The "Swan of Pesaro" is a name linked with some of the most charming
musical associations of this age. Though forty years silence made
fruitless what should have been the richest creative period of
Rossini's life, his great works, poured forth with such facility, and
still retaining their grasp in spite of all changes in public opinion,
stamp him as being the most gifted composer ever produced by a country
so fecund in musical geniuses. The old set forms of Italian opera had
already yielded in large degree to the energy and pomp of French
declamation, when Rossini poured into them afresh such exhilaration
and sparkle as again placed his country in the van of musical Europe.
With no pretension to the grand, majestic, and severe, his fresh and
delightful melodies, flowing without stint, excited alike the critical
and the unlearned into a species of artistic craze, a mania which has
not yet subsided. The stiff and stately Oublicheff confesses, with
many compunctions of conscience, that, when listening for the first
time to one of Rossini's operas, he forgot for the time being all that
he had ever known, admired, played, or sung, for he was musically
drunk, as if with champagne. Learned Germans might shake their heads
and talk about shallowness and contrapuntal rubbish, his _crescendo_
and _stretto_ passages, his tameness and uniformity even in melody,
his want of artistic finish; but, as Richard Wagner, his direct
antipodes, frankly confesses in his "Oper und Drama," such objections
were dispelled by Rossini's opera-airs as if they were mere delusions
of the fancy. Essentially different from Beethoven, Bach, Mozart,
Haydn, or even Weber, with whom he has some affinities, he stands a
unique figure in the history of art, an original both as man and
musician.
GIOACCHINO ROSSINI was the son of a town-trumpeter and an operatic
singer of inferior rank, born in Pesaro, Romagna, February 29, 1792.
The child attended the itinerant couple in their visits to fairs and
musical gatherings, and was in danger, at the age of seven, of
becoming a thorough-paced little vagabond, when maternal alarm trusted
his education to the friendly hands of the music-master, Prinetti. At
this tender age even he had been introduced to the world of art, for
he sang the part of a child at the Bologna opera. "Nothing," said
Mdme. Georgi-Righetti, "could be imagined more tender, more touching,
than the voice and action of this remarkable child."
The young Rossini, after a year or two, came under the notice of the
celebrated teacher Tesei, of Bologna, who gave him lessons in
pianoforte playing and the voice, and obtained him a good place as
boy-soprano at one of the churches. He now attracted the attention of
the Countess Perticari, who admired his voice, and she sent him to the
Lyceum to learn fugue and counterpoint at the feet of a very strict
Gamaliel, Padre Mattei. The youth was no dull student, and, in spite
of his capricious indolence, which vexed the soul of his tutor, he
made such rapid progress that at the age of sixteen he was chosen to
write the cantata, annually awarded to the most promising student.
Success greeted the juvenile effort, and thus we see Rossini fairly
launched as a composer. Of the early operas which he poured out for
five years it is not needful to speak, except that one of them so
pleased the austere Marshal Massena that he exempted the composer from
conscription. The first opera which made Rossini's name famous through
Europe was "Tancredi," written for the Venetian public. To this opera
belongs the charming "Di tanti palpiti," written under the following
circumstances:--Mdme. Melanotte, the _prima donna_, took the whim
during the final rehearsal that she would not sing the opening air,
but must have another. Rossini went home in sore disgust, for the
whole opera was likely to be put off by this caprice. There were but
two hours before the performance. He sat waiting for his macaroni,
when an exquisite air came into his head, and it was written in five
minutes.
After his great success he received offers from almost every town in
Italy, each clamouring to be served first. Every manager was required
to furnish his theatre with an opera from the pen of the new idol. For
these earlier essays he received a thousand francs each, and he wrote
five or six a year. Stendhall, Rossini's spirited biographer, gives a
picturesque account of life in the Italian theatres at this time, a
status which remains in some of its features to-day--
"The mechanism is as follows:--The manager is frequently one of the
most wealthy and considerable persons of the little town he inhabits.
He forms a company, consisting of _prima donna_, _tenoro_, _basso
cantante_, _basso buffo_, a second female singer, and a third _basso_.
The _libretto_, or poem, is purchased for sixty or eighty francs from
some unlucky son of the muses, who is generally a half-starved abbé,
the hanger-on of some rich family in the neighbourhood. The character
of the parasite, so admirably painted by Terence, is still to be found
in all its glory in Lombardy, where the smallest town can boast of
some five or six families of some wealth. A _maestro_, or composer, is
then engaged to write a new opera, and he is obliged to adapt his own
airs to the voices and capacity of the company. The manager intrusts
the care of the financial department to a _registrario_, who is
generally some pettifogging attorney, who holds the position of his
steward. The next thing that generally happens is that the manager
falls in love with the _prima donna_; and the progress of this
important amour gives ample employment to the curiosity of the
gossips.
"The company thus organised at length gives its first representation,
after a month of cabals and intrigues, which furnish conversation for
the town. This is an event in the simple annals of the town, of the
importance of which the residents of large places can form no idea.
During months together a population of eight or ten thousand people do
nothing but discuss the merit of the forthcoming music and singers
with the eager impetuosity which belongs to the Italian character and
climate. The first representation, if successful, is generally
followed by twenty or thirty more of the same piece, after which the
company breaks up.... From this little sketch of theatrical
arrangements in Italy some idea may be formed of the life which
Rossini led from 1810 to 1816." Between these years he visited all the
principal towns, remaining three or four months at each, the idolised
guest of the _dilettanti_ of the place. Rossini's idleness and love of
good cheer always made him procrastinate his labours till the last
moment, and placed him in dilemmas from which only his fluency of
composition extricated him. His biographer says:--
"The day of performance is fast approaching, and yet he cannot resist
the pressing invitations of these friends to dine with them at the
tavern. This, of course, leads to a supper, the champagne circulates
freely, and the hour of morning steals on apace. At length a
compunctious vision shoots across the mind of the truant composer. He
rises abruptly; his friends insist on seeing him home; and they parade
the silent streets bareheaded, shouting in chorus whatever comes
uppermost, perhaps a portion of a _miserere_, to the great scandal of
pious Catholics tucked snugly in their beds. At length he reaches his
lodging, and shutting himself up in his chamber is, at this, to
every-day mortals, most ungenial hour, visited by some of his most
brilliant inspirations. These he hastily scratches down on scraps of
paper, and next morning arranges them, or, in his own phrase,
instruments them, amid the renewed interruptions of his visitors. At
length the important night arrives. The _maestro_ takes his place at
the pianoforte. The theatre is overflowing, people having flocked to
the town from ten leagues distance. Every inn is crowded, and those
unable to get other accommodations encamp around the theatre in their
various vehicles. All business is suspended, and, during the
performances, the town has the appearance of a desert. The passions,
the anxieties, the very life of a whole population are centered in the
theatre."
Rossini would preside at the first three representations, and, after
receiving a grand civic banquet, set out for the next place, his
portmanteau fuller of music-paper than of other effects, and perhaps a
dozen sequins in his pocket. His love of jesting during these gay
Bohemian wanderings made him perpetrate innumerable practical jokes,
not sparing himself when he had no more available food for mirth. On
one occasion, in travelling from Ancona to Reggio, he passed himself
off for a musical professor, a mortal enemy of Rossini, and sang the
words of his own operas to the most execrable music, in a cracked
voice, to show his superiority to that donkey, Rossini. An unknown
admirer of his was in such a rage that he was on the point of
chastising him for slandering the great musician, about whom Italy
raved.
Our composer's earlier style was quite simple and unadorned, a fact
difficult for the present generation, only acquainted with the florid
beauties of his later works, to appreciate. Rossini only followed the
traditions of Italian music in giving singers full opportunity to
embroider the naked score at their own pleasure. He was led to change
this practice by the following incident. The tenor-singer Velluti was
then the favourite of the Italian theatres, and indulged in the most
unwarrantable tricks with his composers. During the first performance
of "L'Aureliano," at Naples, the singer loaded the music with such
ornaments that Rossini could not recognise the offspring of his own
brains. A fierce quarrel ensued between the two, and the composer
determined thereafter to write music of such a character that the most
stupid singer could not suppose any adornment needed. From that time
the Rossini music was marked by its florid and brilliant embroidery.
Of the same Velluti, spoken of above, an incident is told,
illustrating the musical craze of the country and the period. A
Milanese gentleman, whose father was very ill, met his friend in the
street--"Where are you going?" "To the Scala, to be sure." "How! your
father lies at the point of death." "Yes! yes! I know, but Velluti
sings to-night."