Missa Dalmatica
The Missa Dalmatica is a mass in F major by Franz von Suppè for male choir ( tenor I / II and bass ), soloists (tenor I / II and bass) and organ .
History of origin
Franz von Suppè , who was born on April 18, 1819 in Spalato (Split) in Dalmatia , composed a mass in F major as his first sacred vocal work , the manuscript of which he completed on August 24, 1835 after the death of his father. This mass was probably premiered shortly after Suppé and his mother moved to Vienna on September 13, 1835 in the Church of St. Francis in Zara (today Zadar).
With the Mass in F major , the sixteen-year-old Suppé gained access to Ignaz Xaver Ritter von Seyfried's music theory lessons. He recognized the talent of the young composer from the manuscript.
During his professional activity as a theater conductor and composer of stage music, Suppé found little muse for phases of church music. Only 41 years later, in 1876, when he was able to celebrate one of his greatest stage successes with Fatiniza , did he consider it worthwhile to thoroughly revise this early church music. According to the remarks in a letter to the Franciscan Donato Fabianić, a friend from childhood in Zara, the revision of the immature original version must have been " devoid of voice leading, harmony, style and character " of serious nature. However, this can no longer be verified, as the original version has been lost. Suppé wrote: " Last month I accidentally got my hands on part of the mass that I composed in Zara when I was thirteen and which was performed in the Church of St. Francis with your help. I confess that I had to laugh a lot when I saw what a nonsense I had written, without voice guidance, harmony and character, without the slightest idea of musical art, with banal and profane melodies. [...] I had the idea [...] of this bad mass again to write [...] and thus to receive it as my first work in my home country. As I said, however, I have no more than a fragment of it, and therefore ask you to send it to me, as I am sure that you have a copy of the mass. [...] In a month at the latest you will have it again, but in a different version, which will retain the motifs that are least absurd. "
Already in the following year 1877 the first edition for the parts tenor I / II, bass and organ appeared in the Viennese publishing house CA Spina, which had been taken over by Alwin Cranz, under the title Missa Dalmatica quam terna virili voce pulsantibus organis concinendam, composuit et Dalmatiae patriae suae dicavit Franciscus nob. Soup . This revised, second version of the Missa Dalmatica was premiered in 1890 under the direction of the then Maestro di Cappella Antonio Ravasio in the Cathedral of St. Anastasia in Zadar and has since been more or less forgotten, as has all of the sacred music Suppé except for the occasional Requiem .
Character of the fair
Characteristic for the musical language of the Missa Dalmatica is the integration of different stylistic elements in the tonal and formal frameworks which are shaped by church music tradition.
The Kyrie, with its Italian-operatic passages, already refers to these complex influences.
The powerful first section in the Gloria shows in its radiant power Suppé's knowledge of great late baroque choral music. The solo passages, on the other hand, revert to seemingly Italian diastematic phrases that are homogeneously incorporated and do not lose sight of the main theme of the beginning of the movement. Section D begins with a very catchy bel canto solo of the first tenor to arpeggiated organ accompaniment, which later changes into chordal triplet rhythms, which together with the dotted rhythms of the vocal part are reminiscent of the festivity of Wagner's Tannhauser overture. The romantic harmony and diastematics, which are often interspersed with chromatics , are not least due to Suppé's enthusiasm for Wagner's epoch-making works. Another indication of Suppé's admiration for Wagner is his attendance at the first Bayreuth Festival in 1876, the year the Missa Dalmatica was revised.
The Credo , on the other hand, points to the mastery of strict contrapuntal processing techniques from the very beginning of the canon , albeit combined with a lively theme in 9/8 time . The culmination of contrapuntal compositional technique is the fugue of the last Credo section, which takes up the topic of the beginning of the sentence and presents it in the traditional fugue time signature alla breve . Following in Quint responses set fugal exposition of the sentence goes into the free processing of the thematic material and executes at the end, as for circuit Fugierungen 19th century common to a homophonic highlight design of the Reprise connects the Credo begins.
Today's meaning
Only recently has the Missa Dalmatica regained the attention it deserves. It was rehearsed in 2006 by one of the largest male choirs in Germany, the Kölner Männer-Gesang-Verein , under Bernhard Steiner , and performed on August 27, 2006 in Altenberg Cathedral . The world premiere of a new version for solos, male choir, organ and orchestra will take place on September 1, 2007 in the Cologne Philharmonic .
literature
- Musica Sacra , edition 01/2004
Individual evidence
- ↑ Zdravko Blažeković, Franz von Suppé and Dalmatia (Studies in Musicology. Supplements to the Monuments of Music in Austria, Vol. 43, pp. 262ff). The letter is now in the archive of the Franciscan monastery in Kotor. https://www.academia.edu/2918889/Franz_von_Supp%C3%A9_und_Dalmatien
- ↑ Website of the Kölner Männer-Gesang-Verein ( Memento of the original from September 12, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
