The Enlightenment: From Civic Theater to Real Life (Eighteenth Century)

The eighteenth century was the century of reason and light—an age in which musical theater, after the heroic passions of Arcadia, began a profound process of renewal. Opera is a succession of songs, according to the definition of Song that Dante gives, ordered along the plot of a libretto. Songs no longer served only to entertain or to celebrate someone: they became instruments of moral and civic education. Dramatic song was placed at the service of clarity and truth.

The great innovation of the eighteenth century was the clear split between genres, a process launched by Apostolo Zeno’s reform, which sought to remove comic elements from all the songs that formed part of opera seria, elements that in the seventeenth century were instead mixed within the same performance.

Opera Seria and Opera Buffa

Opera Seria (in three acts) reflected the moral and ideal values of the eighteenth century (virtue, reason, heroism), expressing itself through reasoning in recitatives and lyrical outpourings in florid songs called Arias. It was the cosmopolitan genre, intended for court theaters or large public theaters, with virtuoso performers (sopranos, castrati, tenors) admired for their skill. But it was also the repertoire of singers performing in academies, or of people who enjoyed singing at home, or whistling the tunes in the street.

The songs of Opera Buffa, instead, reflected everyday life and the simplicity of daily routine. Comic elements found their home in the numbers of opera buffa (or commedia per musica), also a typically Italian product. The plots of the songs drew inspiration from what happened to bourgeois and common people, with a language more attentive to naturalness than to virtuosity for its own sake—praised by Enlightenment philosophers for its spontaneity. A masterpiece of the genre is La serva padrona (1733) by Giovan Battista Pergolesi, whose songs traveled throughout Italy and Europe, also as detached pieces, for the sheer pleasure of singing them. It entered, in other words, straight into the eighteenth century’s authorial song repertoire.

The Structure of the Dramatic Song

In eighteenth-century operas, Song was articulated into three distinct moments, defining modern musical architecture. One usually begins with Secco Recitative, the most common type, supported only by harpsichord chords in the theater, or by a polyphonic instrument—even just a guitar—if one was at home or in other settings. Here the text proceeded freely (without repetition) to develop dialogue and plot—rather like what happens today in musicals between one sung-and-danced number and the next.

Accompanied Recitative (or Obbligato) was used when scenes carried greater emotional intensity. In that case the voice was supported by the orchestra (especially strings, but not only). Its dramatic use increased progressively over the course of the eighteenth century.

The Song, in this case called an Aria, stood at the moment of maximum musical concentration and lyrical expansion of the show. It served to halt the action so the character could express feelings. Taken on their own, these arias function exactly like certain songs today. The dominant form was the da capo aria (A–B–A), popularized by Alessandro Scarlatti, which allowed the soloist wide scope for coloratura and improvisation.

The need for greater scenic variety also encouraged the birth of ensemble pieces (duets, trios, quartets) and act and opera finales, which are, in practice, highly developed songs and are found especially in opera buffa.

Reforming Masters and Vocal Centers

The success of Italian opera in Europe was sustained by a forge of talents trained in Italy, who carried our song to European cultural hegemony. Naples was universally considered the Capital of Bel Canto. The success of the Neapolitan school rested on the excellence of its four Conservatories, which trained generations of composers—and songwriter-composers (if they also authored the text). Alessandro Scarlatti and his pupil Francesco Durante defined the style of fashionable numbers, based on contrapuntal rigor and melodic sensitivity. Later generations produced internationally prominent figures (such as Pergolesi, Jommelli, Traetta, Paisiello, and Cimarosa) who spread the melodic tradition of Italian song abroad (Stuttgart, Vienna, Saint Petersburg).

Carlo Goldoni (Venice) also played a major role as a librettist (56 librettos for comic operas and farse, often set by Baldassarre Galuppi). In his librettos one finds the same reform that renewed his spoken drama. He was therefore a “lyricist,” as we would say today: he stitched coherent plots together, invented natural characters, and blended comic and sentimental elements with great balance, opening the way to songs that were more human and modern.

International Reformers and Vocal Superstars

Among the international reformers, figures such as Niccolò Jommelli (active in Stuttgart) and Tommaso Traetta (active in Parma and Vienna) sought a synthesis between Metastasian drama and new Enlightenment sensibilities, strengthening stage action, recitatives, and the use of the orchestra to enrich dramatic expression. Italian opera dominated Europe because the song (the Aria) was the perfect vehicle—loved abroad as well—for virtuosity and the expression of the affections.

There were superstars then, too. The emphasis on vocal prowess led to the triumph of celebrated performers, especially high voices (the musici such as Farinelli), admired for their command of coloratura and their capacity for improvisation—elements that guaranteed the audience a unique and unrepeatable performance.

The Intermezzo and Enlightenment Vitality

One of the most original forms of musical theater of the period was a short composition (often for only two or three voices) performed in the intervals of opera seria: the Intermezzo. Here too it was a series of songs, stitched together by a skilled writer who invented brilliant stories inspired above all by everyday life. The musician’s task was to enrich those words with music through fluid, singable melody (as in La serva padrona, whose success in Paris even triggered the famous querelle des bouffons).

Italian musical Enlightenment, while codifying structures, kept the expressive power of melody at the center, projecting our song tradition as a universal model for modern music.