9 - Identity on the Stage

Summary

Outside of a few notable courtly circles, Italian opera struggled garner the sort of public enthusiasm it had in many other parts of Europe. With a Bohemian tradition of plays with musical songs or interludes (perhaps closer to the English ballad opera genre), the genre of all-sung opera had neither the number of outlets or committed artists to make it succeed. As with the English case, the lack of enthusiasm for Italian opera in the Czech lands has historically been seen as a collective national failing. Tantalising hints survive, for example, of elaborate productions as part of the festivities in Prague in 1617 for the official proclamation of Ferdinand II of Styria to succeed Mathias as King of Bohemia. While few particulars of the production survive, a manuscript of notes commenting on the performance is preserved in the British Library, and the comments suggest that the performance was probably a mixture of spoken allegory with some singing. The single manuscript sheet is headed ‘La musica de Regno di Bohemia’ [The music of the Kingdom of Bohemia] and lists those with singing parts: Archduke Ferdinand (alto), Archduke Maximilian (bass), the Emperor Mathias (tenor) and possibly the Pontifical Ambassador. The Grand Duke of Tuscany and the ambassadors of Venice and Spain all had speaking roles. There were other grand musical entertainments in the years leading up to the Thirty Years War, but the political and social upheaval of the war would bury any of the early promise of operatic flowering for about a century.