A Short History of Opera by Donald Grout

Author:Donald Grout
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Music/Genres and Styles/Classical
Publisher: Columbia University Press
Published: 2011-11-22T05:00:00+00:00

HUNGARY

The founder of opera in Hungary was Ferenc Erkel (1810–93), whose Hunyady László (1844) holds the same position in its country as do A Life for the Tsar in Russia and Halka in Poland. Erkel’s other operas were almost equally popular, especially Bánk bán (1861).67 Both Hunyady László and Bánk bán are historical operas, but in order to avoid censorship (for during the nineteenth century Hungary was not an independent nation) Erkel purposely chose to depict historical events in the distant past. Hunyady László is set in the fifteenth century and is concerned with an episode in the life of the János Hungadi family, of which the younger son, Matyás, was eventually to become one of the most memorable kings of Hungary during the Renaissance period. Bánk bán, set in the year 1213, is based upon a play published in 1820. The story deals with the disparity in power between the landed aristocracy and the foreign authorities who govern the land (in this case the queen’s regency) and the desperate measures taken by the former to avenge the actions of the latter. Erkel revised Bánk bán in 1939, and it is this version that has been performed outside Hungary. The opera relies heavily on folk melodies. Even the instrumental passages reflect the folk style, with the scoring requiring a cimbalon.

Another important national composer was Mihály Mosonyi (1814–70), whose last two operas were settings of Hungarian librettos: Szép Ilonka (Fair Ilonka), produced in 1861, and Álois, composed in 1862 but not staged until 1934.68 Others of the early nationalist group were Andreas Bartay (1798–1856), whose Csel (The Trick, 1839) was the first original Hungarian comic opera, and August von Adelburg (1830–73), with the successful opera Zrinyi in 1868. Later nationalists included Jenö Hubay (1858–1937), a celebrated violinist and prolific composer, whose principal opera, A Cremonai Hegedüs (The Luthier of Cremona, 1894), is still given; and Ede Poldini (1869–1957), with the comic opera A csavargó és királylány (The Vagabond and the Princess, 1903). The works of Odön Mihalovich (1842–1929) were Germanic and Wagnerian in musical style, even when on Hungarian librettos, such as Toldi szerelme (Toldi’s Love, 1893). And a pronounced flavor of German Romanticism is heard in the operas of Géza Zichy (1849–1924), whose most ambitious undertaking was a trilogy on the life of Prince Rákóczi (produced at Budapest, 1905–12): Il Rákóczi Ferenc (1909), Nemo (1905), and Rodostó (1912).

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