Page 136 - (DK) The Classical Music Book - Big Ideas Simply Explained
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IN CONTEXT
WE WALK, BY THE FOCUS
Opera in German
POWER OF MUSIC, BEFORE
1770 Johann Adam Hiller’s
comic opera Die Jagd (“The
IN JOY THROUGH Hunt”), one of the most popular
18th-century singspiels opens.
DEATH’S DARK NIGHT 1789 The premiere of Oberon,
König der Elfen (Oberon, King
THE MAGIC FLUTE (1791), of the Elves) by Czech Paul
Wranitzky sets a trend for
WOLFGANG AMADEUS MOZART Zauberoper (“magic opera”).
AFTER
1805 Beethoven’s only opera,
Fidelio, a singspiel, has its
first performance in Vienna.
1816 E.T.A. Hoffmann’s
Undine, a Zauberoper about
a water spirit, opens in Berlin.
1821 Carl Maria von
Weber’s Der Freischütz
(“The Marksman”), a Romantic
singspiel with a supernatural
theme, premieres in Berlin.
ozart’s The Magic Flute,
a two-act opera first
M performed in Vienna in
September 1791, marked the peak
of the development of singspiel
(“sing-play”), a uniquely German
opera genre that combined music
with spoken word.
Based on a libretto by Mozart’s
friend Emanuel Schikaneder, the
opera is set in ancient Egypt and
tells the story of a prince, Tamino,
who strays into the realm of the
mysterious Queen of the Night
where he is attacked by a serpent.
Rescued by the queen’s three
ladies-in-waiting, he falls in love
with a portrait they show him of
the queen’s daughter, Pamina, who
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