Antonio Salieri – An Injustice Redressed

Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of the ‘Classical For Everyone’ Podcast… five hundred years of incredible music. My name is Peter Cudlipp and… If you enjoy any music at all then I’m convinced you can enjoy classical music. All you need are ears. No expertise is necessary. If you’ve ever been curious about classical music… or explored it for a while once upon a time… or just quietly wondered what all the fuss was about… then this is the podcast  for you.

And because there’s a lot of music out there each episode has something of a theme. And for this one it is… the music of Antonio Salieri who lived from 1750 to 1825. I’ll tell you more about him, and why there is an injustice to be redressed as we go along. But here first is the opening section of his concerto for oboe and flute composed in 1774 when Salieri was in his early 20s. It is about seven minutes long and it is performed by the Budapest Strings led by Bela Banfalvi. The solo oboe is played by Lajos Lencses and the solo flute by Janos Balint.

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That was the opening section of the concerto for oboe and flute by Antonio Salieri. It was performed by the Budapest Strings led by Bela Banfalvi. The solo oboe was played by Lajos Lencses and the solo flute by Janos Balint.

Ok. Antonio Salieri was born in Italy near Verona but lived most of his life in Vienna.  He was a contemporary of Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven and he taught Schubert and Liszt. And in the 1780s he was probably the most successful opera composer in Europe. But if today the name Salieri is even vaguely familiar… it is not because of his music… it is because of the rumour that he was in some way mixed up in the early death of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart in 1791.

There seems to be a human need to add meaning to random events. Especially when that event is the unexpected death of a major and beloved figure. Being killed by one of the many lethal diseases of the era just doesn’t seem enough.

The rumours that Mozart was poisoned started in the early 1800s and for reasons now unknown the finger was pointed at the aging Salieri… the idea was that a healthy professional rivalry had taken a particularly nasty turn. And this rumour caused Salieri incredible distress in his old age, including some form of breakdown… which in turn fuelled more speculation of his involvement… did his guilt break his mind?

To set the record straight Salieri was not really even a ‘rival’ of Mozart’s. He was an older, more experienced composer and politically a better placed figure in the court of Emperor Joseph II. He was actually a supporter and champion of Mozart. And he had nothing at all to do with his death. But the rumour lingered… and even if it was referred to only in passing in largely unread biographies and histories that pointed out its lack of any factual merit… the rumour as fuel for dramatic storytelling continued to live on. Especially in Russia with a short play by Alexander Pushkin that was later turned into a one act opera by Rimsky-Korsakov.

But by the twentieth century it was probably just a quirky historical footnote. Where the rumour would have stayed… if Peter Shaffer (SHAYFER) was not such a great playwright, and if Milos Forman was not such a great filmmaker… and if F. Murray Abraham was not such a great actor. Because the 1979 play ‘Amadeus’ and the 1984 film of the same name resurrected the rumour so brilliantly that even now, for people of a certain age… when we hear the name ‘Salieri’ we see a conniving old Italian mediocrity determined to bring ruin down upon the genius Mozart. Which I want to stress is a total distortion and fabrication. Which is not for a second to say the play and film do not deserve their tremendous success. As historical fiction they succeed brilliantly. Incredibly entertaining but utterly untrue.

And if I sound a little adamant about redressing this injustice against Antonio Salieri, it is because in the next weeks and months a new adaptation of the Shaffer play is coming to a TV screen near you. So before poor old Salieri’s reputation is beaten up for this century, I thought it might be timely to push back a little… and more importantly play you some of his incredible music.  And I have a selection from his orchestral works, excerpts from three of the over forty operas he wrote, and the opening of his Requiem Mass.

Next up is the first ten minutes of his opera The Danaides from 1784. I mentioned that Salieri lived most of his life in Vienna but he wrote this for the Royal French opera. Joseph II was happy for his court composer to have sojourns in other capitals. It was good PR for the Emperor’s ‘employee’, and that’s what Salieri was, to make a good impression in other countries.

And just quickly the premise of the opera… In Greek mythology, the Danaïdes  were the fifty daughters of Danaus, king of Libya. In the most common version of the story, the daughters were forced to marry the sons of Danaus' brother Aegyptus. In retaliation, Danaus commanded his daughters to kill their husbands on their wedding night, and all but one obeyed.

I’m going to play you the overture and then the first two arias or songs. This is before things take a turn for the worst and includes the aria ‘Descend from Heaven, Sweet Hymen’ to celebrate the 50 weddings.

Here are Les Talens Lyriques  and the chorus of the Baroque Music Centre of Versailles conducted by Christophe Rousset. And the soloists in this section are Phillipe Talbot and Tassis Christoyannis. The Danaides by Antonio Salieri

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That was the opening of Antonio Salieri’s opera ‘The Danaides’ from 1784. Les Talens Lyriques  and the chorus of the Baroque Music Centre of Versailles were conducted by Christophe Rousset. And the soloists were Phillipe Talbot and Tassis Christoyannis.

Ok.  Next is the opening of Salieri’s Piano Concerto in C from 1773 when the composer was just starting to make a name for himself in Vienna. I’ve listened to this work a few times now and in all seriousness I think it compares favourably with many of Mozart’s early piano concertos and Joseph Haydn’s later ones. It is about nine minutes long; here is the Philharmonia Orchestra with Pietro Spada playing the piano and conducting.

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That was the opening of Salieri’s Piano Concerto in C performed by the Philharmonia Orchestra with Pietro Spada playing the piano and conducting.

Ok. So in his lifetime Salieri’s biggest success was his 1787 opera ‘Tarare’, spelt T A R A R E first performed in Paris in French and then later reworked in Italian for Vienna in 1788 with a new title… ‘Axur, re d’Ormus’ (or Axur, king of Hormus in English). Before I tell you a little more about the opera let me give you a sense of what I mean by biggest success. The opera was still being performed in the 1820s and was performed more often than any of Mozart’s operas, with which it had some close connections. The libretto of ‘Tarare’ (remember that’s the French version) was written by Pierre de Beaumarchais, the author of the play ‘The Marriage of Figaro’. When Emperor Joseph II asked Salieri to make an Italian version for performance in Vienna; ‘Tarare’ became ‘Axur, King of Ormus’, and the librettist Salieri went to was Lorenzo Da Ponte… who wrote the words for Mozart’s three greatest operas including their version  of Beaumarchais’s play ‘The Marriage of Figaro’.

So with this pedigree, where is this opera now? It’s not really an easy question to answer. Another way to come at the problem is to ask how any opera from two and a half centuries ago is still being performed… but that is to evade the question. I think one contributing factor was the change in tastes in opera stories that evolved over the 19^th century. The change I’m thinking of is the increasing psychological depth of the characters as they were portrayed. Even Richard Wagner’s gods are afflicted with complex emotions that seem more natural than anything in these earlier operas concerned with obscure episodes from the ancient world. And perhaps an even better example of this is Salieri’s colleague Mozart’s aforementioned ‘Marriage of Figaro’… The appeal of this opera to modern sensibilities with its complex relationships and mix of comedy and pathos is on a different level to Salieri’s ‘Tarare’ and its German version, ‘Axur’.

And whilst many operas still performed today have crazy plots, they really can be a barrier for contemporary audiences. Here is just the briefest outline of part of the plot of ‘Axur’ to give you an idea…

Axur, King of the Persian Gulf kingdom of Ormus, orders one of his soldiers, Altamor, to abduct Aspasia, the wife of Atar, the heroic commander of Axur's army. Not knowing who kidnapped Aspasia but suspecting an overseas enemy, Atar speaks with the king and begs for justice. Moved by his appeal, Axur allows Atar to take a ship and seek his wife. Before Atar leaves, Axur's slave-servant, tells the general that the king has abducted Aspasia and hidden her in the royal harem.

And that is just the beginning. And whose idea was it to have the names of all the principal characters begin with the same letter?

Ok, I’ve spent too much time perhaps pointing out the defects in the plot… but the music is incredibly good… so here again is… Christophe Rousset directing Les Talents Lyriques with two sections of Antonio Salieri’s opera ‘Tarere’… the opening overture and then the aria ‘De quel nouveau malheur suis-je encor menacé ? or in English ‘What new disaster threatens me now?’ sung by Cyrille Dubois

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That was Christophe Rousset directing Les Talents Lyriques with two sections of Antonio Salieri’s opera ‘Tarere’… the opening overture and then the aria ‘De quel nouveau malheur suis-je encor menacé ? or in English ‘What new disaster threatens me now?’ sung by Cyrille Dubois.

Writing more than forty operas over the course of his career meant that perhaps compared to his contemporaries, Salieri was less interested or less able to write purely orchestral music. But in 1780 his Venetian publisher took several of his opera overtures and grouped them into a three part work that came to be called Antonio Salieri’s ‘The Venetian Symphony’ Here again are the Budapest Strings led by Bela Banfalvi with the final section. It is only about 3 minutes long.

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That was the final section of Antonio Salier’s ‘The Venetian Symphony’ performed by the Budapest Strings led by Bela Banfalvi. Ok. I want to put a final nail in the coffin of the ‘Salieri killed Mozart’ story.  Historical evidence reveals a relationship between the two composers characterized by collaboration and mutual respect alongside professional competition. And I want to play a piece that I think exemplifies this. In 1785, Salieri and Mozart jointly composed a three part song, ‘Per la ricuperata salute di Ofelia’,  (In English… In honour of the recovery of Ophelia) celebrating the recovery from an illness of the soprano Nancy Storace, who had sung in both composers' operas. And the Ophelia in the title of the song was a role she had been about to sing for Salieri when she was taken ill. This work, considered lost until its rediscovery in Prague in 2016, was written also in collaboration with the man who turns up everywhere in this story, the librettist Lorenzo Da Ponte. He wrote an especially lovely final stanza… Here it is in English

Today the beautiful one,

Glory of these woods,

She who in Arcadia

Fills the wild beasts with love,

Today she shall sing once more

In the Temple her familiar songs.

Here is the Prague Sinfonia Orchestra conducted by Christian Benda and the singer is Dagmar Williams.

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That was Salieri and Mozart’s jointly composed song, ‘Per la ricuperata salute di Ofelia’,  (In honour of the recovery of Ophelia) performed by the Prague Sinfonia Orchestra conducted by Christian Benda and the singer was Dagmar Williams.

Later in life, it seems, Salieri knew that his style of opera was waning in popularity and more and more he composed religious music.

Here is the Agnus Dei (or Lamb of God) section from his Requiem Mass… his Mass For The Dead from 1804. This is the Gulbenkian Chorus and Orchestra from Lisbon conducted by Lawrence Foster.

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That was the Agnus Dei (or Lamb of God) section from Salieri’s Requiem Mass… his Mass For The Dead from 1804. The Gulbenkian Chorus and Orchestra from Lisbon were conducted by Lawrence Foster.

Ok, one more opera by Antonio Salieri. The fact that this one has languished is perhaps more of a surprise than the others with their complex plots from ancient  middle eastern empires. This is ‘La scuola de’ gelosi’… ‘the school for jealousy’. With a libretto by Caterino Mazzola. A comic opera from 1778 about which the writer Goethe said…. "my heart was moved by every tune" and he went on to praise the opera's "astonishing richness, variety, and everything is treated with a very delicate taste."

The School for Jealousy centres on two married couples: one bourgeois and one aristocratic. After various schemes, provocations, and romantic entanglements that nearly cross dangerous social boundaries between the classes, everyone is reconciled in a final scene in the woods.

Here is the group ‘L’Arte dell Mondo’ conducted by Werner Ehrhardt. Two sections, about ten minutes long from Mozzola and Salieri’s opera ‘The School of Jealousy’.

First is the aria  “Gelosia, dispetto e sdegno” “Jealousy, spite and anger”  sung by Francesca Lombardi. And then a quintet.. five characters singing in a drawing room as a music lesson and a card game take place.. It begins with the Count singing under his breath… ‘Ah, la rabbia mi divora’ ‘Ah rage is eating me alive’ The singers are… Emiliano d’Auguanno, Federico Sacchi, Patrick Vogel, Roberta Mameli and again Francesca Lombardi.

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That was the group ‘L’arte dell mondo’ conducted by Werner Ehrhardt. With two sections from Antonio Salieri’ and Caterino Mazzola’s opera ‘The School of Jealousy’.

My name is Peter Cudlipp and you have been listening to the ‘Classical for Everyone’ Podcast. On the individual episode pages of the podcast’s website there are links to Spotify playlists with the full versions of most of the music played in each of the episodes.

This podcast is made with Audacity Software for editing, Wikipedia for Research, Claude for Artificial Intelligence and Apple, Sennheiser, Sony, Rode and Logitech for hardware… The music played is licensed through AMCOS / APRA. Classical For Everyone is a production of Mending Wall Studios and began life on Radio 2BBB in Bellingen NSW, Australia thanks to the late, great Mr Jeffrey Sanders. The producers do not receive any gifts or support of any kind from any organisation or individual mentioned in the show. Thanks for your time and I look forward to playing you some more incredible music on the next ‘Classical For Everyone’.