28503 - Musical Dramaturgy (LM)

Learning outcomes

The course aims at providing an approach to and a grasp of Musical Dramaturgy in its basic historical and critical principles.
According to the tenets of the discipline, opera is conceived as an intertwined system of verbal text, dramatic action, and music.
In turn, such a system requires a contextualization within the history of Western music as well as within the history of Western theatre and literature.
At the same time, the course aims at training students in the analysis of operatic music, from both a morphological and a theatrical perspective.

Course contents

Opera in Venice in the mid-17th century: Monteverdi, Cavalli, Cesti

The opening of the Teatro San Cassiano in Venice to opera performances with Benedetto Ferrari and Francesco Manelli's L'Andromeda (1637) marked the birth of the public opera and the beginning of the fortunes of one of the longest-lived genres of musical performance in the history of the performing arts.

The course will address the dramaturgical and morphological analysis of some drammi per musica performed in Venice from the 1640s onwards. In particular, the librettos and scores of operas by Claudio Monteverdi, Francesco Cavalli and Antonio Cesti, among the greatest exponents of the genre, will be examined.

Particular attention will be paid to the dramatic sources of the operas and to the main dramaturgical-musical devices that guided their writing, in relation to the European theatrical and musical tradition of the modern age.

Readings/Bibliography

For all student (Music and Theatre):

• N. Badolato, Amazzoni e sovrani, la festa e il teatro pubblico, in Il contributo italiano alla storia del pensiero – Musica, ed. by S. Cappelletto, Rome, Istituto per l’Enciclopedia Italiana, 2017, pp. 156-163;
• E. Rosand, Opera in Seventeenth-Century Venice: The Creation of a Genre, Berkley, University of California Press, 1991 (disponibile online));
• E. Rosand, Gli esordi del teatro pubblico a Venezia: dal teatro di corte ai teatri d'opera a pagamento, in Enciclopedia della Musica, ed. by J.-J. Nattiez, Turin, Einaudi, 2001, pp. 403-415;
• L. Bianconi, Indagini sull’"Incoronazione", in "Finchè non splende in ciel notturna face". Studi in memoria di Francesco Degrada, ed. by C. Fertonani, E. Sala and C. Toscani, Milan, LED, 2009, pp. 53-72.

Students in the Music curriculum are required to analyse the following librettos and scores (students in the Theatre curriculum are exempt from analytical score reading)

• F. Cavalli, L'Erismena, ed. by di B. Glixon, J. Glixon (score), N. Badolato (libretto), Kassel, Bärenreiter, 2018;
• C. Monteverdi, L’incoronazione di Poppea, ed. by H. Schulze et al. (score) and Nicola Badolato (libretto), Kassel, Bärenreiter, 2017;
• A. Cesti, L'Orontea, ed. by Á. Torrente (score) and N. Badolato (libretto), Kassel, Bärenreiter, 2013 (non-commercial edition, some extracts will be distributed during the lessons).

Rudiments of musical dramaturgy:

• C. Dahlhaus, Drammaturgia dell'opera italiana, Turin, EDT, 2005;
• L. Bianconi - G. Pagannone, Piccolo glossario di drammaturgia musicale, in Insegnare il
  melodramma. Saperi essenziali, proposte didattiche, ed. by G. Pagannone, Lecce-Iseo, Pensa MultiMedia, 2010, pp. 201-263.

Rudiments of Italian metrics and prosody:

• P. Fabbri, Metro e canto nell'opera italiana, Turin, EDT, 2007.
  

Insights into Venetian opera in the 17th century, for all students (Music and Theatre curriculum):

• Claudio Monteverdi’s Venetian Operas. Sources, Performance, Interpretation, ed. by E. Rosand and S. La Via, New York, Routledge, 2022;
  
• I drammi musicali veneziani di Benedetto Ferrari, ed. by N. Badolato and V. Martorana, Florence, Leo S. Olschki, 2013 (in part. the Introduction);
• N. Badolato, I drammi musicali di Giovanni Faustini per Francesco Cavalli, Florence, Leo S. Olschki, 2012 (in part. the Introduction).

Teaching materials and audiovisuals will be made available to students on the ‘Virtuale’ platform.

Students with SLD or temporary or permanent disabilities. It is suggested that they get in touch as soon as possible with the relevant University office (https://site.unibo.it/studenti-con-disabilita-e-dsa/en) and with the lecturer in order to seek together the most effective strategies for following the lessons and/or preparing for the examination.

Teaching methods

Frontal lessons, workshops and practices on score and libretto. Viewing of audiovisual materials.

Assessment methods

During the exam (oral interview) students will have to demonstrate their knowledge about the bibliography. 

Students in Music are required to know the scorese; they will report on the poetic, narrative, and theatrical structure; on musical morphology; on the relations with literary sources.

Students in Theatre and other degree courses are exempt from the in-depth knowledge of the score; but they will have to know the operas on the basis of a repeated listening and analysis of the poetic, narrative, and theatrical structure (also in relation to the literary source).

During the interview, rudiments of Italian metrics and versification will be ascertained.

Students who intend to account for only 6 CFU will agree a reduced program with the teacher (<nicola.badolato@unibo.it>.

Students with SLD or temporary or permanent disabilities. It is necessary to contact the relevant University office (https://site.unibo.it/studenti-con-disabilita-e-dsa/en) with ample time in advance: the office will propose some adjustments, which must in any case be submitted 15 days in advance to the lecturer, who will assess the appropriateness of these in relation to the teaching objectives.

Teaching tools

Collateral activities will be announced at the beginning of the class.

Didactic materials will be soon available online.

Office hours

See the website of Nicola Badolato