The Life of Rossini

to the recitatives and their accompaniments "Tancredi" is indeed somewhat antiquated. But it was new, strikingly new, in the year 1813, when Mozart's great o

predecessors, and, in the opinion of many who admired those

, was, musically speaking, in a much more advanced state of development than opera seria. The dialogue, especially in serious opera, was carried on for interminable

nt, and treated the composer's melodies as so muc

strumentation mild-many instruments, that were afterwards employed prominently a

nly to strengthen the basses. Brass instruments, with the exception of horns, were all but proscribed; and some of the brass ins

the French stage, shocked the early admirers of "Tancredi" as much as the innovations, vocal and instrumental, in "Tancredi" had shocked those who cared only for the much simpler works of Paisiello and Cimarosa. Thus we find Stendhal complaining that

ratic habitué to whom these changes were anything but acceptable. It would be a mistake to suppose that Rossini's operas encountered formidable opposition anywhere; and in England, as in France, tho

One of the most material alterations is that the grand distinction between serious and comic operas is nearly at an end, the separation of the singers for their performance entirely so.[4] Not only do the same sing in both,

Shakspeare's plays and in Mozart's operas; but let Lord Mount Edgcu

g conversations, which present a tedious succession of unconnected, ever-changing motivos having nothing to do with each other: and if a satisfactory air is for a moment introduced which the ear would like to dwell upon, to hear modulated, varied, and again returned to, it is broken off before it is well understood, by a sudden transition int

s succession of unconnected, ever-changing motivos;" but from his own point

scarcely the same entertainment as that which popes, cardinals, and the most illustrious nobles in Italy had taken under their special protection in the early part of the seventeenth century. No general history of the opera in Europe can well be written, for its progress has been different in each country, and we find continual instances of composers

its development at Naples; and Rossini himself, though not educated at Naples, like almost all the other leading composers of Italy, soo

thout going back to the origin of all things, I may perhaps find it more easy to explain to the unlearned reader what Ros

choruses in the madrigal style. "Dafne," performed for the first time in the Corsi p

each of the five acts concludes with a chorus, the dialogue is in recitative, and one of the characters, Tircis, sings an air which

the accompaniments, increased the number of musicians in the orchestra, and made use of a separate combination of instrume

asured recitative. Scarlatti's operas contain the earliest examples of airs with obbligato solo accompaniments, and thi

was afterwards developed by Piccinni, and introduced into serious opera by Paisiello; while the latter succeeded his old master, contemporan

nting or modifying any particular form, wrote the best overtures that the Italian school had

was the first great Italian composer who never studied at the Conservatorie