Singspiel
Encyclopedia
A Singspiel (plural: Singspiele) is a form of German-language
music
drama
, now regarded as a genre of opera
. It is characterized by spoken dialogue
, which is alternated with ensembles
, song
s, ballad
s, and aria
s (which were often lyrical, strophic
, or folk-like), rather like an operetta
.
s in Germany, where dialogue was interspersed with singing. By the early 17th century, miracle plays had grown profane, the word Singspiel is found in print, and secular Singspiele were also being performed, both in translated borrowings or imitations from English and Italian songs and plays, and in original German creations.
In the 18th century, some Singspiele were translations of English
ballad opera
s. In 1736 the Prussia
n ambassador to England commissioned a translation of the ballad opera The Devil to Pay. This was successfully performed in the 1740s in Hamburg
and Leipzig
. A further version of this was made by Johann Adam Hiller and C. F. Weisse in 1766 (Der Teufel ist los oder Die verwandelten Weiber
), the first of a string of such collaborations which led to Hiller and Weisse being called "the fathers of the German Singspiel."
French
operas with spoken dialogue (opéra comique
) were also frequently transcribed into the German, as well. Singspiele were considered popular entertainment
, and were usually performed by traveling troupes (such as the Koch, Döbbelin and Koberwein companies), rather than by established companies within metropolitan centers.
Singspiel plots are generally comic or romantic in nature, and frequently include elements of magic
, fantastical creatures, and comically exaggerated characterizations of good and evil.
wrote several Singspiele: Zaide
(1780), Die Entführung aus dem Serail
(1782), Der Schauspieldirektor
(1786), and finally the sophisticated Die Zauberflöte
(1791).
The subject matter of the Singspiel evolved over time: While tragedy was a less frequent motif
than comedy, romance, or fantasy, most of the Singspiele that are still part of the modern operatic canon are those written on more serious themes, such as Beethoven
's Fidelio
, or Carl Maria von Weber
's Der Freischütz
.
The Singspiel is the direct ancestor of the operetta
s of Franz von Suppé
, Johann Strauss II
and their successors. The Singspiel is also considered the predecessor of German romantic opera
, and many of the genre’s composers, such as Beethoven and Weber, paved the way to the more complex operatic style associated with Wagner
, Richard Strauss
and others. As a result of this evolution, except for use by certain operetta
composers, the Singspiel proper was less prevalent by the 20th century. In 1927, Kurt Weill
created a new word, 'Songspiel,' to describe his work Mahagonny
.
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
music
Music
Music is an art form whose medium is sound and silence. Its common elements are pitch , rhythm , dynamics, and the sonic qualities of timbre and texture...
drama
Drama
Drama is the specific mode of fiction represented in performance. The term comes from a Greek word meaning "action" , which is derived from "to do","to act" . The enactment of drama in theatre, performed by actors on a stage before an audience, presupposes collaborative modes of production and a...
, now regarded as a genre of opera
Opera
Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...
. It is characterized by spoken dialogue
Dialogue
Dialogue is a literary and theatrical form consisting of a written or spoken conversational exchange between two or more people....
, which is alternated with ensembles
Musical ensemble
A musical ensemble is a group of people who perform instrumental or vocal music. In classical music, trios or quartets either blend the sounds of musical instrument families or group together instruments from the same instrument family, such as string ensembles or wind ensembles...
, song
Song
In music, a song is a composition for voice or voices, performed by singing.A song may be accompanied by musical instruments, or it may be unaccompanied, as in the case of a cappella songs...
s, ballad
Ballad
A ballad is a form of verse, often a narrative set to music. Ballads were particularly characteristic of British and Irish popular poetry and song from the later medieval period until the 19th century and used extensively across Europe and later the Americas, Australia and North Africa. Many...
s, and aria
Aria
An aria in music was originally any expressive melody, usually, but not always, performed by a singer. The term is now used almost exclusively to describe a self-contained piece for one voice usually with orchestral accompaniment...
s (which were often lyrical, strophic
Strophic form
Strophic form is the simplest and most durable of musical forms, elaborating a piece of music by repetition of a single formal section. This may be analyzed as "A A A..."...
, or folk-like), rather like an operetta
Operetta
Operetta is a genre of light opera, light in terms both of music and subject matter. It is also closely related, in English-language works, to forms of musical theatre.-Origins:...
.
Origins
Some of the first Singspiele were miracle playMystery play
Mystery plays and miracle plays are among the earliest formally developed plays in medieval Europe. Medieval mystery plays focused on the representation of Bible stories in churches as tableaux with accompanying antiphonal song...
s in Germany, where dialogue was interspersed with singing. By the early 17th century, miracle plays had grown profane, the word Singspiel is found in print, and secular Singspiele were also being performed, both in translated borrowings or imitations from English and Italian songs and plays, and in original German creations.
In the 18th century, some Singspiele were translations of English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
ballad opera
Ballad opera
The term ballad opera is used to refer to a genre of English stage entertainment originating in the 18th century and continuing to develop in the following century and later. There are many types of ballad opera...
s. In 1736 the Prussia
Prussia
Prussia was a German kingdom and historic state originating out of the Duchy of Prussia and the Margraviate of Brandenburg. For centuries, the House of Hohenzollern ruled Prussia, successfully expanding its size by way of an unusually well-organized and effective army. Prussia shaped the history...
n ambassador to England commissioned a translation of the ballad opera The Devil to Pay. This was successfully performed in the 1740s in Hamburg
Hamburg
-History:The first historic name for the city was, according to Claudius Ptolemy's reports, Treva.But the city takes its modern name, Hamburg, from the first permanent building on the site, a castle whose construction was ordered by the Emperor Charlemagne in AD 808...
and Leipzig
Leipzig
Leipzig Leipzig has always been a trade city, situated during the time of the Holy Roman Empire at the intersection of the Via Regia and Via Imperii, two important trade routes. At one time, Leipzig was one of the major European centres of learning and culture in fields such as music and publishing...
. A further version of this was made by Johann Adam Hiller and C. F. Weisse in 1766 (Der Teufel ist los oder Die verwandelten Weiber
Die verwandelten Weiber
Die verwandelten Weiber, oder Der Teufel ist los, erster Theil is a three-act 'comische Oper' by the German composer Johann Adam Hiller, incorporating 14 musical numbers from the popular farce Der Teufel ist los by Johann Georg Standfuss.The libretto was by Christian Felix Weiße based on the...
), the first of a string of such collaborations which led to Hiller and Weisse being called "the fathers of the German Singspiel."
French
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
operas with spoken dialogue (opéra comique
Opéra comique
Opéra comique is a genre of French opera that contains spoken dialogue and arias. It emerged out of the popular opéra comiques en vaudevilles of the Fair Theatres of St Germain and St Laurent , which combined existing popular tunes with spoken sections...
) were also frequently transcribed into the German, as well. Singspiele were considered popular entertainment
Entertainment
Entertainment consists of any activity which provides a diversion or permits people to amuse themselves in their leisure time. Entertainment is generally passive, such as watching opera or a movie. Active forms of amusement, such as sports, are more often considered to be recreation...
, and were usually performed by traveling troupes (such as the Koch, Döbbelin and Koberwein companies), rather than by established companies within metropolitan centers.
Singspiel plots are generally comic or romantic in nature, and frequently include elements of magic
Magic (paranormal)
Magic is the claimed art of manipulating aspects of reality either by supernatural means or through knowledge of occult laws unknown to science. It is in contrast to science, in that science does not accept anything not subject to either direct or indirect observation, and subject to logical...
, fantastical creatures, and comically exaggerated characterizations of good and evil.
Development of the Singspiel
MozartWolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart , baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart , was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music...
wrote several Singspiele: Zaide
Zaide
Zaide is an unfinished opera, K. 344, written by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart in 1780. Emperor Joseph II, in 1778, was in the process of setting up an opera company for the purpose of performing German opera. One condition required of the composer to join this company was that he should write a...
(1780), Die Entführung aus dem Serail
Die Entführung aus dem Serail
Die Entführung aus dem Serail is an opera Singspiel in three acts by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. The German libretto is by Christoph Friedrich Bretzner with adaptations by Gottlieb Stephanie...
(1782), Der Schauspieldirektor
Der Schauspieldirektor
Der Schauspieldirektor , K. 486, is a comic Singspiel written by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart to a German libretto by Gottlieb Stephanie, an Austrian Schauspieldirektor....
(1786), and finally the sophisticated Die Zauberflöte
The Magic Flute
The Magic Flute is an opera in two acts composed in 1791 by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart to a German libretto by Emanuel Schikaneder. The work is in the form of a Singspiel, a popular form that included both singing and spoken dialogue....
(1791).
The subject matter of the Singspiel evolved over time: While tragedy was a less frequent motif
Motif (narrative)
In narrative, a motif is any recurring element that has symbolic significance in a story. Through its repetition, a motif can help produce other narrative aspects such as theme or mood....
than comedy, romance, or fantasy, most of the Singspiele that are still part of the modern operatic canon are those written on more serious themes, such as Beethoven
Ludwig van Beethoven
Ludwig van Beethoven was a German composer and pianist. A crucial figure in the transition between the Classical and Romantic eras in Western art music, he remains one of the most famous and influential composers of all time.Born in Bonn, then the capital of the Electorate of Cologne and part of...
's Fidelio
Fidelio
Fidelio is a German opera in two acts by Ludwig van Beethoven. It is Beethoven's only opera. The German libretto is by Joseph Sonnleithner from the French of Jean-Nicolas Bouilly which had been used for the 1798 opera Léonore, ou L’amour conjugal by Pierre Gaveaux, and for the 1804 opera Leonora...
, or Carl Maria von Weber
Carl Maria von Weber
Carl Maria Friedrich Ernst von Weber was a German composer, conductor, pianist, guitarist and critic, one of the first significant composers of the Romantic school....
's Der Freischütz
Der Freischütz
Der Freischütz is an opera in three acts by Carl Maria von Weber with a libretto by Friedrich Kind. It premiered on 18 June 1821 at the Schauspielhaus Berlin...
.
The Singspiel is the direct ancestor of the operetta
Operetta
Operetta is a genre of light opera, light in terms both of music and subject matter. It is also closely related, in English-language works, to forms of musical theatre.-Origins:...
s of Franz von Suppé
Franz von Suppé
Franz von Suppé or Francesco Suppé Demelli was an Austrian composer of light operas who was born in what is now Croatia during the time his father was working in this outpost of the Austro-Hungarian Empire...
, Johann Strauss II
Johann Strauss II
Johann Strauss II , also known as Johann Baptist Strauss or Johann Strauss, Jr., the Younger, or the Son , was an Austrian composer of light music, particularly dance music and operettas. He composed over 500 waltzes, polkas, quadrilles, and other types of dance music, as well as several operettas...
and their successors. The Singspiel is also considered the predecessor of German romantic opera
Romantische Oper
Romantische Oper was a genre of early nineteenth-century German opera, developed not from the German Singspiel of the eighteenth-century but from the opéras comiques of the French Revolution...
, and many of the genre’s composers, such as Beethoven and Weber, paved the way to the more complex operatic style associated with Wagner
Richard Wagner
Wilhelm Richard Wagner was a German composer, conductor, theatre director, philosopher, music theorist, poet, essayist and writer primarily known for his operas...
, Richard Strauss
Richard Strauss
Richard Georg Strauss was a leading German composer of the late Romantic and early modern eras. He is known for his operas, which include Der Rosenkavalier and Salome; his Lieder, especially his Four Last Songs; and his tone poems and orchestral works, such as Death and Transfiguration, Till...
and others. As a result of this evolution, except for use by certain operetta
Operetta
Operetta is a genre of light opera, light in terms both of music and subject matter. It is also closely related, in English-language works, to forms of musical theatre.-Origins:...
composers, the Singspiel proper was less prevalent by the 20th century. In 1927, Kurt Weill
Kurt Weill
Kurt Julian Weill was a German-Jewish composer, active from the 1920s, and in his later years in the United States. He was a leading composer for the stage who was best known for his fruitful collaborations with Bertolt Brecht...
created a new word, 'Songspiel,' to describe his work Mahagonny
Mahagonny-Songspiel
Mahagonny-Songspiel, also known as The Little Mahagonny, is a "small-scale 'scenic cantata'" written by the composer Kurt Weill and the dramatist Bertolt Brecht in 1927...
.
Resources
- Barbara Russano HanningBarbara Russano HanningBarbara Russano Hanning is an American musicologist who specializes in 16th and 17th century Italian music. She has also written works on the music of 18th-century France and on musical iconography. She earned a PhD in musicology from Yale University...
, Donald Jay Grout: Concise History of Western Music, W.W. Norton & Company, 1998. - Grove Dictionary of Music and MusiciansGrove Dictionary of Music and MusiciansThe New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians is an encyclopedic dictionary of music and musicians. Along with the German-language Musik in Geschichte und Gegenwart, it is the largest single reference work on Western music. The dictionary has gone through several editions since the 19th century...
, Singspiel.