Глюктің "Альчеста" операсы тарихы

Opera by Christoph Willibald Gluck

Alceste, Wq. 37 (the later French version is Wq. 44), is an opera by Christoph Willibald Gluck from 1767. The libretto (in Italian) was written by Ranieri de' Calzabigi and based on the play Alcestis by Euripides. The premiere took place on 26 December 1767 at the Burgtheater in Vienna.

Gluck recomposed and lengthened Alceste to a French libretto by François Louis Gand Le Bland Du Roullet for performances at the Paris Opera, retaining the three act structure. Hercules was added as a pivotal character in Act III, as was a scene at the Gates of Hell. The premiere took place on 23 April 1776 in the second Salle du Palais Royal.

With the presentations in Paris, Alceste became an essentially new work, the translation from Italian to French necessitating several changes in the musical declamation of text, and certain scenes significantly reorganized to new or altered music. Some of the changes were made upon the advice of Jean Jacques Rousseau, one of Gluck's greatest French admirers, but the bulk of the adaptation was the work of French aristocrat Du Roullet, with improvements by the composer. Gluck fought several efforts to make the new version of Alceste conform to French tastes, resisting pressure to end the opera with an extended ballet. The new libretto does, however, introduce several subsidiary characters for dramatic variety, and, following the example of Euripides, on whose work the libretto is loosely based, even calls in Hercules in the final act. Berlioz made adjustments to the opera for a staging in 1861 that starred Pauline Viardot at the Paris Opéra. This was remounted, with further rearrangements, in 1866, starring Marie Battu. The first British performance, which was sung in Italian, took place at the King's Theatre, London on 30 April 1795, starring Brigida Banti. The work was given in French during the Coronation Season of 1937 at the Royal Opera House, conducted by Philippe Gaubert with Germaine Lubin as Alceste. More recent productions in Britain have included those at the Glyndebourne Festival conducted by Vittorio Gui, with Magda Laszlo (1953 and 1954) and Consuelo Rubio (1958) as Alceste; by Scottish Opera in 1974, conducted by Alexander Gibson with the title role shared between Júlia Várady and Ann Murray; and by the Royal Opera in 1981, conducted by Sir Charles Mackerras, with Janet Baker in the title role. In 2015 the opera was given for the first time by the Teatro La Fenice in Venice, directed by Pier Luigi Pizzi, in its unabridged Italian version, also including the parts that Gluck himself had cut at the Vienna premiere out of practical necessities. The Metropolitan Opera gave Alceste in three different seasons, with four sopranos starring in eighteen performances. Its premiere on 24 January 1941, sung in French, featured Marjorie Lawrence. In 1952 the opera was given in English, with Kirsten Flagstad in the title role. Catherine Naglestad appeared in ten performances with the Stuttgart State Opera in 2006, and this production was filmed. Alceste was given by Santa Fe Opera in August 2009 with Christine Brewer in the title role. A production at the Teatro Real Madrid in 2014, conducted by Ivor Bolton, featured Angela Denoke as Alceste; the Bavarian State Opera in Munich, presented the work in 2019, conducted by Antonello Manacorda, with Dorothea Röschmann in the title role. Nowadays the opera is usually given in the Paris version musically, with the libretto sometimes back translated into Italian.

In Don Giovanni, written in 1787, twenty years after Alceste and the year Gluck died Mozart used a similar chord progression, as well as texture and orchestration, for the Commendatore speaking to Don Giovanni in the garden scene that Gluck used for the line of the High Priest when saying that Alceste will die if no one takes her place. Hector Berlioz claimed that this section of Don Giovanni was "heavily in inspired or rather plagiarized". Berlioz discussed the authenticity of some of the arias. For example, when Gluck went to Vienna, an aria was added to act 3. Berlioz came to the conclusion that Gluck was under so much pressure that he let it happen. Berlioz notes Gluck added corrections during rehearsals, and misunderstandings in the score, due to what Berlioz calls Gluck's "happy go lucky" style of writing.