Discover… Resilience
Ludwig van Beethoven, Leonore Overture No. 3, Op. 72b
The Opera
Beethoven’s opera Leonore/Fidelio (see below for the story behind the name) is a “rescue opera,” a genre popular in the era. Librettist Jean-Nicolas Bouilly claimed that his text Léonore, ou l’amour conjugale (Leonora, or Marital Love) was based on actual events that occurred during the Reign of Terror following the French Revolution. He moved the setting to Spain in order to avoid censorship and political concerns. A brief synopsis:
Because of his political views, Florestan is unjustly imprisoned and nearly starved to death by Don Pizzaro, the prison’s governor. Florestan’s wife, Leonore, assumes the identity of a young man named Fidelio in order to search for her husband. She secures a position as the jailer Rocco’s assistant. A subplot involving the jailer’s daughter Marzelline falling in love with Fidelio leavens the action. When Pizzaro learns of an impending inspection by Don Fernando, a government minister who is friends with Florestan, he seeks to evade recrimination by secretly killing Florestan and burying him in the dungeon. Rocco and Fidelio dig the grave as ordered and just as Pizzaro approaches with a dagger to kill Florestan, Leonore brandishes a pistol and reveals her identity. A trumpet call signals Fernando’s arrival. When he learns of Pizzaro’s treachery and Leonore’s heroism, Fernando frees Florestan and the other prisoners while placing Pizzaro in chains. The couple is reunited in the midst of general rejoicing.
The Story
Things are seldom linear with creative people and Ludwig van Beethoven more so than most. The story of Fidelio, Beethoven’s only completed opera (although he contemplated and worked on others), has a complicated context, as well as four overtures.
By 1803, Beethoven had conquered Vienna as a piano virtuoso and was garnering acclaim for his revolutionary compositions in a wide range of genres — symphonies, string quartets, piano sonatas, violin sonatas, piano concertos, dances, and songs. He was also contending with increasing deafness and had resolved to commit wholeheartedly to his music in the 6 October 1802 Heiligenstadt Testament. Thus, it would have been a natural progression to embark on writing an opera, by then a venerated art form which, from some perspectives, represents the pinnacle of musical endeavor.
The impetus arrived in the form of a commission from Emanuel Schikaneder, the Viennese theatrical impresario who had penned the libretto for Mozart’s The Magic Flute. Schikaneder’s libretto for Vestas Feuer (The Vestal Flame) seemed to check the requisite dramatic boxes but after a month’s work, Beethoven only had about ten minutes of music. He considered the stilted text trivial (“verses such as could only come out of the mouths of our Viennese women apple-vendors”) and abandoned the work.
At that point, Baron Peter von Braun, having purchased Schikaneder’s Theater an der Wien, commissioned an opera from Beethoven, suggesting Jean-Nicolas Bouilly’s libretto Léonore, ou l’amour conjugale (Leonora, or Marital Love), a work that had already been set to music three times by other composers but had excellent financial potential in a new setting. The subject matter, love and heroism in the cause of justice and freedom, certainly appealed to Beethoven.
His friend Joseph Sonnleithner provided a libretto in German and the composer leaned into the project with gusto, finishing the opera during the summer of 1805. Between Viennese censors and the difficult vocal writing, the premiere was delayed until 20 November 1805. Hoping to avoid confusion with the earlier versions of Leonore, the theater changed the opera’s title from Leonore, oder der Triumph der ehelichen Liebe (Leonore, or the Triumph of Marital Love) to Fidelio over Beethoven’s strident objection. Most unfortunately, Napoleon’s French army had entered and occupied Vienna the week before, on 13 November. As a consequence, the premiere was attended almost exclusively by French officers not especially well-disposed to Beethoven’s music. The protracted opera was not a success and was withdrawn after only three performances. The overture offered at these performances was what is now known as Leonore Overture No. 2, a lengthy and hugely dramatic work ill-suited for its role.
Following the famous Battle of Austerlitz in December 1805, the Austrians sought peace and signed the Pressburg Treaty later that month. With some semblance of normality restored, Beethoven sought to revive his opera. During a marathon meeting, several close friends prevailed upon him to make judicious cuts and he reluctantly agreed, even going so far as to rewrite the overture. True to form, he was dilatory in completing the revisions and weeks slipped by, severely trying Baron von Braun’s patience. The baron set a firm deadline of 29 March 1806, threatening to forego the production completely if Beethoven didn’t comply. Because Beethoven’s fee was primarily a percentage of the house proceeds (in addition to free lodging at the theater), he had great incentive to meet the deadline.
With a far more congenial audience in attendance than at its premiere, the revised version of the opera was enthusiastically received. The new overture, what we know as Leonore Overture No. 3, was an over-the-top dramatic distillation of the entire opera — exciting but not well-calculated to merely set the scene, instead giving away the whole plot. The success of this production was cut short due to Beethoven’s misperception that he was being cheated out of his share of the proceeds, ending the run after two performances.
There is evidence to indicate that a revival of the opera in Prague was considered in 1807 and Beethoven wrote yet another overture in anticipation of the production, which never came to fruition. This overture was considerably downsized from its predecessors and when later discovered among Beethoven’s manuscripts after his death, it was mistakenly thought to be his first draft, thus leading to its appellation as Leonore Overture No. 1.
The final incarnation of the opera, now definitively named Fidelio, came to be in 1814. Three leading singers hoping to capitalize on Beethoven’s fame sought to produce the opera (from which they would benefit financially) and Beethoven agreed on the condition that he could revise the work yet again. Beethoven asked poet Georg Friedrich Treitschke to revise the libretto and the two streamlined virtually every aspect of the opera. After innumerable delays and many changes, the opening was set for 23 May 1814 but the overture had not been written as of the dress rehearsal. When Beethoven did not show up for a rehearsal the morning of the performance, friends went to his lodging and found him asleep with pages of the overture scattered on the bed and floor, a goblet of wine, and a burnt-out candle indicating the night’s work. Of necessity, the orchestra played his Ruins of Athens Overture prior to the opera that evening; the new Fidelio Overture took its rightful place subsequently, suitably fitting its dramatic role. It is this version of the opera that is now most frequently performed.
While the Fidelio Overture may have claimed primacy, some conductors were loath to omit the encompassing drama of Leonore Overture No. 3 and added it before the final act of the opera. While Gustav Mahler is frequently credited with initiating this practice, it was not uncommon decades earlier. Regardless, Leonore Overture No. 3’s enduring success is a result of its frequent use in concert instead of as operatic curtain-raiser.
The Music
Opening with a slow descending scale that contributes to a sense of harmonic indeterminacy, the overture is a classic example of Beethoven’s exceptionally thorough approach to the development of sparse thematic material. Scale fragments interspersed and sometimes overlaid with arpeggio (chord notes played in succession rather than simultaneously) snippets extend the introduction, heightening anticipation for the melody that must surely be arriving soon. Patience is rewarded with a simple theme that generally outlines a chord. Even this unassuming phrase is subjected to expansion by repetition of segments, building tension that is gloriously released with a full-throated declaration of the theme.
The melody is considered from every angle and wrought finely, aptly evoking the drama of the opera’s plot. The offstage trumpet calls signaling the arrival of the government official and the success of Leonore’s heroic endeavor to save her husband might have prompted other composers to add a few concluding measures to the overture at that point in order to move on with the opera. Beethoven, having so methodically parsed the possibilities of his theme, is loath to relinquish the subject. Tender moments chronicle the couple’s joy at reunification while triumphant sounds embody the victory of justice over evil. As the last prison shackle falls away, a virtuosic swirl of scales begins in the violins, gradually drawing the entire orchestra into one final exultation.
— Eric T. Williams
Claude Debussy, Danses sacrée et profane
While others, notably Franz Liszt, were on the forefront of stylistic change during the nineteenth century, it is surely Claude Debussy who forever established entirely new ways of thinking about the fundamental ways of defining and composing music in Western culture. More than anyone, he truly was the father of much of the philosophical basis for the complete turnover in musical art that defined the twentieth century. And, along the way, he composed some of the most original, creative, and dare we say, beautiful music in the repertoire. His name, of course, is indelibly linked with what is popularly called “musical impressionism,” but that doesn’t really specifically tell you much. What you may say is that he largely worked within a musical style that made little use of so many of the characteristics of a musical tradition that really dominated the concert halls of the 18th and 19th centuries. Most of us are familiar with concepts such as sonata form; development; key relationships; major and minor tonalities, with their respective scales, counterpoint, fugues, and especially “developing” musical ideas in an ongoing linear fashion. As dominant as these procedures were, Debussy saw other ways of creating and working with musical ideas. His specifically French way of looking at things was quite a contrast to the ideas and methods of the German-speaking composers (all names we know so well!) that had dominated concert halls for a couple of centuries. There was opera, to be sure, and Italians had always held sway there, but in abstract music (no words) the Germans were generally king. Along comes Debussy with a refreshing alternative æsthetic.
In a nutshell, Debussy was not much interested in systems of musical composition, wherein each part—large or small—had a rational, expected, and traditional relationships to every other part. Rather, he focused upon listening to musical sounds in new ways—considering them just for their intrinsic sound, and not how they might fit into a hierarchy as a mere building block. He opened up new ways of composing and listening, and the musical world was changed forever.
In keeping with Debussy’s orientation as a composer, he really never wrote any solo concertos (or symphonies, for that matter) in the traditional sense. But of course, he was a master of the orchestra, and did leave us with a half dozen works that may be designated “concertante,” that is, for orchestra and featuring a solo instrument. The Première Rhapsodie for orchestra and clarinet may be familiar. Dances sacrée et profane with harp soloist is an important example, as well.
Over the centuries occasionally works come about from a desire to showcase an innovative or new instrument—certainly, Haydn’s trumpet concerto, written for the new, keyed trumpet comes to mind. And, as is often the case, deficiencies in the new design may ultimately consign the “innovations” to the dustbin of musical history. And so it is with the new kind of harp for which Debussy wrote the Dances. The harp—traditionally, associated with France than any other country—had been a diatonic (incapable of playing the sharps and flats) instrument. Thus, its practical employment in the orchestra did pose challenges. Which is why, among several reasons, that one doesn’t hear much use of the harp in orchestras of the eighteenth century. But, the advent of the double action pedal—or concert—harp in the early nineteenth century facilitated its accelerated employment. However, the increase in chromaticism in music of the late nineteen century led to the introduction in France of the “cross-strung,” or chromatic double harp to facilitate ease of playing all chromatic passages. It was a mixed success. The double row of strings poses additional challenges of its own, and though the design still is used in some cases, the traditional pedal harp is now predominant. Debussy, himself, indicated that the Dances sacrée et profane could be played on either kind of harp, or even on the piano.
Composed in 1904, the two dances are in contrasting styles—the “sacred” dance is couched in somber melodies that evoke ecclesiastical chant, while the “profane” (in French meaning simply secular, not anything blasphemous) evokes the gentle sway of a rather droll secular dance, perhaps a waltz. Throughout, one hears many of Debussy’s signature musical characteristics: modal melodies, parallel harmonies, non-functional harmonies (think of harmonies that don’t drive to cadence, but just “sound pleasant”), and of course, his marvelous mastery of orchestra color in the best French tradition. A subtlety that may be missed if you’re not a harpist are the many passages chockfull of chromaticism. Easy in many instrumental contexts, but a kind of tour de force for harpists! Debussy makes it all seem so facile.
–Wm . E. Runyan
©2020 William E. Runyan