Perception and Reception of Opera, Berlin c. 1815–1828
Final Report Abstract
Focussing the example of Berlin in the 1810s and 1820s, the project contributed to a more differentiated and in-depth look at the cultivation of opera, musical life and music market in the first third of the 19th century, including and cross-linking a number of previously neglected aspects more closely: • a precise empirical recording of the repertoires and opera programmes including exact performance numbers and dates as well as the particular casts; • the production structure and institutional conditions; • a special focus on reception and perception, audience structures and the question of expectations, patterns of reception and moments of popularity; • the relevance of performative and theatrical elements such as the vocal display and popularity of singing stars, acting concerns, stage designs and scenery, costuming, special effects, etc.; • the perception and impact of opera music beyond the stage in concert performances as well as in the various areas of musical leisure and entertainment (in taverns, clubs and private theatre societies, in gardens and squares, at ball events, in panoramas, mechanical theatres and in artistic performances, in salons and in various forms of domestic music-making, etc.). Special attention was paid here in particular to the hitherto mostly ignored music publishers and music trade with its diverse forms of arrangements of operatic music for a wide variety of instruments and formations, from piano reductions to favourite pieces, potpourris and variations to opera dances. With the aim of a multi-perspective and multi-dimensional approach, the complex phenomenon of music theatre could thus be further investigated in its intertwined interrelations between composition, production and aesthetics, institutional and cultural-political aspects as well as the audience-related perception and reception dimensions. While a detailed repertoire and performance database “Opera in Berlin 1810–1830” was set up to record and evaluate the programmes, monographic special studies were devoted to Berlin’s repertoire policy and the diverse forms of reception in and outside the theatres, as well as to the Berlin music trade with its operarelated publishing products. In addition, further exemplary case studies were published in separate articles. A large international conference on the occasion of the 200th anniversaries of the premières of Carl Maria von Weber’s Freischütz and Gaspare Spontini’s German version of Olympia in May/June 1821 further shed light on these topics.
Publications
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Prestige, Probleme, Polarisierung. Spontini als preußischer Generalmusikdirektor zwischen institutioneller Verortung und öffentlicher Wahrnehmung, in: Von Spontini bis Strauss. Hofkapelle und Hofoper Berlin im langen 19. Jahrhundert, hg. v. Detlef Giese, Christian Schaper und Arne Stollberg, Würzburg: Königshausen & Neumann 2022 (Klangfiguren. Studien zur Historischen Musikwissenschaft, 7), ISBN: 978-3-8260-7219-2, S. 97–136
Fabian Kolb
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Über die Deutsche comische Oper. Lexikon Schriften über Musik, 690-696. Bärenreiter-Verlag.
Reichardt, Johann Friedrich
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Die Berliner Fassungen von Gaspare Spontinis Fernand Cortez, in: Gaspare Spontini: The Berlin Years, hg. v. Fabian Kolb und Alessandro Lattanzi, Lucca: Libreria Musicale Italiana 2023 (Studi e Saggi, 54), ISBN: 978-8-8554-3192-7, S. 109– 166
Klaus Pietschmann
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Diffusion des Populären. Zum Wahrnehmungsspektrum von Beethoven und Rossini in der musikalischen Alltagskultur des 19. Jahrhunderts, in: Beethoven und Rossini in ihrer Epoche. Kontexte – Komposition – Aufführung – Rezeption, hg. v. Arnold Jacobshagen, Beate Angelika Kraus und Christine Siegert, Bonn: Verlag Beethoven- Haus [2023] (Schriften zur Beethoven-Forschung, 33)
Fabian Kolb
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Gaspare Spontini: The Berlin Years, Lucca: Libreria Musicale Italiana 2023 (Studi e Saggi, 54), X+296 Seiten, ISBN: 978-8-8554- 3192-7
Fabian Kolb & Alessandro Lattanzi
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Rossini und Artaria: Die Wiener Verlagsproduktion zwischen hausmusikalischer Rezeption, lokaler Verortung und Exklusivansprüchen, in: Rossini in Wien 1822, hg. v. Reto Müller, Leipzig: Leipziger Universitätsverlag [2023] (Schriftenreihe der Deutschen Rossini-Gesellschaft, 12)
Fabian Kolb
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Wahrnehmungsperspektiven und Popularitätsfaktoren der Oper in Berlin um 1830: Das Beispiel der Agnes von Hohenstaufen, in: Gaspare Spontini: The Berlin Years, hg. v. Fabian Kolb und Alessandro Lattanzi, Lucca: Libreria Musicale Italiana 2023 (Studi e Saggi, 54), ISBN: 978-8-8554-3192-7, S. 167–199
Fabian Kolb
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Zwischen Olympia und Freischütz. Oper in Berlin im ersten Drittel des 19. Jahrhunderts: Repertoire – Realisierung – Rezeption, Tagungsbericht 2022, Würzburg: Königshausen & Neumann [2023], ca. 380 Seiten
Fabian Kolb
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„Diesem vertrackten Spontini“. Einblicke in das Berliner Opernleben, die Repertoiregestaltung und die Rolle Gaspare Spontinis, in: Gaspare Spontini: The Berlin Years, hg. v. Fabian Kolb und Alessandro Lattanzi, Lucca: Libreria Musicale Italiana 2023 (Studi e Saggi, 54), ISBN: 978-8-8554-3192-7, S. 25–65
Jasmin Seib
