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University of Iowa speech and dramatic art programs, 1967-1969
1969-04-22 "Dona Francisquita" Page 4
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ZARZUELA Zarzuela has been to Spain what opera was to Italy: the national form of lyric theater. Unlike opera, however, the zarzeula rejected dramma per musica in favor of drama con musica, the alternation of musical numbers with passages of spoken dialogue. The reasons for the conspicuous lack of success of native opera in Spanish are both numerous and complex, although one Spanish writer found a simple explanation. According to Antonio Eximeno, an early prophet of the nineteenth-century nationalist movement in Spanish music, the Spanish simply had too much good sense to adopt anything so repugnant to reason as Italianate opera with its "insufferable monotony of recitative." The Spanish solution to the problem of music,drama.spectacle, and national expression was the zarzuela. Although the term "zarzuela" was first applied to musical entertainments performed before the Spanish royalty in the seventeenth century, the modern reference is to a species of popular dialogue-opera which came into existence in the 1850's. Its rise both reflected and contributed to a strong nationalist movement in Spanish literature, drama, and music in a general sense it can be considered the Spanish counterpart of the German singspiel, the French opera-comique and (on the lighter side) the Viennese operetta. Its plots are often drawn from national history, popular novels, or folk lore, while the traditional character types of Spanish spoken drama find their direct counterparts in the zarzuela. Dances, choruses, and musical forms are often based on folk or folk-like material, and the musical style is characteristically Spanish in rhythm, vocal usage, and orchestration. Dona Fracisquita, the most popular of the hundred-odd zarzuelas of the Catalan composer Amaedo Vives (1871-1932), is one of the most successful works of the Spanish stage; known throughout Europe and Latin American, it has been performed more than 4,000 times in its forty-seven years of existence. The first performance took place at the Teatro Apolo, Madrid, in October, 1923. Because of its great popularity and its rich associations with Madrid theater, Dona Francisquita was chosen as the work with which to reopen the newly refurbished Teatro de la Zarzuela on the occasion of its centennial in 1956. - Donald Thompson
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ZARZUELA Zarzuela has been to Spain what opera was to Italy: the national form of lyric theater. Unlike opera, however, the zarzeula rejected dramma per musica in favor of drama con musica, the alternation of musical numbers with passages of spoken dialogue. The reasons for the conspicuous lack of success of native opera in Spanish are both numerous and complex, although one Spanish writer found a simple explanation. According to Antonio Eximeno, an early prophet of the nineteenth-century nationalist movement in Spanish music, the Spanish simply had too much good sense to adopt anything so repugnant to reason as Italianate opera with its "insufferable monotony of recitative." The Spanish solution to the problem of music,drama.spectacle, and national expression was the zarzuela. Although the term "zarzuela" was first applied to musical entertainments performed before the Spanish royalty in the seventeenth century, the modern reference is to a species of popular dialogue-opera which came into existence in the 1850's. Its rise both reflected and contributed to a strong nationalist movement in Spanish literature, drama, and music in a general sense it can be considered the Spanish counterpart of the German singspiel, the French opera-comique and (on the lighter side) the Viennese operetta. Its plots are often drawn from national history, popular novels, or folk lore, while the traditional character types of Spanish spoken drama find their direct counterparts in the zarzuela. Dances, choruses, and musical forms are often based on folk or folk-like material, and the musical style is characteristically Spanish in rhythm, vocal usage, and orchestration. Dona Fracisquita, the most popular of the hundred-odd zarzuelas of the Catalan composer Amaedo Vives (1871-1932), is one of the most successful works of the Spanish stage; known throughout Europe and Latin American, it has been performed more than 4,000 times in its forty-seven years of existence. The first performance took place at the Teatro Apolo, Madrid, in October, 1923. Because of its great popularity and its rich associations with Madrid theater, Dona Francisquita was chosen as the work with which to reopen the newly refurbished Teatro de la Zarzuela on the occasion of its centennial in 1956. - Donald Thompson
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