Description
Italian opera quickly became integrated into the theatrical landscape of 18th-century Madrid, influencing local genres such as zarzuela and Spanish opera. These genres readily absorbed the musical conventions of dramma per musica and opera buffa. However, their hybrid nature either disrupted the rigid structure of Spanish theatre or led to only sporadic performances.
Fortunately, other theatrical genres were far more prevalent on the Madrid stage and also incorporated conventions from Italian opera. One such genre was the comedia, the most frequently performed theatrical form in 18th-century Madrid. As a declamatory theatre with a continuous yet flexible musical presence, the comedia featured a dynamic dramaturgy that allowed for the integration of various musical pieces. Throughout the century, Spanish and Italian composers wrote music for these plays, often including arias, recitatives, and cavatinas. Moreover, pieces in Italian were frequently incorporated, sometimes taken directly from popular operas of the time. This makes the comedia a valuable genre for studying the reception of these operas in Madrid.
In this paper, we examine comedia and its music, with a particular focus on its relationship with Italian opera in the 18th century. We will analyze the conventions it borrowed and blended from Italian opera and present the Italian pieces incorporated into comedias, some of which were composed by prominent figures of the time, such as Baldassare Galuppi, Carlo Ignazio Monza, and Giuseppe Sarti.
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