A mad scene is an enactment of insanity in an opera, play,[1] or the like. It may be well contained in a number, appear during or recur throughout a more through-composed work, be deployed in a finale, form the underlying basis of the work, or constitute the entire work. They are often very dramatic, representing virtuoso pieces for singers. Some were written for specific singer, usually of a soprano Fach.
Many notable examples were composed for either opere serie or semiserie, as in those of Georg Frideric Handel.
They were a popular convention of French and especially Italian opera in the early 19th century, becoming a bel canto staple. Gaetano Donizetti's Lucia di Lammermoor is the most famous example. As composers sought more realism (verismo), they adapted the convention and better integrated the scene into the opera.
With the rise of psychology (and advances in psychiatry), modernist composers revived and transformed the mad scene in expressionist operas and similar genres (e.g., melodramas, monodramas). Richard Strauss, Arnold Schoenberg, and Alban Berg depicted madness in new and dissonant idioms in the early 1900s. Berg and Britten wrote mad scenes for male roles.
The modern musical theatre was also influenced by the operatic mad scene, as in Lloyd Webber's Sunset Boulevard or Sondheim's Sweeney Todd.
Some ballets contain similar scenes, most notably Adam's Giselle.[1]
YouTube Encyclopedic
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Lucia di Lammermoor: Mad Scene (Natalie Dessay)
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Edita Gruberova sings Lucia at Age 70 - Cadenza, Mad Scene
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Diana Damrau sings Lucia Di Lammermoor Mad Scene live
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Dame Joan Sutherland - 'Eccola!' (The Mad Scene) Donizetti's Lucia di Lammermoor
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Maria Callas Sings The Mad Scene From Thomas' Hamlet
Transcription
Notable examples
- Roland, Act 4, Scene 5, "Je suis trahi! Ciel!"
- Artaserse, "Pallido il sole"
- Idomeneo, "D'Oreste, d'Ajace"
- Ermione, "Essa corre al trionfo"
- Semiramide, "Deh! Ti ferma"
- Lucia di Lammermoor, "Il dolce suono... Ardon gl'incensi... Spargi d'amaro pianto", the locus classicus[2]
- Linda di Chamounix, "Linda! Ah che pensato"
- Maria Padilla
- Torquato Tasso
- Anna Bolena, "Piangete voi... Al dolce guidami... Coppia iniqua"
- I puritani, "O rendetemi... Qui la voce sua soave... Vien, diletto, e in ciel la luna"
- Il pirata, "Col sorriso d'innocenza... Oh, Sole! ti vela di tenebra fonda"
- La sonnambula, "Oh! se una volta sola... Ah! non credea mirarti... Ah! non giunge uman pensiero"
- Die Feen, Act 3, "Halloh! Halloh! Lasst alle Hunde los!"
- Tristan und Isolde
- L'étoile du nord, Act 3
- Dinorah (originally Le Pardon de Ploërmel), "Ombre légère"
- Bánk bán, Act 3, "Tudsz-e madárról éneket?"
- Hamlet, "Partagez-vous mes fleurs"
- Boris Godunov, "Oi! Duschno, Duschno"
- The Oprichnik, finale
- Mazeppa, finale
- The Enchantress, finale
- The Tsar's Bride, "Ivan Sergeyich, khochesh' v sad poydem"
- Mona Lisa, Act 2, "So! so! Hab' ich dich!"
- Wozzeck, Act 1, Scene 2, "Du [Andres], der Platz ist verflucht!"[a]
- Wozzeck, Act 3, Scene 4, "Das Messer! Wo ist das Messer?"[b]
- Lulu, Act 2, Scene 1, "Du Kreatur, die mich durch den Strassenkot zum Martertode schleift!" (Dr. Schön's five-strophe aria)
- Peter Grimes, "Steady. There you are, nearly home"
- Curlew River
- Mass, XVI. Fraction: "Things get broken"
- Miss Havisham's Fire, finale
- The Ghosts of Versailles, "They are always with me"
- Salsipuedes: a Tale of Love, War and Anchovies (2004), Act 3, Scene 3, "Guzmán, Guzmán, ayúdame" (General García)
Comparable examples
- La finta pazza, Act 2, Scene 10 (Deidamia)
- La traviata, "É strano! ... Sempre libera"
- Suor Angelica, arguably in toto
- Sequenza III
- Lost Highway, Scene 5.4, "There's no smoking here"
- Gesualdo: Libro Sesto, IV. "Quel 'no' crudel"
Parodies
- Le pont des soupirs, "Ah! le Doge, ah! Les plombs, le canal Orfano l'Adriatique, c'est fini je suis folle"
- Ruddigore, "Cheerily carols the lark"
- The Grand Duke, "I have a rival! Frenzy-thrilled, I find you both together!"
- A Midsummer Night's Dream, the Pyramus and Thisbe scene
- Candide, "Glitter and be gay"
Notes
See also
References
- ^ a b McCarren, Felicia M. (1998). Dance Pathologies: Performance, Poetics, Medicine. Stanford University Press. pp. 106–107. ISBN 978-0-8047-3524-7.
- ^ a b Albright 2021, 150, 165.
- ^ Albright 2021, 150.
Bibliography
- Albright, Daniel. 2021. Music's Monisms: Disarticulating Modernism, fwd. Alexander Rehding. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. ISBN 978-0-226-79136-4 (ebk). ISBN 978-0-226-79122-7 (hbk). doi:10.7208/chicago/9780226791364.001.0001.
- Anderson, James (1993) The Complete Dictionary of Opera & Operetta, New York
- Arias, Enrique. 1999. "Reflections from a Cracked Mirror: Madness in Music and Theory of the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries—An Overview". In A Compendium of American Musicology: Essays in Honor of John F. Ohl, eds. Enrique Arias, Susan M. Filler, William V. Porter, and Jeffrey Wasson, 133–154. Evanston: Northwestern University Press. ISBN 978-0-8101-1536-1 (hbk).
- Ewen, David (1963) Encyclopedia of the Opera, New York
- The Top 10 Mad Scenes in Opera WQXR Operavore retrieved 13-08-13
- Любимов, Д.В. Осторожно, сумасшествие! // Оpera musicologica. 2021. Т. 13. № 4. С. 172–178. DOI: https://doi.org/10.26156/OM.2021.13.4.008.
- Любимов, Д.В., Кром, А.Е. «Сцена безумия» в опере: проблемы дефиниции // Музыкальный журнал Европейского Севера. 2022. № 2 (30). С. 60–74. URL: http://muznord.ru/images/issue/30/30_Lubimov_Krom.pdf
- Любимов, Д.В. Лючия и Марфа: безумные невесты в оперном театре XIX века // Opera musicologica. 2022. Т. 14, № 3. С. 30–45. DOI 10.26156/OM.2022.14.3.002.
- Любимов, Д.В. Феномен безумия в европейской опере и его научное осмысление: к проблеме периодизации // Музыкальная академия. 2022. № 4. С. 180–195. DOI: 10.34690/278.
- Любимов, Д.В.Лючия и Жизель: безумные героини в музыкальном театре XIX века. DOI 10.24412/2658-7858-2023-33-61-69 // Музыка в системе культуры: Научный вестник Уральской консерватории.–2023.–Вып. 33.–С. 61–69.
- Любимов, Д.В. Сюжетный мотив безумия в театральном творчестве А.Е.Варламова // Вестник Саратовской консерватории. Вопросы искусствознания. 2023. №4 (22). С. 65-72. URL: https://sarcons.ru/image/publikacii/vestnik_sgk/%D0%92%D0%B5%D1%81%D1%82%D0%BD%D0%B8%D0%BA%20%D0%A1%D0%93%D0%9A.2023%20%E2%84%964(22).pdf
- Любимов, Д. В. Уберто и Мельник: безумные отцы в оперном театре XIX века // Опера в музыкальном театре: история и современность. Тезисы VI Международной научной конференции, 11–15 марта 2024 г. / ред.-сост. Н.В. Пилипенко, под ред. И.П. Сусидко, Н.В. Пилипенко, А.И. Масловой / Российская академия музыки имени Гнесиных. — М.: Издательство «Российская академия музыки имени Гнесиных», 2024. - С. 120-121. URL: https://gnesin-academy.ru/upload/iblock/8c7/45titr0z13o7jvzvuuwjnvtpr2gm2xcp/AbstractsBook_Conf_Opera_2024.pdf
This page was last edited on 17 April 2024, at 00:36