sufficiently curious to be quoted.

M. VALABREQUE

"Consider, moreover," said the discomforted director, or rather the discomforted husband of the directress, "that in the time when several provinces beyond the mountains belonged to France, twenty thousand Italians were constantly attracted to the capital and supplied numerous audiences for the Italian theatre; that, moreover, the artists who were chiefly remarked at the theatres of Milan, Florence, Venice and Genoa, could be engaged for Paris by order of the government, and that in such a case the administration was reimbursed for a portion of the extra engagements."

Catalani had left the King's Theatre in 1813, two years before she assumed the management of the Italian Theatre of Paris. With some brief intervals she had been singing in London since 1806, and after quitting England, she was for many years without appearing on any stage, if we except the short period during which she directed the Théâtre Feydau. Her terms were so inordinate that managers were naturally afraid of them, and Catalani found it more to her advantage to travel about Europe, giving concerts at which she was the sole performer of importance, than to accept such an engagement as could be offered to her at a theatre. She gave several concerts of this kind in England, whither she returned twice after she had ceased to appear at the Opera. She is said to have obtained more success in England than in any other country, and least of all in Italy.

When she appeared at the King's Theatre in 1824, and sang in Mayer's Fanatico per la Musica, the frequenters of the Opera, who remembered her performance in the same work eighteen years before, were surprised that so long an interval had produced so little change in the singer. The success of the first night was prodigious; but Mr. Ebers (in his "Seven Years of the King's Theatre"), tells us that "repetitions of this opera, again and again, diminished the audiences most perceptibly, though some new air was on each performance introduced, to display the power of the Catalani. * * * In this opera the sweet and soothing voice of Caradori was an agreeable relief to the bewildering force of the great wonder."

In one season of four months in London, Madame Catalani, by her system of concerts, gained upwards of ten thousand pounds, and doubled that sum during a subsequent tour in the provinces, in Ireland and Scotland. She sang for the last time in public at Dublin, in 1828.

CATALANI'S AGREEMENT

As to the sort of engagement she approved of, some notion may be formed from the following draft of a contract submitted by her to Mr. Ebers in 1826: —

"Conditions between Mr. Ebers and M. P. de Valabrèque

"1. Every box and every admission shall be considered as belonging to the management. The free admissions shall be given with paper orders, and differently shaped from the paid tickets. Their number shall be limited. The manager, as well as Madame Catalani, shall each have a good box.

"2. Madame Catalani shall choose and direct the operas in which she is to sing; she shall likewise have the choice of the performers in them; she will have no orders to receive from any one; she will find all her own dresses.

"3. Madame Catalani shall have two benefits, to be divided with the manager; Madame Catalani's share shall be free: she will fix her own days.

"4. Madame Catalani and her husband shall have a right to superintend the receipts.

"5. Every six weeks Madame Catalani shall receive the payment of her share of the receipts, and of the subscription.