Meta-Opera

Speranza

"MUSIC AND ‘MUSIC’ IN EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY META-OPERATIC SCORES"

A. BELLINI

Bellin writes:

"‘Meta-operas’, that is, operas portraying
the world of opera and its protagonists (such
as impresarios, music directors,
librettists and virtuosi), became increasingly
common during the eighteenth
century."

Here above an informal definition of meta-opera then,

a meta-opera is an opera portraying
the world of opera and its protagonists, such
as impresarios, music directors,
librettists and virtuosi.

Bellini goes on:

"Most of the scholarly literature on meta-opera, however, concentrates on the operas' poetic texts, their librettos."

"Scholars have dealt with these operas-about-operas almost as though they were spoken dramas, without taking into account the many ways in which meta-theatrical practices and conventions are made more complex by the presence of music."

"What do meta-operatic scores look like?"

"Are they similar to other ‘ordinary’ scores of the same time, or do their meta-theatrical techniques set them aside as special?"

Considering a number of eighteenth-century works, Bellini points out "how specific musical means can contribute to the overall effect of meta-operatic plots."

"The stratified nature of meta-narratives is, in fact, mirrored in the scores when realistic music is performed on stage."

"On these occasions, the presence of more than one layer of
musical performance (of music and ‘music’) can be detected in
the score."

"Furthermore, the presence of realistic music allows for a highly flexible treatment of standard operatic practices, and a number of passages work across conventional oppositions such as recitative/closed number, ‘real-life’/‘performed’ and ‘spoken’/‘sung’."

"Meta-operas, therefore, offer a special perspective on the presence of realistic music in opera."

For the record, A. Bellini received the PhD from the University of Cambridge. Her dissertation is

‘Aspects of Meta-Theatre in Eighteenth-Century Italian Opera’,

In it, Bellini explores the phenomenon of meta-theatre in the operatic world, discussing the introduction of dramatic and musical elements that express ‘theatrical self-consciousness’.

Bellini's research interests include eighteenth-century opera, theories of drama, literary criticism and aesthetics.

She is now Associate Lecturer at the Open University.

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Cfr. Speranza, mise-en-abime.