L'incoronazione di Poppea
(The Coronation of Poppea)
Libretto by Giovanni Francesco Busenello
Performing version by Martin Pearlman
Cast in order of appearance:
Fortuna (Fortune)
Virtù (Virtue)
Amore (Cupid)
Ottone (nobleman, husband of Poppea)
Soldiers 1 & 2
Poppea (Roman noblewoman, Nero's mistress)
Nerone (the Roman emperor Nero)
Arnalta (nurse and confidante of Poppea)
Ottavia (empress, wife of Nero)
Nutrice (Ottavia's nurse)
Seneca (philosopher, Nero's mentor)
Valletto (page to the empress)
Drusilla (attendant of the empress, in love with Ottone)
Damigella (lady-in-waiting)
Liberto (captain of the guard)
Famigliari (three friends of Seneca)
Lucano (the poet Lucan, friend of Nero)
Littore (lictor, bodyguard)
Consuls and tribunes
Quartet of amori (cupids)
Program Notes by Martin Pearlman
L'incoronazione di Poppea (The Coronation of Poppea) is the last of the three operas by Monteverdi that have come down to us. The first, L'Orfeo (1607) was written less than a decade after the beginnings of opera and is generally acknowledged as the first masterpiece in the new genre. Then, after a gap of more than 30 years, during which Monteverdi wrote many operas that are now sadly lost, we have two great works from near the end of his life: Il ritorno d'Ulisse (1640) and Poppea (1642).
When he wrote his first operas, Monteverdi was employed at the ducal court in Mantua, where he had the full resources of the court at his disposal. He had extensive rehearsal time, beautiful productions, and large instrumental ensembles, and he was even able to publish a printed score of L'Orfeo. In 1613, he moved to Venice to take up the post of maestro di cappella at St. Mark's Basilica, the most prestigious musical post in Italy after that of the Vatican. There he not only provided church music for St. Mark's but continued to write operas, at first for wealthy patrons and then for the newly opened public opera houses. Writing for the new public institutions, where producers had to be careful about budgets, meant that ensembles were considerably smaller than in his earlier court productions. It also meant that operas now needed to appeal to the tastes of a broader public. Instead of the nymphs and shepherds of early pastoral dramas, his later opera The Return of Ulysses culminates in the famous bloody scene from the Odyssey, in which Ulysses slays the suitors. The Coronation of Poppea, also a story with villains, betrayals and death, is based on historical characters.
The libretto is by the Venetian lawyer and poet Giovanni Francesco Busenello, who also wrote libretti for Cavalli. For his story, he adapted accounts by Tacitus and other ancient writers about the infamous Roman emperor Nero divorcing his wife and marrying his mistress Poppea. It is a libretto with three-dimensional characters, lifelike dialogue and a powerfully developed story.
Remarkable juxtapositions of tragedy and comedy, innocence and decadence shift sharply from one scene to the next. Throughout the opera, Busenello has created complex characters who are neither all good nor all bad. The empress Ottavia, after gaining our sympathy as Nero's rejected wife, ultimately resorts to blackmail to have Poppea murdered. The philosopher Seneca, Nero's mentor and moral compass, sometimes appears intellectually rigid and unsympathetic. Seneca's stoic death is followed by a naïve, humorous scene between two young lovers and then by a wild drunken scene, in which Nero and the poet Lucan sing extravagantly about the beauty of Poppea. As for Poppea herself, she appears to be both manipulating Nero and perhaps genuinely in love with him. And, in what may be the most fascinating and morally ambiguous ending in all of opera, the work concludes with a beautiful love duet for Nero and Poppea, who have been the villains of the story.
Much has been written in recent years about the fact that certain parts of the score -- among them some of Ottone's music, a few instrumental pieces, and even the final duet -- appear to incorporate music by other composers. It is impossible to know for certain whether these were insertions that found their way into the work after Monteverdi's death or whether the aging composer may have worked on his final opera together with younger composers in a kind of workshop setting. Either way, what we have is a beautifully integrated work that makes for a powerful drama.
Our performing version
Sadly, no music from this opera has survived in Monteverdi's hand. It was long thought to be lost, until a manuscript came to light in 1888 in a library in Venice and another was discovered in 1930 in Naples. Both of them were copied out after the composer's death, probably within a decade of it, and were evidently intended for use in performances, although the exact dates and locations of those performances have been matters of some debate. Each score contains numerous errors and occasionally omits notes or words. But beyond actual errors, there are considerable differences in detail, as well as some major differences in which lengthy passages are inserted or omitted. As a result, they present essentially two different versions of the opera.
Boston Baroque performances have been based on my edition, which goes back to the original sources. While some recent editions have mixed and matched elements from both the Venice and Naples scores and from the surviving libretti, I have preferred to follow a single source, the Venice manuscript, referring to the Naples score and the libretti only where they might clarify mistakes or supply some missing notes or words.
Following a single source can give a clearer vision of the opera as it was prepared for an actual production in the seventeenth century, but there are several reasons why the Venice score is of special interest. Not only is it the dramatically stronger version of the two, but also it was prepared under the supervision of the great opera composer Cavalli, whose wife copied out the greater part of the manuscript and who himself wrote directions into the score. Cavalli may possibly even have written some of the ritornelli or other music, since by that time, the opera appears to have taken on some accretions of music by other composers.
The one exception where we do not exactly follow the Venice score is in the final scene of the opera, the coronation. That one scene more than any other appears to be a pastiche of music from various sources and is more diffuse than most of the rest of the drama. In this scene, I have inserted a beautiful quartet of cupids (amori) from the Naples manuscript just before the final duet, although my edition has an appendix that gives that part of the Venice score in its original form.
The instruments in our performance
Perhaps the biggest difference among performing versions of Poppea is in the matter of orchestral accompaniments. In the original score, the instrumental ensemble almost never accompanies a singer. Aside from just a few bars with voice, the orchestra is given only occasional brief interludes (ritornelli).
The question then is whether the manuscript score is complete or whether instruments were meant to accompany singers in places where there is no music written for them. Every director must address this central question. A few composers (e.g. Dallapiccola and Henze) have orchestrated the work throughout, as in a 19th-century opera. That not only changes the basic character of Monteverdi's music, but it also makes it impossible for the singers to be rhythmically free in declaiming their text or for the continuo players to improvise and react to the singers as they are supposed to do in this music. Other more austere performances limit themselves strictly to the notes that are written down, so that the orchestra almost never accompanies singers and plays only about 10 minutes of music in the entire opera. This approach would seem artistically and financially as wasteful for the 17th century as it would be in the 21st.
The version that Boston Baroque performs is in a middle ground. I have composed instrumental parts not only to fill violin lines that are left blank in certain ritornelli but also to accompany singers at important points of heightened drama, moments when a character breaks out of recitative into song.
There are plenty of hints to support this approach. Certain other operas of the time have instrumental parts written out to accompany some arias. Occasionally a score will even give instructions that an aria should be played "with violins" or "with all the instruments," even though no instrumental parts are shown. Orchestral accompaniments like these can heighten moments of true song. But the core of this music is in the freer speech patterns of recitative, supported by a continuo section improvising its accompaniment.
The manuscript scores never specify which instruments are to play but simply give the notes. As in many works of the time, most of the opera consists of just a vocal line with an instrumental bass line below it. One must decide where to assign continuo instruments to play the bass line and improvise harmony above it. To reflect the dramatic situation, we used a variety of continuo instruments to vary the sound-- two harpsichords, theorbo, cello, and lirone. Even in the ritornelli, instruments are not specified. Generally, though, these would be for strings, to which one might decide occasionally to add a few wind instruments for color (e. g. recorders or cornetti).
Performance Edition by Martin Pearlman
Below are preview photos from the edition. You can download or view a PDF of the full edition here.
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Boston Baroque Performances
L'incoronazione di Poppea
April 26 & 28, 2019
NEC’s Jordan Hall, Boston, MA
Martin Pearlman, conductor
Tara Faircloth, stage director
Soloists:
Amanda Forsythe - Poppea
Anthony Roth Costanzo - Nerone
Emily Marvosh - Ottavia
Ryan Belongie - Ottone
Brian Giebler - Arnalta
Kevin Langan - Seneca
Carrie Cheron - Amore, Valetto
Margaret Lias - Virtù, Nutrice
Sonja DuToit Tengblad - Fortuna, Drusilla
Maggie Finnegan - Damigella
Jason Wang - Liberto, 2nd Soldier, Consul
Patrick T. Waters - 1st Soldier, Disciple of Seneca, and Consul
David Tinervia - Littore
Jonas Budris - Lucano
October 27 & 28, 2000
NEC’s Jordan Hall, Boston, MA
Martin Pearlman, conductor
Soloists:
Sharon Baker - Fortuna, Drusilla
Janine Hawley - Virtù, Nutrice
Sandra Piques Eddy - Amore, Valletto
Bejun Mehta - Ottone
Frank Kelley - 1st Soldier, Disciple of Seneca, Consul
Ryan Turner - 2nd Soldier, Liberto
Judith Lovat - Poppea
Deanne Meek - Nerone
Marc Molomot - Arnalta, Disciple of Seneca
Jane Gilbert - Ottavia
Daniel Smith - Seneca, Consul
Elisa Doughty - Damigella
David Kravitz - Littore, Disciple of Seneca, Consul
William Hite - Lucano, Consul
May 23, 1981
Boston University Theater (later The Huntington), Boston, MA
Martin Pearlman, conductor
Jack Eddleman, stage director
Soloists:
Kerry McCarthy - Poppea
Susan Larson - Nero
Karl Dan Sorensen - Arnalta & Disciple of Seneca
Nance Green - Octavia
Jeffrey Gall - Otho
Philip Evancho - Seneca
Teresa Bryant - Drusilla
Jane Struss - Nurse
Patti Dell - Fortuna
Nancy Armstrong - Virtue & Page (Valletto)
Ann Jeffers - Love
Richard Conrad - First soldier, Captain of the guards & Consul
Peter Cody - Second soldier, Disciple of Seneca & Consul
James Maddalena - Mercury & Tribune
John Osborn - Disciple of Seneca, Lictor & Tribune