The Things Students Write

I think it's been long enough now (in years) that I can feel alright about posting some of the things former students of mine wrote on their tests. These all came from student responses to essay questions about Baroque opera and oratorio genres. In very basic terms, the only difference between the two is that opera is staged and oratorio is not. For example, one of the most famous oratorios ever is Handel's Messiah. Compare the music in that to the music in one of Handel's Italian operas, and you'll see what I mean about the only difference really being the staged vs. not-staged (yes, yes, and subject matter too). Anyway, musically the operas and oratorios of the Baroque employ the same or similar forms and devices: arias, choruses, different types of sung dialogue (recitative), word painting (music that mimics something in the text), etc.

Thematically, as I have already hinted at, oratorios usually took their subjects from the Bible, more often than not telling an Old Testament story. Many of the operas of the era took a classics approach through stories from history or Greek and Roman mythology. Plus, most of the operas were done in Italian (because that's where the genre started), but oratorios were more localized. Hence, you have Handel's Italian operas like Giulio Cesare and his English oratorios like Saul (the Old Testament Saul), Jephtha, or Esther.

One early opera by Monteverdi is about the second wife of Nero, Poppea. The title is L'incoronazione di Poppea or Coronation of Poppea. Here's what one of my students wrote for the title of the opera: "the Coronation of Pompae". Hmm. I think they thought they were spelling Pompei. Why they thought that ruinous city was being crowned, I'm not so sure...

Another Italian opera we studied was Handel's Giulio Cesare. When describing the basic plot of the opera, one student identified the protagonist as "Julius Caesar of Italy". (Yes, I know Rome is the capital of the country that is now called Italy. Maybe I'm the only one who gets a kick out of this anachronistic phrase.)

As some of you may know, Handel spent most of his career in England, where he had a lot of success. A lot of his early English career was spent writing Italian operas, but Handel soon realized that many English weren't all that keen on opera (especially in Italian). Remember that Shakespeare guy? The English really liked their drama. And although they often incorporated music into their drama, it was always in their native English and the idea of singing the entire work was, well, foreign. So what does a guy like Handel do instead of Italian opera? He turns to oratorio -- in English. As an oratorio-writer in England, Handel was very successful. One such oratorio that my students had to know was Handel's Saul. An interesting statement from one of my students was that "Handel's Saul contains accompanied oratorio". Uh, yeah, it is an oratorio, it can't contain one. The phrase they wanted to write was "accompanied recitative". (Again, maybe I'm the only one who finds this amusing.)

I don't want you to think there weren't any English composers or English operas. For example, one of the most famous English operas ever was Henry Purcell's Dido and Aeneas. My students had to know this one, too. One of my favorite attempts at a plot summary was this sentence from a student: "Dido is the Queen of Rome, and has a thing for Aeneas." (At this point you can imagine me grading at 3 am and quietly chuckling to myself.)

As I mentioned before, many English were not enthralled with the idea of opera or of following a drama set to music in another language. Add the class distinctions that result and you end up with wonderful social statements like The Beggar's Opera (which was, by the way, the inspiration for Weill and Brecht's 3-Penny Opera). I got an interesting section in a student's essay on this opera: "The entire point of the opera was to mock the Italian opera by satirizing English prostitutes, low-lifes, etc. (that was probably the fuel which got Alfred Lord Tennyson going on his modest proposal about a half century later!)" ?

Students tend to have a hard time writing about music in general. Well, I can't blame them. It's hard to discover the right tools and words to analyze and discuss music using language. They tried though. Often they did surprisingly well. Other times, they seemed to run out of evidence to support their analysis, such as this student's final, brief statement: "And it's in German." Other times, they are able to describe the musical moment they want to use as evidence but have a hard time matching the evidence with the right conclusion, such as this student: "It also repeats notes on a high pitch to show impotance." Typo you say? Just forgot the "r" you say? Perhaps, but it looks to me like a beautiful Freudian slip.