Beethoven: Leonore

Opera no 71

Beethoven: Leonore

Soloists

Orchestre Révolutionnaire et Romantique

John Elliot Gardiner

I've known Fidelio for as long as I can remember but I have never heard Leonore before. It was a fascinating experience. It was like listening to a familiar opera going in and out of focus. Most obviously different are the numbers which Beethoven completely removed but even more interesting is listening to Beethoven's earlier thoughts on some of the most familiar music. There are all sort of different melodic turns, changes in harmony as well as wholesale rewriting of sections. Generally speaking Fidelio is more concise and one can see why Beethoven made cuts and tightened up the whole score. Most of the cuts seem well thought out - though clearly any mature Beethoven is not to be missed - but the section before the final duet between Florestan and Leonore was highly effective and perhaps Beethoven was unwise to remove it. 

I did however miss the extraordinary end of Fidelio, where Beethoven lets rip in an explosion of energy. The very end of Leonore doesn't have that impact and I must confess that after finishing listening to this opera I did put on the last scene of Fidelio, in the Klemperer recording, just to remind me what I had missed.

I also talk the opportunity to listen to the 10 or so minutes that have been rescued from Beethoven's abortive opera Vesta's Feuer because this was the original source of the music in the Florestan-Leonore duet. There it seemed quite pretty and almost conventional. The transformation Beethoven achieved in turning it into the huge outburst of passion in the opera is quite extraordinary.

It has been an highly enjoyable experience listening to the operas which led up to Fidelio. I've know Winton Dean's masterly account of Beethoven as an opera composer for many years and it was really good to be able to hear the examples in his book brought to life in full orchestral performances. The three operas by Paer, Mayr and Gaveaux were all worth listening to, but it only take a few moments of listening to Beethoven to realise the difference between talent and genius.

For the next stage in this project I am going to cover 20th and 21st Century British and Irish opera. 

Kienzl: Der Evangelimann

Opera no  67

Kienzl: Der Evangelimann

Soloists

Munich Radio Orchestra

Lathar Zagrosek

This is another opera which had a huge initial impact but which has almost disappeared from view. I had heard it years ago and was glad to make its reaquaintance. Stylistically it was rather hard to pin down. Wagner was certainly a major influence. The music at the end of the first act to illustrate the fire was clearly indebted to the Magic Fire music from Die Walkure and parts of the anguished monologue in Act 2 could have come from Tannnauser or even Parsifal. Yet elsewhere there was delightlful lighthearted music for the village scenes which could almost have come from The Bartered Bride. There were moments of verismo and the big tune in the overture (reprised later in the opera) seemed almost a straight lift from Tchaikovsky’s Sleeping Beauty. But all of these elements do come together to make an entertaining and dramatic work. Tastes change and the music associted with the Evalgelist – complete with children’s choir – now seems over-sentimental and indeed almost kitch. Perhaps it could still work in a sympathetic production but somehow I doubt it,

This is the last in this group of German operas , where I have tried to follow almost a century of development. What is striking is how little 19^th century German opera has remained in the repertory. Wagner casts an enormous shadow. In fact the only non-Wagner operas from the 19^th century which are still part of the standard repertoire are Hansel and Gretel and Fidelio,

So for the next part of this project I will be looking at some of the operas which form the background to Fidelio.

Nessler: Der Trompeter Von Säckingen

Opera no 66

Nessler: Der Trompeter Von Säckingen

Soloists

WDR radio orchestra

Helmuth Froschauer

You come across this opera from time to time in histories of German music and of 19th century opera. It was hugely successful in its time but has disappeared from the state. I had no idea what to expect from it - but I wasn’t expecting it to start with rousing student songs in the simplest of styles. But that was a clue to what was to follow. This is the lightest of operas - looking forward perhaps to Johann Strauss or Lêhar, but without any of their subtlety of refinement. There were some attractive moments in the score, particularly in the more reflective passages, but to be frank a lot of it was very crude and second rate. Now I like light opera, but there is a difference between lightness and banality and unfortunately banality is the right word for this work. I can see that on a warn evening with an undemanding audience it might be quite entertaining for a while, but that its about it.

Oddly there are two links with Mahler to note. The first is that early in his career he wrote incidentlal music to a play based on the original poem which is the subject of the opera. That music is lost other than one movement which became the Blumine  movement of the original version of his first symphony before it was removed when the work was reduced from five to four movements. Secondly in the early part of his career Mahler didn’t have a choice over the operas he performed and he had to conduct this work many times. He hated it and thought that it was an awful work. I can quite understand why.

Goetz: Der Widerspenstigen Zähmung

Opera no 65

Goetz: Der Widerspenstigen Zähmung

Soloists

Bavarian Radio Orchestra

Jospeha Keilberth

I came across Hermann Goetz while I was still at school when our youth orchestra played his symphony on a residential course. I imagine that the conductor (Trevor Harvey who wrote for Gramophone magazine ) wanted to hear what it sounded like. But the name Goetz is also familiar to readers of the music criticism of George Bernard Shaw, who wrote a very enthusiastic review of this opera 'You have to go to Mozart’s finest quartets and quintets on the one hand, and to Die Meistersinger on the other, for work of the quality we find, not here and there, but continuously, in the Symphony and in the opera, two masterpieces which place him securely above all other German composers of the last hundred years, save only Mozart and Beethoven, Weber and Wagner.  He also said' He has the charm of Schubert without his brainlessness, the refinement and inspiration of Mendelssohn without his limitation and timid gentility, Schumann’s sense of harmonic expression without his laboriousness, shortcoming, and dependence on external poetic stimulus; while as to unembarrassed mastery of the material of music, shewing itself in the Mozartian grace and responsiveness of his polyphony, he leaves all three of them simply nowhere.  Brahms, who alone has touches him in mere brute musical faculty, is a dolt in comparison to him.”, 

As somebody who has never appreciated Brahms that latter comment did rather appeal!

The opera is a version of Shakespeare’s Taming of the Shrew. I did hear it years ago and coming back to it I found it a pure delight. It has real charm. Some attractive lyrical passages and moments of broad comedy. Goetz keeps the momentum going and has a real sense of theatre. The basic musical language is Mendelssohnian but there are are touches of later romantic harmony with a few nods to Wagner here are there. It does in my view rank very highly in the pantheon of comic operas - perhaps only The Barber of Baghdad is its equal. Shaw was spot on!

Bruch: Die Loreley

Opera no 64

Bruch: Die Loreley

Soloists

Munich radio orchestra

Stefan Blunter

I knew that Bruch had written more than the violin concerto but until I started researching this project I didn’t know that he had written operas. This one is an early work written in his mid 20s - it had some early success (Mahler conducted it) but soon faded from the repertoire. The libretto was actually written for Mendelssohn but he died after only completing a few fragments.

I thought that it was a rather curious piece. There was certainly some beautiful music here but for a lot of the time it didn’t actually feel like an opera. The choral sections in particular seemed to come from an oratorio - they were impressive but didn’t have any sense of drive or drama. There was no real sense of transaction - some of the links between sections were very abrupt and reminiscent of French Grand Opera at its worst. Stylistically is was all rather inconsistent. Some of the music was highly complex and then we got passages which seemed naive. The apotheosis at the end was impressive in a way but only just escaped from being kitch and overdone. Altogether then a curious work which I think showed well why Bruch largely kept away from the stage for the rest of his long career. He wrote some massive secular choral works later in life and, although I have not heard any of them. I can imagine that those are more suited to his temperament.

It some ways this opera has some of the same characteristics as both the Schubert and Schumann operas which I have featured in this series.  Musically they are of high quality but the sense of the theatre is just not there. It is the minor composers who seemed to have the grasp of what worked in the threatre.

Cornelius: Der Cid

Opera no 63

Cornelius: Der Cid

Soloists

Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra

Gustav Kuhn

I was particularly looking forward to this. Cornelius’ Barber of Baghdad is one of my favourite operas and certainly one of the greatest comic operas of the mid 19th century. So I was keen to discover what a more serious opera by Cornelius might be like. To be honest it took me quite a time to get on its wavelength - I couldn’t quite understand what Cornelius was doing in the first part of the work. Yes there were some attractive melodies and moments of harmonic piquancy, but it did all seem rather shapeless. But as the work continued, and perhaps as my focus improved, I really started to appreciate the piece. There was some remarkable music here - an intense love duet and then a big ensemble which really had an impact with energy and rhythmic drive. By the end I was captivated - perhaps I need to go back sometime and listen again to the first part of the opera - perhaps I was just not quite in the right mood to appreciate it.

Schumann: Genoveva

Opera no 62

Schumann: Genoveva

Soloists

Chamber orchestra of Europe

Nicholas Harnoncourt

Schumann is one of the composers I turn to a lot - his song cycles have been a central part of my musical experience since my student days. Yet rather to my surprise I have never heard Genoveva, his only opera, before. 

It was well worth the wait. There was some superb music here. Much of it was unmistakably Schumann, but there were some elements which reminded me of Mendelssohn, a few moments of Marschner-like gothic excitement and more than a hint of middle period Wagner. The opera is largely through-composed with a fairly fluid structure without obvious distinction between aria and recitative. The musical langue is sophisticated with some really piquant chromatic harmony that is so characteristic of Schumann’s musical language.

So why it this such a rarity? I think that it is partly because this style of opera got superseded by Wagner, but also because in many ways it has the feel of an oratorio or other concert work rather than a work for the stage. Schumann gives himself the luxury of long postludes to arias and highly developed choral writing - things which sound wonderful but probably feel overlong on the stage. Ultimately I missed the spell of the greasepaint which you get in some of the other works in the selection of German operas I have been listening for this blog - even though in purely musical terms they are not on the save level of invention as Schumann’s work. The comparison between what works on the stage and purely musical values is a fascinating one.

Wagner: Die Feen

Opera no 61

Wagner Die Feen

Soloists

Munich Opera

Wolfgang Sawallisch

This was Wagner’s first complete opera, though it was not given its first performance until after his death. I knew the overture and I think that I heard at least some of the opera when it was revived on Radio 3 in the 1970s as a part of a series of uncut performances of the early Wagner operas.

For a 20 year old with only a modest musical education this was an astonishing achievement. It is assured and full of drama. Weber is the most obvious influence and you can also hear passages reminiscent of the choral music of Schubert and Mendelssohn. But already Wagner had a distinct voice and I am sure that parts of this could have been incorporated into Lohengrin or Tannhauser without anybody noticing anything amiss. You get some moment of comic relief amid the drama - there is a long duet for the subsidiary characters in act 2 - which reminds us that Wagner’s next opera Das Liebesverbot was a comic opera. Who knows - had Die Feen been performances and Das Liebesverbot been given more than a single disastrous performance the whole direction of Wagner’s career might have been quite different.

The high point in this opera is probably the big soprano aria in Act 2 - which can best be described as Weber on steroids. It is a real tour de force of the early romantic style. It is perhaps too long, but then even in this cut performance of the opera there were several moments where one wanted Wagner not to dwell quite so long in the moment and get on to the next bit of action. But overall this was a really good experience and I think that it is only the sheer weight of the impact of Wagner’s mature operas that has led Die Feen to be only of curiosity value. It deserves more than that.

Flotow: Alessandro Stradella

Opera no 60

Flotow: Alessandro Stredella

Soloists

Bavarian Radio Orchestra and Chorus

Heinz Walberg

Flotow is known almost exclusively for Martha, although that opera has now itself virtually faded from view. Alessandro Stradella is the only other of his operas to have any lasting success - it was performed quite extensively in the decades after its first production.

I didn’t know what to expect. From the opening I imagined that we were going to get something in the German romantic tradition of Weber and early Wagner, with horns very much to the fore. But after a while it settled down into a rather lighter style which , like several of the operas in this part of the project, shows just how strong the influence of Singspiel still was in German at the time. But there was also more than an hint of Italian Buffo , particularly in the ensembles. The music was pleasant enough without being particularly memorable but some of the harmony was fairly crude and there were some awkward gear changes in places. So a real curiosity this time and I can’t imagine that this opera will ever be staged again.

Lachner: Catharina Cornaro

Opera no 59

Lachner: Catharina Cornaro

Soloists

München Rundfunkorchestra

Ralf Weikert

Lachner is now remembered, if at all, for writing the recitatives for the version of Cherubini's Medea that until recently was the only version of the opera that was ever hear - the famous Callas recordings of the work all use Lachner's recitatives.

This opera is a fascinating example of the way that opera was developing in Germany in the middle part third of the century. It is a curious mixture of styles both forward and backward looking. Some of it could would not have been out of place in Lohengrin whereas other parts were reminiscent of some of the cruder and noises moments in the operas of Spontini. There were episodes that could have come from Singspiel, some parts which were dangerously near to kitch and an apotheosis which seemed like a pre-echo of the end of Faust. Altogether a curious mixture which was certainly did not amount to more than a sum of its parts. There was some pleasing music here in places as well as some very ordinary material. Grove is pretty dismissive of Lachner,  saying' contemporary opinion undoubtedly overestimated Lachner as a composer, misled by his abilities as a conductor and above all as the trainer and developer of an orchestra without whose preparation Wagner's works could not have been fully realised in Munich'. On the basis of this opera I couldn't disagree with that verdict.

Loewe: Die Drei Wünsche

Opera no 58

Loewe: Die Drei Wünsche

Soloists

Rundfunkorchester des SWF

Peter Falk

I enjoyed the Loewe ballads in last year’s project https://andrew365newpieces.blogspot.com/2025/12/blog-post.html . I know that he was a prolific song composer but I hadn’t realised that he had also written operas. In fact he wrote 5 but this was the only one which was ever performed. In reality is more like a Singspiel than an opera - essentially it is a series of individual numbers connected by dialogue. I wasn’t expecting anything too serious but in fact this is a very light-weight piece which for its time must have seen rather old-fashioned. There is little here that couldn’t have been written a generation earlier. That’s not a criticism of course- on its own terms the piece works well. One senses that Loewe was happiest with the song form rather than anything more symphonic and there is nothing here which looks forward to the development of German opera into the middle years of the 19th century. An enjoyable listen but I didn’t think that it had the characterfulness of the Lortzing opera which preceded it in this series.

Lortzing: Der Waffenschmied

Opera no 57

Lortzing: Der Waffenschmied

Soloists

Munich Radio Orchestra

Leopold Hager

This was a complete delight from beginning to end. I was fortunate to be able to conduct performances of Lortzing’s Undine  at University and I have heard Tsar und Zimmerman but this opera was new to me. It is a lighthearted work in the Singspiel tradition - a love story of the rich man disguising himself as a poor blacksmith to win the lady of his love. It gives Lortzing the opportunity to use anvils in a way which prefigures their use in Il trovatore.

The whole opera has a lightness of touch with both looks back to Mozart and Weber but also forward to the lighter operas of Johann Strauss and Lehár. But there are also passages which could have come from the Savoy operas and some which reminded me of Cornelius and Humperdinck. Lortzing has a great melodic gift and a real sense of fun. The whole thing passed by without any longuers and left me wanting to explore the remain Lortzing recordings on my shelves.

Marschner: Der Templer und die Jüdin

Opera 56

Marschner: Der Templer und die Jüdin

Soloists

Grosses Orchester Der RAVAG

Kurt Tenner

Marschner along with Lortzing (who will be next in this project) was the leading composer of German operas between Weber and Wagner. He is most notable for the gothic elements in his two most famous operas, Hans Heiling and Der Vampyr but his style picked up many elements of early Romantic music. This opera is his version of Scott’s Ivanhoe. It has a place in the footnotes of musical history because Schumann quoted an aria from Act 3 of the opera, in which Ivanhoe sings of the virtues of England, in his Symphonic Etudes. This was as a tribute to the English composer Sterndale Benrett, to whom Schumann’s work is dedicated.

I have heard this opera before but I was glad to re make its acquaintance. It is less distinctive thn the two more famous Marschner operas I mentioned earlier but on its own terms was very enjoyable. While it has its dramatic moments much of it is quite light in character, reminding us that early Romantic opera in German used folk like elements and simple choruses as a key ingredient. This was a very old recording derived originally from a radio performance so the sound quality was not great - I suspect that some of the nuances were probably lost. I made the same comment in relation to another Marschner operas - Der Holzldieb https://andrew365newpieces.blogspot.com/2025/12/marschner-der-holzdiebsol.html- in my 365 project last year. It would be really good to get some modern recordings of a range of Marschner operas - I rate him highly and would like to hear more of his work.

Kreutzer: Das Nachlager in Granada

Opera 55

Kreutzer: Das Nachlager in Granada

Soloists

Kölner Rundfunkorchestra

Helmut Froschauer

Konradin Kreutzer (not the person to whom Beethoven dedicated a violin sonata) was part of the circle of musicians in Vienna at the turn of 19th century and certainly knew Beethoven and, perhaps, Haydn.  He was a prolific composer whose work included many operas. This one, his last, is the only one to have maintained even the slightest toe-hold in the German repertory. 

It shows just how influential the works of Weber, particularly Der Freischütz had become in Germany. It seems almost that Kreutzer had used that score as a recipe book when putting together his opera. All the elements that define German Romantic opera are there - hunting horns, peasant choruses, pastoral scenes, lyrical arias and dramatic ensembles. I found the score enjoyable but not particularly memorable - except perhaps for the rather striking use of bell-like effects near the end of the first act. I suspect that there are dozens of operas of this type lying forgotten on dusty shelves in the back of German opera houses - the chance of revival now are extremely thin.

Schubert: Fierrabras

Opera 54

Schubert: Fierrabras

Soloists

Chamber orchestra of Europe

Claudio Abbado

Schubert was a prolific composer of operas - there are a least a dozen of them although the exact number depends on how you count incidental music and unfinished works. Fierrabras was his last completed opera but it was not performed until 1897.

Given the sense of the dramatic that Schubert brings to his songs it is perhaps a surprise that he didn’t establish himself as an opera composer. There is some lovely music here but somehow if doesn’t all hang together as a coherent drama. Perhaps one of the problems is that Schubert’s tendency to be prolix and unfocussed - the ‘heavenly length’ of the 9th symphony comes to mind. The choruses are extensive and so make the work seem rather like an oratorio rather than an opera when you listen without the benefit of the staging.  Perhaps the most interesting aspect of the work is the quite extensive use of melodrama (spoken word over music) in the latter part of the opera - I’m sure that Fidelio was an influence here but there are also echoes of The Magic Flute.

I do think that Schubert opera is a lost cause, delightful as some of the music is. But it is worth remembering that he was only 26 when he wrote this, his last opera. As the CD booklet which comes with this recording points out, this was the age at which Mozart wrote the first of his operas which has remained in the repertoire - Dir Entfûhrung. As so often one can only wonder what the music of a mature Schubert would have been like. Alas we will never know.

Mendelssohn: Die Hochzeit des Camacho

Opera 53

Mendelssohn: Die Hochzeit des Camacho

Soloists

Anima Eterna

Jos van Immerseel

I knew that Mendelssohn had written some early operas - though to speak of early works of a composer who wrote masterpieces in his teens seems slightly odd - but I had assumed that they were modest domestic pieces. So this took me by surprise. It is a full scale work lasting about 90 mins with a full cast, chorus and sizeable orchestra. It didn’t make much of an impact when it was first performed and indeed some of the criticism seems to have persuaded Mendelssohn that opera was not for him. That was a great pity because there is much to enjoy in this piece and it could have formed the basis of a significant operatic oeuvre had things turned out differently.

This is very much the Mendelssohn of the Octet and the overture to A Midsummer Night’s Dream - light and airy with a real sense of style and rhythmic impetus. The Magic Flute is an obvious influence as probably were the early works of Weber. What surprised me most was the choral writing - this was much more developed and extensive that one would expect from operas of this period (other than in France). It pointed the way towards the Mendelssohn of Elijah is some of the grander elements, though it never became sentimental in the way that some of the composer’s choral writing sometimes become.

So quite a discovery. One which gave me a lot of pleasure but ultimately was the ‘road not taken’. Had things turned out differently I a well image that Mendelssohn would have taken a place alongside Weber as the distinctive voice of early 19th century Romantic opera.

Weber: Silvana

Opera no 52

Weber: Silvana

Soloists

Hagen Philharmonic Orchestra and Chorus

Gerhard Markson

As I said at the conclusion of opera 51 I am now turning to German Romantic opera. It is natural to start with Weber as Der Freischutz as that is really the foundation of everything that follows. But Freischutz did not spring from nowhere and this earlier opera (the first of his that has survived in complete form) shows the composer gradually finding his voice. I found it a charming work with a lot of signs of what was to come. All the elements are there: drama, comedy, melodrama, dance and choruses. It doesn’t quite have the maturity of the better known Weber operas but it is clear that even at an early age he was a master of the operatic form.  I included another Weber opera, Abu Hassan, in last year’s project https://andrew365newpieces.blogspot.com/2025/09/weber-abu-hassan.html. This was a promising start for this part of the project.

Nicolai: The Merry Wives of Windsor

Opera 13

Nicolai: The Merry Wives of Windsor

Soloists

Bavarian State Opera

Robert Heger

In the days when concerts regularly started with overtures the overture to this opera was one of the most regularly performed pieces. But these days overtures are much less commonly played and so this has rather fallen from familiarity. I'll return to it later.

The opera, which dates from 1849, was Nicolai's last - he died aged 38 only a couple of months after the premiere. I thought that it was a delightful work -it is infused with the spirit of Weber and, especially, Mendelssohn. Some of the pieces in the opera could have passed for additional numbers in the incidental music to A midsummer night's dream and I am sure that Mendelssohn would not have disowned them.

This is very much an opera about the merry wives themselves - the role of Falstaff is surprisingly small, though I suspect that with the spoken dialogue taken into consideration it is a much more expansive role on stage than it is on disc. The ensembles are a real joy and there is great good humour throughout - even when Falstaff is being pinched!  Some of the solo arias are a little cloying and there is too much old-fashioned ornamentation but that it a minor drawback in what is otherwise an impressive score. Who knows what Nicolai might have written had lived another 30 years.

Back to the overture. As I listened to the opera I mentally ticked off the appearance of all of the themes from the overture except the most famous one - the C major tune that forms the second subject. But it never appeared.  What confidence to reserve that lovely tune just for the overture and keep the audience waiting for its (non) appearance. 

Spohr: Faust

Opera no 2

Spohr: Faust

Soloists

Bielefeld Opera chorus and orchestra

Geoffrey Moull

Spohr didn’t make much of an impression when I listened to one of his double quartets in my 365 project (https://andrew365newpieces.blogspot.com/search/label/Spohr) but this opera made a much more positive impression. It has quite a complex history. It was originally written in 1813 as a singspiel with spoken dialogue and went through various changes until 1851, when it was turned into a full-length opera. This means that it is stylistically quite varied. Some of it has classical routes but largely it belongs in the world of Mendelssohn and Schumann, though there are passages which could have been by Marschner. There are some very old-fashioned coloratura sections in a couple of the arias which do seem rather out of place. On the whole though the piece has a dynamic impetus and moves to a gripping climax. I was certainly pleased to have made its acquaintance