L'arbore di Diana

L'arbore di Diana, by Lorenzo Da Ponte and Vicente Martín y Soler, is one of some sixty operas produced at the Vienna Burgtheater under the auspices of the emperors Joseph II and Leopold II, between 1783 and 1792. In such distinguished company as Mozart's Le nozze di Figaro, Don Giovanni and Così fan tutte, the reader may be surprised to find that our opera was the most preferred with the largest number of performances: sixty-five in that theater alone. Next in order of frequency of performances, with sixty-two, comes Paisiello's Barbiere di Siviglia, followed by Sarti's Fra i due litiganti, with fifty-eight. Una cosa rara, the successful opera by Martín y Soler, was performed fifty-five times, and Figaro, the most popular of Mozart's theatrical works only achieved thirty-eight performances; Don Giovanni had fifteen and Così fan tutte,…

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Notas

here are extensive lists of performances at the Burgtheater in the period in Otto Michtner, “Das alte Burgtheater als Opernbühne: von der Einführung des deutsches Singspiels (1778) bis zum Tod Kaiser Leopolds II (1792)” (Vienna: Hermann Böhlaus Nachf., 1970), and more recently, in Dorothea Link, “The National Court Theatre in Mozart's Vienna” (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1998).

Mentioned in Dorothea Link, ““L'arbore di Diana: a model for Così fan tutte”“, in Stanley Sadie, ed. “Wolfgang Amadè Mozart: Essays on his Life and Music”, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1996, pp. 362-73; 373 and n. 63.

Baltasar Saldoni, “Diccionario biográfico-bibliográfico de efemérides de músicos españoles” (Madrid: Imprenta Antonio Pérez Dubrull, 1868-81). Facsimile edition by Jacinto Torres (Madrid: Centro de Documentación Musical, 1986).

An up-to-date presentation of known facts (and new discoveries) about the beginnings of Martín y Soler's career may be found in Rainer Leonhard Kleinertz, “Zwischen Neapel und Madrid: Vicente Martín y Soler und das Spanische Königshaus”, “Anuario Musical” 51 (1996): 165-75. Previously, Ulisse Prota-Giurleo had recovered important documents concerning the Neapolitan sojourn of the composer: “Del compositore spagnuolo Vincente Martín y Soler”, “Archivi” 27 (1960): 145-56. For a general biographical overview, the best sorce is Dorothea Link's doctoral dissertation, “The Da Ponte Operas of Vicente Martín y Soler”, University of Toronto, 1991. (Chapter 1: “Martin's career”).

Modern edition by Juan Bautista Otero, Isidro Olmo Castillo, Manuel Forcano and Oscar Gil (Barcelona: Real Compañía Ópera de Cámara, 1999).

“Memorie di Lorenzo Da Ponte da Ceneda scritte da esso” (Nueva York, 1823-27). Modern edition: “Memoirs of Lorenzo Da Ponte”, trad. al inglés por Elisabeth Abott (Filadelfia: Lippincott, 1929). The quotations in the present English version are drawn from citations in Link, “Da Ponte Operas”.

The Memoirs from which these epithets are quoted were written in the 1820s. In a letter written by Da Ponte to Casanova in 1795, however, the tone is manifestly different: he calls Martín y Soler “damned bastard”, “malevolent”, talks about his “black soul” and complains of the Spaniard's usurpation of his rights, of his stealing from him, and of his calumnies. Evidently, time tempered the ire of the old “abbé”. (See Link, “Da Ponte Operas”, p. 220).

“Times”, London, April 17, 1797, quoted by Link, “Da Ponte Operas”, p. 228.

Francesco Pitichio, for whom Da Ponte had written the libretto of “Bertoldo”

1 Da Ponte, “Memoirs”, p. 174, in Link, “Da Ponte Operas, pp. 48-49.

1 She had been temporarily replaced by the leading singer of the “Singspiel” company, Caterina Cavalieri, at the behest of the Emperor himself (letter of June 11th, 1788). See Mary Hunter, “The Culture of Opera Buffa in Mozart's Vienna: A Poetics of Entertainment” (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1999), pp. 17 and 43.

1 Quoted in Link, “Da Ponte Operas”, pp. 49-50.

1 Harris, “Handel and the Pastoral Tradition” (London: Oxford Univ. Press, 1980), p.11.

1 Quote in Link, “Da Ponte Operas”, p. 50.

1 Anonymous, “Lettre d'un habitant de Vienne à son ami à Prague, qui lui avait demandé ses réflexions sur l' opéra intitulé L' arbore di Diana”, Österreichische Staatsarchiv, HstA, Karton 40, Vertrauliche Akten; quoted by Link, “Da Ponte Operas”, p. 67, from Michtner, “Burgtheater”, p. 435.

1 “Der Stein der Weisen” has been recently released in a CD performed by Boston Baroque; it includes an extensive companion booklet by David Buch and Martin Pearlman where the relationship to “Die Zauberflöte” is discussed.

1 With music by Benedikt Schak, who would later play the role of Tamino. See Otto Erich Deutsch, “Mozart: A Documentary Biography” (Stanford University Press, 1965), p. 367.

1 At least, this is what may be inferred from Mary Hunter's study of nearly 80 “opere buffe” performed at the Burgtheater. Hunter, “Culture of Opera Buffa”, pp. 40-42 and “passim”.

1 Link, ““L'arbore di Diana”: a model for “Così fan tutte”“.

2 Hunter, “Culture of Opera Buffa”, pp. 250-56.

2 Link, “Da Ponte Operas”, pp. 26 and 331-37 for the productions, 74-77 and 300-302 for the sources. In general, the source information is limited to the first Viennese production.

2 Cited by Link, “Da Ponte Operas”, p. 227.

2 Mary Hunter refers to a MS 10777 in Vienna, containing (in piano reduction) arias composed by Angelo Tarchi for “La ferrarese”, as substitutions for numbers I / 9 and II /14. Unfortunately I found this information too late to include the substitute arias in this edition.

2 “Lettre d'un habitant de Vienne”, quoted in Link, “The Da Ponte Operas”, p. 57.

2 The calligraphy of these changes is the same as that in the rest of the manuscript. Given that in this case we are evidently dealing with a composing score (or, at the very least, one where changes were composed-in), and given that, according to Link, these are not Martín y Soler autographs, we are led to believe that the copyist himself provided—or at least modified—the substitute arias.

2 “True Briton”, April 19, 1797, quoted in Frederick Petty, “Italian Opera in London, 1760-1800 “ (Ann Arbor: UMI Research Press, 1982), p. 314