Christoph Willibald Gluck

Christoph Willibald Gluck is a German Compositeur born in Erasbach on July 2nd, 1714 and died with Vienna (Austria) on November 15th, 1787.

Professor of harpsichord and song of Marie-Antoinette, future queen of France, it changed the face of the opera with his famous reform, aiming at introducing the naturalness and the dramatic truth, which opposed it to the piccinists, defenders of the Italian opera, without never however scrambling it with anyone. There remains one of the most important type-setters of the traditional period with Joseph Haydn, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Karl Ditters von Dittersdorf, Franz Krommer and Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach.

Biography

Gluck was the son of a forester of Bavarian Haut-Palatinat, former serviceman with the service of princes de Lobkowitz which, by leaving the service, had taken the traditional profession in the family. It should not be imagined, as give it to believe certain biographies, that he was a poor wretch logger: the type-setter himself said that he was the son of a Master of National Forestry Commission, which undoubtedly constitutes a good transposition, and it is certain that his/her father died strong rich person.

Christoph Willibald Gluck was registered in 1731 with the faculty of philosophy of Prague. But, since its more young age, it showed provisions for the music which his/her father ingéniait himself to oppose. He had learned only the Guimbarde, instrument low noise to which he could be exerted in hiding-place and, in 1734, he left the paternal house for Vienna to become musician.

It is with Milan, where it arrived in 1735 and studied under the direction of Giovanni Battista Sammartini, that it made play its first opera in 1741. Several others followed in various towns of Italy, then with London, in 1745 - 1746. It entered there in relation to Lord Middlesex, director of the Opera which was still with the old theater of Haymarket. Gluck gave to it with a certain success in January 1746 an opera on mythological subject, the Fall of the Giants ( Caduta de' Giganti ), then, in April of the same year, Artamene , dissociated of sound Tigrane of 1743. At the time of this English stay, Gluck discovered the music of Haendel - to which one perhaps sought to oppose it, because the Prince of Wales, which protected the Opera, was in conflict with his father the king George II which protected Haendel - and bound with the type-setter Thomas Arne.

Gluck left England and travelled during three years, in particular with Dresden, Copenhagen, Naples and Prague. In 1748, it made play with a great success with Aachen its Semiramide riconosciuta , on a booklet of Métastase. September 15th, 1750, he married Maria Anna Pergin, girl of a negotiating rich person of Vienna. They did not have a child but adopted a girl, Marianne, born in 1759 and prematurely dead in 1776.

Gluck ends up being established in Vienna in 1752 in the capacity as leader of the prince of Saxony-Hildburghausen, then of choirmaster. It started to arrange French light operas for the theater of the court and to compose of the Italian entertainments. His/her friends initially tried without success to obtain a post office at the court to him but, in 1759, it was named with the theater of the court and, a little later saw itself granting a pension.

It became acquainted with the poet Ranieri of' Calzabigi and of the choreographer Gasparo Angiolini, and, with them, it composed a dramatic ballet Don Juan (1761). The following year, it composed the opera Orfeo ED Euridice , which engaged what it is agreed to call the “reform of the opera” and remains like one of its masterpieces. In 1764 it gave an Op3era Comique, the unforeseen meeting , and the following year two ballets, then two new operas, always on booklets of Calzabigi, Alceste (1767) and Paride ED Elena (1770).

Gluck then decided to apply its theories to the French opera and, in 1774, it gave Iphigénie in Aulide and Orphée and Eurydice , version French of its opera of 1762. It was a triumph at the same time as the starting point of a controversy with holding of the Italian music, which chose like champion the type-setter Niccolò Vito Piccinni. The quarrel burst in 1777 with Armide , which made following the French version of Alceste (1776) and was followed in 1779 by the greatest success of Gluck, Iphigénie in Tauride , and its greater failure, Echo and Narcisse .

Admired by its contemporaries like Joseph Martin Kraus, Gluck however put a term at its career. It revised Iphigénie in Tauride for a German version and composed of the songs but renonça to be gone to London and died in 1787 in Vienna.

Works

Artaserse ( Artaxerxès ), booklet of Metastasis, played with Milan on December 26th 1741
Demetrio , booklet of Metastasis, played with Venice on May 2nd 1742
Demofoonte , booklet of Métastase, played with Milan on January 6th 1743
Tigrane , played with Creamed on September 26th, 1743
Sofonisba (or Siface ), booklet of Métastase and Silvani, played Milan on January 18th 1744
Finta Schiava ( the supposed Slave ), in collaboration, booklet of Silvani, played Venice on May 13rd, 1744
Ipermestre , booklet of Metastasis, played in Venice on November 21st, 1744
Poro ( Porus ), booklet of Metastasis, played with Turin on December 26th, 1744
Ippolito , played in Milan on January 31st 1745
Caduta de' Giganti ( the Fall of the Giants ), booklet of the Vanneschi abbot, represented with the Theater of Haymarket with London on January 7th 1746
Artamene , opera into 3 acts, booklet of the Vanneschi abbot, represented with the Theater of Haymarket with London on March 4th, 1746
Nozze d' Ercole E of Ebb ( the Marriage of Hercules and Hébé ), opera, anonymous booklet, represented with Pillnitz on June 29th 1747
Semiramide riconosciuta , opera, booklet of Metastasis, represented with Aachen on May 5th 1748
Contesa de' Numi ( the Argument of the gods ), serenata in 2 parts, represented with Charlottenborg on April 9th 1749
Ezio ( Aëtius ), booklet of Metastasis, represented with Prague on December 26th, 1749
Issipile ( Hypsipyle ), booklet of Metastasis, represented in Prague in 1751 - 1752
Clemenza di Tito , represented with Naples on November 4th 1752
the Pilgrims of Mecque or the unforeseen Meeting , presented for the first time to Burgtheater of Vienna in 1764
Feste d' Apollo , given to Parma on July 24th, 1769
Alceste , creates in 1767 with Vienna, and in 1776 with Paris (French version).
Iphigénie in Tauride , played in Paris on May 18th 1779
Philemon and Baucis , opera ballet
Orfeo ED Euridice , opera

External bonds

Biography in English
Article on Feste d' Apollo (Philémon and Baucis, Aristeo and Orphée)
Influence of Gluck on Berlioz

Simple: Christoph Willibald Gluck

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