Singing roles: 
Madame Herz, an opera singer (soprano) 
Mademoiselle Silberklang, an opera singer (soprano) 
Herr Vogelsang, a singer (tenor) 
Buff, stage manager & singer (bass) 

Spoken roles: 
Herr Frank, an impresario 
Herr Eiler, a banker 
Herz, an actor 
Madame Pfeil, an actress 
Madame Krone, an actress 
Madame Vogelsang, an actress 

Orchestra:  
2 flutes, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 2 horns, 2 trumpets, timpani, and strings 

*** 

Overture 

1. Ariette: Da schlägt die Abschiedsstunde (Mme. Herz) 
2. Rondo: Bester Jüngling! (Mlle. Silberklang) 
3. Trio: Ich bin die erste Sängerin (Mlle. Silberklang, Mme. Herz, Herr Vogelsang) 
4. Finale: Jeder Künstler strebt nach Ehre (Silberklang, Herz, Vogelsang, Buff)  

Program Notes by Martin Pearlman

Program Notes

On February 7, 1786, the Emperor Joseph II threw an elaborate party at the orangery of the Schönbrunn palace in Vienna.  In the long, narrow building, comfortably heated from below the floor, a sumptuous meal was spread out below the orange trees.  Small stages were set up at either end of the building, and the guests, seated in the middle, were treated to an after-dinner competition between a singspiel and an Italian opera.  The singspiel, with its spoken dialogue between the musical numbers would compete against the Italian opera, to be sung throughout with recitatives, arias and ensembles.  For the occasion, the emperor commissioned Mozart to compose the singpiel and Salieri to compose the opera, and both works were to be one-act satires on prima donnas and the problems of opera companies.  Mozart's Der Schauspieldirektor (The Impresario) was performed first.  The guests had then to turn their chairs around and face the opposite stage to watch Salieri's Prima la musica, poi le parole (First the Music, then the Words).

Several years earlier, the emperor had briefly promoted a National Theater that was to promote German-language opera, and this was evidently another experiment to pit German against Italian opera.  As it turned out, Salieri's opera was the winner, at least in the short run.  His music was generally preferred by the audience, and reviews gave Mozart even less attention than his librettist.  Mozart's fee was half that of Salieri's, although to be fair, Salieri's work was a complete opera buffa and contained much more music.  Mozart's effort  moreover suffered from a poor libretto with overly long spoken dialogue.

To write The Impresario, Mozart had to take time out from work on Le nozze di Figaro, which was premiered later that same year.  He had been eager to produce an Italian opera in Vienna, but the ones that he had begun in the past few years turned out to have no prospects for performance and remained incomplete.  Now that he had  a real commission and Da Ponte's fine libretto for Figaro, the commission to compose The Impresario, a lighter German singspiel, must have felt like a distraction.  Nonetheless, it did provide some money and placed his name again before the public as an opera composer. 

The librettist chosen by the emperor was Johann Gottlieb Stephanie the younger, who had provided Mozart with the libretto for another singspiel, The Abduction from the Seraglio, four years earlier.  Stefanie's original dialogue for The Impresario, which includes six speaking characters in addition to the four who sing, is long, diffuse and rather silly and has probably kept Mozart's entertaining music from becoming more popular than it is today.   

The original cast included the librettist himself in the speaking role of the impresario.  The role of Mme. Herz, the older and more dramatic of the two dueling divas, was sung by Mozart's sister-in-law, Aloysia Weber.   Her music goes up to high F's in the ensembles, the same extreme range as the arias for the Queen of the Night, which Mozart later wrote for her sister.  Mlle. Silberklang, whose music is generally brighter and faster than that of her rival, was sung by Caterina Cavalieri, Salieri's mistress.  Although she was not generally considered a good actress, Mozart valued her as a singer and wrote a good deal of music for her, including the role of Constanze in The Abduction from the Seraglio and Elvira's famous aria "Mi tradi"  for the second production of Don Giovanni.  The role of Eiler was sung by Valentin Adamberger, who had been the original Belmonte in The Abduction from the Seraglio. 

The overture to this work is on a surprisingly large scale for a such a short drama.  In its size and musical sophistication it is comparable to the overture to Figaro, written only a few months later.  Perhaps Mozart saw it as a chance to show his genius independent of the libretto.   

Synopsis

Following the overture,  the scene opens as Frank, an impresario, and Buff, a comic actor, have received permission to open a theater in Salzburg.  Frank is skeptical about starting a company in this "land of sausage,"  but Buff reassures him.  "Leave your good taste at home," he insists, and think about selling tickets.  They must produce vulgar and popular works, not masterpieces; they must promise people fine tortes and pastries but give them dumplings and sauerkraut; hire the cheapest actors and singers but bribe the critics to write glowing reviews.  "The world wants to be deceived," he says.  The high-minded Frank reluctantly consents to go along. 

They begin by hiring dramatic actresses.  Madame Pfeil is mediocre and vain, but her wealthy lover offers to contribute her fee.  Then they meet her rival, the tragedienne Madame Krone, who performs a dramatic scene together with her colleague Monsieur Herz, and they hire them both.  The comic actress, Madame Vogelsang, performs a scene with Buff, and she too is hired, but the tragedienne and the comedienne argue about their fees. 

Now that the company has several actors, they look for singers.  Mme. Vogelsang and M. Herz recommend their spouses as opera singers.  M. Herz presents his wife, who sings a dramatic aria [#1], and Frank hires her.  Another soprano appears, a Mlle. Silberklang, who is certain that Frank "must without a doubt know of my reputation."  She sings "a small Rondeau" for him [#2], and she too is hired. 

Mme. Vogelsang returns to introduce her husband, but by now, the two divas, Mme. Herz and Mlle. Silberklang are bickering about their fees and about who is to receive top billing.  In the trio which follows [#3], M. Vogelsang attempts to mediate in vain.  Eventually the dramatic actresses too join in the fray, and Frank, in despair, threatens to cancel his plans to form a company.  At this, the women relent, and all is peaceful again -- until the next time.  In a final ensemble [#4], Mme. Herz, Mlle. Silberklang and M. Vogelsang agree that they must put their art above personality.  Nonetheless, the two divas cannot resist competing in a bit of vocal display, and the comedian Buff joins in with an ironic verse of his own.

Boston Baroque Performances

Back to resource library