2025 Digital Festival Program Book Draft

Bo on Early Music Fe ival

PAUL O’DETTE & STEPHEN STUBBS , Artistic Directors

KATHLEEN FAY, Executive Director

2025 VIRTUAL FESTIVAL

Experience the Festival magic again in the comfort of your own home with ENCORE! Our 2025 VIRTUAL FESTIVAL showcases select performances recorded live at the June 2025 Festival and premiering this fall.

VIRTUAL EVENTS INCLUDE: Programs subject to change.

n CENTERPIECE OPERA | Keiser’s Octavia

n CHAMBER OPERA | Telemann’s Pimpinone and Ino

n CONCERT | Boston Early Music Festival Orchestra

Rivers of Splendor: Handel’s & Telemann’s Water Music

n CONCERT | BEMF Chamber Ensemble & Friends

With performances by sopranos Emma Kirkby, Emőke Baráth, Amanda Forsythe, Danielle Reutter-Harrah & Teresa Wakim; tenors Aaron Sheehan & Jason McStoots; and bass-baritone Christian Immler

Watch for more information later this summer at BEMF.ORG

BOSTON EARLY MUSIC FESTIVAL

Thursday, June 12

Schedule

Friday, June 13

Schedule

Special

June 2025

Dear Friends:

It is with the greatest pleasure that welcome you to the June 2025 Boston Early Music Festival—the 23rd edition of our biennial Festival and Exhibition. It has been a remarkable years since the very first Festival, and all of us at BEMF are profoundly honored to have played our part of the tremendous growth of Early Music in North America. This year, we have chosen as our theme Love & Power, a potent—and dangerous!—combination that will take us on many extraordinary voyages through history with music from the High Middle Ages to the dawn of the Romantic era.

The grand Operatic Centerpiece of the Festival is the North American premiere of Reinhard Keiser’s Octavia, which brings lavish spectacle and brilliant orchestration to a nuanced tale of the corruption of power and the resilience of love in the Rome of Emperor Nero. Grammy-winning Musical Directors Paul O’Dette and Stephen Stubbs and acclaimed Stage Director Gilbert Blin lead the fully staged production of this monumental work. Breathtaking sets; sumptuous, period-inspired costumes; ex uisite Baro ue dance; and beautifully evocative music combine in an operatic feast sure to delight. Our incomparable team includes the 31-member Boston Early Music Festival Orchestra, led by Concertmaster Robert Mealy; six Baro ue dancers from the Boston Early Music Festival Dance Company, under the direction of Marie-Nathalie Lacoursi re, Dance Director; and six singers and one dancer from the BEMF Young Artists Training Program, under the leadership of Gilbert Blin, Jason McStoots, and Jeffrey Grossman.

BEMF’s critically acclaimed Chamber Opera Series explores the genius of Georg Philipp Telemann with a fascinating, interwoven pairing of stylish slapstick from the comic intermezzo Pimpinone and scintillating drama with the cantata Ino’s thrilling story drawn from Ovid’s Metamorphoses. This groundbreaking evening features a trio of outstanding singers and the exceptional BEMF Chamber Ensemble in a magnificent production featuring gorgeous costumes and inventive staging.

Throughout the Festival week, BEMF’s concerts will showcase some of Early Music’s most dynamic and acclaimed ensembles and artists. Longtime BEMF friends return, among them The Tallis Scholars, The Boston Camerata, and ox Luminis; the week also features many d buts, including Kiya Tabassian with his ensemble Constantinople and the distinguished instrumental duo of brothers Enrico and Marcello Gatti. The BEMF Orchestra presents a special concert of Water Musics by Handel and Telemann, and our beloved Saturday latenight concert features eight stellar singers performing favorite period showpieces.

There is so much more: the Organ and Keyboard mini-festivals, our world-famous Exhibition, the symposia and masterclasses, a film, and BEMF’s post-Festival Berkshires residency at the Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center in Great Barrington, followed by a performance at the Caramoor Center in Katonah, New York. The book you hold is your passport to the full riches of BEMF.

In this, my th year at the helm of BEMF, I remain so proud of and grateful to our Board of Directors, whose unflinching support has seen us through flourishing and challenging times. I salute our extraordinary staff, and the musicians and audience who are the very reason we exist. On behalf of our Board, Overseers, Trustees, Staff, and Artistic Directors, thank you so much for attending our 2 rd Boston Early Music Festival. We are so very glad you’re here.

Yours sincerely,

Kathleen Fay Executive Director

Welcome to the 23nd biennial Boston Early Music Festival! This week overflows with everything nd you’ve come to expect from our world-class festival: a sumptuous Centerpiece Opera, the Exhibition with its wares and expertise from across the continents, a rich array of Concurrent and Fringe Events, and attendees from around the globe who are as excited to be here as you are! Our theme of Love & Power frames an exploration of the wealth of emotions and drama that have animated the world’s history and interpersonal relationships.

American humorist Mark Twain is often credited with saying: “History does not repeat itself, but it rhymes.” These rhymes will abound this week, as our artists recount stories of political maneuvering in the Roman Empire in Octavia, our Centerpiece Opera; The Boston Camerata portrays the intrigues of medieval European kings mad with power; and the more prosaic struggles of domestic relationships come to life in Telemann’s opera Pimpinone.

June 2025

Love, encompassing both romantic and divine love, is perhaps the world’s greatest source of musical and dramatic inspiration, and the concerts this week will showcase its many facets in a dizzying array of forms. Trio Mediæval offers sacred and ecstatic works of Hildegard von Bingen and Leonel Power, the Boreas Quartett Bremen evokes Shakespearean love in dulcet recorder tones, and Pacific MusicWorks presents an eclectic selection of pieces exploring the more extreme reaches of love in song.

This week’s Festival Concerts will cross oceans, with performances exploring distant reaches and unexpected connections, from the wild musical adventures of the Holy Roman Empire, brought to life by ACRONYM, to the intellectual sympathies between J. S. Bach and Omar Kayyam, as explored by Constantinople, to Grammy-winner Aaron Sheehan singing a panorama of European songs extolling the many virtues of wine. The Keyboard and Organ Mini-Festivals and Fringe Concerts will offer you impossible choices, with unforgettable performances at every turn. The many Concurrent Events include scholarly discussions of performance practice, explorations of historical contexts and currents, and opportunities to watch the next generation of artists step into the spotlight. For pure inspiration, nothing can top our Engaging Communities session BEMF Beyond Borders on Sunday morning, showcasing young recorder players from Boston, Taiwan, and Brazil and string players from Arkansas.

With so many events happening at all hours, there’s always something for you to enjoy for as long as you can spend with us. If you didn’t set aside the whole week to take it all in, perhaps your experiences this time will inspire you to block off the whole week for our next festival in 2027. And if there’s something you missed—or that you just have to see again!—keep an eye out this fall for our ENCORE! virtual festival, which will feature video recordings of several of this week’s events for you to experience again—and again!

Warmest greetings,

President of the BEMF Board of Directors

Board of Directors

Bernice K. Chen, Chairman • David Halstead, President

Ellen T. Harris, Vice President • Susan L. Robinson, Vice President • Adrian C. Touw, Treasurer • Peter L. Faber, Clerk Brit d’Arbeloff • Michael Ellmann • George L. Hardman • Glenn A. KnicKrehm • Robert E. Kulp, Jr.

Miles Morgan † • Bettina A. Norton • Lee S. Ridgway • Ganesh Sundaram • Christoph Wolff

Kathleen Fay, Executive Director

43 Thorndike Street, Suite 302 • Cambridge, MA 02141-1764

Tel: 617-661-1812 • Fax: 617-661-1816

bemf@bemf.org • BEMF.org

& POWER

June2025

June2025

June2025

DearFriends,

DearFriends,

DearFriends,

CityofBoston,Massachusetts

CityofBoston,Massachusetts

OfficeoftheMayor MichelleWu

OfficeoftheMayor MichelleWu

CityofBoston,Massachusetts

OfficeoftheMayor

MichelleWu

Itismypleasuretowelcomeyoutothe23rdbiennialBostonEarlyMusicFestival!

Itismypleasuretowelcomeyoutothe23rdbiennialBostonEarlyMusicFestival!

Itismypleasuretowelcomeyoutothe23rdbiennialBostonEarlyMusicFestival!

Since1981,thisfestivalhasbroughttogetherresidentsandvisitorsfromaroundthe worldtoenjoyclassicalmusicinhistoricspacesacrossourcity.Fromfortepianoand theorgantoBaroqueoperaandBEMFʼsworld-famousexhibition—wearesoexcitedfor themelodies,history,scholarship,andcraft thatyouwillsharewithourcitythisweek.

Since1981,thisfestivalhasbroughttogetherresidentsandvisitorsfromaroundthe worldtoenjoyclassicalmusicinhistoricspacesacrossourcity.Fromfortepianoand theorgantoBaroqueoperaandBEMFʼsworld-famousexhibition—wearesoexcitedfor themelodies,history,scholarship,andcraft thatyouwillsharewithourcitythisweek.

Since1981,thisfestivalhasbroughttogetherresidentsandvisitorsfromaroundthe worldtoenjoyclassicalmusicinhistoricspacesacrossourcity.Fromfortepianoand theorgantoBaroqueoperaandBEMFʼsworld-famousexhibition—wearesoexcitedfor themelodies,history,scholarship,andcraft thatyouwillsharewithourcitythisweek.

Bostonisacitythatunderstandswelltheimportanceofourpast.Andwepride ourselvesonthewaysourhistoryechoesinourpresent.TheBostonEarlyMusic Festivalisatraditionthattapsintothisresonanceandremindsusofjusthowmuchwe standtogainwhenwedelvedeepintoexploringtherichmusicaltraditionsthatpaved thewayforsomuchofthemusicweenjoytoday.

Bostonisacitythatunderstandswelltheimportanceofourpast.Andwepride ourselvesonthewaysourhistoryechoesinourpresent.TheBostonEarlyMusic Festivalisatraditionthattapsintothisresonanceandremindsusofjusthowmuchwe standtogainwhenwedelvedeepintoexploringtherichmusicaltraditionsthatpaved thewayforsomuchofthemusicweenjoytoday.

Bostonisacitythatunderstandswelltheimportanceofourpast.Andwepride ourselvesonthewaysourhistoryechoesinourpresent.TheBostonEarlyMusic Festivalisatraditionthattapsintothisresonanceandremindsusofjusthowmuchwe standtogainwhenwedelvedeepintoexploringtherichmusicaltraditionsthatpaved thewayforsomuchofthemusicweenjoytoday.

Iwanttothankalloftheperformers,staff,andmembersoftheBoardfortheimmense amountofloveandworkthatispouredintomakingthisincredibleeventpossibleeach year.Wearesogratefulforyourstewardshipofthisimportantpartofourartisticand culturalhistory,andforyourongoinginvestmentinstrengtheningBostonʼsrelationship tothearts.

Iwanttothankalloftheperformers,staff,andmembersoftheBoardfortheimmense amountofloveandworkthatispouredintomakingthisincredibleeventpossibleeach year.Wearesogratefulforyourstewardshipofthisimportantpartofourartisticand culturalhistory,andforyourongoinginvestmentinstrengtheningBostonʼsrelationship tothearts.

Iwanttothankalloftheperformers,staff,andmembersoftheBoardfortheimmense amountofloveandworkthatispouredintomakingthisincredibleeventpossibleeach year.Wearesogratefulforyourstewardshipofthisimportantpartofourartisticand culturalhistory,andforyourongoinginvestmentinstrengtheningBostonʼsrelationship tothearts.

Sincerely,

Sincerely,

Sincerely,

MichelleWu MayorofBoston

MichelleWu MayorofBoston

MichelleWu MayorofBoston

May15,2025

DearFriends,

Welcometothe23rdbiennialBostonEarlyMusicFestival!

Recognizedas“theworld’sleadingfestivalofearlymusic,”BEMF’slegacyinBostonandbeyond spansdecades.TheCityofBostonishonoredtohaveorganizationslikethisaspartofourarts sector,andwelookforwardtocontinuingtouplifttheworkbeingdonetobringmoreartsand cultureopportunitiestoresidentsandvisitorsalike.

CongratulationstoBEMFonanotherexcitingprogram!

Sincerely,

KennyMascary InterimChiefofArtsandCulture

17th May 2025

Welcome to the 2025 Boston Early Music Festival

Dear friends,

From the Consul General

David Clay MBE

His Majesty’s Consul General in Boston

It is my pleasure to welcome you to the 2025 Boston Early Music Festival, one of the most highly-anticipated events on the city’s cultural calendar. This is my first year in Boston and I am looking forward to sampling some of the Festival’s carefully curated programmefor the first time. Itpromises to be a true showcase for the depth, diversity and richness of early music.

This year, it is wonderful to see the return of two distinguished British ensembles: The Tallis Scholars and The English Cornett & Sackbut Ensemble. Under the direction of Peter Phillips, The Tallis Scholars will present music marking the 500th anniversary of Palestrina’s birth and inspired by the Sistine Chapel. Their collaboration with the English Cornett & Sackbut Ensemble on 9th June offers a rare opportunity to hear Renaissance vocal and instrumental traditions in dialogue.

As the father of three young children, it is wonderful to see that the programme includes a Family Day. This is a great opportunity to introduce children to the experience of listening to early music. I hope that for some of the young audience at the Boston Ballroom on 14th June, it will be the beginning of a lifelong relationship with music of this period.

Whether you are attending a single concert or immersing yourself in the full week of events, I hope you find the Festival to be a rewarding and engaging experience. Thank you for supporting this vibrant community of performers who continue to bring early music to life.

With best wishes,

David Clay MBE

His Majesty’s Consul General in Boston

A Note from the Artistic Directors

Welcome to our 2025 Festival depicting many different views of Love and Power in music, dance, spectacle and sound. In 2009, we presented a festival devoted to the Power of Love, which generated a great deal of enthusiasm and requests for a sequel. After all, much of the music composed in the past millennium has dealt with love and its impact. Yet, as we were working on Reinhard Keiser’s magni cent opera Octavia for this year’s festival, we were reminded about not only the power of love, but also the love of power. These two potent forces not only motivate the plot of our opera, but they are particularly topical in today’s world. The idea behind our theme was to explore the ways in which power and love have in uenced one another throughout music history. In reality, the true theme of this year’s festival is “The Power of Music,” since it is music that expresses the human condition in ways no other art form can. Composers of the Middle Ages, and Renaissance and Baroque periods, were particularly adept at vividly portraying the gamut of human experience.

For this year’s festival, we have chosen a richly varied lineup of both well-known performers and new discoveries, performing music, both vocal and instrumental, sacred and secular, choral, orchestral and chamber, familiar and unfamiliar from the Middle Ages to the late Classical and early Romantic periods.

Our centerpiece opera, Reinhard Keiser’s Octavia, has been on our radar screen for many years, as we have worked our way through the beautiful but still largely unknown operatic repertoire of Baroque Germany, or to be more speci c, Baroque Hamburg. Hamburg created an especially vibrant operatic culture, beginning in the late seventeenth century, producing a repertoire we have visited many times before

at BEMF, beginning with Johann Georg Conradi’s Ariadne, which we presented in 2003, continuing two years later with the world premiere of Johann Mattheson’s Boris Goudenow, then Handel’s rst opera Almira in 2013, and Christoph Graupner’s Antiochus und Stratonica, which we performed in Germany in 2019 and recorded in 2020, just before Covid shut down the world. Stay tuned for news about our next Hamburg opera in 2027!

Keiser’s Octavia was such an innovative, colorful score that the young Handel “borrowed” numerous arias from it to use in his Agrippina of 1709. (He was evidently not concerned that Venetian audiences would have ever heard the music of Reinhard Keiser, so why not pilfer what he could!) To make the connection between the two works as vivid as possible, a selection of excerpts from Agrippina will be performed by members of our Young Artists Training Program this week.

One of our favorite recent chamber opera productions combined Telemann’s comic intermezzo Pimpinone with his dramatic cantata Ino. Unfortunately, those performances in the Fall of 2021 took place during the Covid period when few brave souls were venturing out in public. We felt now would be the perfect time to revive that production to permit a wider audience to enjoy Telemann’s amazing operatic gifts. These works, composed at two very different times in the composer’s career (1725 and 1765, respectively), show his incredibly inventive musical vocabulary and his ability to succeed brilliantly in both comic and tragic genres.

This year’s festival offers a cornucopia of delights representing music from the early Middle Ages to the early nineteenth century in a wide variety of vocal and instrumental con gurations. The highlights include the BEMF

continued

A NOTE FROM THE ARTISTIC DIRECTORS

Orchestra performing Handel’s beloved Water Music with Baroque dancers Hubert Hazebroucq and Marie-Nathalie Lacoursière,ACRONYM, The Tallis Scholarsjoined by The English Cornett & Sackbut Ensemble,Ensemble Castor with Sherezade Panthaki,Telemann’s sublime “Paris” Quartets performed by the extraordinary Gatti brothers, Vox Luminis, Concerto Romano(in a hilarious program of comic scenes from Venetian seicento opera), Trio Mediæval, The Boston Camerata(celebrating their 70th anniversary!), Constantinople with Hana Blažíková, ExtravaGamba! (with music for 2 to 16 viols), the extraordinary recorder consort Boreas Quartett Bremen,the dynamic violin and harpsichord duo ofThéotime Langlois de Swarte and Justin Taylor, Paci c MusicWorksperforming the exquisite harp consorts of William Lawes and his wonderful but seldom heard songs, sung by Danielle Reutter-Harrah,a lute song recital featuring BEMF favoriteAaron Sheehan,and to top it all off, a Saturday night party of your favorite singers performing their party pieces in“Starry, Starry Night.”Then there are the masterclasses, symposia, pre-concert talks, dance workshops, the Organ and Keyboard Mini-Festivals, the BEMF Youth Ensemble, BEMF Beyond Borders, the Fringe festival, and

the incredible BEMF Exhibition. The instrument, bow, and string makers, and the publishers, are the life blood of the early music movement, and their presence here is a vital part of the BEMF experience. Please support our wonderful exhibitors and thank them for all they do for early music! How can there be so many can’t-miss events all packed into seven days of bliss? At BEMF, we are gluttons for pleasure! Prepare for an exhausting yet exhilarating week of music, merry making, rewarding reconnections with friends and colleagues, and discovering all the latest developments in early music research.

Thinking ahead to 2027, we are pleased to announce that the centerpiece opera for the June 2027 Festival will be the American premiere of Telemann’s magni cent 1728 opera Emma und Eginhard, in a co-production with the Telemann Festival in Magdeburg, where it will be presented in 2028. This work is considered by many scholars to be Telemann’s nest opera and the pinnacle of achievement in the history of the Hamburg opera, and we are honored to be able to spearhead this project.

—Paul O’Dette and Stephen Stubbs

Boston Early Music Festival, Inc.

Management

Kathleen Fay, Executive Director

Carla Chris eld, General Manager

Maria van Kalken, Assistant to the Executive Director

Brian Stuart, Director of Marketing and Publicity

Elizabeth Hardy, Marketing and Development Associate & Exhibition Manager

Perry Emerson, Operations Manager

Corey King, Box Of ce and Patron Services Director

Esme Hurlburt, Patron Services & Advertising Associate

Andrew Sigel, Publications Editor

Julia McKenzie, Director of the BEMF Youth Ensemble

Nina Stern, Community Engagement Advisor

Artistic Leadership

Paul O’Dette and Stephen Stubbs, Artistic Directors

Gilbert Blin, Opera Director

Robert Mealy, Orchestra Director

Marie-Nathalie Lacoursière, Lucy Graham Dance Director

Board of Directors

Bernice K. Chen, Chairman

David Halstead, President

Ellen T. Harris, Vice President

Susan L. Robinson, Vice President

Adrian C. Touw, Treasurer

Peter L. Faber, Clerk

Brit d’Arbeloff

Michael Ellmann

George L. Hardman

Glenn A. KnicKrehm

Robert E. Kulp, Jr.

Miles Morgan†

Bettina A. Norton

Lee S. Ridgway

Ganesh Sundaram

Christoph Wolff

Board of Overseers

Diane Britton | Gregory E. Bulger | Amanda Pond | Robert Strassler | Donald E. Vaughan

Board of Trustees

Marty Gottron & John Felton, Co-Chairs

Deborah Ferro Burke | Mary Deissler | James A. Glazier | Douglas M. Robbe | Jacob Skowronek

deceased

Jon Aaron

Debra K.S. Anderson

Kathryn Bertelli

Mary Briggs

Diane Britton

Douglas M. Brooks

Gregory E. Bulger

Julian G. Bullitt

Deborah Ferro Burke

John A. Carey

Anne P. Chalmers

Bernice K. Chen

Joel I. Cohen

Brit d’Arbeloff

Vivian Day

Mary Deissler

Peter L. DeWolf

JoAnne W. Dickinson

Richard J. Dix

Alan Durfee†

Michael Ellmann

Peter L. Faber

Emily C. Farnsworth

Kathleen Fay

Members of the BEMF Corporation

Lori Fay

John Felton

Frances C. Fitch

Claire Fontijn

James A. Glazier

Marty Gottron

Carol A. Haber

David Halstead

George L. Hardman

Ellen T. Harris

Rebecca Harris-Warrick

Richard Hester

Jessica Honigberg

Jennifer Ritvo Hughes

Edward B. Kellogg†

Thomas F. Kelly

Glenn A. KnicKrehm

Christine Kodis

John Krzywicki

Kathryn Kucharski

Robert E. Kulp, Jr.

Ellen Kushner

Christopher Laconi

Thomas G. MacCracken

William Magretta

Bill McJohn

Miles Morgan†

Nancy Netzer

Amy H. Nicholls

James S. Nicolson†

Bettina A. Norton

Scott Offen

Lorna E. Oleck

Henry P.M. Paap

James M. Perrin

Bici Pettit-Barron

Amanda Pond

Melvyn Pond

Paul Rabin

Christa Rakich

Lee S. Ridgway

Michael Rigsby

Douglas M. Robbe

Michael Robbins

Susan L. Robinson

Patsy Rogers

Wendy Rolfe-Dunham

Loretto Roney

Ellen Rosand

Valerie Sarles†

David W. Scudder

Andrew Sigel

Jacob Skowronek

Arlene Snyder

Jon Solins

Robert Strassler

Ganesh Sundaram

Adrian C. Touw

Peggy Ueda

Donald E. Vaughan

Nikolaus von Huene

Howard J. Wagner

Benjamin D. Weiss

Ruth S. Westheimer

Allan Winkler

Hal Winslow

Christoph Wolff

Arnold B. Zetcher

Ellen Zetcher

† deceased

ank you, from Kathleen Fay, Executive

Director

…to the following individuals whose dedication, determination, and support helped make this extraordinary Festival possible:

John Achatz & Mary Farrell

Jamie Allen

Ara Arakelian

Adrian Avalos

Michael Beattie

Emily Bieker

Tomas Bisschop

Gilbert Blin & Henk Elderhorst

Victoria Bocchicchio

Geoff Briggs

Karin Brookes

Beth Brown

Julian Bullitt

Karen Burciaga

Susan Burns

James Busby

Shane Cadman

Shannon Canavin

Sarah Cantor

Phoebe Carrai

Madeline Case

William E. Catanesye

Artemis Cheung

Carla Chris eld & Benjamin Weiss

Nancy Coolidge

Karin Cuellar

Neal Cutler

Sarah Darling

Carlos Dolan

Drs. Charles & Elizabeth Emerson

Perry Emerson & Sierra Thibodeau

Siegbert Ernst

Kieran Fallon

Lori Fay & Christopher Cherry

Allison Ferrick

Eden Filter

Claire Fontijn

Frederick Frank

Rebecca Frank Oeser

Friends of Armenian Culture Society of Boston

Jesie Fu

Cléa Galhano

Myriam Gamichon

Erin Genett

Gawain Glenton

Marty Gottron & John Felton

Virginie Gouet

Jeffrey Grossman

Elizabeth Hardy

Ellen Hargis

Beth Harris

Ellen T. Harris

Lori Harrison

Robert Hasserjian, M.D.

Hubert Hazebroucq

Morgen Heissenbuettel

Dylan Hillerbrand

Nicholas Holloway

Esme Hurlburt & Callum Lane

Julia Jaime Rodriguez

Ben Jeter

Richard Johnson

Jared Katz

Bonnie Kelly

Laura Kennedy

Corey King

Jessica Kinney

Anna Kjellsdotter

Glenn KnicKrehm

Joseph Kung

Vivian Kung

Marie-Nathalie Lacoursière

Carsten Lange

Ginger Lawrence

Debbie Levey & Crispin Weinberg

Fynn Liess

Anna Lysack

Ben Maines

Heather Martell

Kelly Martin

Alexander McCargar

David McCormick

Brian McCreath

George McCully & Barbara Ardan

Ruth McKay

Julia McKenzie

Alan McLellan

Jason McStoots

Robert Mealy & Emery Snyder

Lionel Meunier

Rick Michaud

Gigi Mitchell-Velasco

Madison Molloy

Jillian Moore

Martin Morell

David Morris

Jonathan Moyer

Marianne Murphy & Robin Taliesin

Nelida Nassar

Lisa Nigris

Bettina Norton

Paul O’Dette & Christel Thielmann

Isabel Oliart

Antonio Oliart Ros & Stephanie Rogers

Kathryn Pappalardo

Karola Parry

Anne Pinson

Jennifer Prentiss

Susan Pundt

Bruce Randall

Marjorie Randell-Silver & Eric Silver

Rod Regier

Lucy Rice

Rob Robbins

John Roberts

Mercedes Roman-Manson & Gordon Manson

David Rowe

Robb Scholten

Kathy Schuman

Charlotte Scott

Grace Sexton

Jamie Siebenaler

Andrew Sigel

Joan Margot Smith

Grant Sorenson

Michael Sponseller

Jan Stahlmann

Nina Stern

Scott Stevens

Abigail Stoner

Brian Stuart & Cait Hutton-Stuart

Stephen Stubbs & Maxine Eilander

Melinda Sullivan & Larry Friedman

Carrie Sykes

Peter Sykes

Karin Tate

Zaven Torikian

Angela & Eckhardt van den Hoogen

Maria van Kalken & Hal Winslow

Thomas Walton

Anna Watkins

Karin Watkins

Joy & Jonathan Wessler

Allan Winkler

Bob Winters

Kathy Wittman

Young Artists Training Program participants

Become a Friend of the Festival Please Join the Friends of the Boston Early Music Festival

Become a Friend of the Boston Early Music Festival by donating at one of several levels:

u Friend

u Partner

u Associate

u Patron

u Guarantor

u Benefactor

u Leadership Circle

u Artistic Directors’ Circle

u Festival Angel

The Boston Early Music Festival promotes the continuing vitality of Early Music through unparalleled Baroque opera productions, a celebrated concert series, a biennial worldclass international Festival, Grammy-winning recordings, and acclaimed touring programs.

As the world’s leading presenter and producer of the very highest quality performances of Early Music, including standard repertoire and newly revived masterpieces that inspire and delight contemporary audiences, BEMF gives music lovers a better understanding of the great music of the past, while providing worldwide leadership services on behalf of artists, musicologists, instrument makers, and colleague institutions.

What makes it all happen? Artistically, BEMF is privileged to work with the world’s leading directors, musicians, and scholars to assemble its broad range of concerts, groundbreaking operas, and other insightful activities. But without an enthusiastic audience with whom we can share our passion and performances, we would be an institution without a purpose.

That’s why BEMF turns to every fan of Early Music and ne musicianship who both understands the importance of our work and appreciates the vital contribution BEMF makes to Boston’s rich cultural landscape. Ticket sales cover less than half the cost of producing our Festival and concerts. Please consider supporting the world-renowned Boston Early Music Festival!

Thank you for attending our historic 23rd Boston Early Music Festival. We are thrilled that once every two years, thousands of devoted fans from around the U.S. and the world converge on Boston—“America’s early music

$45

$100

$250

$500

$1,000

$2,500

$5,000

$10,000

$25,000

capital”—to share in an unforgettable week of extraordinary performances, enlightening events, and opportunities to learn from each other. It’s your dedication that keeps us going!

Please consider making a tax-deductible contribution today.

u Visit BEMF.org/Support

u Call BEMF at 617-661-1812 with your credit card information or send that information or your check (payable to BEMF) to 43 Thorndike Street, Suite 302, Cambridge, MA 02141-1764.

u Increase your philanthropic impact with a Matching Gift from your employer! You may be able to double or even triple the size of your gift. Simply follow the instructions on your employer’s matching gift form.

u With a gift of appreciated stocks or bonds, you can support the Boston Early Music Festival while enjoying signi cant tax advantages.

u Join BEMF’s Orpheus Society, a special circle of friends who have arranged to remember BEMF in their estate plans. There are many ways to support BEMF in perpetuity through Planned Giving while achieving your own nancial goals, which may include life-long income for you and/or your family members, signi cant tax advantages, and the chance for your gift to go further.

u No matter whether you make a gift of cash, stock, or include BEMF in your estate planning, you may always direct your gift to a particular area that interests you, such as a Named Gift supporting one of our artists or performances, the Baroque Opera Recording Fund, the Kathleen Fay Leadership Fund, or the Berkshire Friends of BEMF.

Please contact Kathleen Fay, Executive Director, at kathy@bemf.org or 617-661-1812 with questions about giving to BEMF, or visit BEMF.org/Support to make a gift today!

Many thanks for your generous support!

Friends of the Boston Early Music Festival

Our membership organization, the Friends of the Boston Early Music Festival, includes contributors from all over the world. These individuals recognize the Festival’s need for further nancial support in order to ful ll its aim of serving as a showcase for the nest talent in the early music eld.

This list re ects donations received from April 1, 2023 to May 14, 2025

FESTIVAL ANGELS

($25,000 or more)

Anonymous (3)

Diane & John Paul Britton

Bernice K. Chen

Brit d’Arbeloff

Peter L. Faber

Lori Fay & Christopher Cherry

David Halstead & Jay Santos

George L. Hardman

Glenn A. KnicKrehm

Jeffrey G. Mora, in memory of Wendy Fuller-Mora

Miles Morgan†

Lorna E. Oleck

Susan L. Robinson

Andrew Sigel

Joan Margot Smith

Piroska Soos†

Donald E. Vaughan & Lee S. Ridgway

Marilee Wheeler Trust

ARTISTIC DIRECTORS’ CIRCLE

($10,000 or more)

Anonymous (4)

James C. Busby

Katie & Paul Buttenwieser

Susan Denison

Tony Elitcher & Andrea Taras

Marie-Pierre & Michael Ellmann

Jean Fuller Farrington

Clare M. S. Fewtrell†

James A. Glazier

Donald Peter Goldstein, M.D., in memory of Constance Kellert Goldstein

Ellen T. & John T. Harris

Barbara & Amos Hostetter

David M. Kozak & Anne Pistell, in memory of their parents

Robert E. Kulp, Jr., in memory of James Nicolson, Miles Morgan & Ned Kellogg

Mr. & Mrs. Thomas G. MacCracken

Heather Mac Donald & Erich Eichman

Bill McJohn

Bettina A. Norton

Harold I. Pratt

Kenneth C. Ritchie & Paul T. Schmidt

Joanne Zervas Sattley

David Scudder & Betsy Ridge

Karen Tenney & Thomas Loring

Maria van Kalken & Hal Winslow

Christoph Wolff

LEADERSHIP CIRCLE

($5,000 or more)

Anonymous (2)

Douglas M. & Aviva A. Brooks

Beth Brown, in memory of Walter R.J. Brown

Gregory E. Bulger & Richard J. Dix

Peter & Katie DeWolf

Susan Donaldson

Kathleen Fay, in memory of Dorothy Ryan Fay

John Felton & Marty Gottron, in honor of Paul O’Dette

Mei-Fung Kerley, in memory of Ted Chen

Alan M. King

Dr. Peter Libby, in memory of Dr. Beryl Benacerraf

Harriet Lindblom, in memory of Daniel Lindblom

Marianne & Terry Louderback

Victor & Ruth McElheny

Nina & Timothy Rose

Will & Alexandra Watkins

BENEFACTORS

($2,500 or more)

Anonymous (3)

Annemarie Altman

Dr. Alan & Mrs. Fiona Brener

Amy Brown & Brian Carr

John A. Carey

Robert & Elizabeth Carroll

Carla Chris eld & Benjamin D. Weiss

Jeffrey Del Papa

Carl E. Dettman

David Emery & Olimpia Velez

Phillip Hanvy

Dr. Robert L. Harris

Thomas M. Hout & Sonja Ellingson Hout

Lawrence & Susan Liden

John S. Major & Valerie Steele

Rebecca Nemser, in memory of Paul Nemser

Keith Ohmart & Helen Chen

Brian Pfeiffer

Paul Rabin & Arlene Snyder

Patsy Rogers

Catherine & Phil Saines, in honor of Barbara K. Wheaton

Paul L. Sapienza PC CPA

Raymond A. & Marilyn Smith

Richard K. & Kerala J. Snyder

Adrian & Michelle Touw

Will & Alexandra Watkins

John C. Wiecking

Allan & Joann Winkler

Ellen & Arnold Zetcher

GUARANTORS

($1,000 or more)

Anonymous (11)

Morton Abromson & Joan Nissman

Judy & Thomas Allen

A.M. Askew

Ann Beha & Robert Radloff

Michael & Sheila Berke

Mary Briggs & John Krzywicki

The Honorable Leonie M. Brinkema & Mr. John R. Brinkema

Pamela & Lee Bromberg

David L. Brown

James Burr

Betty Canick

David J. Chavolla

Bernice Chen & Mimi Kerley, in memory of Ted Chen

Peter S. Coleman

Dr. & Mrs. Franklyn Commisso

Mary Cowden

Geoffrey Craddock

Richard & Constance Culley

Belden & Pamela Daniels

The Davison-Twomey Family

Mary Deissler

Ross Duf n & Beverly Simmons, in honor of Kathleen Fay

John W. Ehrlich

Henk Elderhorst

Charles & Elizabeth Emerson

Michael Fay

Claire Fontijn, in memory of Arthur Fontijn & Sylvia Elvin

Bruce A. Garetz

Alexander Garthwaite

Sarah M. Gates

George & Marla Gearhart

Rebecca & Ronald Harris-Warrick

H. Jan & Ruth H. Heespelink

Michael Herz & Jean Roiphe

James & Ina Heup

Jessica Honigberg

Jane Hoover

Jean & Alex Humez

Paul & Alice Johnson

Thomas F. Kelly & Peggy Badenhausen

Barry D. Kernfeld & Sally A. McMurry

Art & Linda Kingdon

Fran & Tom Knight

Neal & Catherine Konstantin

Kathryn Mary Kucharski

Robert & Mary La Porte

Amelia J. LeClair & Garrow Throop

John Leen & Eileen Koven

James Liu & Alexandra Bowers

Mark & Mary Lunsford

MAFAA

William & Joan Magretta

Carol Marsh

David McCarthy & John Kolody

Amy & Brian McCreath

Michael P. McDonald

Marilyn Miller

Sheila A. Murphy

Louise Oremland

Richard & Julia Osborne

William J. Pananos

Neal J. Plotkin & Deborah Malamud

Gene & Margaret Pokorny

Amanda & Melvyn Pond, in honor of everything that BEMF does

Tracy Powers

Susan Pundt

Martha J. Radford

Christa Rakich & Janis Milroy

Alice Robbins & Walter Denny

Arthur & Elaine Robins

Sue Robinson

Jose M. Rodriguez & Richard A. Duffy

Lois Rosow

Michael & Karen Rotenberg

Carlton & Lorna Russell

Kevin Ryan & Ozerk Gogus, in memory of

Dorothy Fay

Lynne & Ralph Schatz

Susan Schuur

Wendy Shattuck & Sam Plimpton

Laila Awar Shouhayib

Cynthia Siebert

Elizabeth Snow

Murray & Hazel Somerville

Ted St. Antoine

Catherine & Keith Stevenson

Paola Stone, in memory of Edmondo Malanotte

Theresa & Charles Stone

Carl Swanson

Lisa Teot

Paula & Peter Tyack

Reed & Peggy Ueda

Richard Urena

Louella Krueger Ward, in memory of Dr. Alan J. Ward, PhD, ABPP

Peter J. Wender

PATRONS

($500 or more)

Anonymous (5)

Jonathan B. Aibel & Julie I. Rohwein, in honor of James Glazier

Nicholas Altenbernd

Brian P. & Debra K. S. Anderson

Eric Hall Anderson

Susan P. Bachelder

Louise Basbas

William & Ann Bein

Susan Bromley

Julie Brown & Zachary Morowitz

Robert Burger

Frederick Byron

John Campbell & Susanna Peyton

Anne Chalmers & Holly Gunner

Mary Chamberlain

JoAnne Chernow

Joseph Connors

David Cooke

Elizabeth & David Cregger

Warren R. Cutler

Eric & Margaret Darling

Kathryn Disney

Ellen Dokton & Stephen Schmidt

Helen Edwards

Austin & Eileen Farrar

Daniel & Paula Fay

Mary Fillman & Mary Otis Stevens

Martin & Kathleen Fogle

Elizabeth French

Jonathan Friedes & Qian Huang

Fred & Barbara Gable

Sandy Gadsby & Nancy Brown

David & Harriet Griesinger

Laury Gutierrez & Elsa Gelin

Joan E. Hartman

Catherine & John Henn

Ian Hinchliffe & Marjorie Shapiro

Phyllis Hoffman

Wayne & Laurell Huber

Charles Bowditch Hunter

Jean Jackson, in memory of Louis Kampf

Richard Johnson & Annmarie Linnane

Robin Johnson

Patrick G. Jordan

Barbara & Paul Krieger

Tom & Kate Kush, in honor of Michael Ellmann

Frederick V. Lawrence, in memory of Rosemarie Maag Lawrence

Rob & Mary Joan Leith

Susan Lewinnek

Catherine Liddell

Roger & Susan Lipsey

Mary Maarbjerg

Quinn MacKenzie

Marietta Marchitelli

Carol & Pedro Martinez

Anne H. Matthews

June Matthews

Ray Mitzel

Nancy Morgenstern, in memory of William & Marjorie Pressman

Alan & Kathy Muirhead

Robert Neer & Ann Eldridge

Clara M. & John S. O’Shea

Richard† & Lois Pace, in honor of Peter Faber

Eugene Papa

Henry Paulus

David & Beth Pendery

Joseph L. Pennacchio

Phillip Petree

Hon. W. Glen Pierson & Hon. Charles P. Reed

Mahadev & Ambika Raman

Sandy Reismann & Dr. Nanu Brates

Michael Rogan & Hugh Wilburn

Ellen Rosand

Rusty Russell, in memory of Alan Durfee

Cheryl K. Ryder

David Schneider & Klára Móricz

Richard Schroeder & Dr. Jane Burns

Charles & Mary Ann Schultz

Harvey A. Silverglate, in memory of Elsa Dorfman

Mark Slotkin

Lynne Spencer

Louisa C. Spottswood

Ann Stewart

Ronald W. Stoia

David & Jean Stout, in honor of Kathy Fay

Ralph & Jeanine Swick, in memory of Alan & Judie Kotok

Douglas L. Teich, M.D.

Lonice Thomas

Mark S. Thurber & Susan M. Galli

John & Dorothy Truman

Patrick Wallace & Laurie McNeil

Robert Warren

Congratulations, Kathy!

Under the leadership of Executive Director Kathy Fay for the past 38 years, the Boston Early Music Festival has grown to set the gold standard for excellence in Early Music with critically acclaimed concerts, biennial festivals, international tours, and award-winning recordings of Baroque opera. With our increasingly ambitious goals have come ever-greater challenges, and we have seen Kathy meet these again and again with determination, fortitude, and grace.

To recognize and honor Kathy for her distinguished service to BEMF and to Early Music, the Board of Directors has established the

The Fund will be a permanent resource that will allow BEMF to extend its reach further and take on exciting new projects. With profound thanks for your generous consideration, The BEMF Board of Directors

Please join the following supporters of the KATHLEEN FAY LEADERSHIP FUND

Debra K.S. & Brian Anderson

Amy Brown & Brian Carr

Beth Brown

Shannon Canavin

John A. Carey

Peter Charig & Amy Briemer

Bernice K. & Ted† Chen

Karen Draper & Howard Graves

Marie-Pierre & Michael Ellmann

Dorothy Ryan Fay†

Constance† & Donald Goldstein

George L. Hardman

Lois & Butler Lampson

Dr. Peter Libby

Diane Luchese

Victor & Ruth McElheny

Jeffrey G. Mora & Wendy Fuller-Mora†

Arthur J. Ness & Charlotte Kolczynski

Kenneth C. Ritchie & Paul T. Schmidt

Alice Robbins & Walter Denny

Susan L. Robinson

Raymond A. & Marilyn Smith

Ann Stewart

Janet Todaro

Maria van Kalken & Hal Winslow

Anonymous (2)

TO MAKE A CONTRIBUTION: Visit BEMF.org/donate (Donation Honoree: Kathleen Fay Leadership Fund) Call the BEMF o ce at 617-661-1812

Mail a check (payable to BEMF; memo: Kathleen Fay Leadership Fund) to Boston Early Music Festival, 43 Thorndike Street, Suite 302, Cambridge, MA 02141

Thomas & LeRose Weikert

Polly Wheat & John Cole

Scott & Barbara Winkler

Kathleen Wittman & Melanie Andrade, in memory of John Wittman

Beverly Woodward & Paul Monsky

Janet Zander & Mark Ellenberger

The Zucker Family

ASSOCIATES

($250 or more)

Anonymous (12)

Elizabeth Alexander

Julie Andrijeski & J. Tracy Mortimore

Carl Baker & Susan Haynes

Tim Barber & Joel Krajewski

Lawrence Bell

Helen Benham

Susan Benua

Noel & Paula Berggren

Judith Bergson

Barbara R. Bishop

Wes Bockley & Amy Markus

Deborah Boldin & Gabriel Rice

James Bowman

Sally & Charlie Boynton

David Breitman & Kathryn Stuart

C. Anthony Broh & Jennifer L. Hochschild

David C. Brown

Robert Burton & Karen Peterson

Darcy Lynn Campbell

Joseph Cantey

Peter Charig & Amy Briemer

Floyd & Aleeta Christian

Daniel Church & Roger Cuevas

John K. Clark & Judith M. Stoughton

Sherryl & Gerard Cohen

Derek Cottier & Lauren Tilly

Tekla Cunningham & David Sawyer

Carl & May Daw, in memory of Ned Kellogg

Leigh Deacon

William Depeter

Michael DiSabatino, in honor of Nancy Olson

Charles & Sheila Donahue

Alan Durfee†

Chuck Epstein & Melia Bensussen

The Rev’d Richard Fabian

Lila M. Farrar

Gregg, Abby & Max Feigelson

Janet G. Fink

Charles Fisk

Dr. Patrick J. Fox, in honor of Nancy Olson

Fred Franklin, in memory of Kaaren Grimstad

Gisela & Ronald Geiger

Monica & David Gerber

Nancy L. Graham

The Graver Family

Mary Greer

Thomas H. & Lori B. Griswold

Deborah Grose

Sonia Guterman, in memory of Martin Guterman

Dr. Joanna Haas

Eric & Dee Hansen

Deborah Haraldson

Rebecca & Richard Hawkins

Diane Hellens

Katherine A. Hesse

David Hoglund

Amy & Seamus Hourihan

Keith L. & Catherine B. Hughes

Francesco Iachello

Chris & Klavs Jensen

Michele Jerison

Karen Johansen & Gardner Hendrie

Kathleen O’Dea Kelly

David P. Kiaunis

Robert L. Kleinberg

Forrest Knowles

George Kocur

Jay Carlton Kuhn, Jr.

Christopher Larossa

Jasper Lawson

David A. Leach & Laurie J. LaChapelle

William Leitch

Robert & Janice Locke

William Loutrel & Thomas Fynan

Dr. Bruce C. MacIntyre

Sally Mayer

Donna McCampbell

Anne McCants

Andrew Modest & Beth Arndtsen

Stephen Moody

Agatha Morrell

Gene Murrow

Michael J. Normile

Nancy Nuzzo

John R. Palys

Jane P. Papa

John Parisi

Susan Pettee & Michael Wise

Elizabeth V. Phillips

Stephen Poteet

Anne & François Poulet

Lawrence Pratt & Rosalind Forber

Brandon Qualls

Virginia Raguin, in honor of Kathy Fay

Julia M. Reade & Robert A. Duncan

Rodney J. Regier

David Rehm

Hadley & Jeannette Reynolds

Marge Roberts

Paul Rutz

Susan Sargent

Richard L. Schmeidler

Maria Schreiber, in honor of Corey King

Miriam N. Seltzer

Mr. Terry Shea & Dr. Seigo Nakao

Jacob & Lisa Skowronek

David Snead & Kate Prescott

Jon Solins & Mary Peterson

Jeffrey Soucy

Victoria Sujata

Melinda Sullivan & Larry Friedman

Jonathan Swartz

Ken & Margo Taylor

Kenneth P. Taylor

Elizabeth Trumpler, in memory of Donald Trumpler

Peter & Kathleen Van Demark

Robert Viarengo

Robert & Therese Wagenknecht

Juanita H. Wetherell

The Rev. Roger B. White, in memory of Joseph P. Hough

Sarah Whittaker

Susan Wyatt J. Yavarkovsky & C. Lowe

PARTNERS

($100 or more)

Anonymous (10)

Anonymous, in memory of Dorothy Ryan Fay

Anonymous, in memory of Thomas Roney

Vilde Aaslid

Anne Acker

Joseph Aieta III

Mr. Neale Ains eld & Dr. Donna Sieckmann

Joanne Algarin

Druid Errant D.T. Allan-Gorey

Ken Allen

Gene Arnould

Neil R. Ayer, Jr. & Linda Ayer

Judith Bairstow

Eric & Rebecca Bank

Dr. David Barnert & Julie Raskin

Rev. & Mrs. Joseph Bassett

Alan Bates & Michele Mandrioli

Elaine Beilin

Alan Benenfeld

Larry & Sara Mae Berman

John Birks

Sarah Bixler & Christopher Tonkin

Katharine C. Black

Moisha Blechman

Dan Bloomberg & Irene Beardsley

Claire Bon lio

Richard Borts & Paulette York

Patricia Boyd

Sibel Bozdogan

James Bradley

Todd A. Breitbart

Joel Bresler

Andrew Brethauer

Derick & Jennifer Brinkerhoff

Catherine & Hillel Shahan Bromberg

Lawrence Brown

Margaret H. Brown

John H. Burkhalter III

Judi Burten, in memory of Phoebe Larkey

William Carroll

Bonnie & Walter Carter

Verne & Madeline Caviness

Robert B. Christian

Deborah J. Cohen

Carol & Alex Collier

Anne Conner

Peter B. Cook

Robert B. Crane

Martina Crocker

Katherine Crosier, in memory of Carl C. Crosier

Gray F. Crouse

Donna Cubit-Swoyer

Alicia Curtis & Kathy Pratt

Syd Cushman

Ruta Daugela

Jim Diamond

Deborah & Forrest Dillon

Paul Doerr

Tamar & Jeremy Kaim Doniger

Ben Dunham & Wendy Rolfe-Dunham

John Dunton & Carol McKeen

Peter A. Durfee & Peter G. Manson

Michael Durgin, in memory of Lisle Kulbach

Jane Edwards

Mark Elenko

Thomas Engel

Anne Engelhart & Douglas Durant

David English

Jake Esher

Seth Estrin

Marilyn Farwell

Margot Fassler

Ellen Feingold

Grace A. Feldman, in honor of Bernice Chen

Annette Fern

Carol L. Fishman

Dr. Jonathan Florman

Howard C. Floyd

Gary Freeman

Robert Freeman

Marica & Jeff Freyman

Friends

Michael Gannon

R. Andrew Garthwaite

Stephen L. Gencarello

William Glenn

Tom Golden

The Goldsmith Family

Lisa Goldstein

Lorraine & William Graves

Winifred Gray

Judith Green & James Kurtz

John Gruver & Lynn Tilley

Peter F. Gustafson

Eric Haas, in memory of Janet Haas

Richard & Les Hadsell

Peter Hainer

Tunie Hamlen

Suzanne & Easley Hamner

Judith & Patrick Hanlon

Joyce Hannan

David J. Harris, MD

Sam & Barbara Hayes

Donatus Hayes

Karin Hemmingsen

Marie C. Henderson, in memory of A. Brandt Henderson

Rebecca Henderson

Patricia G. Hoffman

Roderick J. Holland

Jackie Horne

John Hsia

Judith & Alan Hudson

Constance Huff

Joe Hunter & Esther Schlorholtz

Willemien Insinger

Susan L. Jackson

M. P. Johnson

Tim Johnson, in memory of Bill Gasperini

Judith L. Johnston & Bruce L. Bush, in memory of Daniel Lindblom

David K. Jordan

Marietta B. Joseph

George Kaminsky

David Keating

Thomas Keirstead

Mr. & Mrs.

Seamus C. Kelly

Louis & Susan Kern

Joseph J. Kesselman, Jr.

Holly Ketron

Leslie & Kimberly King

Maryanne King

Pat Kline

Valerie & Karl KnicKrehm

Leslie Kooyman

Valerie Krall

Ellen Kranzer

Benjamin Krepp & Virginia Webb

Robert W. Kruszyna, in memory of Harriet Kruszyna

Peter A. Lans

Claire Laporte

Bruce Larkin & Donna Jarlenski

Diana Larsen

Joanne & Carl Leaman

William Lebow

Alison Leslie

Drs. Sidney & Lynne Levitsky

Ellen R. Lewis

Laura Loehr

John Longstreth

Sandra & David Lyons

Desmarest Lloyd MacDonald, in memory of Ned Kellogg

Patrick Macey

Louise Malcolm, in memory of W. David Malcolm, Jr.

Jeffrey & Barbara Mandula

Anna Mansbridge

Robert Marshall

Peter Martin

Timothy Masters

Dr. Arnold Matlin & Dr. Margaret Matlin, Ph.D.

Mary McCallum

Lee McClelland

Heidi & George McEvoy

George McKee

Dave & Jeannette McLellan

Cynthia Merritt

Susan Metz, in memory of Gerald Metz

Eiji Miki†

Marg Miller

Deborah Mintz

Nicolas Minutillo

Rosalind Mohnsen

David Montanari & Sara Rubin

Michael J. Moran, in memory of Francis D. & Marcella A. Moran

Stefanie Moritz

Rodney & Barbara Myrvaagnes

Debra Nagy, in honor of Kathy Fay

Cindy K. Neels

Avi Nelson

Arthur & Charlotte Ness, in memory of Ingolf Dahl

Nancy Nicholson

Jeffrey Nicolich

Caroline Niemira

Lee Nunley

Leslie Nyman

Michael & Jan Orlansky

Patricia T. Owen

David & Claire Oxtoby

Valerie Palms

Theodore Parent, in memory of Ruth Parent

Susan Patrick, in memory of Don Partridge

Jonah Pearl

Elizabeth Pearson-Grif ths

Ben Peck & Valerie Horst

John Percy

John Petrowsky

Bici Pettit-Barron

Susan Porter & Robert Kauffman

Thomas Prescott

Klaus & Andrea Radebold

George Raff

Boson Early Music Fesival ORPHEUS SOCIETY Bo on Early Music Fe ival ORPHEUS SOCIETY

A NTONIA L. B ANDUCCI

J UDITH B ERGSON

B EVERLY B IGGS

L INZEE C OOLIDGE

D OROTHY R YAN F AY †

S ARAH M. G ATES

J AMES A. G LAZIER

W ILLIAM H AFFNER -J ONES

G EORGE L. H ARDMAN

B ETH F. H OUSTON

W AYNE & L AURELL H UBER

E DWARD B. K ELLOGG † G LENN A. K NIC K REHM F ORREST K NOWLES R OBERT E. K ULP , J R . J UNE M ATTHEWS M ILES M ORGAN †

A MY N ICHOLLS

N ANCY N UZZO

K EITH O HMART

& H ELEN C HEN

B ICI P ETTIT -B ARRON

The Boston Early Music Festival extends its heartfelt gratitude to the members of the ORPHEUS SOCIETY living and recently departed who have included BEMF in their estate planning.

K ENNETH C. R ITCHIE & P AUL T. S CHMIDT

P ATSY R OGERS

N ANCY & R ONALD R UCKER

P IROSKA S OOS †

K ATHY H. U DALL

R EED & P EGGY U EDA

A NONYMOUS (3)

Join the ORPHEUS SOCIETY by investing in the future of the Boston Early Music Festival through a charitable annuity, bequest, or other planned gift. With many ways to give and to direct your gift, our staff will work together with you and your advisors to create a legacy that is personally meaningful to you.

To learn more about Planned Giving with BEMF, please call us at 617-661-1812, email us at kathy@bemf.org, or visit us online at BEMF.org/plannedgiving/

PHOTO: KATHY WITTMAN

Deborah M. Reisman, in memory of Woody O’Kane

Melissa Rice

Dennis & Anne Rogers

Sherry & William Rogers

Stephanie L. Rosenbaum

Paul Rosenberg & Harriet Moss

Peter & Linda Rubenstein

Charlotte Rutherfurd

Patricia & Roger Samuel

Mike Scanlon

Robert & Barbara Schneider

Clem Schoenebeck, in memory of Bill Schoenebeck

R. Scholz & M. Kempers

Lynn & Mary Schultz

Michael G. Schwartz

Alison M. Scott

David Sears

Jean Seiler

David Seitz & Katie Manty

Aaron Sheehan & Adam Pearl

Michael Sherer

Kathy Sherrick

Susan Shimp

Rena & Michael Silevitch

Hana Sittler

John & Carolyn Skelton

Elliott Smith & Wendy Gilmore

Jennifer Farley Smith & Sam Rubin

Richard Snow

William & Barbara Sommer eld

Scott Sprinzen

Gail St. Onge

Scott Stansbury

Esther & Daniel Steinhauer

John Strasswimmer

Barbara Strizhak, in memory of Elliott Strizhak

Richard Stumpf

Margaret Sulanowska, in memory of

Jacek Sulanowski

Robert G. Sullivan & Meriem Pages

Tim & Ann Szczesuil

Boryana & Jeff Tacconi, in memory of

Nikolay Tonev

Richard Tarrant

John & Barbara Tatum

Lisa Terry

Meghan K. Titzer

Janet Todaro, in honor of Kathy Fay

Edward P. Todd

Peter Townsend

Pierre Trepagnier & Louise Mundinger

Carol Tsang

Ruth W. Tucker

Konstantin & Kirsten Tyurin

Barbara & John VanScoyoc

Richard & Virginia von Rueden

Stephen Wallace

Susan Walters

Cheryl S. Weinstein

The Westner Family

Susan & Thomas Wilkes

David L. Williamson

Phyllis S. Wilner

John Wolff & Helen Berger

David Yutzler

Ellen L. Ziskind

Lawrence Zukof & Pamela Carley

FRIENDS

($45 or more)

Anonymous (5)

Anonymous, in memory of Cheryl Parkhurst

Claudia Amodeo & Roberto Collao

Maja Anderson

Anne Azéma & Joel Cohen

Antonia L. Banducci

Lois Banta

Douglas Baskett

Iris Bass

J. Robert Beatty

Leslie Becker & William Loomis

Michael & Susan Bennett

Lawrence Berman

Martha Birnbaum

John Bishop

Judith Mary Bloomgarden

Lani Bortfeld

Dr. Emile L. Boulpaep, in memory of Elisabeth Boulpaep

Louise Bourgault

Rhys Bowen & Rebecca Snow

Margaret Brewer

Edgar Bridwell

Jane K. Brown

Nevin C. Brown

Caroline A. Bruzelius

Carolyn Bryant-Sarles

John Caldwell

Shannon Canavin & Kevin Goodrich

Nancy L. Cantelmo

R. Cassels-Brown

Joan Christison-Lagay

Edward Cipullo

Walter Collins

Virginia Hammond Conmy & Family, in memory of Thomas Kemper Roney

Jeanne Conner

Jane Connolly

Marjorie & Andrew Cooke

Linzee Coolidge

Steve & Suzanne Cooper

Kathleen Corcoran

Elizabeth Cousins

Francine Crawford

David Cronin

Mary & Jeremy Curtis

William D. Curtis

Robert Dennis

Mary Dill

Sarah Dillon & Peter Kantor

David Doolittle

Diane L. Droste

Priscilla Drucker

Wendy Ebeling

Jan Elliott

John Empey

Jane & Robert Evans Noel, in honor of Amy Fagan

Russel Feldman & Anne Kane

Martha Ferko

Katherine Fick

Helaine Fingold

Frances Conover Fitch

Louise Forrest-Bowes

Edward W. Freedman

Cameron Freer

Peter Frick

Joseph Gaken

Hans Gesell

Joseph Grafwallner

Jimmy Hamamoto

Margaret Hanley

Laurence Hannan

Charles Haverty & Alexandra Glucksmann

Christopher Heigham

Marie C. Henson

Martin Herbordt

Carole Hilton

Kalon Ho

Margaret Hornick

Russell Houldin

Eleonore Huet

Jay Jacobson

Dian Kahn

Garry Kalajian

Sarah Kalkert

Lynn Kearny

Kevin Kellogg

Robert M. Kelly

Suzanne Berger Keniston

David & Alice Kidder

John N. Kirk

Jim & Claudette Klimes, in memory of Tom Roney

Donna Knoll

Dean Kolbas

Betty Landesman

Jane Lappin

Charles E. Larmore

Normand & Margaret LeBlanc, in memory of Edward (Ned) Kellogg

Fred Lemmons

Jo-Lin Liang

Liz Loveland

Ky Lowenhaupt & Daniel Sullivan

Harold MacCaughey

Ted Macdonald & Yuan Wang

Elizabeth McNab

Dennis Lee Milford

Kathleen Moore

Martha Morton

Peter & Mary Muncie

Elizabeth Murray

Prof. Myrna Nachman

Jennie Needleman

John & Marianne Nelson

Paul Neuhauser

Ruth Nisse

Stephen H. Owades

Gene & Cheryl Pace

William Packard

Dr. Lewis J. Patsavos

Ruth Peacock

FRIENDS OF BEMF

Rebecca Pechefsky & Erik Ryding

Britta Pennypacker, in memory of Hella Benge

Andrea Phan

Pamela Posey

Marian Rambelle

Professor Julia Williams

Robinson

Martha Ronish

Lisa & Gary Rucinski

Freda Salatino

Kate Salfelder

Gregory Salzman

William Schaefer

Edward Schneider

Raymond Schneider

Karl-Heinz Schoeps-Jensen

Peter Schulz

Peter Schuntermann

Kathryn Scott

Ann Shedd & Mark Meess

Deborah Shulman

Susan & Joseph Silverman

Linda Simpson

Carol Steinberg

Jean Stewart

Katie Stewart, in memory of Thomas K. Roney

Mary Stokey

Rita Teusch

Nicoleta Theodosiou

John Thier, in honor of Essential Workers

Michael Thompson

JoAnn Udovich

Mr. & Mrs. Charles Vail

Sonia Wallenberg

John Wand

Phil & Mary Warbasse

Kincade & Elizabeth Webb

Esther Weinstein

Bob & Binney Wells

Joe Winn

Mary Beth Winn

Robin Zora

† deceased

Bo on Early Music Fe ival PLANNED

Play a vital and permanent role in BEMF’s future with a planned gift. Your generous support will create unforgettable musical experiences for years to come and may provide you and your loved ones with considerable tax benefits.

Join the BEMF ORPHEUS SOCIETY by investing in the future of the Boston Early Music Festival through a charitable annuity, bequest, or other planned gift. With many ways to give and to direct your gift, our staff will work together with you and your advisors to create a legacy that is personally meaningful to you.

To learn more about Planned Giving with BEMF, please call us at 617-661-1812, email us at kathy@bemf.org, or visit us online at BEMF.org/plannedgiving/

FOUNDATIONS & CORPORATE SPONSORS

Anonymous (2)

Aequa Foundation

American Endowment Foundation

Appleby Charitable Foundation

Applied Technology

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“Nothing short of revelatory.” —GRAMOPHONE

ALSO AVAILABLE

Bo on Early Music Fe ival

Paul O’Dette & Stephen Stubbs, Musical Directors

INTERNATIONALLY AWARD-WINNING

The Boston Early Music Festival (BEMF) is universally recognized as a leader in the eld of early music. Since its founding in 1980 by leading practitioners of historical performance in the United States and abroad, BEMF has promoted early music through a variety of diverse programs and activities, including an annual concert series that brings early music’s brightest stars to the Boston and New York concert stages, and the biennial weeklong Festival and Exhibition, recognized as “the world’s leading festival of early music” (The Times,London). Through its programs BEMF has earned its place as North America’s premier presenting organization for music of the Medieval, Renaissance, and Baroque periods and has secured Boston’s reputation as “America’s early music capital” (Boston Globe).

International

Baroque Opera

One of BEMF’s main goals is to unearth and present lesserknown Baroque operas performed by the world’s leading musicians armed with the latest information on period singing, orchestral performance, scenic design, costuming, dance, and staging. BEMF operas reproduce the Baroque’s stunning palette of sound by bringing together today’s leading operatic superstars and a wealth of instrumental talent from across the globe to one stage for historic presentations, all zestfully led from the pit by the BEMF Artistic Directors Paul O’Dette and Stephen Stubbs, and creatively reimagined for the stage by BEMF Opera Director Gilbert Blin. Biennial centerpiece productions feature both the Boston Early Music Festival Orchestra, led by Orchestra Director Robert Mealy, and the Boston Early Music Festival Dance Company, led by BEMF’s newly appointed Dance Director, Marie-Nathalie Lacoursière.

The twenty-second biennial Boston Early Music Festival, A Celebration of Women, was held in June 2023 and featured Henry Desmarest’s 1694 opera Circé from a libretto by Louise-Geneviève Gillot de Saintonge. The current (twentythird) Festival, Love & Power, has as its centerpiece Reinhard Keiser’s 1705 opera Octavia.

BEMF introduced its Chamber Opera Series during its annual concert season in November 2008, with a performance of John Blow’s Venus and Adonis and MarcAntoine Charpentier’s Actéon. The series features the artists of the Boston Early Music Festival Vocal and Chamber Ensembles and focuses on the wealth of chamber operas composed during the Baroque period, while providing an increasing number of local opera a cionados the opportunity to attend one of BEMF’s superb offerings. Subsequent annual productions include George Frideric Handel’s Acis

and Galatea, Henry Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas, combined performances of Charpentier’s La Descente d’Orphée aux Enfers and La Couronne de Fleurs, Monteverdi’s Orfeo, a double bill of Pergolesi’s La serva padrona and Livietta e Tracollo, a production titled “Versailles” featuring Les Plaisirs de Versailles by Charpentier, Les Fontaines de Versailles by Michel-Richard de Lalande, and divertissements from Atys by Jean-Baptiste Lully, Francesca Caccini’s Alcina, the rst opera written by a woman, a combination of Telemann’s Pimpinone and Ino, joint performances of Lully’s Idylle sur la Paix and Charpentier’s La Fête de Rueil, John Frederick Lampe’s The Dragon of Wantley, and most recently Telemann’s Don Quichotte. Acis and Galatea was revived and presented on a four-city North American Tour in early 2011, which included a performance at the American Handel Festival in Seattle, and in 2014, BEMF’s second North American Tour featured the Charpentier double bill from 2011. In summer 2025, The Dragon of Wantley will be performed at Con dencen in Stockholm, Sweden, and at Oldenburgisches Staatstheater in Oldenburg, Germany, as part of Musikfest Bremen.

BEMF has a well-established and highly successful project to record some of its groundbreaking work in the eld of Baroque opera. The rst three recordings in this series were all nominated for the Grammy Award for Best Opera Recording, in 2005, 2007, and 2008: the 2003 Festival centerpiece Ariadne, by Johann Georg Conradi; Lully’s Thésée; and the 2007 Festival opera, Lully’s Psyché, which was hailed by BBC Music Magazine as “superbly realized…magni cent.” In addition, the BEMF recordings of Lully’s Thésée and Psyché received Gramophone Award Nominations in the Baroque Vocal category in 2008 and 2009, respectively. BEMF’s next three recordings on the German CPO label were drawn from its Chamber Opera Series: Charpentier’s Actéon, Blow’s Venus and Adonis, and a release of Charpentier’s La Descente d’Orphée aux Enfers and La Couronne de Fleurs, which won the 2015 Grammy

“ e world’s leading festival of early music.” —The Times, London

Award for Best Opera Recording and the 2015 Echo Klassik Opera Recording of the Year (17th/18th Century Opera). Agostino Steffani’s Niobe, Regina di Tebe, featuring Philippe Jaroussky and Karina Gauvin, which was released in January 2015 on the Erato/Warner Classics label in conjunction with a seven-city, four-country European concert tour of the opera, has been nominated for a Grammy Award, was named Gramophone’s Recording of the Month for March 2015, is the 2015 Echo Klassik World Premiere Recording of the Year, and has received a 2015 Diapason d’Or de l’Année and a 2015 Preis der Deutschen Schallplattenkritik. Handel’s Acis and Galatea was released in November 2015. In 2017, while maintaining the focus on Baroque opera, BEMF expanded the recording project to include other select Baroque vocal works: a new Steffani disc, Duets of Love and Passion, was released in September 2017 in conjunction with a six-city North American tour, and a recording of Johann Sebastiani’s St. Matthew Passion was released in March 2018. Four Baroque opera releases followed in 2019 and 2020: a disc of Charpentier’s chamber operas Les Plaisirs de Versailles and Les Arts Florissants was released at the June 2019 Festival, and has been nominated for a Grammy Award; the 2013 Festival opera, Handel’s Almira, was released in late 2019, and received a Diapason d’Or. Lalande’s chamber opera Les Fontaines de Versailles was featured on a September 2020 release of the composer’s works; Christoph Graupner’s opera Antiochus und Stratonica was released in December 2020. BEMF’s recording of Desmarest’s Circé, the 2023 Festival opera, was released concurrently with the opera’s North American premiere, Pergolesi’s La serva padrona and Livietta e Tracollo was released in December 2023, Telemann’s Ino and opera arias for soprano featuring Amanda Forsythe was released in October 2024, and the newest recording, Lully’s Idylle sur la Paix and Charpentier’s La Fête de Rueil, is being released for the June 2025 Festival.

Celebrated Concerts

Some of the most thrilling musical moments at the biennial Festival occur during one of the dozen or more concerts presented around the clock, among them a program by the acclaimed Boston Early Music Festival Orchestra, which often feature unique, once-in-a-lifetime collaborations and programs by the spectacular array of talent assembled for the Festival week’s events. In 1989, BEMF established an annual concert series bringing early music’s leading soloists and ensembles to the Boston concert stage to meet the growing demand for regular world-class performances of early music’s beloved classics and newly discovered works. BEMF then expanded its concert series in 2006, when it extended its performances to New York City’s Gilder Lehrman Hall at the Morgan Library & Museum, providing “a shot in the arm for New York’s relatively modest early-music scene” (New York Times).

World-famous Exhibition

The nerve center of the biennial Festival, the Exhibition is the largest event of its kind in the United States, showcasing nearly one hundred early instrument makers, music publishers, service organizations, schools and universities, and associated colleagues. In 2013, Mozart’s own violin and viola were displayed at the Exhibition, in their rst-ever visit to the United States. Every other June, hundreds of professional musicians, students, and enthusiasts come from around the world to purchase instruments, restock their libraries, learn about recent musicological developments, and renew old friendships. For four days, they visit the Exhibition booths to browse, discover, and purchase, and attend the dozens of symposia, masterclasses, and demonstration recitals, all of which encourage a deeper appreciation of early music, and strengthen relationships between musicians, participants, and audiences. symposia, masterclasses, and demonstration recitals, all of which encourage a deeper appreciation of early music, and strengthen relationships between musicians, participants, and audiences.

esm.rochester.edu/apply

The Virtual Early Music America Summit aims to bring together the early-music community of North and South America for thought-provoking presentations, performances, workshops, and networking. Plus, virtual concerts by outstanding partners from Montréal, the Americas, and beyond.

earlymusicamerica.org/summit

Paul O’Dette

Artistic Directors

Stephen Stubbs

PAUL O’DETTE, BEMF Artistic Co-Director, Musical Co-Director, theorbo, lute, archlute has been described as “the clearest case of genius ever to touch his instrument” (Toronto Globe and Mail). He appears regularly at major festivals the world over performing lute recitals and in chamber music programs with leading early music colleagues.

Mr. O’Dette has made more than 155 recordings, winning two Grammy Awards and receiving eight Grammy nominations and numerous international record awards. The Complete Lute Music of John Dowland (a 5-CD set for harmonia mundi usa) was awarded the prestigious Diapason d’Or de l’Année, and was named “Best Solo Lute Recording of Dowland” by BBC Radio 3. The Bachelar’s Delight: Lute Music of Daniel Bacheler was nominated for a Grammy as Best Solo Instrumental Recording in 2006.

While best known for his recitals and recordings of virtuoso solo lute music, Paul O’Dette is also active as a conductor of Baroque opera. Together with Stephen Stubbs he won a Grammy as conductor in 2015 for Best Opera Recording, as well as an Echo Klassik Award, for their recording of Charpentier’s La Descente d’Orphée aux Enfers with the Boston Early Music Festival Chamber Ensemble. Their CDs of Conradi’s Ariadne, Lully’s Thésée, and Lully’s Psyché, with the Boston Early Music Festival Orchestra on the CPO label, were nominated for Grammys in 2005, 2007, and 2008; their 2015 BEMF CD of Steffani’s Niobe, Regina di Tebe on the Erato/Warner Classics label was also nominated for a Grammy, and received both an Echo Klassik and the coveted Jahrespreis der Deutschen Schallplattenkritik. Their recording of Charpentier’s Les Arts Florissants was nominated for a Grammy in 2019.

In addition to his activities as a performer, Paul O’Dette is an avid researcher, having worked extensively on the performance of seventeenth-century Italian and English

STEPHEN STUBBS, BEMF Artistic Co-Director, Musical Co-Director, Director of Paci c MusicWorks, Baroque guitar, lute, who won the Grammy Award as conductor for Best Opera Recording in 2015, spent a thirty-year career in Europe. He returned to his native Seattle in 2006 as one of the world’s most respected lutenists, conductors, and Baroque opera specialists. He now lives with his family in Agua Dulce, California.

In 2007, Stephen established his new production company, Paci c MusicWorks (PMW), based in Seattle, re ecting his lifelong interest in both early music and contemporary performance. The company’s inaugural presentation was a production of South African artist William Kentridge’s acclaimed multimedia staging of Claudio Monteverdi’s opera The Return of Ulysses in a co-production with the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. PMW’s performances of the Monteverdi Vespers were described in the press as “utterly thrilling” and “of a quality you are unlikely to encounter anywhere else in the world.” PMW is now a touring ensemble.

Stephen Stubbs is also the Boston Early Music Festival’s Artistic Co-Director along with his long-time colleague Paul O’Dette. Stephen and Paul are also the musical directors of all BEMF operas, recordings of which were nominated for six Grammy awards, including one Grammy win in 2015. Also in 2015, BEMF recordings won two Echo Klassik awards and the Diapason d’Or de l’Année. In 2017, they received the Preis der Deutschen Schallplattenkritik.

In addition to his ongoing commitments to PMW and BEMF, other recent appearances have included Handel’s Giulio Cesare and Gluck’s Orfeo in Bilbao, Mozart’s Magic Flute and Così fan tutte for the Hawaii Performing Arts Festival, Handel’s Agrippina and Semele for Opera Omaha, Cavalli’s Calisto and Rameau’s Hippolyte et Aricie for Juilliard, Mozart’s Il re pastore for the Merola program, and seven

solo song, continuo practices, and lute repertoire. He has published numerous articles on issues of historical performance practice, and co-authored the John Dowland entry in the New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians. Paul O’Dette is Professor of Lute and Director of Early Music at the Eastman School of Music, where he has been awarded the Eisenhart Award for Excellence in Teaching. He has been Artistic Co-Director of the Boston Early Music Festival since 1993.

productions for Opera UCLA including Cavalli’s Giasone, Monteverdi’s Poppea, and Handel’s Amadigi. In recent years he has conducted Handel’s Messiah with the Seattle, San Francisco, Edmonton, Birmingham, Houston, and Nova Scotia Symphony orchestras.

His extensive discography as conductor and solo lutenist includes well over 100 CDs, many of which have received international acclaim and awards.

Opera Director

GILBERT BLIN, BEMF Opera Director, Stage Director, Costume Co-Designer for Pimpinone and Ino, Young Artists Training Program Director, graduated from the Paris Sorbonne with a Master’s degree focusing on Rameau’s operas, an interest that he has broadened to encompass French opera and its relation to Baroque theater, his elds of research as historian, stage director, and designer. He was awarded a Doctorate from Leiden University for a thesis dedicated to his approach to Historically Informed Staging. His début productions include Massenet’s Werther and Delibes’s Lakmé for Paris Opéra-Comique, and Meyerbeer’s Robert le Diable for Prague State Opera. Since his production of Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice for the Drottningholm Theatre in Sweden in 1998, Dr. Blin has established himself as a sought-after opera director for the early repertoire: he directed Vivaldi’s Orlando furioso for the Prague State Opera, designed and staged Vivaldi’s Rosmira fedele, Handel’s Teseo and Alessandro Scarlatti’s Il Tigrane for Opéra de Nice, and directed Lully’s Thésée and Lully’s Psyché for the Boston Early Music Festival.

As Stage Director in Residence at BEMF beginning in 2008, Gilbert Blin staged a trilogy of English operas: Blow’s Venus and Adonis, Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas, and Handel’s Acis and Galatea. In 2011, after the staging of Steffani’s Niobe, Regina di Tebe, he presented Charpentier’s La Descente d’Orphée aux Enfers and La Couronne de Fleurs. In 2013, with his production of Handel’s Almira, Gilbert Blin was appointed Opera Director of the Boston Early Music Festival. Other productions for BEMF include Monteverdi’s L’incoronazione di Poppea and Il ritorno d’Ulisse in patria, Campra’s Le Carnaval de Venise, Steffani’s Orlando generoso, and Lully’s Idylle sur la Paix and Charpentier’s La Fête de Rueil for Boston and New York.

Other recent productions include Donizetti’s Maria Stuarda for Bratislava, Desmarest’s Circé for Boston, Rameau’s Dardanus for Stockholm, and Telemann’s Don Quichotte for Boston.

ARTISTIC LEADERSHIP

Orchestra Director

ROBERT MEALY, BEMFOrchestraDirector, violin, BEMF Orchestra and Chamber Ensemble concertmaster, is one of America’s most prominent Baroque violinists. The New York Times remarked that “Mr. Mealy seems to foster excellence wherever he goes, whether as director of the Boston Early Music Festival Orchestra, concertmaster of the Trinity Baroque Orchestra in New York, or at The Juilliard School, as director of the historical performance program.” While still an undergraduate, he was asked to join the Canadian Baroque orchestra Tafelmusik; after graduation he began performing with Les Arts Florissants. Since then, he has recorded and toured with many ensembles both here and in Europe, and served as concertmaster for Masaaki Suzuki, Nicholas McGegan, Helmuth Rilling, Paul Agnew, and William Christie, among others.

Since 2005 he has led the BEMF Orchestra in their festival performances, tours, and award-winning recordings. In New York, he is principal concertmaster at Trinity Wall Street in

MARIE-NATHALIE LACOURSIÈRE, BEMF

Dance Director, Stage Co-Director and Choreographer of Pimpinone and Ino, choreographer, dancer, is a multidisciplinary artist recognized for her originality and creativity in stage direction and choreography. Trained in dance, music, and commedia dell’arte, she founded Les Jardins Chorégraphiques in Montreal in 2007, a company dedicated to integrating music and movement of the Baroque period in innovative ways.

their traversal of the complete cantatas of J. S. Bach. He is also co-director of the acclaimed seventeenth-century ensemble Quicksilver. In summers he teaches at the American Baroque Soloists Academy in San Francisco and is often a featured artist at William Christie’s summer festival in Thiré. He made his recital début at Carnegie Hall in 2018.

Recent chamber projects have ranged from directing a series of Ars Subtilior programs at The Cloisters in New York to performing the complete Bach violin and harpsichord sonatas at Washington’s Smithsonian Museum. Mr. Mealy has directed the Historical Performance Program at The Juilliard School since 2012, leading his Juilliard students in acclaimed performances both in New York and abroad, including tours to Europe, India, New Zealand, Bolivia, and (most recently) China. Before coming to Juilliard, he taught for many years at Yale and Harvard. In 2004, he received EMA’s Binkley Award for outstanding teaching and scholarship. He still likes to practice.

Dance Director

A long-time collaborator of the Boston Early Music Festival, she has worked on numerous productions as a dancer and choreographer since 2007. She had the privilege of collaborating with stage director Gilbert Blin, who also invited her to the Nice Opera to dance in Scarlatti’s Il Tigrane. Throughout her career, she has staged and choreographed more than forty operas in Canada and internationally, including world premieres of Lully’s Le Ballet de l’Impatience and Lorenzani’s Nicandro e Fileno.

For the past twenty years, she has been creating productions for the Montreal Baroque Festival, developing a distinctive scenic approach that merges historical music and dance. In

2023, she was nominated for an Opus Prize, awarded by the Conseil Québécois de la Musique (Quebec Music Council), for her production De la Pavane au Swing with Les Boréades de Montréal. In 2019, she won an Opus Prize for Best Early Music Production for her staging and choreography of John Blow’s Venus and Adonis with Clavecin en Concert.

She has been invited to present her creations at major international festivals, including Saint-Riquier and Les Saintes in France, Modena in Italy, and the Vancouver Early Music Festival in Canada. Since 2021, she has been directing the scenic projects at the Prangins Baroque Festival in Switzerland.

A passionate educator, she teaches stage movement and direction for opera singers and leads opera workshops at Saint-Laurent College, Vincent-d’Indy College, and the Montreal Conservatory of Music.

She is excited to strengthen her commitment to the Boston Early Music Festival as its new Lucy Graham Dance Director and to further enrich BEMF’s dedication to Early Dance, expanding its presence in productions and inspiring new generations of performers and audiences.

From Shy Beginnings to Dance Direction: A Personal Journey

Dancing has fascinated me since early childhood. However, I wasn’t naturally exible, and I was painfully shy. My rst ballet classes were far from triumphant—despite my deep love for playing a bunny on stage. Then came synchronized swimming, and suddenly, everything changed. In the water, I found my element: a space where movement, rhythm, and storytelling owed naturally together. I remember especially the group routines—learning to move in harmony, to listen, to collaborate.

Around the same time, I began piano lessons, and later, singing lessons. I was still very shy. My father was so nervous at my rst recital he was convinced I wouldn’t be able to sing in front of an audience. But I surprised everyone: I had worked with my teacher to add gestures to my little sherman’s song. That was the moment I discovered the power of embodying someone else—of telling a story and drawing people in.

From that eight-year-old miming every action to this new chapter as Dance Director at BEMF, my core passions haven’t changed: collaboration and storytelling. Since my first experience at BEMF in 2007—as a dancer and later a choreographer—it has been an extraordinary journey. With a background in music, commedia dell’arte, and acting, I’ve found at BEMF an exceptional artistic home where I can express myself fully, alongside a team of inspiring colleagues.

Historical dance is an incredibly rich eld—it’s about research and rediscovery: unearthing forgotten works and questioning how we bring them to life today. I’m now excited to take the next step—developing the next generation of the dance troupe

so it can continue to evolve and thrive at BEMF. I love the spirit of a company: growing together, sharing our diverse backgrounds, and weaving them into powerful stories for you, our audience.

My goal is to create a space where each dancer can bring their individuality to the stage—where the richness of each personality is not erased but embraced, shaped through the style and spirit of Baroque dance. Historical dance thrives on this balance: precision and freedom, form and expression.

I’m also eager to introduce younger dancers to this remarkable art form. Baroque dance is incredibly diverse—it invites us to explore elegance, rhythm, emotion, theatricality. But more than anything, it demands a deep connection to the music. Every gesture must be grounded in phrasing, in breath, in the emotional landscape of the piece. Movement is never abstract—it must speak, reveal, and resonate. When it does, it becomes more than beautiful; it becomes meaningful.

This is the work I look forward to developing with BEMF’s dancers—cultivating expressive movement that springs from music, character, and emotion, and inviting today’s audiences into the living pulse of the Baroque stage.

I take on this appointment with deep gratitude, and I will do my best to imagine, question, and express the essence of BEMF: creating Baroque spectacles that speak to our deepest artistic sensibilities.

—Marie-Nathalie Lacoursière

SUNDAY, JUNE 8MONDAY, JUNE 9TUESDAY, JUNE 10WEDNESDAY, JUNE 11

THURSDAY, JUNE 12FRIDAY, JUNE 13SATURDAY, JUNE 14SUNDAY, JUNE 15

Organ Mini-Festival: Owolabi | FLC

Keyboard Mini-Festival: Yang | FCB

Colonnade Hotel Exhibition The Colonnade Hotel

The Colonnade Hotel

Organ Mini-Festival: Moyer FLC

Keyboard Mini-Festival: Ercoli FLC

Organ Mini-Festival: Johnson FLC

Keyboard Mini-Festival: Taylor | FLC

Young Artists Training Program Participants FCB

Gatti, Gatti & Friends JH Constantinople EC ExtravaGamba! JH

BEMF Youth Ensemble & BEMF Beyond Borders JH

Boreas Quartett Bremen JH

BEMF Orchestra JH

Keiser’s Octavia ECMT

Vox Luminis EC

Langlois de Swarte & Taylor JH

Concerto Romano EC

ECMT Emerson Cutler Majestic Theatre, 219 Tremont Street

Telemann’s Pimpinone and Ino JH

Keiser’s Octavia ECMT

BEMF Chamber Ensemble JH

JH New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall, 30 Gainsborough Street

EC Emmanuel Church, 15 Newbury Street

FLC First Lutheran Church of Boston, 299 Berkeley Street

FCB First Church Boston, 66 Marlborough Street

BEMF WELCOME CENTER

2025 Festival Week Schedule of Events

TO PURCHASE TICKETS FOR BEMF EVENTS DURING FESTIVAL WEEK (June 8–15), you may purchase tickets online all week long from Sunday, June 8 through Sunday, June 15 at BEMF.org. Tickets can also be purchased in person, Wednesday through Saturday from 10am to 4pm at the BEMF Welcome Center, near the entrance to the Festival Exhibition at the The Colonnade Hotel, 120 Huntington Avenue, Boston. Additionally, you may call the BEMF Box Office at 617-661-1812 for credit card sales, Monday through Saturday from 10am to 4pm. Acceptable forms of payment for purchases are American Express, VISA, MasterCard, Discover, and cash (for in-person sales). You may also purchase tickets for individual events—at their respective venues—30 minutes prior to the performance. See page 40 for concert venue box office information. An Exhibition Pass provides admission to the Exhibition and to Festival Concurrent Events, excluding pre-opera talks (see pages 49–58 and 334–339). An Exhibition Pass may be purchased for $10 at the BEMF Welcome Center in The Colonnade Hotel, Wednesday through Saturday, from 10am to 4pm daily, online at BEMF.org, or at the door of most Festival events. All sales are final. No refunds or exchanges are available for any ticket purchases.

Sunday, June 8

2pm Pre-opera Talk by Paul O’Dette and Stephen Stubbs, Musical Directors; Gilbert Blin, Stage Director; Robert Mealy , Orchestra Director ; Hubert Hazebroucq, Choreographer: The Power of Love and the Love of Power. Emerson Cutler Majestic Theatre, 219 Tremont Street, Boston. FREE with opera ticket.

3:10pm Opening Fanfare: Members of the BEMF Orchestra. Lobby, Emerson Cutler Majestic Theatre, 219 Tremont Street. FREE with opera ticket.

3:30pm Opening Performance of Reinhard Keiser’s Octavia: Paul O’Dette and Stephen Stubbs, Musical Directors; Gilbert Blin, Stage Director; Robert Mealy, Orchestra Director ; Marie-Nathalie Lacoursière , Dance Director; Hubert Hazebroucq, Choreographer; Anna Kjellsdotte r , Costume Designer ; Alexander McCargar , Set Designer; Kelly Martin , Lighting Designer. Emerson Cutler Majestic Theatre, 219 Tremont Street. $250, $153, $117, $87, $67, $30. Please see pages 60-132 for cast and ensemble, synopsis, articles, and more.

Monday, June 9

5pm ACRONYM: Amor Temporalia: Instrumental music of Bertali, Schmelzer, Valentini, Biber, Priuli, and others. New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall, 30 Gainsborough Street, Boston. $64, $49, $35, $25

8pm The Tallis Scholars, directed by Peter Phillips, and The English Cornett & Sackbut Ensemble: Jubilate! Music of Lassus, Palestrina, Gombert, Andrea Gabrieli, and Giovanni Gabrieli. New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall, 30 Gainsborough Street. $70, $55, $40, $25.

10:30pm Aaron Sheehan, tenor, and Paul O’Dette, lute: The Excellency of Wine: Songs of Love, Laughter, and Drinking – Lute songs by Dowland, Guédron, Moulinié, and Henry Lawes. New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall, 30 Gainsborough Street. $25.

Tuesday, June10

5pm Ensemble Castor, with Sherezade Panthaki, soprano: Inspiring Genius – Precious Friendships: Music of Reinhard Keiser, George Frideric Handel, Johann Sebastian Bach, and Georg Philipp Telemann. New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall, 30 Gainsborough Street. $64, $49, $35, $25.

8pm The Boston Camerata, directed by Anne Azéma: A Gallery of Kings: On the Uses and Abuses of Power, ca. 1300. New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall, 30 Gainsborough Street. $64, $49, $35, $25.

10:30pm Pacific MusicWorks, directed by Stephen Stubbs, with Danielle Reutter-Harrah , soprano: Murder, Mayhem, Melancholy, and Madness: Music of Edward Johnson, Dowland, William Lawes, Robert Johnson, Matteis, and Purcell. New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall, 30 Gainsborough Street. $25.

FESTIVAL WEEK SCHEDULE OF EVENTS

Wednesday, June11

9:30am– Symposium : Global Early Musics . TheFirst 10:30am LutheranChurchofBoston, 299BerkeleyStreet, Boston. $10orFREEwithExhibitionPass.

10am– Exhibition: HuntingtonBallroom, TheColonnade 5pm Hotel, 120HuntingtonAvenue, Boston. $10or FREEwithExhibitionPass.

11am– Early Music America’s Emerging Artists Showcase 12:30pm Concert. TheFirstLutheranChurchofBoston. FREE.

2:30pm– Masterclass: Kola Owolabi, organ. TheFirstLutheran 4:30pm ChurchofBoston. $10orFREEwithExhibitionPass.

5pm The Tallis Scholars , directedby Peter Phillips : InspiredbytheSistineChapel: MusicofMorales, Palestrina, andAllegri. EmmanuelChurch, 15 NewburyStreet, Boston. $64, $49, $35, $25

5:30pm Pre-opera Talk by Paul O’Dette and Stephen Stubbs, MusicalDirectors: ThePowerofLoveandthe LoveofPower. EmersonCutlerMajesticTheatre, 219TremontStreet. FREEwithoperaticket.

6:40pm Opening Fanfare: Membersofthe BEMF Orchestra Lobby, EmersonCutlerMajesticTheatre, 219 TremontStreet. FREEwithoperaticket.

7pm Reinhard Keiser’s Octavia: Paul O’Dette and Stephen Stubbs , MusicalDirectors; Gilbert Blin , Stage Director; Robert Mealy, OrchestraDirector; MarieNathalie Lacoursière , DanceDirector; Hubert Hazebroucq , Choreographer; Anna Kjellsdotter , CostumeDesigner; Alexander McCargar , Set Designer; Kelly Martin, LightingDesigner. Emerson CutlerMajesticTheatre, 219TremontStreet. $250, $153, $117, $87, $67, $30

Please see pages 60–132 forcastandensemble, synopsis, articles, andmore

8pm Trio Mediæval with Kevin Devine , organetto & hurdy-gurdy: Caritasabundatinomnia / Love aboundsineverything: MusicofHildegardvon BingenandLeonelPower. EmmanuelChurch, 15 NewburyStreet. $64, $49, $35, $25.

10:30pm The English Cornett & Sackbut Ensemble : Love WithoutWords: MusicoftheSongofSongs. EmmanuelChurch, 15NewburyStreet. $25.

Thursday, June12

9am– BEMF Organ Mini-Festival, Part One: Kola Owolabi, 11am The Voice of the Organ: Manifestations of Power and Love. The First Lutheran Church of Boston, 299 Berkeley Street. $25; $60 for all three parts.

9:30am– Dance Workshop: Marie-Nathalie Lacoursière, BEMF 11am

Dance Director. Session One: Raise and lower the nimble foot, set the body with ease and grace (Octavia, Act I, Scene 14). Emmanuel Church Parish Hall, 15 Newbury Street. $10 or FREE with Exhibition Pass.

10am– Exhibition: Huntington Ballroom,The Colonnade 5pm Hotel, 120 Huntington Avenue, Boston. $10 or FREE with Exhibition Pass.

11am– Masterclass: Maxine Eilander, Baroque Harp. Colonnade 1pm East Room, The Colonnade Hotel, 120 Huntington Avenue. $10 or FREE with Exhibition Pass.

11:30am– Dance Workshop: Marie-Nathalie Lacoursière, BEMF 1pm Dance Director and Hubert Hazebroucq, Octavia Choreographer. Session Two: Raise and lower the nimble foot, set the body with ease and grace (Octavia, Act I, Scene 14). Emmanuel Church Parish Hall, 15 Newbury Street. $10 or FREE with Exhibition Pass.

11:30am– BEMF Organ Mini-Festival , Part Two: Jonathan 1:30pm William Moyer , The Abuse of Power and the Renewal of Love. The First Lutheran Church of Boston, 299 Berkeley Street. $25; $60 for all three parts.

2pm– Lecture: Alexander McCargar: Designing for Handel 3pm and Keiser: Johann Oswald Harms. Colonnade East Room, The Colonnade Hotel, 120 Huntington Avenue. $10 or FREE with Exhibition Pass.

2pm– BEMF Organ Mini-Festival, Part Three: Erica Johnson, 4pm Re ection and Transformation: Struggles in Power and Love. The First Lutheran Church of Boston, 299 Berkeley Street. $25; $60 for all three parts.

4pm Pre-concert Talk by Dr. Carsten Lange , Director, Centre for Telemann Research Magdeburg:“…they made the ears of the court and the city unusually attentive.” Telemann’s so-called Paris Quartets New England Conservatory’s Williams Hall, 30 Gainsborough Street. FREE with concert ticket.

5pm Enrico Gatti, violin, Marcello Gatti, Baroque ute & Friends: Flatteusement, Vivement & Tendrement: The power of love and affection in Paris. New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall, 30 Gainsborough Street. $64, $49, $35, $25.

7pm Pre-concert Talk by Ellen T. Harris, Class of 1949 Professor Emeritus, MIT: The Water Music: On It or In It? New England Conservatory’s Williams Hall, 30 Gainsborough Street. FREE with concert ticket.

8pm Boston Early Music Festival Orchestra, Robert Mealy, Orchestra Director with Marie-Nathalie Lacoursière and Hubert Hazebroucq, dancers: Rivers of Splendor: Handel’s and Telemann’s Water Music. New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall, 30 Gainsborough Street. $70, $55, $40, $25.

10:30pm Théotime Langlois de Swarte, violin, and Justin Taylor, harpsichord: The Power of Love: Music of Rameau, Francœur, François Couperin, Eccles, Bach, Corelli, and others. New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall, 30 Gainsborough Street. $25.

Friday, June13

9am– BEMF Keyboard Mini-Festival, Part One: Yi-hen Yang, 11am clavichord: Awaken to Love. First Church Boston (NEW LOCATION!), 66 Marlborough Street, Boston. $25; $60 for all three parts.

10am– Exhibition: Huntington Ballroom,The Colonnade 7pm Hotel, 120 Huntington Avenue, Boston. $10 or FREE with Exhibition Pass.

10am– Masterclass: Enrico Gatti, Baroque Violin & Marcello 12 noon Gatti, Baroque Flute. Emmanuel Church Music Room, 15 Newbury Street. $10 or FREE with Exhibition Pass.

11:30am– BEMF Keyboard Mini-Festival, Part Two: Federico

1:30pm Ercoli, fortepiano: Farewell: On the other side of love and power The First Lutheran Church of Boston, 299 Berkeley Street. $25; $60 for all three parts.

2pm– BEMF Keyboard Mini-Festival, Part Three: Justin Taylor, 4pm harpsichord: French Love. The First Lutheran Church of Boston, 299 Berkeley Street. $25; $60 for all three parts.

2pm Pre-concert Talk by Ellen T. Harris, Class of 1949 Professor Emeritus, MIT: Nero (His Mother, His Wives, His Lovers): Once More With Feeling. First Church Boston, 66 Marlborough Street. FREE.

3pm Special Concert: BEMF 2025 Young Artists Training Program participants: George Frideric Handel’s Agrippina; Gilbert Blin, Founder & Director; Jason McStoots, Associate Director, 2025; Jeffrey Grossman, Musical Director, 2025. First Church Boston, 66 Marlborough Street. FREE.

5pm Constantinople , directed by Kiya Tabassian , setar with Hana Blažíková, soprano: Bach & Khayyam. Emmanuel Church, 15 Newbury Street. $64, $49, $35, $25.

5:30pm Pre-opera Talk by John H. Roberts , Professor Emeritus, University of California, Berkeley: Keiser’s Octavia: Rivalry and Recompense. Emerson Cutler Majestic Theatre, 219 Tremont Street. FREE with opera ticket.

6:40pm Opening Fanfare: Members of the BEMF Orchestra Lobby, Emerson Cutler Majestic Theatre, 219 Tremont Street. FREE with opera ticket.

7pm Reinhard Keiser’s Octavia: Paul O’Dette and Stephen Stubbs , Musical Directors; Gilbert Blin , Stage Director; Robert Mealy, Orchestra Director; MarieNathalie Lacoursière , Dance Director; Hubert Hazebroucq , Choreographer; Anna Kjellsdotter , Costume Designer; Alexander McCargar , Set Designer; Kelly Martin, Lighting Designer. Emerson Cutler Majestic Theatre, 219 Tremont Street. $250, $153, $117, $87, $67, $30.

Please see pages 60–132 for cast and ensemble, synopsis, articles, and more.

8pm Vox Luminis, Lionel Meunier , Artistic Director: Vanitas Vanitatum et omnia vanitas: Music of Carissimi and Förster. Emmanuel Church, 15 Newbury Street. $64, $49, $35, $25.

10:30pm Concerto Romano, directed by Alessandro Quarta with Luca Cervoni , tenor: Arnalta’s Café: An Operatic Nanny Romp through 17th-century Italy. Emmanuel Church, 15 Newbury Street. $25.

Saturday, June14

10am– BEMF Symposium : Producing and Performing 12:30pm Reinhard Keiser’s Octavia, moderated by Ellen T. Harris, with John H. Roberts, Paul O’Dette, Stephen Stubbs, Gilbert Blin, Robert Mealy, Hubert Hazebroucq, Alexander McCargar, and Kelly Martin. Boston Ballroom, The Colonnade Hotel, 120 Huntington Avenue. $10 or FREE with Exhibition Pass.

FESTIVAL WEEK SCHEDULE OF EVENTS

10am– Exhibition: HuntingtonBallroom, TheColonnade 5pm Hotel, 120HuntingtonAvenue, Boston. $10or FREEwithExhibitionPass

1pm– Family Day: Commedia dell’Arte for Kids and a 3pm Scavenger Hunt at the World-Famous BEMF Exhibition. Boston Ballroom, The Colonnade Hotel, 120 Huntington Avenue. FREE.

1:30pm– Masterclass: Boreas Quartett Bremen, recorder solos 4:30pm and consorts. New England Conservatory’s Williams Hall, 30 Gainsborough Street. $10 or FREE with Exhibition Pass.

1:30pm– Masterclass: Emma Kirkby, Paul O’Dette, and Stephen 4:30pm Stubbs: 17th-century accompanied solo song. New England Conservatory’s Burnes Hall, 255 St. Botolph Street. $10 or FREE with Exhibition Pass.

2:30pm & Film: The Making of BEMF’s Circé, A Documentary 3:30pm Film (Two Showings). Boston Ballroom, The Colonnade Hotel, 120 Huntington Avenue. $10 or FREE with Exhibition Pass.

5pm BEMF Viol Collective, directed by Christel Thielmann: ExtravaGamba!: A Feast of Favorite Viol Consorts for 2 to 16 Viols. New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall, 30 Gainsborough Street. $64, $49, $35, $25.

7pm Pre-opera Talk by Paul O’Dette and Stephen Stubbs, Musical Directors , and Fynn Liess , Artistic Management and Dramaturg, Center for Telemann Research Magdeburg: Telemann’s Pimpinone and Ino. New England Conservatory’s Williams Hall, 30 Gainsborough Street. FREE with opera ticket.

8pm BEMF Chamber Opera Series: Georg Philipp Telemann’s Pimpinone and Ino: Paul O’Dette and Stephen Stubbs, Musical Directors; Gilbert Blin and Marie-Nathalie Lacoursière, Stage Directors ; Robert Mealy , Concertmaster ; Marie-Nathalie Lacoursière , Choreographer; Gilbert Blin and WERIEM, Costume Designers; Kelly Martin, Lighting Designer. New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall, 30 Gainsborough Street. $105, $69, $45, $25.

10:30pm Emőke Baráth, Amanda Forsythe, Emma Kirkby, Danielle Reutter-Harrah, and Teresa Wakim, soprano; Aaron Sheehan and Jason McStoots, tenor; Christian Immler, bass-baritone & BEMF Chamber Ensemble, Paul O’Dette and Stephen Stubbs, Musical Directors: Starry, Starry Night: Music of Monteverdi, Luigi Rossi, Carissimi, and Steffani . New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall, 30 Gainsborough Street. $25.

Sunday, June15

10am– Special Youth Concert: BEMF Youth Ensemble, Julia 11am McKenzie, director, BEMF Beyond Borders, Nina Stern and Cléa Galhano, directors, BEMF Beyond Borders, and A String Fort Smith , Lori Fay , director. New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall, 30 Gainsborough Street. FREE.

12:30pm Boreas Quartett Bremen, with Caleb Mayo, narrator, and guest artist Kathryn Montoya , recorder: Shakespeare in Love. New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall, 30 Gainsborough Street. $64, $49, $35, $25.

2pm Pre-opera Talk by John H. Roberts , Professor Emeritus, University of California, Berkeley: Keiser’s Octavia: Rivalry and Recompense. Emerson Cutler Majestic Theatre, 219 Tremont Street. FREE with opera ticket.

3:10pm Opening Fanfare: Members of the BEMF Orchestra. Lobby, Emerson Cutler Majestic Theatre, 219 Tremont Street. FREE with opera ticket.

3:30pm Reinhard Keiser’s Octavia: Paul O’Dette and Stephen Stubbs , Musical Directors; Gilbert Blin , Stage Director; Robert Mealy, Orchestra Director; MarieNathalie Lacoursière , Dance Director; Hubert Hazebroucq , Choreographer; Anna Kjellsdotter , Costume Designer; Alexander McCargar , Set Designer; Kelly Martin, Lighting Designer. Emerson Cutler Majestic Theatre, 219 Tremont Street. $250, $153, $117, $87, $67, $30.

Please see pages 60–132 for cast and ensemble, synopsis, articles, and more.

BEMF in the Berkshires Schedule of

Events

Friday, June 27

7pm Pre-opera Talk by members of the Pimpinone and Ino Directorial Team. The Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center, 14 Castle Street, Great Barrington, MA. FREE with opera ticket.

8pm Georg Philipp Telemann’s Pimpinone and Ino .

The Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center, 14 Castle Street, Great Barrington. $85, $55, $25.

Sunday, June29

Saturday, June28

2pm Pre-opera Talk by members of the Pimpinone and Ino Directorial Team. The Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center, 14 Castle Street, Great Barrington, MA. FREE with opera ticket.

3pm Georg Philipp Telemann’s Pimpinone and Ino

The Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center, 14 Castle Street, Great Barrington. $85, $55, $25.

BEMF at Caramoor Schedule of Events

3pm Pre-opera Talk by Members of the Pimpinone and Ino Directorial Team. Venetian Theatre, Caramoor Center for Music & the Arts, Inc., 149 Girdle Ridge Road, Katonah, NY. FREE with opera ticket.

4pm Georg Philipp Telemann’s Pimpinone and In o . Venetian Theatre, Caramoor Center for Music & the Arts, Inc. $126, $106, $79.

Event Venues

15 Beacon Hill Friends House, 6 Chestnut Street, Fringe Concerts

7 The Cathedral Church of St. Paul, 138 Tremont Street, Fringe Concerts

14 Church of the Advent, Library, 30 Brimmer Street, Fringe Concerts

3 Church of the Covenant, 67 Newbury Street, Fringe Concerts

13 The College Club of Boston, 44 Commonwealth Avenue, Fringe Concerts

Community Room, Roxbury Branch, Boston Public Library, 169 Dudley Street, Fringe Concerts

5 The Colonnade Hotel, 120 Huntington Avenue, Exhibition & BEMF Welcome Center, Symposia & Lectures, Masterclass, Family Day, Film

2 Emerson Cutler Majestic Theatre, 219 Tremont Street, Centerpiece Opera, Pre-Opera Talks

4 Emmanuel Church, 15 Newbury Street, Festival Concerts, Dance Workshops, Masterclass

9 First Church Boston, 66 Marlborough Street, Keyboard Mini-Festival, Special Performance, Pre-Performance Talk, Fringe Concerts

11 The First Lutheran Church of Boston, 299 Berkeley Street, Organ Mini-Festival, Keyboard Mini-Festival, Masterclass, Symposia, Concurrent Event, Fringe Concerts

10 Goethe-Institut Boston, 170 Beacon Street, Fringe Concerts

Marsh Chapel, Boston University, 735 Commonwealth Avenue (off map), Fringe Concerts

1 New England Conservatory (Jordan Hall, Williams Hall), 30 Gainsborough Street, Chamber Opera, Festival Concerts, Special Concerts, Masterclass, Pre Performance Talks

8 New England Conservatory (Burnes Hall), Student Life and Performance Center, 255 St. Botolph Street, Masterclass

6 Old South Church, Gordon Chapel, Mary Norton Hall, and the Guild Room, 645 Boylston Street, Fringe Concerts

Old West Church, 131 Cambridge Street (off map), Fringe Concerts

12The Paulist Center Library, 5 Park Street, Fringe Concerts

MBTA Stops Near Event Venues

A Arlington (Green Line – B, C, D, E trains)

J Back Bay (Orange Line)

Boston Univ. Central (off map; Green Line – B trains only)

Bowdoin (off map; Blue Line)

B Boylston (Green Line – B, C, D, E trains)

Charles/MGH (off map; Red Line)

L Chinatown (Orange Line)

C Copley (Green Line – B, C, D, E trains)

G Government Center (Blue Line; Green Line – B, C, D, E trains)

H Hynes Convention Center (Green Line – B, C, D trains)

M Massachusetts Ave. (Orange Line

Nubian (off map; Silver Line – SL4, SL5)

D Park Street (Red Line; Green Line – B, C, D, E trains)

P Prudential (Green Line – E trains only)

F Symphony (Green Line – E trains only)

E Tufts Medical Center (Orange Line)

Subway fare is by plastic Charlie Card, paper Charlie Ticket, or contactless payment ($2.40 per ride). Daily and Weekly passes are available. Charlie Tickets are sold by machines at most MBTA Stations. Charlie Cards can be obtained from staffed Customer Service booths. Riders cannot share cards or tickets—everyone needs their own. See mbta.com for more information.

...a place to learn about some of the industry’s new and leading instrument builders, music sellers, service organizations, and ensembles.

“One stop shopping for the historical-performance set” —The Wall Street Journal

The Exhibition

Welcome to the 23rd biennial Boston

Early Music Festival Exhibition

Exhibition & CD Store Hours

The Colonnade Hotel 120 Huntington Avenue, Boston

Wednesday, June 11 10am–5pm

Thursday, June 12 10am–5pm

Friday, June 13 10am–7pm

Saturday, June 14 10am–5pm

The Boston Early Music Festival Exhibition is the premier early music trade show in North America and one of the largest in the world. Visit us in our new location at The Colonnade Hotel to test nely crafted Medieval, Renaissance, Baroque, and Classical instruments, stock up on facsimiles and edited performance editions, refresh your bookshelf, and connect with colleagues and friends. For a fascinating hands-on early music experience, the BEMF Exhibition is unparalleled!

The Exhibition is also home to the popular BEMF CD Store. With hundreds of titles on hand, including our new release—Lully’s Idylle sur la Paix and Charpentier’s La Fête de Rueil—and our 2024 release of Telemann’s Ino and Arias for Soprano featuring Amanda Forsythe, you’ll want to leave plenty of time to take a good look. The CD store is also your source for BEMF Merchandise. Pick up a Love & Power T-shirt for yourself and one for a friend back home!

Elizabeth Hardy, Exhibition Manager

The Colonnade Hotel Event Rooms, Main Floor

Keyboard Instruments & Accessories

Harpsichord Clearing House, Inc.

Klop Orgel- en Clavecimbelbouw

Steven W. Sørli, Lautenwerk Maker

String Instruments, Bows & Accessories

Affourtit Historical Bows

Anatolian Harps

Louis Bégin Archetier Inc.

Boston Catlines

Dipper Restorations

Warren Ellison, Violin Maker

Gabriela’s Baroque

Gamut Music, Inc.

H. F. Grabenstein, Bowmaker

E. Hoffer Historical Bows

Timothy G. Johnson, Luthier

Dan Larson

Sarah W. Peck Violins

Perrin & Associates Fine Violins

Unpro table Instruments

Wind Instruments & Accessories

Boaz Berney Historical Flutes

Bretti Musical Instruments

Canzonet Cases

Thomas Carroll Early Clarinets and Chalumeaux

Edward Cipullo, Flutemaker

Exhibitor Directory

Sheet Music, Books & Recordings

Braemore/ Kenmore Room

Braemore/ Kenmore Room

Booths 1 & 2

Booth 6

Table 15

Booth 9

Booth 10

Booth 8

Table 33

Booth 6

Booth 5

Table 34

Table 29

Booth 9

Table 19

Table 30

Booth 7

Booth 3

Table 27

Table 40

Booth 14

Table 32

Table 44

Early Music Shop of New England Booths 11, 12 & 13

Leatherman Woodwinds

Simon Polak Early Flutes

RecorderStands.com

Von Huene Workshop

Table 38

Booth 4

Tables 35 & 36

Table 43

Basiliea Books

BEMF CD Store

Breitkopf & Härtel

The Alan Durfee Collection

Huntington Foyer

Huntington Foyer

Tables 17 & 18

Huntington Foyer

Early Music Shop of New England Booths 11, 12 & 13

The Packard Humanities Institute

Yesterday Service, Inc.

Schools, Societies & Ensembles

American Recorder Society

Amherst Early Music

Early Music America

Historical Harp Society

La Donna Musicale/RUMBARROCO

Viola da Gamba Society of America

Related Arts

DavidtfPhotography

Versilian Studios LLC

Table 20

Tables 23, 24 & 25

Table 37

Table 22

Table 28

Table 16

Table 31

Table 42

Table 39

Table 45

Affourtit Historical Bows

Pieter Affourtit Hoorn, Netherlands +31 651127566 affourtitbows@gmail.com www.affourtit-bowmaker.com

Since 2010, Affourtit Historical Bows and Gabriela’s Baroque have been working as a team, exhibiting together, learning from each other, and promoting our work each on our own continent. Pieter Affourtit makes bows for violin, viola, cello, viols, and double bass, in early Baroque, Baroque, and Classical styles. Each bow is handmade according to the highest professional standards and has been tested on stage. Gabriela Guadalajara makes violins, violas, and cellos in Baroque style, as well as the whole family of viols. In addition, this year we’ll have a whole selection of Baroque strings for sale at our booth.

Boston Catlines

Olav Chris Henriksen

Somerville, MA

617-776-8688

catlines@aol.com

www.bostoncatlines.com

Boston Catlines distributes strings in plain and overspun gut, nylon, overspun nylon, carbon ber, and nylgut for all types of early bowed and plucked instruments. We custom-make roped catline gut strings, and we specialize in custom- tting strings to instruments of all sizes, pitches, and tunings. We are the U.S. distributor for Pyramid lute strings. We also carry Kürschner gut, Aquila nylgut, and strings by Savarez and Pirastro. On display we have gut and synthetic strings for early bowed and plucked instruments.

Dipper Restorations

Andrew Dipper Minneapolis, MN 612-375-0708

adipper@givensviolins.com www.givensviolins.com/dipper-restorations/

Founded in 1968, Dipper Restorations is one of the premier dealers of original Baroque and Classical violins, violas, cellos, and gambas (including 5-string piccolo cellos), as well as contemporary copies of early instruments and bows. Andrew Dipper has studied original bows making copies of early Baroque and Classical bows for violin, viola, cello, and bass. Dipper sets up his instruments according to proper historical standards and his restorations are exceptionally thorough. He also provides restoration and conservation services to museums and collectors, primarily for bowed instruments built before 1830. Dipper’s work with original instruments and bows informs all his making and restoration.

H. F. Grabenstein, Bowmaker

Harry Grabenstein Williston, VT

802-872-8923

info@hfgbowmaker.com www.hfgbowmaker.com

H. F. Grabenstein studied bowmaking with William Salchow at the University of New Hampshire in 1982 and 1983 and was Bowmaker at the Tourin Musica from 1983 to 1990. Grabenstein continues to build a full range of historical bows for the viol and violin families of string instruments. Using snakewood, pernambuco, ebony, and other hardwoods he creates beautifully detailed bows that play expressively and are secure on the string. Clients include members of Fretwork, ACRONYM, A Far Cry, The King’s Noyse, the Van Swieten Quartet, the Baltimore Consort, Ensemble Galilei, Tempesta di Mare, Diderot String Quartet, Les Barocudas, Chatham Baroque, The Orchestra of the Eighteenth Century, the Boston Symphony, the Chicago Symphony, and The Cleveland Orchestra.

the Compenius tradition, with wooden pipes for all stops. Klop also offers harpsichords after Dulcken, Ruckers, Taskin, and early Italian makers.

Steven W. Sørli, Lautenwerk Maker

Steven W. Sørli

Amherst, MA

413-259-1774

ssorli@gmail.com

www.lautenwerk.com

Steven has been making lautenwerke since 1999 and has completed 52 lute-strung keyboard instruments. His designs are creative with a vibrant and colorful sound. Models offered include a small double-strung ottavino, a single-strung clavicytherium, a keyed lyre, larger lautenwerk models and a double-strung pedal board clavicytherium. This year features Steven’s latest invention—an ottavino with a single rank of jacks plucking both choirs with the option to play only one choir. The string unisons are exactly the same length with the same plucking point. The action is quiet and extremely light. Maintenance is simple with one rank of jacks.

SCHEDULE

SUNDAY, JUNE 8

2pm Pre-opera Talk by Paul O’Dette and Stephen Stubbs, Musical Directors; Gilbert Blin, Stage Director; Robert Mealy, Orchestra Director; Hubert Hazebroucq, Choreographer: The Power of Love and the Love of Power. Emerson Cutler Majestic Theatre, 219 Tremont Street, Boston. FREE with opera ticket.

3:10pm Opening Fanfare: Members of the BEMF Orchestra Lobby, Emerson Cutler Majestic Theatre, 219 Tremont Street. FREE with opera ticket.

3:30pm Opening Performance of Reinhard Keiser’s Octavia: Paul O’Dette and Stephen Stubbs, Musical Directors; Gilbert Blin, Stage Director; Robert Mealy, Orchestra Director; Marie-Nathalie Lacoursière, Dance Director; Hubert Hazebroucq, Choreographer; Anna Kjellsdotter, Costume Designer; Alexander McCargar, Set Designer; Kelly Martin, Lighting Designer. Emerson Cutler Majestic Theatre, 219 Tremont Street. $250, $153, $117, $87, $67, $30. Please see pages 60–132 for cast and ensemble, synopsis, articles, and more.

SUNDAY | JUNE 8

TICKETS FOR BEMF EVENTS

TO PURCHASE TICKETS FOR BEMF EVENTS DURING FESTIVAL WEEK (JUNE 8–15), you may purchase tickets online all week long from Sunday, June 8 through Sunday, June 15 at BEMF.org. Tickets can also be purchased in person, Wednesday through Saturday from 10am to 4pm at the BEMF Welcome Center, near the entrance to the Festival Exhibition at the The Colonnade Hotel, 120 Huntington Avenue, Boston. Additionally, you may call the BEMF Box Office at 617-661-1812 for credit card sales, Monday through Saturday from 10am to 4pm. Acceptable forms of payment for purchases are American Express, VISA, MasterCard, Discover, and cash (for in-person sales). You may also purchase tickets for individual events—at their respective venues—30 minutes prior to the performance. See page 40 for concert venue box office information. An Exhibition Pass provides admission to the Exhibition and to Festival Concurrent Events, excluding pre-opera talks (see pages 49–58 and 334–339). An Exhibition Pass may be purchased for $10 at the BEMF Welcome Center in The Colonnade Hotel, Wednesday through Saturday, from 10am to 4pm daily, online at BEMF.org, or at the door of most Festival events. All sales are final. No refunds or exchanges are available for any ticket purchases.

The Boston Early Music Festival extends heartfelt thanks to the following individuals and organizations for their extraordinary support of our North American premiere of

Joan Margot Smith

Glenn A. KnicKrehm and Constellation Charitable Foundation Principal Production Sponsor

Sponsor of Marie-Nathalie Lacoursière, Dance Director

Sponsor of Christian Immler, performing the role of Seneca Sponsor of Phoebe Carrai, violoncello, and Laura Jeppesen, viola

Bernice K. Chen

Sponsor of Gilbert Blin, Stage Director

James C. Busby

Sponsor of Aaron Sheehan, performing the role of Piso

Lorna E. Oleck

Sponsor of Sherezade Panthaki, performing the role of Clelia

Karen Tenney and Thomas Loring

Sponsors of Hannah De Priest, performing the role of Livia

Diane and John Paul Britton

Sponsors of Kathleen Fay, Executive Producer

Harold I. Pratt

Sponsor of Sarah Darling, violin, and Jesse Irons, violin

Marianne and Terry Louderback

Sponsor of one member of the BEMF Dance Company

Martha Radford

Partial Sponsor of Douglas Ray Williams, performing the role of Nero

Tom and Judy Anderson Allen

Sponsors of the pre-opera talk by John H. Roberts on Friday, June 13

Dr. Robert L. Harris

Peter Libby

Sponsor of the pre-opera talk by Paul O’Dette and Stephen Stubbs on Wednesday, June 11

Sponsor of the pre-opera talk by Paul O’Dette, Stephen Stubbs, Gilbert Blin, Robert Mealy, and Hubert Hazebroucq on Sunday, June 8

The Boston Early Music Festival also extends our gratitude to the following sponsors of our Young Artists Training Program

An Anonymous Donor

Marie-Pierre and Michael Ellmann

Henk Elderhorst

Matinée Performances: Sunday, June 8 & Sunday, June 15, 2025 at 3:30pm

Evening Performances: Wednesday, June 11 & Friday, June 13, 2025 at 7pm

Emerson Cutler Majestic Theatre, 219 Tremont Street, Boston, Massachusetts

HAMBURG, 1705

Music by Reinhard Keiser (1674–1739)

Libretto by Barthold Feind (1678–1721)

Paul O’Dette & Stephen Stubbs, Musical Directors

Gilbert Blin, Stage Director

Robert Mealy, Orchestra Director

Marie-Nathalie Lacoursière, Dance Director

Hubert Hazebroucq, Choreographer

Anna Kjellsdotter, Costume Designer

Alexander McCargar, Set Designer

Kelly Martin, Lighting Designer

Ellen Hargis, Assistant Stage Director

Kathleen Fay, Executive Producer

The directors of Boston Early Music Festival’s June 2025 production of Reinhard Keiser’s Octavia wish to dedicate our production to Thomas Ihlenfeldt

June 26, 1958 – June 20, 2022

Thomas Ihlenfeldt, one of the leading Keiser experts and our close friend and colleague, had already begun his work as our musicological advisor and editor for BEMF’s 2025 centerpiece opera, Octavia, when he was tragically killed in a car accident on June 20, 2022. Thomas had dedicated himself to the lute and theorbo, and particularly to the legacy of the Hamburg Opera, since his time as a student of Stephen Stubbs at the Akademie für Alte Musikin Bremen in the 1990s. After graduation, he became a regular performer with the Freiburger Barockorchester, The Harp Consort, and Weser-Renaissance, and in 1990 established his own ensemble, Capella Orlandi Bremen, dedicated to the music of Reinhard Keiser.

Vocal Cast

Emőke Baráth

Douglas Ray Williams

Amanda Forsythe

Sherezade Panthaki

Aaron Sheehan

Hannah De Priest

Christian Immler

Michael Skarke

Richard Pittsinger

Marc Molomot

Violin I

Jason McStoots

Boston Early Music Festival Dance Company

Marie-Nathalie Lacoursière, Dance Director and Dancer

Hubert Hazebroucq, Choreographer and Dancer

Julian Donahue

Junichi Fukuda

Caitlin Klinger

Alexis Silver

Boston Early Music Festival Orchestra

Robert Mealy, concertmaster

Cynthia Roberts

Beth Wenstrom

Sarah Darling

Miloš Valent

Violin II

Julie Andrijeski, principal

Johanna Novom

Jesse Irons

Emily Dahl Irons

Viola

Daniel Elyar, principal

Laura Jeppesen

Dagmar Valentová

Violoncello

Phoebe Carrai, principal

Matt Zucker

Keiran Campbell

Jennifer Morsches

Double bass

Nathaniel Chase

Oboe & Recorder

Debra Nagy, principal

Natural horn

Todd Williams

Nathanael Udell

Percussion

Michelle Humphreys

Theorbo

Paul O’Dette

Baroque Guitar

Stephen Stubbs

oboe & recorder

Kathryn Montoya, principal

recorder & oboe

Bassoon

Dominic Teresi, principal

Allen Hamrick

Marilyn Boenau

Sally Merriman

Continuo Violoncello

David Morris

Harpsichord

Jörg Jacobi

Baroque harp

Maxine Eilander

Boston Early Music Festival Young Artists Training Program

Gilbert Blin, Founder & Director

Jason McStoots, Associate Director, 2025

Jeffrey Grossman, Musical Director, 2025

Singers of the Young Artists Training Program

Anna Bjerken

Reed Demangone

Samuel Higgins

Seth Hobi

Raphaël Laden-Guindon

Andréa Walker

Dancer of the Young Artists Training Program

Irenie Melin-Gompper

Octavia Cast

(Characters are listed in the order given by the original libretto.)

Emőke Baráth, Octavia, his wife

Douglas Williams, Nero, Roman Emperor

Michael Skarke, Tiridates, King of Armenia

Amanda Forsythe, Ormœna, the King’s wife

Hannah De Priest, Livia, a Latin Princess, relative of the Emperor

Aaron Sheehan, Piso, a Campanian Prince and Roman Patrician

Sherezade Panthaki, Clelia, a Florentine Princess

Richard Pittsinger, Fabius, Imperial General

Christian Immler, Seneca, a Stoic Philosopher and Imperial Adviser

Jason McStoots, Lepidus, a Chamberlain

Marc Molomot, Davus, Court Quartermaster

Anna Bjerken*, Lady-in-Waiting to Octavia

Andréa Walker*, Maid of honor to Clelia

Reed Demangone*, Ormœna’s nurse

Sam Higgins*, Sporus, the Emperor’s freedman

Seth Hobi*, A Praetorian Centurion

Raphaël Laden-Guindon*, A Praetorian Prefect

Roman Actors: Caitlin Klinger, Irenie Melin-Gompper*, Marie-Nathalie Lacoursière, Alexis Silver, Julian Donahue, Junichi Fukuda, Hubert Hazebroucq

Roman Gentlemen and Noble Ladies: Caitlin Klinger, Alexis Silver, Marie-Nathalie Lacoursière, Irenie Melin-Gompper*, Julian Donahue, Hubert Hazebroucq, Junichi Fukuda

Fishermen: Marie-Nathalie Lacoursière, Alexis Silver, Julian Donahue, Junichi Fukuda

Gravediggers: Julian Donahue, Junichi Fukuda, Hubert Hazebroucq

Ghosts: Caitlin Klinger, Alexis Silver, Marie-Nathalie Lacoursière

Flora: Marie-Nathalie Lacoursière

Cupids: Caitlin Klinger, Alexis Silver

Zephyrs: Julian Donahue, Junichi Fukuda

*Denotes member of the 2025 Young Artists Training Program

Boston Early Music Festival Octavia Production Credits

Kathleen Fay

Executive Producer

Maria van Kalken

Mercedes Roman-Manson

Carmen Alfaro Henry

Production Manager

Carla Chris eld

Perry Emerson

Elizabeth Hardy

Morgen Heissenbuettel

Grant Sorenson

Isabel Oliart

Erin Genett

Nicholas Holloway

Emma Ross

Abigail Lindhart

Emma Belfer

Gordon Manson

Assistant to the Executive Producer

Production Stage Manager

General Manager

Operations Manager

Production & Company Assistant

Intern Assistant to the Musical Directors & Orchestra Director

Intern Assistant to the Stage Director

Orchestra & Operations Intern

Company Assistant

Company Assistant

Assistant Stage Manager

Assistant Stage Manager

Production Assistant

Technical Director

Michael Geoghegan

Ren Squire

Kaitlin Smith

Tyler Lindsley

Zachary Connell

Maya Ramirez

Ian Thorsell

Seth Bodie

Jackie Oliva

Chloe Moore

Melina Abreu

Taylor Clemente

Ellen Hargis

Dan McGaha

Deck Supervisor

Master Electrician

Assistant Technical Director/Flyman

Assistant Master Electrician

Programmer

Props Supervisor

Props Artisan

Wig Designer & Supervisor

Costume & Wardrobe Supervisor

Assistant Costume Shop Supervisor

Hair & Makeup Designer

Hair & Makeup Artisan

Supertitle Creator

Supertitle Supervisor

The Boston Early Music Festival wishes to thank the following individuals and organizations for assistance with our North American premiere of Reinhard Keiser’s Octavia

Our thanks to the entire BEMF Directorial team—including Paul O’Dette and Stephen Stubbs, Musical Directors; Gilbert Blin, Stage Director; Robert Mealy, Orchestra Director; Marie-Nathalie Lacoursière, Dance Director; Hubert Hazebroucq, Choreographer; Anna Kjellsdotter, Costume Designer; Alexander McCargar, Set Designer; Kelly Martin, Lighting Designer; Ellen Hargis, Assistant Stage Director; Mercedes Roman-Manson, Production Manager; Gordon Manson, Technical Director; and Kathleen Fay, Executive Producer—for their painstaking and diligent research and work preparatory to the mounting of this landmark presentation of the June 2025 Festival; Robert Mealy, for creating our performing edition of Reinhard Keiser’s Octavia; Stephen Stubbs for the English translation of the Octavia libretto; Ellen Hargis, for the creation of the supertitles; Gilbert Blin for his essay, Octavia, the rebel opera of a noble-minded poet (page 70); Alexander McCargar for his essay, (Re)Constructing a Baroque World in Boston (page 80); Stephen Stubbs and Paul O’Dette for their article, A Note from the Musical Directors on Keiser and Feind’s Octavia (page 86); Gilbert Blin and Ellen Hargis for their Synopsis of Octavia; Andrew Sigel for his careful attention to detail as editor of our Festival publications including the libretto and essays throughout this Octavia section; Glenn KnicKrehm at Constellation Center, for access to the

Constellation Library, architectural renderings, and archival collections of historic theaters; Kathy Wittman, Ball Square Films, for her videography and photographic expertise; the staff and engineers of GBH FM Radio, Boston, especially Sam Brewer, Brian McCreath, Allan McLellan, and Antonio Oliart Ros, for their superb recordings and broadcasts of our performances; the staff at the Emerson Cutler Majestic Theatre and ArtsEmerson, especially Rebecca Frank Oeser, General Manager, Of ce of the Arts, Christina Harrington, Senior Director, Finance & Business Operations, Jamie Siebenaler, Senior Box Of ce Manager, and Kieran Fallon, Associate Box Of ce Manager; the staff at Emmanuel Church in Boston, especially The Reverend Pamela L. Werntz, Rector, Ryan Turner, Artistic Director of Emmanuel Music, Michael Beattie, Artistic Administrator & Guest Conductor of Emmanuel Music, Robb Scholten, Events Administrator, and Julian Bullitt, Member of the Building Commission; Burkhard Schmilgun, Angela and Eckhardt van den Hoogen, and our colleagues at cpo/classic production osnabrück, for our ongoing recording partnership; and BEMF staff members Maria van Kalken, Carla Chris eld, Brian Stuart, Elizabeth Hardy, Perry Emerson, Corey King, and Esme Hurlburt, for their untiring help in ways too numerous to list here.

W Single-manual Italian harpsichord by Owen Daly, X Salem, Oregon, 2004, courtesy of Peter Sykes.

W German “David’s Harfe” double harp (after a harp found in the Sondershausen castle from circa 1700) X by Claus Henry Hüttel, Düren, 2003, courtesy of Maxine Eilander.

Historical Timeline of Octavia

These cultural events may help to place Octavia in its true surroundings.

1607 Claudio Monteverdi’s Orfeo (BEMF 2012 & 2015), with a libretto by Alessandro Striggio, premieres in Mantua.

1625 Francesca Caccini’s La liberazione di Ruggiero dall’isola d’Alcina (BEMF 2018 & 2023), with a libretto by Ferdinando Saracinelli, created in Florence.

1627 Schütz’s Dafne, the rst German opera, premiered in Torgau, Saxony.

1640 Début of Monteverdi in Venetian public opera: Il Ritorno d’Ulisse in Patria (BEMF 2015), with a libretto by Badoaro.

1643 Monteverdi’s L’incoronazione di Poppea (BEMF 2009 & 2015), with a libretto by Busenello, premieres in Venice.

1647 Luigi Rossi’s L’Orfeo (BEMF 1997), with a libretto by Buti, is performed in Paris.

1662 Cavalli’s Ercole Amante (BEMF 1999), with a libretto by Buti, is performed with ballets by Lully.

1674 Birth of Reinhard Keiser.

1675 Lully and Quinault’s Thésée (BEMF 2001).

1678 Lully rewrites Psyché (BEMF 2007) as a tragédie lyrique

Foundation of the Hamburg Opera; rst production is Theile’s Adam und Eva. Birth of Barthold Feind.

1681 Birth of Georg Philipp Telemann. Birth of Johann Mattheson.

1683 Blow’s Venus and Adonis (BEMF 2008 & 2009) thought to have premiered in London. Charpentier writes Les Plaisirs de Versailles (BEMF 2016 & 2019).

Lalande’s Les Fontaines de Versailles (BEMF 2016 & 2019) is performed at Versailles.

1684 Charpentier’s Actéon (BEMF 2008 & 2009) is performed in Paris.

1685 February: Birth of George Frideric Handel (d. 1759). March: Birth of Johann Sebastian Bach (d. 1750).

Charpentier’s La Couronne de Fleurs (BEMF 2011 & 2013).

Charpentier’s La Fête de Reuil (BEMF 2022).

Lully’s Idylle sur la Paix (BEMF 2022).

1686 Charpentier’s opera La Descente d’Orphée aux Enfers (BEMF 2011 & 2013).

1687 Death of Lully.

1688 Steffani’s Niobe, Regina di Tebe (BEMF 2011), with a libretto by Orlandi, premieres in Munich.

Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas (BEMF 2010), with a libretto by Tate, is performed in London.

1691 Conradi’s Ariadne (BEMF 2003), with a libretto by Postel, opens in Hamburg.

Purcell’s King Arthur (BEMF 1995), with text by Dryden, is performed in London.

Steffani’s Orlando generoso (BEMF 2019), with a libretto by Mauro, premieres in Hanover.

1694 Desmarest’s Circé (BEMF 2023), with a libretto by Saintonge, premieres in Paris.

Keiser’s rst two operas premiere: Procris und Cephalus in Brunswick, and Basilius in Hamburg, both to librettos by Bressand.

1695– Six Steffani operas, presented a few years earlier in 1699 Italian in Hanover, are performed in German translation in Hamburg.

1696 or Keiser named musical director of Oper am 1697 Gänsemarkt in Hamburg, a post he holds until 1718.

1699 André Campra’s Le Carnaval de Venise (BEMF 2017 & 2021), with a libretto by Jean-François Regnard, opens in Paris.

1703 Keiser’s opera Claudius, to a libretto by Hinsch, premieres in Hamburg, the rst German opera to include some arias in Italian; this becomes a regular feature of Hamburg operas going forward.

1704 Death of Charpentier.

Reinhard Keiser’s Almira composed for Hamburg on a libretto by Feustking, but premiered in Weissenfels in July.

1705 January: Handel’s rst opera, Almira, Königin von Castilien (BEMF 2013), with a libretto by Feustking, premieres in Hamburg.

February: Handel’s second opera, Nero, with a libretto by Feustking, opens in Hamburg.

August: Keiser’s Die edelmühtige Octavia (BEMF 2025), with a libretto by Barthold Feind, premieres in Hamburg.

Keiser and Handel in Hamburg

Reinhard Keiser was the Director of the Hamburg Opera and its leading composer when the eighteen-year-old Handel arrived in 1703. Keiser decided to compose the score to the libretto of Almira for a 1704 premiere, but upon running into nancial dif culties he decamped, leaving Hamburg in the lurch, ultimately completing and producing his Almira in Weissenfels. Hamburg needed to nd a new composer to set the libretto, as work on their production had already commenced. With the second composer in line, Johann Mattheson, too busy with his own opera (Cleopatra), the commission passed on to “the new kid”: Handel wrote it as his rst opera. When Keiser returned to Hamburg, he realized that Handel had scored a major hit with Almira (January 1705) and he had to move quickly to re-establish his preeminence. Handel’s second opera, Nero (February 1705) not having been a popular success (the score does not survive), Keiser jumped in with a different take on the same story. Octavia for August 1705 is the result.

I think it is also fun and noteworthy that Handel clearly took Octavia with him to Italy in 1706 and plundered it mercilessly for his own cantatas and particularly the 1709 Agrippina.

1706 Handel leaves for Italy.

1707 Graupner’s Antiochus und Stratonica (BEMF 2020), with a libretto by Feind, premieres in Hamburg.

1708 Handel’s La Resurrezione (BEMF 2017) is created in Rome.

1709 Handel’s Agrippina, with a libretto by Grimani, premieres in Venice.

1710 Birth of Giovanni Battista Pergolesi. Mattheson writes Boris Goudenow (BEMF 2005).

1718 Handel’s Acis and Galatea (BEMF 2009, 2011 & 2015) is rst performed.

1721 Death of Barthold Feind.

1722 Telemann becomes the director of the Hamburg Opera.

1725 Telemann’s Pimpinone (BEMF 2021 & 2025) premieres in Hamburg as an intermezzo between acts of Handel’s Tamerlano.

1728 Telemann’s Emma und Eginhard premieres in Hamburg. Death of Steffani.

1733 Pergolesi’s La serva padrona (BEMF 2014, 2017 & 2021) premieres in Naples.

1734 Pergolesi’s Livietta e Tracollo (BEMF 2014, 2017 & 2021) premieres in Naples.

1737 John Frederick Lampe’s The Dragon of Wantley (BEMF 2023), with a libretto by Henry Carey, premieres in London.

1738 The Hamburg Opera closes due to nancial problems.

1739 Death of Keiser.

1759 Death of Handel.

1761 Telemann’s serenata Don Quichotte auf der Hochzeit des Comacho (BEMF 2024), with a libretto by Daniel Schiebeler, premieres in Hamburg.

1765

Telemann’s cantata Ino (BEMF 2021 & 2025), composed when he was 84 years old.

1767 Death of Telemann.

—Paul O’Dette, Stephen Stubbs, and Gilbert Blin

Octavia, the rebel opera of a noble-minded poet

“A poor reputation is a clock subject to frequent repairs.”

Simon

Bignicourt (1709–1775) in Pensées et ré exions philosophiques, 1755.

Die Römische Unruhe, oder Die Edelmühtige Octavia (The Roman Rebellion, or The Noble-Minded Octavia), with music by Reinhard Keiser (1674–1739) and a libretto by Barthold Feind (1678–1721), premiered in Hamburg at the Oper am Gänsemarkt on August 5, 1705.

Hamburg operas of the late seventeenth century embrace artistic liberties that might otherwise be seen as unconventional even for the eyes and ears of opera lovers, past and present. While such liberties in dramatic composition could risk appearing excessive if not carefully executed, Feind masterfully integrates them, reinforcing the status of his opera Octavia as a landmark of German Baroque opera.

Taking liberties with the historical fate of the Roman Empress Octavia, Nero’s consort, the opera enriches its narrative with additional historical events, interpolated with great artistic liberty. In his rst original libretto for Keiser, Barthold Feind sets a new standard for the German stage, positioning Octavia as a bold and innovative work from one of opera’s most signi cant German theorists.

A staged performance of Octavia invites audiences to reconsider both their understanding of the historical gures of the rst century and the ways in which late-seventeenthcentury opera reimagined them. As a quintessential example of an “opera of memory,” Feind and Keiser’s Octavia encapsulates both a distinctive vision of the Roman Empire and the distinctive artistic style of the Baroque age.

1678. Private Collection.

Octavia (late 39 or early 40 AD – June 9, 62 AD) was the daughter of Emperor Claudius and his third wife, Valeria Messalina. After her mother’s death and her father’s remarriage to Agrippina the Younger, she became the stepsister of the future Emperor Nero, Agrippina’s son. She also became his wife in a politically motivated marriage arranged by Agrippina, who sought to secure Nero’s political future. Empress Claudia Octavia was popular with the Roman people, but her marriage was disastrous. When Nero’s mistress, Poppaea, became pregnant, he divorced and banished Octavia, claiming she was infertile. The decision provoked a public outcry, leading Nero to accuse Octavia of adultery and order her to commit suicide. These are the facts on which historians generally agree.

Octavia’s tragic fate made its way to the stage rather quickly. Her doomed relationship with Nero is the subject of the play Octavia, the only surviving example of a Roman drama based on Roman history. Although sometimes attributed to Nero’s tutor, the philosopher Seneca (who died in 65 AD), it was written by an unknown author after Nero’s death in 68 AD. The play dramatizes the downfall of Claudia Octavia and represents her as Nero’s virtuous and popular wife. Nero, increasingly tyrannical and obsessed with his mistress Poppaea Sabina, decides to divorce Octavia and marry Poppaea. The action unfolds with the Ghost of Agrippina (Nero’s murdered mother) rising at the beginning, prophesying Nero’s eventual downfall. Octavia is mourning her fate, feeling powerless

against Nero’s cruelty and Poppaea’s ambitions. Seneca tries to counsel Nero towards moderation and justice, but Nero ignores him. Poppaea is portrayed as ambitious and ruthless, eager to see Octavia cast down. The Roman populace (the “Chorus”) sympathizes strongly with Octavia, lamenting her fate and criticizing Nero’s tyranny. The play ends with a bleak vision of Octavia’s exile and the people’s grief, emphasizing the decline of moral and civic Roman values under Nero’s rule.

Aside from the play Octavia, there were few ancient sources that a late seventeenth-century writer interested in the fate of Empress Octavia, Nero’s consort, would have consulted rst. These surviving historical accounts of Nero’s life, written by non-contemporary witnesses, were often biased, leaving signi cant gaps that invited speculation and fabrication. Unlike other emperors, Nero’s real life remained somewhat obscure, largely due to the intrinsic biases of the surviving evidence. The bulk of what is known about Nero comes from Tacitus, Suetonius, and Cassius Dio, historians who had little sympathy for Nero and who wrote long after the emperor’s death. Tacitus and Suetonius wrote their accounts more than 50 years after, while Cassius Dio wrote his history over 150 years later. Although these posthumous sources contradict each other on certain events in Nero’s life, they are consistent in their condemnation of him. Tacitus’s own experience of the tyranny, corruption, and decadence during the reign of Domitian (81 AD–96 AD) may explain the bitterness and irony in his political analysis, particularly regarding the factors that led to such conditions. Through their portrayals of Nero, all three writers highlight the dangers of unchecked power, the pursuit of authority unrestrained by moral principle, and the confusion and instability caused by the concentration of wealth in the hands of a few. Feind doubtlessly found great material in their accounts, if not on their damaging take on Nero’s reign.

In opera’s early years, most dramma per musica drew inspiration from the myths and history of classical antiquity. Beginning in the mid-seventeenth century, operas and other dramatic works increasingly focused on the life of Nero. The ancient Roman play Octavia likely in uenced some of these works, alongside the writings of ancient historians, which were then becoming more widely available through translation and new printed editions. After Claudio Monteverdi’s opera L’incoronazione di Poppea (Venice, 1643), the characters of Nero and Octavia appeared in several Italian operatic works. Alongside these operatic adaptations, the excesses of Nero’s reign have also been explored in spoken theater. In addition to Britannicus (1669), Jean Racine’s quintessential French tragedy about Octavia’s doomed younger brother, an English work, The Tragedy of Nero, Emperour of Rome (1674) by Nathaniel Lee must have attracted the attention of Barthold Feind, whose interest for English theater is well documented. The list of characters of this action-packed play includes Octavia, Nero, Seneca, Piso (who conspired against Nero), Poppaea, Agrippina,

Britannicus, and Emperor Caligula’s ghost. In 1708, Feind noted in his Gedancken von der Opera (Thoughts about Opera): “I am not of the same opinion as the French writers who imitate the ancient Greeks and Romans and let the most important deeds to be narrated in their Tragedies so that the actor’s best action consists only of a melancholy report, mainly when it has to do with the fall of a person. In this the English are here also completely different from them.”

An admirer of the historical dramas of German playwright Daniel Casper von Lohenstein (1635–1683), Feind would have known his 1665 tragedy, Agrippina; it centers on the downfall of Nero’s mother. In uenced by Shakespeare, the play features the characters of Octavia, Nero, and Seneca, as well as the ghost of Britannicus.

Octavia is also the subject of the massive German novel Die Römische Octavia (1677–1707) by Anton Ulrich, Duke of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel. Originally published in three volumes in 1677, this Baroque novel was highly successful at the time. Decades later, it was completed with three additional volumes between 1703 and 1707, around the time Octavia was created in Hamburg. Keiser’s relationship with the Duke was a decisive one. In 1694, when he was twenty, he had been appointed court composer by the Duke of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel and presented his rst opera, Procris und Cephalus, in the recently built opera house. Common themes can be found in Feind’s libretto and Anton Ulrich’s novel. Both works juxtapose historical accounts of the imperial court—drawn from the sources available at the time—with fictional elements, which primarily unfold in the private spheres of Rome. These two narrative levels are intricately connected: on one hand, Octavia endures persecution by Nero, while on the other, Roman nobles engage in the political intrigues surrounding Nero’s overthrow. This interplay of history and invention is rst re ected in the opera’s original title, Die Römische Unruhe (The Roman Rebellion), emphasizing how Nero’s tumultuous life lent itself to dramatic reenactment.

Like the novel, which uses history as a foundation for creative storytelling, dramatic works about Octavia and Nero take considerable liberties with historical events. Some even feature happy endings, where all the characters survive and are ultimately reconciled. The same applies to Reinhard Keiser and Barthold Feind’s opera Octavia (1705). The presence of key protagonists—Nero, Seneca, and Octavia— and the underlying conflict between the governance envisioned by the Senate and the People of Rome versus Nero’s personal ambitions, which drive the emperor to defy legal and moral constraints for the sake of love, establish clear connections to the rst-century drama Octavia.

Feind’s later theoretical writings on opera emphasize that a poet should not be con ned by reality, arguing that the truth of the stage operates on a different level. This principle is evident in his treatment of history in Octavia, his rst libretto for Keiser. While the fate of the Empress remains the central

subject, it is approached with signi cant creative liberty. Beyond Octavia’s story, Feind expands on other events of Nero’s reign, freely incorporating historical events that took place years apart. He intertwines the Pisonian conspiracy to overthrow Nero with the visit to Rome of Tiridates, King of Armenia, who pledges allegiance to the Empire. This blending of historical moments serves to heighten the dramatic impact of the opera, illustrating Feind’s belief in the stage’s capacity to transcend strict historical accuracy for the sake of compelling storytelling.

In the libretto of Octavia, these political events are structured around the Pisonian conspiracy, which occurred in 65 AD. While Feind’s treatment of the conspiracy does not yet achieve the grand, epic scale that later nineteenth-century operas would bring to such historical plots, it nonetheless adds depth to Octavia’s character. Rather than portraying her merely as a passive victim of Nero’s cruelty, Feind introduces an emotional connection between Octavia and Piso, who loves her, offering a reinterpretation of her historical fate. In this version, the virtuous Octavia is saved from her forced suicide by Piso, giving the story a dramatic twist that diverges from historical accounts.

The Pisonian conspiracy, led by Senator Piso, took place in 65 AD, three years after Octavia’s death—while the visit of Tiridates, King of Armenia, as a client ruler of Rome, suggests an even later setting, in 66 AD. In Feind’s Octavia, these events collide within a ctional timeline. However, of cial and administrative records indicate that conspiracies were indeed unfolding around the time of Tiridates’s visit to Rome, making the opera’s dramatic liberties not entirely detached from reality. The Roman of cial calendar records that at the beginning of 66 AD, sacri ces were made to celebrate the thwarting of a conspiracy against the emperor. Other sacri ces marked a military victory, likely connected to the campaigns in Armenia. The Romans had successfully nalized an agreement establishing Armenia as a Roman protectorate while allowing Tiridates to retain his throne. This arrangement was formalized with a grand coronation ceremony in Rome in May of 66 AD, accompanied by numerous public prayers of thanksgiving decreed by the Senate. Furthermore, to accommodate this solemn occasion, the religious festival of Dea Dia was postponed by one month and celebrated in mid-June. This intense succession of state celebrations took a toll on Nero’s health—by late summer, sacri ces were offered for his well-being, as he was reportedly suffering from a cold. Later in the year, Nero faced yet another conspiracy, prompting further sacri ces “for having foiled a new conspiracy against the emperor.”

The operatic potential of this turbulent period—marked by political unrest, religious ritual, and personal suffering—was keenly appreciated by Feind. His libretto for Octavia captures this historical moment with a striking balance of historical observation, psychological depth, and acute political insight. While Feind, under the pressure of Hamburg’s preference for

Nero, and the lists of his evils Engraving by Jean Picquet (fl. 1611–1650) from Suetone.

De la vie des douze Cesars. Nouvellement traduit en français by Jean Baudouin (1584–1650), published by Jean Richer, Paris, 1611. Private Collection.

happy endings, altered the fate of Octavia and the historical outcome of the Pisonian conspiracy, he successfully crafted a series of powerful moments that gradually build dramatic tension. The nal scene when the emperor comes back to his senses can even be interpreted as Nero’s redemption. Feind’s construction of the libretto demonstrates a keen understanding of what made opera appealing to Hamburg audiences. By alternating between public and private events, he allows the audience to follow the characters’ psychological journeys while also incorporating large-scale scenes with choruses and dances to ensure an engaging spectacle for the city’s diverse paying audience. Additionally, elements from various years of Nero’s reign were skillfully woven into the plot, creating enough twists and turns to captivate both the rich patrons in the boxes and the lower classes in the parterre

Keiser, then co-artistic director of the Oper am Gänsemarkt, had been demanding crowd-pleasing operas from his librettists. Claudius, which premiered in Hamburg in 1703, was Keiser’s most recent attempt to stage the grandeur of Imperial Rome. The libretto, written by Heinrich Hinsch (1650–1712), blends a wide array of elements—both historical, featuring Octavia’s parents Emperor Claudius and Empress Messalina, and mythological, including the gods

Silenus, Minos, and others. Roman soldiers share the stage with Bacchantes and Satyrs, while the city of Rome itself opens directly onto mythological settings such as Pluto’s cavern. This extravagant fusion, however, was not to Feind’s taste. In Octavia, he sought to elevate the style of opera by grounding it in human events and historical locations. While he does not entirely abandon mythology or the supernatural, he gives them a unique dramatic function: the gods in Octavia appear only as ctional characters portrayed by actors under Nero’s stage direction. In doing so, Feind integrates the emperor’s histrionic tendencies as a cultural reality, seen from the perspective of the main characters.

This effect is further emphasized by the absence of GrecoRoman gods in Feind’s Octavia, a stark contrast to their frequent appearances in other operas of the period. The spectacle of elaborate stage machinery, with ying deities and mythological effects, is not fully present—or at least not in the same direct way. The audience is not expected to perceive these divine gures with the same reality as the historical characters. This choice may also have been in uenced by the preferences of Hamburg’s audiences. As early as 1697, Christian Heinrich Postel, in the multilingual preface to his libretto Der geliebte Adonis for Keiser in Hamburg, offered a lengthy apology for the inclusion of “pagan fables.” Feind himself noted in 1708 that Hamburg audiences had become “totally disgusted by the pagan fable of deities.” Instead of presenting pagan gods as divine beings, Feind integrates them into the staged entertainments orchestrated by Nero in honor of the sovereigns of Armenia. By assigning them a representative function—as characters in a play within the play—Feind skillfully constructs a cultural environment that re ects both the spiritual beliefs of Nero’s time and the emperor’s own theatrical obsessions. The year following Octavia, in the preface to his libretto

for another opera with Keiser, La costanza sforzata (1706), Feind explicitly articulates his perspective on the purpose of German Baroque drama: “Characteristics vary with each nation according to the custom of the times, for our plays, especially the musical ones, are vastly different from the ancient tragedies and comedies of Euripides, Sophocles, Seneca, Plautus, Terence, and by now also the later German ones of Lohenstein, Gryphius, and Hallmann. The French, in turn, differ from the Italians and Germans in many works because of the composition of the music as well as the poetry.” Feind’s comparison with the dramatists of classical antiquity is of particular signi cance—both culturally and aesthetically—and his engagement with Roman authors is evident in several of the dramaturgical decisions he made in Octavia.

After the Greek theater giants, Feind begins his list of ancient writers with Seneca. In addition to his knowledge about the play Octavia, which Feind—like all his contemporaries— attributed to Seneca, he also integrates the stoic philosopher as a character in his libretto. As Nero’s tutor, Seneca is portrayed as a voice of reason amid the young emperor’s growing instability. His main role, however, centers on staging a psychodrama in which Octavia appears to Nero as her own ghost, and therefore he is also presented as a dramatist. The scene begins with a series of hallucinations: Nero envisions the spirits of his mother Agrippina, his greatgrandmother Antonia, and various Romans who plotted against him and were executed on his orders. These visions serve as ominous portents and re ect Nero’s inner turmoil. Encouraged by Seneca—who seeks to exploit Nero’s guilty conscience—Octavia performs her own ghostly apparition to accuse him of his crimes. Feind was undoubtedly in uenced by Shakespeare for this scene, the dramatic power of which inspired the illustrator for a later edition of his libretto. The ghost of Octavia drives Nero into a spiral of self-doubt and repentance. For the rst time in the opera, he seems to recognize that his cruelty will leave him unloved and alone— yet also realizes it is too late to change. He contemplates suicide, only to be brought back to reality by the arrival of his loyal guards.

Beyond his exploration of tragic elements through Seneca, Feind also draws inspiration from the comedies of Plautus and Terence. Publius Terentius Afer (ca.195/185 BC –ca. 159 BC), better known as Terence, was a prominent playwright during the Roman Republic. He authored six comedies, all adaptations of Greek originals. After his death, and especially during the imperial period—including the reign of Nero—Terence became second only to Virgil as the most widely read and studied Latin poet. He remained a staple of the school curriculum, even as other Republican authors were supplanted by Augustan poets and, after the rst printed edition in 1470, became a standard name in the Classical Studies. Alongside Terence, the comedies of Plautus were also based on Greek originals adapted to suit Roman tastes. His plays often preserved much of the Greek structure

The tomb believed to be the one of Nero outside Rome “Sépulcre P. Vibii Mariani sepulchrum. Hors de Rome.” (The tomb of P. Vibius Marianus. Outside Rome.)

welcomes Pan and his

masks

Engraving by Pieter Schenck (1661–1715) after Johann von Sandrart (1606–1688) from Nouveau theatre d’Italie ou description exacte de ses villes, palais, églises. published by Pierre Mortier, Amsterdam, 1704. Private Collection.

and themes while infusing them with Roman avor, making them more accessible and appealing to local audiences. As the earliest surviving complete works of Latin literature, Plautus’s comedies were rediscovered during the sixteenth-century Renaissance humanism. The German editions produced by Veit Werler in the 1510s played a signi cant role in the early reception of Plautus in German-speaking regions. Feind may also have consulted one of the many French editions circulating throughout Europe at the time, widely available in both academic settings and private libraries.

An anonymous frontispiece vividly echoes the libretto of Octavia and sheds light on how Plautus was perceived in the early eighteenth century. At the center of the image stands the god Pan, bearing a globe on his back like Atlas, surrounded by theatrical masks. The image of Pan bearing the globe like Atlas may symbolize the universality of theater and its divine or mythological roots in early modern iconography. To the right, Plautus is depicted seated at his desk, crowned with poetic laurels and writing on a scroll. In the lower left corner, a winged Cupid holds a mask and faces the gure of a genius presenting a scroll titled Les Comédies de Plaute In the background, behind a proscenium arch, a stage is visible, populated by characters from all of Plautus’s plays.

These gures are arranged in a formation reminiscent of a Baroque chorus, with men and women standing apart—an arrangement that highlights both the enduring relevance of Plautus’s work and its in uence on the theater of the time. This sense of theatricality is heightened by a draped curtain above the composition, evoking the idea of theater within the theater—a concept Feind employs in Octavia. Inspired by the known poetic and theatrical ambitions of the emperor Nero, Feind stages a scene in which Nero offers the Queen of Armenia a performance in his own private theater, merging imperial vanity with performative spectacle. Feind’s use of meta-theatrical elements is evocative of contemporary trends and mirrors what was known of Nero’s own performance on stage, recorded in ancient sources like Suetonius.

Among the comedies of Plautus, Mostellaria may have held relevance for Feind, as its title translates from Latin as The Ghost. In this play, when the master returns home unexpectedly, his slave invents an elaborate story to prevent him from entering the house, claiming it is haunted by the ghost of a man who was cruelly murdered there. The play, which draws on the popular belief that a violent death leads to a restless spirit, may have inspired Feind in crafting the two ghost scenes in Octavia. Death is a constant presence throughout

Octavia: from the evocation of lives lost in the recent war with Armenia, to Nero’s command that Octavia take her own life, and the execution of the failed conspirators led by Piso. Feind intensi es this atmosphere by introducing two supernatural apparitions: the “real ghosts” that appear in the graveyard scene, and Octavia herself, who appears to Nero in the form of her own ghost. The reaction of Nero to the apparition is made plausible by the presence of “real ghosts” before. Here Feind, playing with the concept of verisimilitude, tries to articulate in practice what he later claims as a principle: “The truth is presented in theatrical performances through ctions, for otherwise, it wouldn’t be verse that is spoken and sung. The stage only imitates nature to a certain degree, and anyone who wants to see something entirely natural can turn to the great stage of the world, which offers new presentations every day—not the small one of operas and comedies. A play is, so to speak, merely a shadow play, where one sees something, but touches neither esh nor bone.”

The attention Feind gives to Roman theater in the libretto of Octavia suggests that, while he may have held personal ideas about the development of German drama and, more speci cally, Hamburg opera, he was also aware of the central role the performing arts played in Roman culture. In his libretto, likely inspired in part by Nero’s well-documented passion for the stage, Feind refers no fewer than four times to the arti cial world of the Roman theater. These allusions are evocative of how Romans engaged with the stage, particularly the use of masks by actors, a convention that the Baroque stage absorbed and reinterpreted through forms such as commedia dell’arte, dance, and pantomime.

At the Oper am Gänsemarkt, Friedrich Christian Feustking (1678–1739), who served as poet-in-residence during the 1704–1705 season, also drew on classical themes for the librettos he produced during his tenure. One of the most prominent examples is Almira, Königin von Castilien, set to music by the young George Frideric Handel. Premiered on January 8, 1705, Almira received praise for its music, but Feustking’s text—based on a libretto by Giulio Pancieri, originally set to music in 1691 for a Venetian performance— elicited mixed reactions. Critics expressed confusion or disappointment at the adaptation, and a polemical exchange ensued between Barthold Feind and Feustking. Feind criticized the libretto as being in the “bad taste of the Hamburg parterre” implying that the “cloak and dagger” libretto catered to the lower classes, who stood in what was then the cheapest section of the theater. The season had opened with Johann Mattheson’s Die unglückselige Cleopatra, Königin von Egypten oder Die betrogene StaatsLiebe, Feustking’s rst libretto, which premiered on October 20, 1704. This opera, centered on the fall of Cleopatra and the death of Mark Antony, re ected contemporary interest in Roman history and the moral struggles of imperial gures. Its focus on the political dynamics between Rome and its allies set the tone for the season and laid the groundwork for further exploration of Roman imperial narratives.

More directly relevant to Feind’s Octavia was the opera that followed Almira on February 25, 1705: Handel’s Die durch Blut und Mord erlangete Liebe, oder: Nero (Love Acquired Through Blood and Murder, or: Nero). Although it was performed only three times and ultimately deemed a failure, the opera had a signi cant in uence on Octavia. While the score is now lost, Feustking’s libretto shared the same historical setting—the reign of Nero—and featured many of the same characters, including Nero, Octavia, Seneca, and Tiridates. Feind’s use of these gures in his Octavia, and his continuation of themes related to power, cruelty, and psychological torment, suggests that, despite Feind’s aversion for Feustking, Handel’s Nero served as a key source of inspiration in the shaping of Octavia.

The list of spaces and sets required for the staging of Nero in Hamburg reveals some intriguing similarities with those found in Octavia, including the rare “Fischerey” ( shing pond), which is associated with Nero’s “Palast” (palace), the iconic Domus Aurea (Golden House). This suggests an economical reuse of existing scenic resources from the theater’s “magazine” (scenery storage or repertory). Beyond the speci c recurrence of the “Fischerey” and the general presence of Nero’s imperial “Palast” in both works, the list of spaces in Octavia—where the action unfolds—is compiled by Feind as a collection of Roman architectural landmarks from antiquity. Notably, Feind does not adhere strictly to historical chronology: he includes monuments that Octavia would not have known in her lifetime. Feind’s blending of Roman monuments across time periods re ects a common Baroque practice of assembling a mythical or composite vision of the past, rather than striving for strict historical accuracy.

The spatial arrangements in Baroque operas such as Octavia are not merely backdrops for dramatic action; they are active participants in the construction of meaning. The variety of locations presented on stage—ranging from imperial palaces to more mundane civic spaces—re ects the strati ed nature of Roman society and visually reinforces class distinctions embedded within the narrative. These alternating settings, juxtaposing loci of political power with scenes of everyday Roman life, provide a theatrical microcosm of the Roman world. This interplay between scenography and narrative helps convey a complex understanding of identity, status, and imperial ideology.

In Octavia, the libretto orchestrates encounters between characters of diverse geographic origins, social strata, and political roles. Through these interactions, the opera constructs what might be termed a “spectrum” of Roman society. This spectrum not only encompasses social and political differentiation but also functions ideologically, articulating each character’s position in relation to Romanitas—the set of cultural ideals, legal institutions, and moral values that de ned Roman identity in contrast to external “others.”

Romanitas operated through exclusion as much as inclusion. Central to its logic was the binary opposition to the barbari—a term inherited from Greek (barbaros) that the Romans applied to those outside the Greco-Roman civic and cultural sphere. These “barbarians” were constructed as uncivilized, irrational, and politically immature. In the operatic context, such distinctions are not only implied in dialogue and plot but also embedded within casting choices, costume, gesture, and stage design. For example, the inclusion of Armenians as foreign gures in Octavia—before their assimilation into the Roman Empire— invokes this civilizational hierarchy, reinforcing Rome’s image as a rational and ordered empire pitted against the chaotic periphery. In Octavia the opposition between Roman virtue and Armenian “barbarism” is literalized on stage, with contrasting scenic motifs, musical styles, and costumes assigned to each group. Similarly, Handel’s Nero employs spatial and musical juxtapositions to depict Rome as a morally compromised but still hegemonic center, surrounded by characters who alternately conform to or challenge its ideals. In these operas, Roman identity is not simply asserted—it is dramatized, negotiated, and sometimes undermined, depending on the moral arc of the plot.

Moreover, the reuse and adaptation of scenic elements across multiple operas—such as the appearance of the “Fischerey” or imperial “Palast” in both Nero and Octavia—suggest a scenographic vocabulary that was both symbolic and economical. These shared features serve not only to represent imperial spaces but to carry ideological weight, evoking luxury,

decadence, or authority, depending on their context. This recycling of set pieces re ects the theater’s practical constraints, but also a kind of iconographic shorthand recognizable to contemporary audiences steeped in popular antiquarian culture.

One of the key mediators of that culture was Giacomo Lauro’s Antiquae Urbis Splendor (1615), a volume of imagined reconstructions of ancient Rome widely disseminated and reprinted throughout the seventeenth century. Though present scholars dismiss Lauro’s engravings as largely fantastical, they were then considered serious visual resources and were frequently consulted by painters, architects, and set designers. Through works like Lauro’s, even illiterate spectators were exposed to a mythologized version of Rome: grandiose, idealized, and deeply theatrical. In this way, the opera house became a site where scholarly antiquarianism, popular imagination, and political allegory converged.

Ultimately, operas like Octavia and Nero do more than dramatize historical events: they recon gure antiquity to speak to contemporary concerns—about authority, legitimacy, empire, and cultural identity. The stage becomes a forum where the idea of Rome is not just remembered but actively reconstructed, with Romanitas as both a narrative device and a visual language. In Hamburg, as in other opera houses of the time, the poet librettist worked closely with the set designer to establish a visual language for a convincing theatrical opera performance. The designer of Octavia had to present an attractive visual

realization of Feinds’s poetic vision that would contribute to the success of the enterprise. This was probably the task of Johann Oswald Harms (1643–1708), the set designer who had been commissioned to create the sets for the Oper am Gänsemarkt since 1695.

While Giacomo Lauro may have served as a source of inspiration for the Hamburg production, the most up-to-date visual and textual document likely available to Feind and Harms was The Description of Ancient and New Rome by François Desseine. This work was reissued in 1704 by François Halma in Amsterdam, accompanied by lavish etchings by Jan Goeree (1670–1731). Goeree’s illustrations for the Beschryving van Oud en Nieuw Rome possess a distinctive poetic quality: on a single page, he juxtaposes the ruins of ancient Roman structures with their imagined reconstructions. These architectural renderings are often framed within trompel’œil devices—scrolls pinned to walls—around which gures in classical attire appear to comment or gesture toward the monuments, as if engaged in scholarly or theatrical debate.

The visual effects are strikingly immersive. The illusionistic technique produces a vertiginous sensation for the viewer, especially upon close inspection, where multiple layers of visual narrative coexist within a single composition. These engravings not only functioned as antiquarian documents but also provided a scenographic model, blurring the boundaries between scholarly reconstruction and theatrical imagination. In a comparable fashion, Feind’s libretto can be seen as a dramatic reconstruction of Nero’s Rome, pieced together from historical fragments, literary sources, and visual representations. His approach mirrors that of Goeree: working from the “ruins” of antiquity, he reanimates a coherent, if idealized, Roman world on stage.

Baroque operatic productions, particularly those with Roman subject matter like Octavia, participated in a wider cultural project of reconstructing antiquity—not simply as historical recall but as imaginative reconstitution. Librettists, set designers, and engravers alike engaged with the physical and textual remains of the ancient world to craft new visions that spoke to the aesthetics and ideologies of their own time. Goeree’s etchings are not straightforward topographical views, but rather visual essays in historical imagination. In each composition, he places reconstructions of ancient Roman monuments alongside their present-day ruins, frequently within a single visual eld. Architectural settings are presented as pinned scrolls or unfolded maps, arranged on the backdrop of walls or columns, around which gures in antique dress engage in what seems to be critical commentary or performance. The effect is both didactic and theatrical: Goeree stages the past as a site of ongoing interpretation, mediated through image, viewer, and allegorical participants.

This technique evokes the illusionism of trompe-l’œil but applied not only to space but to time. As the eye moves from crumbling arch to restored temple, from silent ruin to active dialogue, the spectator is drawn into a vertiginous oscillation between history and its reconstruction. The engravings thus operate as a kind of visual dramaturgy, inviting the viewer to contemplate not merely what ancient Rome was, but how it might be remembered, interpreted, and reanimated. Feind’s dramaturgy in Octavia enacts a similar gesture. Working with fragmentary historical sources, a theatrical tradition of Roman imperial narratives, and a popular appetite for classical spectacle, Feind reassembles Nero’s Rome as a dynamic site of political con ict and cultural symbolism. Like Goeree, he does not aim for strict historical accuracy. Instead, he selects and synthesizes elements—architectural, linguistic, social—to construct a version of Rome that is understandable to his audience as both antique and allegorical. The staging of Octavia, which incorporates spatial markers such as the “Fischerey” and “Nero’s Palast”, mirrors Goeree’s interest in the visual tension between ruin and restoration: symbols of imperial grandeur are embedded in a narrative of decline, echoing contemporary concerns with authority and decadence.

Furthermore, both Goeree and Feind position their respective audiences—viewers of prints and spectators of opera—not as passive recipients but as interpreters. The inclusion of costumed gures pointing toward architectural reconstructions in Goeree’s engravings nds its parallel in the way Feind uses characters from different social and geographic backgrounds to comment on, participate in, or resist the imperial order. In both media, antiquity is rendered not as a distant past but as a

In Octavia—Barthold Feind’s first libretto for Reinhard Keiser—Feind offers not a faithful historical account but rather his own imaginative version of Roman history. Drawing on ancient sources but treating them with creative liberty, Feind constructs a text tailored to the culturally diverse and intellectually curious audiences of early eighteenth-century Hamburg. In doing so, he repositions antiquity as a realm of interpretive play, accessible to both connoisseurs of classical learning and spectators in search of vivid theatrical spectacle. The double title of the work boldly announces the duality of the action and the protagonist.

Feind’s manipulation of the chronology of Nero’s reign is central to this project. By altering the pacing and sequencing of historical events, he enables Keiser to explore time not as a rigid historical continuum but as a exible dramatic tool. This innovation allows the opera to present antiquity in a dual mode: on the one hand, as a kind of archaeological reconstruction—an earnest attempt to reveal, interpret, and stage the past with scholarly

living structure that invites active engagement. Thus, Goeree’s illustrations and Feind’s libretto belong to a shared Baroque impulse: the reconstruction of antiquity as a layered, mediated experience. Each deploys illusion, juxtaposition, and citation to evoke Rome—not as it was, but as it might be imagined, remembered, and staged anew.

ambition; on the other, as an entertaining theatrical ction that breathes life into a dead empire through music, gesture, and scenography.

This double vision—part antiquarian, part dramatist—de nes the aesthetic of Feind and Keiser’s collaborations. Over the course of their next operas, they would continue to blend Roman motifs with action-packed dramaturgy, populated by emperors, generals, and historical gures. Their version of the past, while ltered through Baroque imagination, is not just a setting for exotic grandeur, but a mirror for contemporary concerns: power, virtue, ambition, and downfall.

Rome held a strong visual and ideological presence in Hamburg at the time. The northern city was not simply fascinated by the ancient world as a distant spectacle, but engaged with it as a framework for learning, identity, and cultural aspiration. Two years after Octavia, in 1707, Feind articulated his broader views on opera in Gedancken von der Opera (Thoughts on Opera).

There, he argued for opera as a self-suf cient artistic form, distinct from spoken drama. His assertion that opera could stand as an autonomous and intellectually valuable genre anticipates the later claims of Johann Mattheson, who in 1728 declared: “The opera is in itself a little art world, constructed from various building materials on an imposing stage and made with much learning.”

Mattheson’s claim underscores the pedagogical and encyclopedic ambitions of early eighteenth-century opera. It is telling that he included the libretto of Octavia among his recommended books for a cultivated Hamburg lady’s library—a sign that Feind’s text was valued not just as entertainment, but as literature. The libretto could, in Mattheson’s view, stand independently from both music and stage—an artifact of learning, worthy of contemplation and rereading. Octavia uses classical names and events not for antiquarian accuracy, but as a dramaturgical eld of satire, pathos, and human con ict.

es how Baroque opera could transform antiquity into a exible, multifaceted construct—at once an educational tableau, a moral mirror, and a thrilling spectacle. Through Feind’s libretto and Keiser’s music, Rome is not preserved as a museum piece but reanimated as a living world on a singing stage.

(Re)Constructing a Baroque World in Boston

Any reconstruction contains the seeds of artistic freedom and imagination. While the Cambridge and Oxford Dictionaries de ne reconstruction as “building something again that has been destroyed” and “an attempt to repeat an event,” they also hint at the creative potential in reconstruction when de ning it as an “impression” of a past event. The eighteenthcentury artist, architect, writer, and antiquarian, Giovanni Battista Piranesi (1720–1778), attempted in many of his prints to reconstruct ancient Rome for his audiences and collectors (see Figures 1 and 2). While Piranesi maintained a scholarly rigor throughout his study of archaeology, in his passion for the subject, he was also unafraid to dream up possible pasts. He has thus been described by modern scholars as combining science with pure invention. Despite this invention, his works still give us one of the clearest and most complete “impressions” of ancient Rome. Minuscule architectural details as well as entire monuments from his

prints can still be recognized in ancient ruins today. It was his very invention which still makes his reconstructions so alluring, engaging, and convincing. Although Piranesi’s fame has eclipsed that of seventeenth- and eighteenth-century stage designers, he is in many aspects indebted to their work and the world of the Baroque stage.

Piranesi’s combination of outright fantasy with disciplined scienti c study is the same approach as that of Baroque stage and costume designers as well as librettists and composers. For operas that took place in ancient Rome, conjuring a convincing world was, similar to Piranesi, part science, part invention. The idea of the creative potential embodied in a reconstruction served as a fundamental idea in the conception of BEMF’s 2025 production of Octavia on multiple levels. First, we had to decipher how theater artists in late seventeenth- and early eighteenth-century Hamburg—where

Octavia premiered in 1705—would have interpreted ancient Rome. What sources were available for them to study? Had they traveled to the Italian peninsula? What did they make of the concepts of “historical accuracy” or “reconstruction”? Second, as artists and practitioners of theater today, we had to decide where and to what degree to bring in our own artistic voices into a historically informed staging. How do we capture an “impression” of something based on the fragmentary parts which have come down to us?

During the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, Rome was a popular location to recreate on stage, appearing in countless operas. At the same time, emperors, kings, and princes across Europe styled themselves as “Romani” in festive processions and costumed celebrations aligning themselves with the legacy of the Roman emperors. Rulers even had genealogies fabricated which showed them as direct descendants of gures like Julius Caesar. There was a strong interest in visually reviving the glory of Rome, something which theater and opera were perfectly suited to do. The artists creating costumes and stage designs for these ephemeral events served as forerunners to Piranesi. Piranesi even apprenticed under the stage designers Giuseppe and Domenico Valeriani in Venice and closely studied the works of (and possibly studied with) the Galli Bibiena family. While such theater artists formulated their ideas from the expanding wealth of knowledge on ancient Rome, dispersed through illustrated books and growing collections of antique sculpture, as artists working for the theater, they also had to invent and imagine.

Johann Oswald Harms and Octavia

For Octavia, we can say with near certainty that the stage designs were created by Johann Oswald Harms (1643–1708). Harms became “Dekorationsmaler”—a term literally meaning “decoration painter” (“decoration” referring to the painted sets)—for the Hamburg Oper am Gänsemarkt in 1695. He remained in that position until 1701 but continued to work for the Hamburg Opera on

individual projects after that. As a scenic designer around 1700 at a public opera house, his sets were not just created for a single opera and thrown away, but added to the stock and reused. By 1705, the year of the premiere of Octavia, the Hamburg opera would have had a huge inventory of set pieces designed by Harms. In Boston for BEMF, a similar practice has been set in place by Gilbert Blin starting in 2008. Each centerpiece opera contains mostly new set pieces but includes several that have appeared in past shows. This practice was mainly possible in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries due to the standardized technical machinery built into Baroque theaters. Obviously, the city of Boston has no Baroque theaters with original built-in stage machinery, so behind the set pieces at the Cutler Majestic, a technical system imitating that of a Baroque stage has been devised, overseen by Technical Director Gordon Manson and Production Manager Mercedes Roman-Manson. This allows for the reuse of some scenic pieces and a standard system for integrating new ones.

In designing the stage for Octavia, part of my research involved understanding Johann Oswald Harms’s design aesthetic as well as how he would have interpreted ancient Rome. He did make his own grand tour to the Italian peninsula in the 1660s. Horst Richter, the rst scholar to create a monograph on Harms, Johann Oswald Harms. Ein deutscher Theaterdekoratur des Barock (1965), places Harms in Rome from approximately 1665 to 1668. Several of Harms’s surviving sketches depict Roman monuments with enough detail and geographic information that we can still gure out exactly where Harms sat and drew (see Figure 3). By 1669 he was in Venice, where he would have learned about stage practices, developments in scenic technology, and have been able to see many operatic performances rst hand. It is highly likely, but based only on circumstantial evidence, that Harms travelled through Vienna on his way back to Hamburg. In Vienna he could have met the imperial theater engineer Lodovico Ottavio Burnacini who had brought a Venetian in uence to the Viennese court, and whose stage designs were widely disseminated through engravings.

We are extremely lucky that a large collection of Harms’s drawings and sketches today survive at the Herzog Anton Ulrich Museum in Braunschweig, Germany. Consulting these drawings proved instrumental in conceiving the stage for Boston and understanding Octavia. While the Oper am Gänsemarkt in Hamburg was heavily inspired by Venetian Opera both in the design of the opera house itself and the works performed there, it still had a uniquely northern style and approach.

Within Harms’s surviving drawings in Braunschweig, none can be de nitively linked with the 1705 production of Octavia. However, two rough sketches are labelled with “nerone”—likely referring to George Frideric Handel’s opera Die durch Blut und Mord erlangte Liebe, oder: Nero (Love Obtained through Blood and Murder, or: Nero), performed just months before Octavia (see Figures 4 and 5). The two operas likely shared some scenic elements and sets. The rst set unveiled to the Boston audience in 2025, as the curtain rises, is the Imperial Hallin the palace of Nero, described in the libretto as being decorated with columns. The design is taken directly from two of Harms’s sketches. I was able to identify within the drawings in Braunschweig a drawing of a backdrop and a matching drawing of a shutter which were previously catalogued apart from one another with no link made between them (see Figures 6 and 7). Using Harm’s designs as a base I redrew the two drawings and digitally painted them since Harms’s originals were only pen and ink (see Figures 8 and 9). The single shutter sketch was then mirrored and repeated on either side of the stage and missing parts of the backdrop sketch completed based on Harms’s architectural details. In June 2025 in Boston, audiences are

thus able to see the separate scenic elements reunited and the entire scene reconstructed at full-scale for the rst time since approximately 1705.

A second scene for our production of Octavia also draws directly from Harms’s work: the Fishery in the Imperial Menagerie directly before the intermission (see Figure 10). The backdrop for this scene with pond, Neptune statue, and classically inspired pavilions with grotto-like details is derived from an anonymous gouache painting created after a design by Harms. The small gouache painting, today in the collection of the Staatsbibliothek Berlin, commemorates the celebrations held in Hamburg for the crowning of the King of Prussia in 1701. Music for the event was composed by Reinhard Keiser. While Harms’s stage designs were created especially for the event, it is possible that they entered the stock and could have been reused for productions such as Octavia, just a few years later.

For other scenes of Octavia, we have had to be even more inventive and imaginative. While the opera itself was chosen primarily for its musical excellence, the libretto contains over fourteen different locations, an exciting but quite dif cult challenge for a design and directorial team. In realizing the piece, we have chosen to merge similar locations in a way that does not over-simplify the opera but ideally strengthens the dramaturgy and the clarity of the story. For example, several less-de ned locations, such as various streets and alleyways around the Capitoline Hill in Rome, as well as the outdoor Flaminian Market, have been merged and represented with a single street scene. For several scenes taking place in different parts of the countryside outside

Rome, I have decided to use a painting by Nicolas Poussin (1594–1665) as the base for a backdrop. Although Poussin was a classical French painter, he was, like Harms, highly in uenced by Italy. He arrived in Rome roughly forty years before Harms and painted many Italian campagna landscapes. His compositional arrangements and placement of gures, have a distinct theatricality and arti ciality which complements the Baroque stage. It is even said that as studies for his paintings, Poussin arranged little wax gures within boxes, just like a stage design model. In his painting used as a base for the backdrop, a temple, placed directly in the center and indicating a proximity to Rome, is uncomfortably and rather strangely blocked by a rough hill, serving as a form of visual dramaturgy that foreshadows the more ominous operatic events to come (see Figure 11).

The unifying of several locations from the opera into single scenic typologies is not simply the result of technical or other limitations we face today while bringing Octavia to a modern stage. It was not uncommon that a libretto would describe settings with more detail, while the stage showed more consistent, conventional spaces. Just as certain stock theatrical characters such as those found in commedia dell’arte would be recognizable to audiences and conjure certain associations and emotions, so too would speci c scenic typologies such as a forest, a royal hall, or a street scene. The deeper spatial speci city could be read by those with the printed libretto, and for those only watching, the repetition of certain sets would make the story clearer and easier to follow. Additionally, despite the technical marvel that the Baroque stage was, it was not unlimited in the visual

scenes it could present. Moveable ats could most easily be changed at intervals and the technical apparatuses, despite their versatility, could not display unlimited scenes. There are reports of travelers to Venice commenting on awkward breaks and loud, clunky scenic changes made in full view of the audience. Despite the Hamburg theater being modelled on Venetian precedents (it was constructed by a Venetian architect, performed much Venetian repertoire, and was the rst public opera house outside of Venice), we have decided not to attempt to reenact this part of the experience.

In creating a historically informed staging for BEMF’s Octavia we have managed to come closer to many of the original designs than ever before. While only a few of Harms’s drawings have a reference to “nerone” and may have been used for either (or both!) Handel’s Nero and Keiser’s Octavia in their respective 1705 premieres, his work provides a perspective on the general aesthetic and visual interpretation of ancient Rome that would have been glimpsed on the Hamburg stage. While we have worked rigorously to study and present historical accuracy, like Keiser and Harms (as well as Piranesi), we have not held back our imagination and the potential for new waves of creativity. Through the close study of period documents during archival visits to collections across Europe, and to site visits of the ancient locations of Nero’s Rome, we have traversed the many layers of the ancient city—invented, lost, and actual— and present our “reconstruction” of Octavia

—Alexander McCargar

A Note from the Musical Directors on Keiser’s Octavia

The years 1703 to 1705 were an intense period of creativity and turmoil at the Hamburg Gänsemarkt Opera concerning in particular three artistic protagonists: Reinhard Keiser (1674–1739), George Frideric Handel (1685–1759) and the librettist Barthold Feind (1678–1721). In the summer of 1703, Keiser, already the leading composer of the Hamburg Opera as well as its musical director for around six years, also became the formal Director of the Opera (his directorship lasted until 1707). Although not documented, this development may have been a motivating factor in the arrival at Hamburg of the eighteen-year-old Handel. Keiser was widely recognized as the leading operatic composer in Germany, and it is well within the realm of possibility that the young Handel wanted to be in the orbit of this iconic composer.

These three were by no means the only prominent artists of the Hamburg Opera at this time: other young composers drawn to the Hamburg Opera around Keiser included Johann Mattheson (who called Keiser “the greatest opera composer in the world”), Johann Christian Schiefferdecker, and Christoph Graupner; and on the literary side Christian Heinrich Postel (1658–1705) had been the leading librettist of the Hamburg Opera since his rst libretto (Eugenia) in 1688. From then until his last (Pomona in1702), he wrote twenty-six libretti for Hamburg, the last seven of which were all created for Keiser. He became the model for a generation of younger librettists including Christian Friedrich Hunold, Heinrich Hinsch, Friedrich Christian Feustking, and Barthold Feind himself. In the years after Postel’s nal libretto in 1702, Keiser had composed operas on the libretti of each of these authors until the decisive moment when he began the new long-term relationship with Feind when they worked together for the rst time on Octavia.

Both Keiser and Handel composed operas on the libretto for Almira . The relationship between the two was complex to say the least. Ruggiero Fedeli (ca. 1675–1722) had set a Venetian libretto from 1691 for Brunswick (Braunschweig) in 1702. Keiser had the Italian text translated into German by the novice librettist Feustking (1678–1739), retaining fteen of the original Italian aria texts, intending to produce it for Hamburg. Keiser even reused three of Fedeli’s aria settings to accommodate the singer of the title role who had sung it in Brunswick. Keiser’s Almira was slated for performance in Hamburg in 1704, but instead Keiser suddenly departed for Weissenfels—it was presented there instead. With Keiser’s departure, and Mattheson’s occupation writing his own Cleopatra for the fall of 1704, it fell to the young Handel (who had not yet composed an opera) to set the libretto, which was then premiered in January 1705. The reason

for Keiser’s precipitous departure for Weissenfels has been variously explained, but the most likely of these (as noted by the leading Keiser scholar John H. Roberts) is related by Handel’s biographer John Mainwaring: that Keiser, “being a man of gaiety and expense, involved himself in debts, which forced him to abscond.”

This set the stage for Handel’s Almira in January 1705, which was a great success for the young composer— although it also attracted the sharp criticism of the libretto by two of Keiser’s literary allies, Hunold and Feind. Handel then proceeded to produce his second opera, Nero, for Hamburg in February. This, however, was not considered a success, and gave Keiser the opportunity to make a triumphant return to the Hamburg stage in August of 1705 with his new opera (with a very similar cast of characters to Handel’s Nero) on a new libretto by Feind: Octavia.

Feind, alone amongst his fellow librettists for the Hamburg Opera, occupied himself with aesthetics, seeking to formulate a cohesive theory of opera. These thoughts found expression in various prefaces to his libretti, but most importantly in his 1708 Gedanken von der Opera (‘Thoughts on the Opera’). There are a few things, particular to the genre of the Hamburg Opera which are worth mentioning here:

1. The integration of Italian texted arias: This was rst introduced in Keiser’s 1703 opera Claudius. Here the librettist was Hinsch, one of the librettists of the “interregnum” between Postel and Feind. After the introduction of these Italian arias (an idea which remains controversial until the present day) it was almost universally adopted for future Hamburg operas. Feind expresses his opinion about this usage in the foreword to Octavia: “Since the delicacy of the Italian language has been introduced in other operas, which has drawn the ears of the audience to itself with a kind of hidden tickling, I decided to add some to this work as well.” (“Weil auch bisher die Delicatesse der Italienische Sprache in andern Opern die Ohren der Zuschauer durch eine verborgene Kitzlung an sich gelocket/ so habe aus dieser Ursache einige hinzu gefüget.”)

2. The presence or absence of the “fool”: Feind seems to have been the leading advocate of banishing the traditional role of the “fool” (equivalent to that role in Shakespearean drama) which was traditional to the Hamburg opera. He writes about this on various occasions, but in particular in his foreword to the libretto for Octavia, he notes that he would

rather have dispensed with the character of Davus altogether (in keeping with Aristotle’s dictum vis-àvis the genre of tragedy), but he felt moved to include this comic gure for the sake of the audience.

More importantly, Feind approached the libretto for Octavia with a combination of “historically informed” scenarios and opportunities for the exploration of psychological drama. Please read the article by Gilbert Blin for an in-depth exploration of these elements. Feind and Keiser must have recognized something in each other that caused them, after the artistic success of Octavia, to work together on at least six further collaborations. There are many things that could be enumerated to express the particular musical and dramatic success of Keiser’s score for Octavia (the richness of the orchestration, including the very prominent use of two, three, or ve bassoons, and the rst known use of the natural horn in opera are easily identi ed markers of Keiser’s musical ambition here), but the musical realization of Feind’s later scenes, including the apparition of Octavia impersonating her own ghost, and most particularly the Act III scenes of Nero’s tortured internal dialogue ( rst encountering a series of the persons he had wronged, then the “ghost” of Octavia, and nally contemplating suicide before pulling back from the brink) called forth a musically dramatic language from Keiser of an intensity that went beyond anything before it. In particular, breaking through the

traditional dichotomy of aria and recitative to explore the emotional potential that was possible through the use of orchestrally heightened declamation (which came to be known as recitativo accompagnato), seems like a clear precursor of later usage by Handel and even Mozart. In Conradi’s Ariadne of 1691, the earliest complete surviving opera from Hamburg (BEMF 2003), we have the rst use (to my knowledge) of this technique in the annals of opera—although the relatively lightly studied eld of late-seventeenth-century Italian opera may yet bring earlier examples to light. But it seems that the composers of the Hamburg opera were borrowing ideas from the German oratorio (many composers wrote both opera and oratorio).

As early as 1709, in Handel’s Agrippina, he uses a clearly related technique to highlight the emotional turmoil of Ottone when he discovers that Poppea has been unfaithful to him. In this light, we can see Keiser’s Octavia as substantially more than just an excellent example of the tradition of early eighteenth-century Hamburg (German) opera. It is, in fact, a central event in the career of Keiser and Feind, and a model for German opera throughout the eighteenth century.

—Stephen Stubbs, May 2025

Summary of the Plot of Octavia

Rome, rst century CE. Tiridates, the King of Armenia, arrives in Rome with his wife, Ormœna, to demonstrate allegiance to the Roman Empire. During their visit, Emperor Nero becomes infatuated with Ormœna while Tiridates regains his crown. Driven by his desire to marry Ormœna, Nero commands his wife, Empress Octavia, to end her own life. However, Piso, who is in love with Octavia, intervenes and prevents her suicide. He then launches a rebellion against Nero, who ees. On the advice of Seneca, Octavia disguises herself as

a ghost and appears before Nero, accusing him of murder. Deeply moved by this haunting encounter, Nero is struck with remorse for his actions. After Piso’s rebellion is crushed, Nero discovers that Octavia is still alive. Recognizing Piso’s noble intentions in saving the empress’s life, Nero rewards him by forgiving his attempted coup. In the end, harmony is restored in Rome, and Octavia’s noble heart triumphs.

—Gilbert Blin and Ellen Hargis

Synopsis of Octavia

PART I

A Hall in the Imperial Palace

The imperial army has conquered Armenia, and in Rome, the court praises Emperor Nero, who orders the construction of a monument in his honor. Seneca, the Imperial Advisor, warns Nero against succumbing to hubris. Empress Octavia joins Nero, and they express their mutual affection. They are interrupted by Lepidus, a chamberlain, who announces that the Armenian King Tiridates has arrived to declare his allegiance to Rome. Octavia is uneasy, fearing that Nero’s decision to restore Tiridates’s throne will provoke unrest among the Roman people, while Davus, a court quartermaster, mocks the thirst for power.

A Street in Rome by the Capitoline

When Tiridates and Ormœna, his Queen, appear before Nero, Ormœna humbly thanks him for the return of her husband’s crown. Nero is captivated by her charms as he instantly restores Tiridates’s throne. Piso, a Roman patrician, and Imperial General Fabius hide their consternation at the return of Armenia, recalling the loss of so many Roman lives during its conquest. Octavia, noticing Nero’s growing infatuation with Ormœna, confronts him, but her words fall on deaf ears. Determined to celebrate the occasion, Nero commands a grand feast to honor the visiting King and Queen that very night. While Ormœna revels in Nero’s attentions, Octavia struggles with jealousy and heartbreak. Despite her anguish, she resolves to remain patient, lamenting the loss of Nero’s affection but clinging to hope for its return.

Flaminio Market in Rome

Princess Livia, a young kinswoman of Nero, mourns the absence of a lover. Fabius, who is besotted with Livia, persistently seeks her favor, only to be rejected. Lepidus joins Fabius and both vent about the Armenian affair. Their rant is interrupted by Piso, who aspires to be Emperor. Alone, he confesses his love for Empress Octavia. Princess Clelia gives him troubling news from the palace: Nero has severely punished a senator for daring to criticize the emperor’s decision to restore Tiridates’s crown. Piso, observing the growing madness of the tyrant, warns that the political tides may soon shift. After his departure, Clelia re ects on her attraction to King Tiridates.

A Hall in the Imperial Palace

Nero, ignoring the discontent of the Roman patricians, hosts a grand feast in honor of King Tiridates and Queen Ormœna. During the revelry, the court joins in singing and dancing, yet underlying tensions simmer. Members of the court whisper about their new infatuations, jealousies, and frustrations over the lavish honors Nero has bestowed upon the foreign king and queen. Davus muses about the folly of rulers.

A Street in Rome by the Capitoline

Princess Clelia is wooed by Lepidus, but she is not won over. Meanwhile, Nero wrestles with his growing obsession for Ormœna. Despite the Queen’s protests in support of Empress Octavia, Nero declares that he no longer loves his wife and decrees that Octavia must die. Ormœna, torn between pity and ambition, is eventually swayed by Nero’s passionate declarations of love. Lepidus arrives, and Nero entrusts him with the task of commanding Octavia to kill herself. A distressed Lepidus reveals Nero’s order to Tiridates, unaware that Clelia has overheard their conversation.

A Country Road near Tivoli

Octavia mourns the loss of Nero’s affection and resolves to accept her fate with dignity. Piso joins her and reveals Nero’s deadly scheme. Although moved by Piso’s concern, the noble-minded Octavia is resigned to her destiny. When Piso confesses his love for her, Octavia rebukes him for harboring such inappropriate feelings.

A Fishing Pond in the Imperial Gardens

The court gathers for a shing party, trying to decipher omens in the sh they catch, but their revelry is interrupted by a sudden storm. The party scatters in search of shelter, and Octavia and Ormœna nd themselves alone together. Octavia confronts Ormœna about Nero, alluding to her rival’s role in the emperor’s betrayal though accepting her own doom.

PART II

Flaminio Market in Rome

Consumed by jealousy, Tiridates struggles with his resentment about Nero and Ormœna. Fabius warns him to be discreet. Their conversation is interrupted by Livia. Both men express their admiration for her, but Livia rebuffs their advances and urges Tiridates to remain faithful to his wife. Soon after, Piso delivers a ery speech to his fellow conspirators, condemning Nero’s tyranny and the deteriorating state of Rome under his rule.

A Country Estate, where Octavia is Held Prisoner

Octavia, held captive and resigned to her fate, prepares herself for death by poison or dagger. As she steels herself, Nero, accompanied by Lepidus, comes to witness her nal moments. Piso also hides nearby, watching the scene unfold. Octavia bids farewell to life and raises the dagger. Overcome with con icting emotions, Nero cannot bear to watch her die and leaves. Piso then intervenes, seizing the dagger and discarding the poison. Octavia protests, insisting that defying the emperor’s orders is treason, but Piso swears vengeance, vowing to kill Nero and end his tyranny.

A

Graveyard

Davus, grumbling about the absurdity of love, is gathering bones from the graveyard to make a potion against it. He is frightened by ghosts, who then chase off some gravediggers.

Flaminio Market in Rome

Seneca re ects on the destructive passions of human life and cautions Nero that his illicit affair with Ormœna threatens Rome’s stability and the whole of the Roman Empire. Nero is de ant and unwavering; he dismisses Seneca’s warnings and clings to his obsession.

Nero’s Theater

A theatrical performance is held by Nero in Ormœna’s honor: Flora, the goddess of spring, brings Cupids and gentle breezes. The festivities are interrupted by rebels who storm the theater, calling for Nero’s death and declaring Piso the successor to the throne. Thanks to Fabius’s loyalty to the Empire, Nero, unnerved and his mind in disarray, narrowly escapes the plotters.

Flaminio Market in Rome

Piso leads his rebels against the Imperial forces, now commanded by Fabius. Piso is defeated and captured. Following the battle, Fabius once again presses Livia for her affection, and she declares that she will seek Nero’s approval to reward him for victory over the rebels.

A Desolate Field

Seneca tells Octavia that Nero has ed Rome. He advises Octavia to disguise herself as a ghost and appear before Nero, hoping to terrify him into abandoning his destructive

path and restoring order to his mind and therefore to Rome itself. Nero wanders, raving and hallucinating, accompanied by Sporus, his favorite. Exhausted, he collapses into sleep. Octavia appears, pretending to be her own ghost, and demands that he answer for his crimes. Confused and terri ed by this vision, Nero is shaken to his core. Overcome with guilt, he repents his in delity and yearns for reconciliation with Octavia. Fabius arrives, reporting that the rebellion has been quelled and Piso imprisoned. Grateful for his faithful service, Nero rewards Fabius by granting him Livia’s hand in marriage.

A Street in Rome by the Capitoline

Tiridates and Ormœna, now reconciled, are walking together when Clelia approaches with troubling news: Piso is to be executed. The couple, moved by his fate, vow to attempt to secure his release. Meanwhile, Lepidus once again pleads for Clelia’s love. Realizing that Tiridates will never be hers, Clelia nally accepts Lepidus. The court gathers for the public execution. Seneca and Fabius offer thanks to the gods for Nero’s safety. Nero, still haunted by guilt for having ordered his wife to die, summons Piso to face punishment for plotting against him and failing to prevent Octavia’s suicide. Upon learning from Seneca that Piso has in fact saved Octavia, Nero relents. In a gesture of imperial mercy, he pardons Piso and asks for the gods’ blessings on the newly united couples. Octavia arrives, and Nero publicly apologizes to her; she nobly forgives him. With peace restored, love should prevail.

—Gilbert Blin and Ellen Hargis

Octavia

Die Römische Unruhe, oder Die Edelmühtige Octavia. The Roman Rebellion, or The Noble-Minded Octavia.

Music by Reinhard Keiser (1674–1739)

Libretto by Barthold Feind (1678–1721)

English Translation by Stephen Stubbs

First Performance: Hamburg, Oper am Gänsemarkt, August 5, 1705

Die Römische Unruhe.

Oder:

Die Edelmühtige OCTAVIA.

In einem Sing=Spiel, Auf dem grossen Hamburgischen Schau=Platz aufgeführet.

Gedruckt im Jahr 1705.

Personen.

Nero, Römischer Käyser.

Octavia, dessen Gemahlin.

Tiridates, König aus Armenien.

Ormœna, des Königs Gemahlin.

Livia, eine Latinische Princeßin, mit dem Käyser verwandt.

Piso, ein Campanischer Fürst und Römischer Patritius.

Clelia, eine Florentinische Princeßin.

Fabius, Käyserl. General.

Seneca, ein Stoischer Philosophus und Käyserl. Raht.

Lepidus, ein Cammer=Herr.

Davus, Hof=Fourir.

Sporus, des Käysers Freygelaßner. Im Spiel stumm.

Flora mit einigen Ze rn und Amouretten

Einige Römische Fürsten, Cavalliers, Dames, Edel=Knaben, Fischer, Soldaten, Gratien, aufrührische Bürger &c.

The Roman Rebellion. Or:

The Noble-Minded OCTAVIA.

A music theater piece given at the Great Theater of Hamburg.

Printed in 1705.

Characters.

Nero, Roman Emperor.

Octavia, his wife.

Tiridates, King of Armenia.

Ormœna, the King’s wife.

Livia, a Latin Princess, relative of the Emperor.

Piso, a Campanian Prince and Roman Patrician.

Clelia, a Florentine Princess. Fabius, Imperial General.

Seneca, a Stoic Philosopher and Imperial Adviser.

Lepidus, a Chamberlain.

Davus, Court Quartermaster.

Sporus, the Emperor’s freedman. Mute.

Flora with Zephyrs and Cupids

Some Roman Princes, Gentlemen, Noble Ladies, Noble Youths, Fishermen, Soldiers, Graces, Rebellious Citizens, etc.

Entréen und Reyhen=Täntze.

Des Käysers und der gantzen Hof=Statt.

Der Todten=Gräber.

Der Fischer.

Der Winde.

Der Dames und Cavalliers.

Der Geister.

Der Amouretten.

Der Schau=Platz ist die Gegend in und um Rom.

Octavia

Erster Handlung.

Erster Auftritt.

Der Schau=Platz zeiget einen mit Seulen=Stellungen geschmückten Verhör=Saal, mit einem Thron=Himmel, unter welchem der Käyser von vielen Römischen Fürsten und Edelleuten fussfällig verehret wird. Auf einem besondern Tische liegen Kron und Scepter.

Nero, Fabius, Piso, Lepidus, Seneca seitwerts.

Chorus

Herrsche glücklich, grosser Käyser!

(Auff des Käysers Wink richtet sich das Volck wieder auff.)

Nero

Wo Titans frühes Morgen=Licht

Für Jovis Allmacht muß erröhten, Wenn es beschämt der Lüffte Dämmrung bricht; Wo Cynthia aus Ehrfurcht scheint erblast, Und wo Olympus Wolcken=Last

Des Atlas Stützen hat vonnöhten, Sey mir ein Denckmahl aufgericht!

Aria. Nero.

Atlas stützt den blauen Bogen

Von dem hohen Firmament.

Gleiche Last ist dem gewogen, Der der Herrschafft Bürde kennt.

Atlas &c.

Chorus

Herrsche glücklich, grosser Käyser!

Nero

Läst Seneca sein Vivat nicht erthönen, Da uns das Volck gebückt

Den Zoll getreuer Wünsche schickt, Und unser Haupt die Sieges= und Friedens=Palmen krönen?

Entrées and Line-Dances.

The Emperor and his entire Court. The Gravediggers. The Fishermen.

The Winds.

The Noble Ladies and Gentlemen

The Ghosts

The Cupids.

The Scene is the area in and around Rome.

Octavia

Act One.

Scene One.

The scene shows a reception room decorated with columns, and a raised throne, in which the Emperor is obediently honored by many Roman Princes and the nobility. On a special table the crown and scepter are displayed.

Nero, Fabius, Piso, Lepidus, Seneca from the side.

Chorus

Reign happily, great Caesar, reign happily! (At a signal from the Emperor, the crowd stands up again.)

Nero

Where Titan’s early morning light blushes before Jove’s omnipotence, when it is shamed into the breaking dawn; where Cynthia (the moon) pales in awe, and where Olympus’s heavy cloud cover needs Atlas’s support, there let a monument be raised to me!

Aria. Nero.

Atlas supports the blue arch Of the heavenly rmament. An equal burden is given to he Who knows the weight of ruling.

Atlas…

Chorus

Reign happily, great Caesar, reign happily!

Nero

Does Seneca not raise his voice in “Vivat” now that the kneeling public sends its tithe of good wishes, and our head is crowned with wreathes of victory and peace?

Seneca

Was nützet dir ein leerer Schall, Den deine Schmeichler hören lassen?

Sey nicht so sicher vor dem Fall, Denck, daß im Labyrinth Verworffner Eitelkeit Hochmuhts=Gedancken Flügel sind, Die Wahn wie Wachs in das Ge eder fassen.

Aria. Seneca.

Ruhig seyn, sich selbst gelassen, Ist der Seelen wahres Gut. (Geht ab. Nero steigt vom Thron.)

Nero

Geh immer hin mit deiner Ruh, Und sieh nur für dir selber zu.

Anderer Auftritt. Octavia. Vorige.

Octavia und Nero à 2

Octavia

Kan dich mein Arm umschliessen,

Nero

Ich meine Schöne küssen, à 2

So steht mein Geist in Ruh.

Lepidus

Dünckt Eurer Majestät nicht Zeit zu seyn, Dem König aus Armenien Den Vorlass anzudeuten?

Nero

Mach’ ihm kund, Daß wir zur Stund Ihn in der Burg zu sehn Uns gleich bereiten, Und führ ihn selbst herein. (Lepidus tritt ab.)

Dritter Auftritt. Vorige. Davus hernach.

Octavia Kriegt er die Krone denn zurücke?

Nero

Der Fried ist so gemacht.

Octavia

Was sagt das Volck? Mich daucht es sey verdrossen:

Seneca

What use do you have for the empty noise that your sycophants make ring in your ears? Be not so sure of your situation; remember that in the Labyrinth of pro igate vanity, pride-addled thoughts are wings, in which madness, like wax, can get stuck in the feathers.

Aria. Seneca.

Be at peace, return to your true self, That is the soul’s real treasure. (He leaves. Nero descends from his throne.)

Nero

Go away with your “peace,” and look out for yourself!

Scene Two. Octavia joins them.

Duet. Octavia and Nero. Octavia

If my arms can embrace you…

Nero

If I can kiss my beauty…

Both …Then my soul is at peace.

Lepidus

Does it not seem to your majesty that it is time to admit the Armenian King into your presence?

Nero

Let him know, that we at this hour are preparing ourselves to meet him in the castle— and bring him in yourself. (Lepidus leaves.)

Scene Three. Davus joins them.

Octavia

Will he be given his crown back?

Nero

Peace was agreed on this basis.

Octavia

What do the people say? They seem angry to me.

Nero

Was Volck? Wir haben es beschlossen, Wer murrt, dem bricht man das Genicke.

Piso und Fabius à 2 (Wie stoltz ist er bey seinem Glücke!) (Davus kommt.)

Davus

Ein Herr mit vielen Edelknaben

Hat an den Käyser eine Sach, Und ist bereits im Vorgemach, Ihm vorbringen, Daß er so gern möcht eine Krone haben. (Ich muß auch eins von Kronen sagen.)

Aria. Davus.

Will man gerne Kronen tragen, Thut man wohl, Es dem Käyser anzusagen. Das geht ein, Dieweil allein Nur ein Käyser krönen soll.

Fabius

Der König tritt schon ein.

Piso

Soll man die Paucken lassen schallen?

Nero

Thut nach gefallen. (Er steigt mit Octavia auf den Thron.)

Aria. Nero.

La Roma trionfante, Viva in ogni Età.

Con penna d’Adamante Mio nome scriverà.

La Roma &c.

Vierdter Auftritt.

Unter dem Schall der Paucken und Trompeten naht sich der König Tiridates und Ormœna mit vielen Dames, Cavalliers und Edelknaben zu dem Throne und knien.

Ormœna und Tiridates à 2 Durchlauchtster, ist dein Zorn vergangen, So laß doch deinen Gnaden=Schein

Mit neuen Strahlen prangen.

Nero

Auf, auf, geliebte Freunde.

Nero

What people? We have decided it so. If someone grumbles, he will have his neck broken.

Piso and Fabius (How proud he is in his luck!) (Davus arrives.)

Davus

A Gentleman with a large entourage seeks an audience with the Emperor, and is already in the antechamber to present his plea to have his crown restored. (I also have to say something about crowns!)

Aria. Davus.

If one would like to wear a crown, One would do well To tell the Emperor. That is true, Because only An Emperor can bestow a crown.

Fabius

The King is already entering.

Piso

Should we let the timpani sound?

Nero

If you like.

(He ascends the throne with Octavia.)

Aria. Nero.

Triumphant Rome

Shall live forever!

And with an adamantine pen, My name shall be written! Triumphant Rome…

Scene Four.

Amidst the sound of trumpets and timpani King Tiridates and Ormœna, with many noble ladies, gentlemen, and children, enter to the throne and kneel.

Ormœna and Tiridates

Your most serene highness, if your anger has abated, let your mercy shine forth with a new light.

Nero

Please stand, beloved friends.

Ormœna

Soll deine Magd sich glücklich nennen, So laß Armenien bekennen, Daß ihm die schon verlohrne Krone Der Käyser wiederschenckt zu einem Gnaden=Lohne, Wir bleiben dir treu biß ins Grab.

Nero

So holder Schönheit spricht man nichtes ab. Denn weil euch Rom als Feinde Hinfort nicht mehr zu fürchten hat, Setzt Nero dir, mein trautster Thiridat, Die Krone wieder auf das Haupt. Ormœna, deiner Hand Will ich das Scepter reichen, Zum Zeichen

Der Herrschafft über das erhaltne Land, (Der Herrschafft über dieses Hertz, So deine Schönheit mir geraubt.)

(Fabius und Lepidus überreichen Kron und Scepter auf einem Sammtnen Küssen.)

Ormœna und Tiridates à 2

Für diese Gnad bleibt Hertz und Seele dein.

Fabius und Piso à 2

(O Schimpf, O Spott!)

Piso

(Was mit so vielem Blut und Leben Erworben ist, so wieder hinzugeben.)

Nero (Unschätzbar=schönes Engelbild!)

Ormœna

Ist mir erlaubt, Der grossen Käyserin In Unterthänigkeit die Hand zu küssen?

Nero

Dein Wille ist mein Wunsch, Octavia, Bereite dich, Reich Hand und Mund ihr hin. (Ach Tiridat ist glücklicher als ich!)

Octavia

Ich wünsche Glück zu dieser neuen Ehre.

Nero (Ormœna, du entzündest mich!)

Lepidus, Fabius und Piso à 3

Der Himmel gebe doch, daß sie beständig wäre!

Ormœna

Your maidservant will count herself lucky, if Armenia [Tiridates] acknowledges that his lost crown was restored by the Emperor’s generosity: we will remain true to you unto the grave.

Nero

One can deny nothing to such a noble beauty. Because Rome no longer sees you as enemies to be feared, from now on Nero himself, my trusty Tiridates, places your crown once again upon your head. Ormœna, I place the scepter in your hand as a sign of your dominion over that land (and your power over this heart, which your beauty has stolen from me).

(Fabius and Lepidus present the crown and scepter on a velvet pillow.)

Ormœna and Tiridates

For this merciful act, our hearts and souls are yours.

Fabius and Piso (O scandal! O mockery!)

Piso (That which was won with so much blood and loss of life—just to give it back like that!)

Nero (Unfathomably beautiful Angel!)

Ormœna

May I be allowed to kiss, in servitude, the hand of the Empress?

Nero

Your desire is my command. Octavia, prepare yourself… extend your hand and mouth to her! (Ah, Tiridates is luckier than I!)

Octavia I wish you luck with this new honor.

Nero (Ormœna! Ormœna, you set me a ame!)

Lepidus, Fabius, and Piso Heaven grant that this blessing remain constant!

Piso (Pfuy, daß ich diß bekennen müssen.)

Nero (Ormœna, du entzündest mich!)

Octavia

Mein Käyser. (Er sitzt in Gedancken.)

Nero (Ormœna, du entzündest mich!)

Octavia

Wie ist doch mein Gemahl so still?

Nero (Ach Tiridat ist glücklicher als ich!)

Octavia

Wie so still?

Nero

Ich sinne auf ein Freuden=Spiel.

Octavia

(Das mich vielleicht mit Reu und Leyd erfüllt.

Kömmt etwa ihm Ormœn schon schöner für als ich?)

Mein Käyser, höre doch ein Wort

An diesen Ort.

(Sie ziehet ihn seitwerts.)

Aria. Octavia.

Geliebte Augen, sagt, wo zielt ihr hin?

Schaut nicht in einen frembden Spiegel, Ich bin ja euer Gegenstand.

Nero

Octavia, zur Ehre und Vergnügen

Des Königs und der Königin

Werd’ heut ein Fest vollzogen, Eh’ sich Diana zeigt an ihrem Bogen.

Octavia

(Ich spühre schon, daß ich verrahten bin.)

Nero

Drumb nöhtige die neue Gäste!

Octavia

(O weh! Der neuen Neben=Buhlerin, Soll ich noch selbst die Spur und Wege zeigen, Mein Ehbett zu besteigen!)

Nero

Nun fort!

Piso (Fie, that I must make such a statement!)

Nero (Ormœna! Ormœna, you set me a ame!)

Octavia

My Caesar! (He is lost in his thoughts.)

Nero (Ormœna! Ormœna, you set me a ame!)

Octavia

Why is my husband so quiet?

Nero (Ah, Tiridates is luckier than I!)

Octavia Why so quiet?

Nero I would like to play a Pleasure Game.

Octavia (A game that will perhaps ll me with sorrow and regret. Does he nd Ormœna more beautiful than me?) My Caesar, listen to my words now:

(She pulls him aside.)

Aria. Octavia.

Beloved eyes, tell me, where are you looking? Do not look in a foreign mirror, I am your constant object.

Nero

Octavia, for the honor and pleasure of the King and Queen, a great feast will be created before Diana appears in the heavens.

Octavia (I already see that I am betrayed.)

Nero Then show our guests the way!

Octavia (O torture! So I must myself show the new mistress the way to mount my wedding bed!)

Nero

Get on with it!

Octavia

Sie werden so gefällig seyn, Dem neuen Freuden=Feste Noch vor dem Abend beyzuwohnen.

Ormœna und Tiridatesà 2

Wir stellen uns, wie sie verordnen, ein.

Octavia

Vielleicht kan ich dir da, wie du verdienest, lohnen.

Fünffter Auftritt. Ormœna.

Ormœna

Nun scheint mein Glück recht Knospen zu gewinnen, Sobald ich nur den Käyser angesehn, Gab er mir seine Glut durch Blicke zu verstehn, Ermuntert euch, seyd froh ihr Sinnen.

Aria. Ormœna.

Non mi negate, Pupille grate, Di vostro sguardo L’acceso ardor.

Se voi scoccate

La luce e il dardo, Piace al mio cor. Non mi &c.

Sechster Auftritt. Octavia.

Octavia

Verlassene Octavia, Dein Ehbett wird verschmäh’t, Des Käysers Auge war als eine Wende, Die sich nach alle Winde dreh’t, Wenn er die Königin ansah. Betrübteste Octavia.

Aria. Octavia.

Geloso sospetto Tormenta l’affetto costante D’un alma penante.

Siebender Auftritt.

Der Schau=Platz verändert sich in den Flaminischen Marckt, und zeigt im Prospect desselben Thor mit den Stadt=Mauren.

Livia

Ach armes Hertz, In was für Noht bistu gebracht!

Durch einen Blick geliebter Augen, Die ich zum ersten mahl betracht,

Octavia (to Tiridates and Ormœna) Please be so kind as to attend our revels now before evening falls.

Ormœna and Tiridates

We will do whatever you command.

Octavia

(Perhaps I can then reward you as you deserve!)

Scene Five. Ormœna alone.

Ormœna

Now it seems that my luck is growing new buds! As soon as I saw Caesar, he let me understand his passion through his glances. Be encouraged and be happy my soul!

Aria. Ormœna.

Do not deny me, Lovely eyes, The burning passion Of your glance: If you shoot Shining arrows It pleases my heart. Do not…

Scene Six. Octavia alone.

Octavia

Abandoned Octavia! Your marriage bed will be de led. Caesar’s eyes were like a weather-vane that turns at every wind when he saw the Queen. Saddest, most miserable Octavia!

Aria. Octavia. Jealous suspicion Tortures the faithful love Of a suffering soul.

Scene Seven. The scene changes to the Flaminian market, and shows in perspective the same city gate with the city walls.

Livia

Ah, poor heart!

What an extreme distress you nd yourself in! Through one glance from beloved eyes, which I saw for the rst time,

Verspührt’ ich eine süsse Macht, Die was emp ndliches in meine Seele bließ, Jedoch sobald mein Schöner mich verließ, Gedacht’ ich Ruhe zu gewinnen, Wol Ruh! nichts als verwirrte Sinnen.

Aria. Livia.

Kehre wieder, Mein Verlangen, Meine Seele seuftzt nach dir!

Achter Auftritt.

Fabius. Livia.

Livia (Unzeitige, verhaste Gegenwart!)

Fabius

Bistu noch nicht ein Trost in meinen Nöhten?

Livia

Darffstu dich nicht erröhten

Auf solche freche Art Mir fürs Gesicht zu treten, Da ich so offt den Zutritt dir versagt?

Fabius

Versagt, doch wieder alle Schuld, Was hab ich denn verbrochen?

Livia

Du kanst nur gehn, diß sey genug!

Fabius

Ach habe nur so viel Gedult, Noch einmahl mich zu hören, Warumb wiltu dich von mir kehren? (Livia kehret sich umb.)

Livia

Dein Wort=Spiel ist nur Wind und Trug.

Fabius

Diß hat der Selbst=Betrug gesprochen, Schau dieses Hertz, nimms hin, es ist dein eigen, Mein Augen=Quell soll tausend Zähren, Die Brust dir tieffe Wunden zeigen.

Livia

(Das Beyleid rührt mich zwar, doch lieb ich ihn noch nicht.) Wer erstlich starcke Glut muß fühlen, Kan sich hernach im Schatten wieder kühlen, Gehab dich wohl, mein Fabius. (Ab.)

I felt such a sweet power which woke something sensitive in my soul. But then, once my fair one left my presence, I expected to regain my sense of peace. What peace? Nothing but confused emotions!

Aria. Livia. Come back to me, My desired one! My soul sighs for you!

Scene Eight. Fabius. Livia.

Livia (Badly timed and hated presence!)

Fabius

Will you give me no comfort in my misery?

Livia

Don’t you blush to come before me in such an insolent fashion, when I have so often rejected your advances?

Fabius

Denied again, and yet guiltless; what have I ever done wrong?

Livia

You can just go now, let that be enough!

Fabius

Ah, have at least enough patience to hear me out; why do you turn away from me?

(Livia turns back.)

Livia

Your little word-games are just hot air and deceit.

Fabius

Thus speaks self-deception in person: just look into my heart, take it, it is yours! My eyes have cried a thousand tears, my heart can show you deep wounds.

Livia

(Pity for him moves me, but still I do not love him.) He who at rst feels loves ames, can then cool himself in the shade. Be well, my Fabius. (she exits)

Neunter Auftritt. Fabius allein.

Fabius

Gehab dich wohl, mein Fabius.

Aria. Fabius.

Du kanst hoffen, Sagt das Glücke, Und macht Thür und Angel offen. Doch mein Hertz

Spricht: Die Hoffnung ist nur Schertz, Nichts als leere Schmeichel=Tücke.

Du kanst hoffen, &c.

Zehnter Auftritt.

Fabius, Lepidus.

Lepidus

Auf solche Arth den Frieden einzugehn, So schlechter Dings mit Reich und Kron zu spielen?

Fabius

Wenn Nero ihn vom Tiridat erbeten, Könt’ er nicht spöttlicher auf unser Seite seyn.

Lepidus

Und warumb giengstu ihn mit ein?

Fabius

Ich must’ ihm ja zu Dienste stehn, Und konte nicht allein auf frembde Seite treten.

Lepidus

Indessen murrt das Volck.

Fabius

Das Volck steht nicht in Ruh, Biß Strang und Schwerd ihm Friede macht.

Lepidus

Der Adel selbst ist schwürig.

Fabius

Laß es gehn.

Sie sehen schon behutsam zu, Wenn man den Degen p egt zu schleiffen, Rom hat ja Dolche, Beil und Strang.

Lepidus

Dis ist zu hitzig auserdacht, Ein Anschlag muß erst langsam reiffen, Kein Degen schützt allein die Kronen dieser Erden.

Scene Nine. Fabius alone.

Fabius

“Be well, my Fabius!”

Aria. Fabius.

Fortune says “You can hope” And seems to open the door. Yet my heart Says: “hope is only a joke, Nothing more than attering tricks!”

Fortune says…

Scene Ten.

Fabius, Lepidus.

Lepidus

To enter into a peace agreement on such terms, and to play around with the empire and the crown like that!

Fabius

If Nero needs to ask Tiridates sometime to have them back, he has already made a mockery of our side.

Lepidus

Then why did you agree to help him?

Fabius

I still need to serve him, and couldn’t go to the other side all by myself.

Lepidus

The people are grumbling now.

Fabius

The people will never be at peace, until the noose and sword and might force them to be peaceful.

Lepidus

The nobility is also troublesome.

Fabius

Let it go, they are already watching attentively while we are sharpening our rapiers. Rome also has daggers, axes and ropes.

Lepidus

Your imagination is getting too heated; an attack must be allowed to slowly ripen; no single sword protects the crowns of this world.

Fabius

Noch Weißheit, noch Verstand

Reicht bey dem Aufruhr eine Hand.

Lepidus

Die Feder und das Schwerdt erhalten beyd’ ein Land.

Fabius

Wie wirds denn endlich werden, Die Zögerung ist hier zu lang?

Lepidus

Ein jeder sucht Gelegenheit

Sich bey bequemer Zeit zu rächen, Und auf den Käyser loßzubrechen.

Fabius

Und weistu mehr?

Lepidus Was denn?

Fabius

Der Piso ...

Lepidus

Fabius.

Fabius

Der wird ...

Lepidus

Was wird er denn?

Fabius

Du wirst noch mehr schon hören, Die Zeit wird alles lehren.

Fabius und Lepidus á 2 Fahr wohl, Ich geh zu meiner {Livien / Clelien}.

Eilffter Auftritt. Piso.

Aria. Piso.

Ich segel auf den Liebes=Wellen, Dieweil es so mein Schicksal heischt, Die Hoffnung, an das Land zu stellen, Hat mich schon manchesmahl geteuscht. Getrost! Beginnt mein Schiff zu wackeln, Will ich mit Freuden untergehn, Es leuchten mir zwey schöne Fackeln, Die nahe bey dem Milch=Weg stehn.

Fabius

Neither wisdom nor reason suf ce to give rebellion a helping hand.

Lepidus

The pen and the sword together preserve a country.

Fabius

When will it nally happen?

The hesitation is taking too long!

Lepidus

Everyone looks for the right moment to seek revenge, and to attack the Emperor.

Fabius

And you know what else?

Lepidus What?

Fabius Piso…

Lepidus

Fabius…

Fabius

He will…

Lepidus

What will he do?

Fabius

You will soon hear more; time will reveal all.

Fabius and Lepidus Farewell, I go to my {Livia / Clelia}.

Scene Eleven. Piso alone.

Aria. Piso.

I sail into the waves of love, Although I may meet my fate there; To leave my hopes on land Has often led to disappointment. Be comforted! If my ship begins to shudder, I will go down with joy! My way is lighted by two lovely torches That rival the light of the Milky Way.

Piso

Octavia ist schön, so sagt die Liebe, Noch mehr als schön, diß zeugen meine Triebe. Entzündtes Hertz, Beklemmter Sinn, Was legt ihr ihr vor Nahmen bey?

Ach Schmertz!

Sagt, was ihr ihr vor Nahmen gebet. O weh! Die Furcht macht daß ihr bebet, Und zitternd fragt: Ist sie nicht Käyserin?

Die Schönheit macht, daß ich dich liebe, Dein hoher Stand, daß ich mich nur betrübe, Schön= und getreue Käyserin!

Aria. Piso.

Porto il seno tra tto d’un dardo, Che un bel guardo dal ciglio vibrò; La saëtta e fatale, Altro strale nel petto non vò, Porto il seno tra tto d’un dardo, Che un bel guardo dal ciglio vibrò.

(Clelia kömmt.)

Zwölffter Auftritt. Clelia. Piso.

Clelia

Was seuffzestu?

Piso

Etwas verborgenes stöhrt meine Ruh.

Clelia

Hastu gesehn das Hauß des Lucius zerstöhren, Des Lucius, den man den Tapfern hieß, Das Nero niederreissen ließ?

Piso

Muß ich denn stets von seinem Wüten hören? Was war die Schuld?

Clelia

Weil er den Raht berieff, dem Käyser vorzutragen, Dem Tiridat den Frieden abzuschlagen. Jedoch es ist nicht Zeit hie lange zu verweilen, Weil man zur Burg muß eilen, Das Freuden=Fest mit anzusehn.

Piso

Nur kurtze Zeit Gedult, Es möchte wohl bald anders gehn. (Trit ab.)

Dreyzehender Auftritt. Clelia.

Piso

Octavia is beautiful, so says my love; more than just beautiful, so says my desire. En amed heart, oppressed senses, why should her Name matter so much? Oh pain!

Say, what does her Name mean? O torture! Fear makes me quake and tremble to ask: “Is she not the Empress?” Beauty makes me love you, yet your high station lls me with sorrow, fair and faithful Empress!

Aria. Piso.

My heart is pierced by an arrow Which a lovely glance shot from her eyes. This arrow is deadly, I want none other in my breast. My heart is pierced by an arrow Which a lovely glance shot from her eyes. (Clelia arrives.)

Scene Twelve. Clelia. Piso.

Clelia

Why do you sigh?

Piso

Something secret and hidden is destroying my peace.

Clelia

Did you see that Lucius’s house is destroyed; Lucius, the one who was called “the brave”: Nero ordered its destruction.

Piso

Must I always hear about his rages? What was his crime?

Clelia

He summoned a special council to advise Nero not to make peace with Tiridates. However, now is not the time to dally here, we must hurry to the palace to see the joyous festivities!

Piso

Have a bit of patience; it will soon go a different way entirely. (He leaves.)

Scene Thirteen. Clelia.

Clelia

Auf die Gedancken bracht’ ich ihn, Umb meiner Gegenwart sich zu entziehn, Und etwas Ruhe zu gewinnen, Meinem Schicksal nachzusinnen.

Umb mich seufftzt Lepidus, Ich aber muß

Des Tiridates Blicken

Getreue Seufftzer wieder schicken.

Furcht, Anmuht, Freude, Schmertz, Vergnügen, Läst Cypripor aus seinem Köcher iegen.

Aria. Clelia.

Holde Strahlen, wehrtes Licht, Das aus schönen Augen bricht, Du entzündest mehr und mehr!

Vierzehender Auftritt.

Das Theatrum verändert sich in einen zum Spielen gewidmeten Platz im grossen Vorhoff der Käyserl. Burg, mit einem Amphitheatro, in welchem des Cupido himmlischer Pallast zu sehen. In der Lufft schweben viele Gratien und Liebes=Götter in verschiedenen Machinen.

Nero mit Ormœna, Tiridates und Octavia, Piso und Livia, Fabius und Lepidus mit Clelia, Davus mit der gantzen Hoffstatt.

Nero

Zu ihrer Ehr ist dieser Platz erbaut, Und im Pallast, der dorten wird geschaut, Soll heut das Abendmahl gehalten werden, Dieweil die Lieb ein Himmel ist auf Erden. Denckt daß die Gratien uns selbst bedienen!

Auf, auf, ihr Liebsten und Getreuen, Bereitet euch gleich mit gesammter Schaar, Diß edle Paar

Mit einem Tantze zu erfreuen, Last Lieb und Lust in euren Hertzen grünen.

(Sie schliessen hierauf ins gesamt einen Kräyß, in welchem noch unterschiedliche Dames und Cavaliers treten. Unter Absingung folgender Aria, gehet die gantze Suite herumb, Nero bleibt immer in der Mitte.)

Aria. Tutti.

Amor Amor reitzt zum Springen, Zu dem Spielen, zu dem Singen, Drum verbannet alles Leid In Ewigkeit.

Die frohe Zeit Machet beym spielenden Streit Hüpfen und Lachen und Schertzen

Dem Hertzen Bereit.

Amor Amor &c.

Clelia

I got him to think about something so that I could get away from him, in order to have some peace and quiet to re ect on my own fate. Lepidus sighs for me… I, however, have to send true sighs in the direction of Tiridates’s glances.

Fear, Grace, Joy, Pain, Pleasure, y forth from Cupid’s quiver.

Aria. Clelia.

Noble rays, worthy light, Shining forth from fair eyes, You en ame me more and more!

Scene Fourteen.

The scene changes to a sporting ground in the large forecourt of the royal palace, with an amphitheater in which Cupid’s heavenly palace can be seen. In the air many graces and cupids are seen oating in various machines.

Nero with Ormœna, Tiridates and Octavia, Piso and Livia, Fabius and Lepidus with Clelia, Davus with all the courtiers.

Nero

This place has been built in your honor; And in the Palace, which you can see through here, dinner will be served— while Love makes a heaven here on earth. Imagine, the Graces themselves will serve us! Up, up all beloved, faithful friends, prepare yourselves with the entire court to delight this noble pair with a dance.

Let Love and Desire be evergreen in your hearts!

(Now they all form a great circle in which various ladies and gentleman appear. While singing the following aria the entire company goes around, Nero always stays in the middle.)

Aria. Tutti.

Cupid moves us to dance, To play and to sing, Therefore banish all sorrow Forever.

The happy time, With playful competition, With hopping and laughing and joking Prepares Our hearts.

Cupid moves us to dance…

Beym Anfang dieser Aria fordert Nero die Ormœna aus den Reyhen und tantzt mit ihr, da inzwischen die andern sich zu beyden Seiten stellen. Auf gleiche Arth continuiren die andern, und nach geendigtem Spiel tantzen alle ins gesammt, worüber Seneca zugehen kömmt.

Menuet.

Hebet und sencket den fertigen Fuß, Setzt den Leib bequem Und angenehm.

Bereitet die lächelnden Lippen zum Kuß, Dieweil sich heut alles erlustigen muß.

Octavia

Verhaste Frölichkeit, Die mir nur einen Fallstrick streut! (Geht ab.)

Nero

Ich sah Octavia nach Piso sehn? (Geht ab.)

Tiridates

Müst’ eben mein Gemahl so stets beym Nero stehn? (Geht ab.)

Ormœna

Octavia sah mich erzürnet an, Doch acht’ ich ihren Zorn nicht groß. (Geht ab.)

Piso

Octavia ward von dem Tiridat geführt, O Eifersucht die dieses Hertze rührt! (Geht ab.)

Livia

Und Fabius war stets bey Clelia, Diß macht den Anschlag bloß. (Geht ab.)

Fabius

Der Piso führte Livia, Dadurch er mir zu viel gethan. (Geht ab.)

Clelia

Der Tiridat gieng bey Octavien, Was für Verdruß ist mir geschehn! (Geht ab.)

Lepidus

Bey dieser Lust war keiner recht erfreut. (Geht ab.)

Davus

Die Thorheit war allhie bey Scheffeln ausgestreut. (Geht ab.)

Seneca

O Eitelkeit! (Geht ab.)

Ende der ersten Handlung

At the beginning of the following aria, Nero invites Ormœna out of the circle and dances with her. Meanwhile, the others place themselves on one side or the other. In the same manner, the others continue the dance, and at the end of this play they all dance together, at which time Seneca enters.

Menuet.

Raise and lower your nimble feet, Seat your body, comfortably And pleasurably.

Prepare your smiling lips for kisses, For today, everything must be for pleasure.

Octavia

Hated celebrations— that are only a trap for me! (leaves)

Nero

I saw Octavia looking at Piso. (leaves)

Tiridates

Must my wife always be with Nero? (leaves)

Ormœna

Octavia looked at me angrily, but I don’t care much about her anger. (leaves)

Piso

Octavia is accompanied by Tiridates. O jealousy that shakes my heart! (leaves)

Livia

And Fabius was always with Clelia; this makes his intentions clear. (leaves)

Fabius

Piso was with Livia; in this he does me harm. (leaves)

Clelia

Tiridates went out with Octavia; that really annoys me! (leaves)

Lepidus

At these festivities no one was really happy. (leaves)

Davus

Stupidity was spread around here by the shovel-full. (leaves)

Seneca

O vanity! (leaves)

End of Act One

Anderer Handlung. Erster Auftritt.

Ein Spatzier=Gang mit Alléen und Garten=Häusern zwischen dem Capitolio und Colosseo. Clelia nachmahls Lepidus.

Aria. Clelia.

Wenn mein Geist in seinem Leide, Einen kurtzen Stillstand fühlt, Kehret gleich das bange Schertzen Süsser Schmertzen, Zweifach zu verliebten Hertzen, Wann ein schönes Auge spielt. (Lepidus kömmt.)

Lepidus

Hab’ ich noch keine Gunst zu hoffen?

Clelia

Wie es scheint, So hat ein Unfall dich betroffen?

Lepidus

Weil dieses Hertz um was geliebtes weint, Ach schleicht den allemahl bey Amors Freuden Nur Schmertz und Leiden In unsern Seelen ein!

Besinne dich, holdseeligs Götter=Bild, Und stärcke mich in meiner Pein.

Clelia

Was wunderstu dich doch, daß ich dich nicht kan lieben, Ich weiß nicht, was du heischen wilt. Weistu was Liebe ist?

Ihr Trieb ist zwar in unser Hertz geschrieben, Doch ihren Ursprung hat kein menschlicher Verstand, Kein Geist, wie klug er ist, erkand.

Lepidus

Wiltu mein Flehen nicht erhören?

Clelia

Ich kan dir keine Gunst gewehren.

Lepidus

Kans möglich seyn, daß du so grausam bist? Der Purpur, so auf deinen Wangen thront, Die Anmuht, so in deinem Wesen wohnt, Ist etwas Englisches, allein in meiner Pein, Kanstu darum wohl menschlich seyn.

Clelia

Bloß vom Geschicke, Und nicht von mir, rührt dein Gelücke, Wenn dieses will, so steht mein Hertz dir offen,

Act Two. Scene One.

A walkway with alleys and garden-houses between the Capitoline Hill and the Colosseum. Clelia, and later Lepidus.

Aria. Clelia.

When my soul, in the midst of its suffering, Pauses to re ect, It immediately feels the anxiety Caused by the sweet pains Which plague the amorous heart When a fair eye plays with it. (Lepidus arrives.)

Lepidus

Have I no hope of your good will?

Clelia

So it seems, but what mishap has befallen you?

Lepidus

This heart of mine is crying about something beloved, ah, why are Cupid’s pleasures always accompanied by pain and suffering creeping into our hearts? Please reconsider, kindly goddess, and help me bear my pain.

Clelia

Why are you still amazed that I can’t love you? I don’t know what you are asking of me! Do you know what love is? The instinct for it is written in our hearts, but the origin of it is not known to any human mind, and no one, no matter how clever, knows the answer.

Lepidus

Will you not at least hear my pleas?

Clelia

I can grant you no favors.

Lepidus

Is it possible that you are so cruel? The purple on your cheek, the grace in your nature is something angelic; but toward my suffering can you not be more humane?

Clelia

It is from fate, not me, that your bad luck stems; if fate wills it, then my heart will be open to you.

Lepidus

Wohlan, so will ich hoffen.

Anderer Auftritt.

Nero, Ormœna.

Aria. Nero.

Bey dem Zunder neuer Pein, Fragt das Pochen unser Seelen, Ob wir fehlen, Wenn wir eine Schönheit wehlen. Die Gedancken stehen still, Wenn der Mund bekennen will. Aber ach, verborgne Strahlen, Die uns alles schöne mahlen, Wincken nein,

Bey dem Zunder neuer Pein.

(Ormœna kömt.)

Nero

Ach köntestu in dieses Hertze sehn, Wie du darinnen angeschrieben.

Ormœna

Weicht nicht bey dir die Lieb’ aus ihren Schrancken?

Ich bin an Tiridat vermählt, Da du Octavia zu deiner Gunst erwehlt.

Nero

Octavia, die niemahls mich vergnügt.

Ormœna

Und doch ist sie der Krone wehrt geschätzet.

Nero

Kan dich ein Käyser nicht zur Gunst bewegen?

Ormœna

Weil er in andern Armen liegt. Wenn ich dich würde lieben Wie würde sie verletzet?

Nero

Verletzet? Wie, kan Nero nicht befehlen?

Hat ihr das Glück die Kron bestimmt, So ist schon Raht, daß man sie wieder nimmt.

Ormœna

Wodurch?

Nero Wodurch? Durch ihr entseelen.

Ormœna

(O Weh, der Schluß ist gar zu widerlich.)

Lepidus

Well then, I will hope.

Scene Two.

Nero, Ormœna.

Aria. Nero.

At the aring up of a new pain, The throbbing in our soul asks: Are we wrong When we choose a new beauty?

Thoughts go silent

When the mouth wants to confess. But ah, hidden rays

Which paint everything beautiful, Signal “No”, At the aring up of a new pain.

(Ormœna arrives.)

Nero

Ah, if only you could see into my heart, how your name is written there!

Ormœna

Is your love not going beyond its proper boundaries? I am married to Tiridates; You had the luck to win Octavia’s hand.

Nero

Octavia who never gave me pleasure.

Ormœna

And yet she is worthy of the crown.

Nero

Can an Emperor not move you to be kind?

Ormœna

While he lies in the arms of another? If I would love you, how wounded would Octavia be?

Nero

Wounded? What? Can Nero not command? If luck brought her a crown, then it would be advisable now to take it back.

Ormœna How?

Nero How? I’ll do away with her!

Ormœna (O horror! This conclusion is far too shocking!)

Nero

Besinne dich, Ormen, besinne dich.

Ormœna

So liebstu sie nicht mehr?

Nero

Nein, nein.

Ormœna

Und wilt dich von ihr scheiden lassen?

Nero

Nicht diß allein, sie soll erblassen.

Ormœna

(Ormœna, gehstu dieses ein, Ihr Sinnen, geht zu Raht, Was sagt mein liebster Tiridat?)

Aria. Ormœna.

Es streiten mit reitzender Blüthe

In meinem Gemüthe, Liebe, Treue, Glück und Ehr.

Ormœna

(Doch wo ist Treu, wo wahre Lieb’ auf Erden?

Wo Treu und Liebe kämpfft

Bey einer die zur Käyserin soll werden

Da wird sie durch das Glück und Ehrsucht leicht gedämpfft.)

Nero

Besinne dich.

Ormœna

Kan ich dir sicher trauen?

Nero

Du kanst auf meine Worte bauen.

Ormœna

So nim dieß Hertz, das dir zur Wohnung auffgericht, Genieß es wie du wilt.

Nero

Ach so wird meine Pein gestillt, Mein Engel, zu Bestärckung deiner Treu Vergnüge mich mit einem Kuß!

Ormœna

Weil man dem Käyser folgen muß So stimm ich bey.

Aria. Ormœna.

Caro amante, Nerone adorato! Prendi li baci, che io ti do.

Nero

Think carefully, Ormen, think carefully.

Ormœna

So you don’t love her any more?

Nero

No, no.

Ormœna

And you will divorce her?

Nero

Not just that, she must die.

Ormœna

(Ormœna, will you go along with this? I must take counsel with myself! And what will my beloved Tiridates say?)

Aria. Ormœna.

Delightful blossoms compete with one another In my heart: Love, Faith, Fortune, and Honor.

Ormœna

(Yet where is faithfulness, and true love on earth? Where faith and love do battle within one who should become Empress, they are slightly muted by luck and ambition.)

Nero

Think carefully!

Ormœna

Can I really trust you?

Nero

You can depend on my words.

Ormœna

Then take this heart, which is made to be your refuge: enjoy it as you will.

Nero

Ah, now my pain is stilled. My angel, as a pledge of your faith, please me with a kiss.

Ormœna

Because one must follow Caesar, I obey.

Aria. Ormœna.

Dearly beloved, adored Nero, Take this kiss, which I give you.

Dritter Auftritt. Vorige, Lepidus.

Nero

Zu rechter Zeit kömt Lepidus, Nun soltu sehn, daß mir zu trauen sey. (Zu Lepidus) Du bist ja wohl getreu?

Lepidus

Ich dencke nicht, Daß ich mich jemahls so verhalten, Daß Eure Majestät deßwegen zweifeln muß.

Nero

Wenn nur dein Hertz auch also spricht. Hör’ an, du solt ein Amt verwalten, Nim einen Dolch und ein Gefäß mit Gifft Und bring es in Octavien Gemach,

Lepidus (O weh!)

Nero

Mit dem ausdrücklichen Befehle, Daß sie von beyden eins zu ihrem Tod’ erwehle, Doch warte biß die Fischerey vollbracht.

Lepidus

Ach harte Bohtschafft, die mich trifft!

Mein Käyser, ach ....

Nero

Schweig, nim in acht Was wir dir ferner sagen,

Du solt sie auch des Ehebruchs verklagen, Und sprechen, daß sie so der Käyser=Kronen Verlustig sich gemacht, Wir wollen deinen Dienst nach Würden lohnen.

Vierter Auftritt.

Tiridates, Lepidus, nachmahls Clelia.

Aria. Tiridates.

Das blinde Kind der Liebe

Will daß man Kummers=voll

Die Leidenschafft beseuftzen soll.

Doch öst die Regung ihrer Triebe Bey solcher bangen Pein

Uns manches Labsal ein.

Tiridates

Und nun entfernt Ormœna sich von mir

Und sucht ... (er erblickt den Lepidus) (Er stöhret mich.) Was kräncket dich?

Scene Three. Lepidus joins them.

Nero

Lepidus arrives at the right time. Now you will see that I am to be trusted. (to Lepidus) Are you faithful to me?

Lepidus

I don’t believe that I have ever acted in a way to cause your Majesty to doubt it.

Nero

I hope your heart really means it. Listen, I have a task for you: take a dagger and a jar of poison and bring them to Octavia’s chambers…

Lepidus (O my god!)

Nero

…with the express order that she must choose one of them for her death, but wait until the shing games are concluded.

Lepidus

Ah, what a harsh and cruel task. My Caesar…

Nero

Silence! Now hear the rest of your orders: You must accuse her of adultery, and that she has made herself unworthy of Caesar’s royal crown. We will reward your service worthily.

Scene Four.

Tiridates, Lepidus, later Clelia.

Aria. Tiridates. That blind child, Cupid, Wants us to sigh for passion, And be full of cares. Yet along with the incitement of passions, And all their anxious cares, Some relief ows as well.

Tiridates

Ah! now Ormœna goes away from me and seeks… (he sees Lepidus) (He interrupts me!) What is the matter?

Lepidus

Es wird ja täglich Blut vergossen.

(Clelia kömt und bleibt in der Ferne stehen.)

Clelia (Da nd ich ihn,)

Tiridates

Was ist beschlossen?

Lepidus

Octavia sol sterben.

Tiridates Wie? Octavia?

Clelia (Was hör ich!)

Tiridates

Irrstu, Lepidus?

Lepidus

Du wirst schon sehn, daß man mir glauben muß. (Geht ab.)

Tiridates

Ich will die Warheit bald erfahren. (Geht ab.)

Fünffter Auftritt. Clelia.

Clelia

Da ich ihn kaum erblick

Entzieht ihn mir das neidische Geschick! Du eilst zwar fort, jedoch dein Angedencken Muß ich in dieser Brust bewahren.

Aria. Clelia.

Bionde chiome, care rete!

Se risplende vostro seren

Al mio sen, Dilettosi mi siete.

Bionde chiome, care rete!

Sechster Auftritt.

Eine Land=Strasse mit einer Aue, wodurch ein Bach rinnt, in welchem die Sonnen=Strahlen spielen. In der Ferne zeigt sich Tibur (Tivoli) auf einem angenehmen Hügel.

Aria. Octavia.

Die Edelmuht pranget mit Lorber und Kron.

Octavia

Beym Unglück tobt ein sclavisches Gemühte

Ich halte meinem Schicksaal still,

Lepidus

Blood is being shed every day. (Clelia arrives and stays in the distance.)

Clelia (There he is!)

Tiridates

What is decided?

Lepidus

Octavia must die.

Tiridates What? Octavia?

Clelia (What do I hear?)

Tiridates

Are you sure you’re not wrong, Lepidus?

Lepidus

You will see that I must be believed. (he leaves)

Tiridates I will soon nd out the truth. (he leaves)

Scene Five. Clelia.

Clelia

Now that I’ve just found him, jealous fate takes him away from me! You rush to leave, and yet the souvenir of your presence remains in my heart.

Aria. Clelia.

Golden hair, worthy nets! Let your beauty shine Into my heart. You are my beloved delight! Golden hair, worthy nets!

Scene Six.

A country road with a meadow, through which a brook runs, on which the sunlight plays. In the distance Tivoli can be seen on a pleasant hillside.

Aria. Octavia. Nobility is resplendent with laurel and crown.

Octavia

In misfortune, slavish [lesser] minds rage. I however, quietly accept my fate;

Ich suche keine Rach’, und seh ob nicht in Güte, Mein Käyser widerkehren will.

Aria. Octavia.

Torna, o sposo, torna a me!

Octavia

Umsonst, ich muß mich nur mit leerer Hofnung nehren!

Beliebter Bach, die Quelle meiner Zähren Wird deinen spielenden Cristall Auff seinem blancken Kiesel mehren.

Aria. Octavia.

Wallet nicht zu laut, Silber=helle Bach=Cristallen!

Siebender Auftritt. Piso, Octavia.

Piso

Der Käyser hat Ormœn zur Fischerey geladen, Ach Schönste Käyserin!

Octavia

Meinstu, daß ich deßwegen traurig bin?

Piso

Ich kenne deinen grossen Geist, Der sich in allen Thun erweist, Allein dein Ungelück macht auch die Felsen rege, Was Wunder, daß es mich bewege?

Octavia

Was für ein Unglück, rede.

Piso

Ach dein Gemahl, der Blut=Tyran, Doch ach ...

Octavia

Was ist es dann?

Piso

Die Zunge wird fast blöde, Er sucht dich zu verstossen, Und ruhet nicht, biß er durch Gifft und Stahl Dein reines Blut vergossen.

Octavia

Er ist mein Herr, mein Käyser, mein Gemahl, Mein Leben ist ihm bloß allein verp icht, Vergnügt ihm meine Liebe nicht, So sterb’ ich gerne, Vergnügt soll sich mein Auge brechen, Wenn er mir will mein Todes=Urtheil sprechen.

I seek no revenge, and hope that with my goodwill, my Caesar will return to me.

Aria. Octavia. Return, my husband, return to me!

Octavia

In vain, I must nourish myself with empty hopes! Beloved brook, source of my tears, will your playful crystals fall upon his unfeeling stone?

Aria. Octavia. Do not babble too loudly, You silvery river crystals.

Scene Seven. Piso, Octavia.

Piso

Caesar has invited Ormœna to join him at the shing place. Alas! Most beautiful Empress!

Octavia

Do you think that I’m sad because of that?

Piso

I know of your great spirit, which is proven in everything you do. Still, your misfortunes would move a stone. Do you wonder that I am also moved?

Octavia What misfortune? Speak!

Piso

Ah, your husband, the bloody tyrant… alas…

Octavia What then?

Piso

My tongue can hardly move… he seeks to abandon you, and won’t rest until, by poison or the sword, he spills your guiltless blood.

Octavia

He is my master, my Caesar, my husband, my life is in his hands alone. If my love no longer pleases him, then I am happy to die; I will look on with equanimity if he pronounces the death sentence upon me.

Piso

Nein, die gerechte Sterne, Die werden mir schon Wege zeigen, Dem Ubel vorzubeugen. Ist mir noch mehr erlaubt?

Octavia Erzehle!

Piso

So höre dann, geliebte Seele!

Aria. Piso.

Ein Blick von deinem Angesicht Macht meine keusche Seele schmachten, Will ich dein Wesen recht betrachten, Rückt mir das Hertz ins Augen=Licht, Da wünsch’ ich nur auf dieser Erden, Dem wachen Argus gleich zu werden.

Octavia

Hat eine Fantasey Dir dein Gehirn verrückt, Und trägstu keine Scheu, Nach so verbotne Frucht zu fragen?

Piso

Kan ich davor, daß mich dein Aug’ entzückt?

Octavia

Soll sich ein Knecht des Käysers nicht entblöden, Mit solchen wilden Reden

Die Majestät auffs schärffste zu verletzen? Kein Weib, das Treu und Zucht

Zur Wohnung ihrer Seel gesucht, Wird solchen Spott vertragen, Noch hören solche Frechheit an.

Piso

Vergib, so fern ich dir zu weh gethan!

Octavia

Darff denn ein Untersaß

Selbst seine Käyserin so hönisch schätzen? Schweig, und bereue das. (Geht ab.)

Piso

Soll meine Zunge schweigen, So mag mein thränend Aug von meinen Leiden zeugen.

Achter Auftritt.

Ein lustiges mit vergüldeten Statuen und andern Ornaten geziertes Revier an der Kayerlichen Menagerie, woselbst ein grosser Teich mit vielen Schiffen zu sehen, in welchen der

Piso

No, the just stars will show me the way to prevent such an evil. Am I allowed to do more?

Octavia

Tell me.

Piso

Then hear this, beloved soul!

Aria. Piso.

A glance from your eyes Causes my chaste soul to languish. If I want to truly ponder your essence, My heart must emerge into my eyes. Then my only wish on this earth Is to be like all-seeing Argus.

Octavia

Has a fantasy made you lose your mind? And have you no shame to ask for such forbidden fruits?

Piso

What can I do if your eyes have enchanted me?

Octavia

Should one of Caesar’s knights have the effrontery, with such wild talk, to threaten to hurt his Majesty so deeply? No wife, with faithfulness and modesty in her soul, could allow such a mockery, nor even hear such impudence.

Piso

Please forgive me if I have caused you pain.

Octavia

Can an underling then treat his Empress with such scorn? Silence, and regret your words! (she leaves)

Piso

If my tongue must be silent, so let my tear-stained eyes be witness to my suffering.

Scene Eight.

A pleasant riviera in the royal menagerie with golden statues and other ornaments, where a large lake can be seen with many boats in which the Emperor and his whole court

Käyser mit der gantzen Hofstatt schet. Nero. Octavia. Tiridates. Ormœna. Livia. Piso. Fabius. Lepidus. Davus, nebst einen Chor von Fischern mit ihren zur Fischerey gehörigen Geräthe.

Chorus

Auf zum angeln, auf zum schen, auf zum Netz!

Bringt Hälter, Kescher, Züber, Bringet Kannen, Wasser=Küber, Daß man Fische drinnen setz. Auf zum angeln, auf zum schen, auf zum Netz!

(Hierauff halten die Fischer einen Tantz, da unterdessen die andere schen.)

Ormœna zu Nero

Hat Eure Liebden was gefangen?

Nero

Es war ein Hecht, der wiederum entgangen.

Davus

(Das trifft noch ziemlich ein, Die Hechte p egen insgemein

In einem frischen Teich den Strich zu fressen, Das deine Eigenschafft auch nicht vergessen.)

(Ormœna fängt einen Aal.)

Nero zu Ormœna

Was fängt Ormœna?

Ormœna

Einen Aal.

Davus

(Ja, ja, bey dir gibts auch zu schen.)

Seneca

Denck, daß das Glücke schlipfrig sey, Das eh’ wirs uns versehn, p egt wieder zu entwischen, Und seine Schwester ist hernach die Reu!

Ormœna

(Ich weiß, daß du ein Schulfuchs bist.)

Nero zu Octavia

Was fängt dann mein Gemahl!

Octavia (fängt eine Murene)

(Ja wol Gemahl! Du teuschest mich,)

Es war ein’ eintzige Murene, Die in dem Glaß durch einen Pfriemen=Stich

In ihrem Blute muß ersterben.

Davus

(Sie mercket wohl, wie’s hier geschoren ist.)

are shing.

Nero, Octavia, Tiridates, Ormœna, Livia, Piso, Clelia, Fabius, Lepidus, Davus, as well as a chorus of sherman with all their shing gear.

Chorus

Let’s go sporting, let’s go shing, bring your nets! Bring baskets, bring sh-nets, bring pitchers, And water buckets, In which to put our sh. Let’s go sporting, let’s go shing, bring your nets! (After this some of the shermen dance while the others sh.)

Ormœna (to Nero)

Did your Highness catch something?

Nero

It was a pike, but he got away.

Davus

(That seems very accurate, in fresh-water lakes pikes usually eat the shline, and you [Nero] do just the same!)

(Ormœna catches an eel.)

Nero (to Ormœna) What did Ormœna catch?

Ormœna

An eel.

Davus

(Yes, yes, with you there is something very shy.)

Seneca

Remember, luck is something slippery, that before we even notice, slips away again, and leaves behind his sister: regret!

Ormœna

(I know that you are a clever scholar.)

Nero (to Octavia)

What has my wife caught?

Octavia (she catches a moray eel) (Yes, my husband, you betray me!)

It was a single moray eel which was caught in a glass and with an awl stitch had to die in its own blood.

Davus

(She now sees how the sheep are shorn here.)

Nero und Ormœna à 2

(Es deutet ihr Verderben.)

(Livia bekömmt in ihrem Netze einen Scarus.)

Fabius zu Livia

Was fängt dann meine Schöne?

Livia

Ein Scar, der Römer beste Speise.

Fabius

Wie artig schertzt das Glücks=Gestirn!

Man nennet diesen Fisch des Jupiters Gehirn, Und unser Rom nennt dich die Weise.

Davus (bekömmt einige Frösche)

Was thu ich denn für einen Fang?

Au weh, Blut schlecht! Welch lieblicher Gesang!

Fünff junge Frösch. Ein rarer Schatz, Die Tierchen sind sonst gut für einen Plauder=Matz. Ihr Brüder, frisch, noch einen andern Gang.

(Die Fischer ziehen die Netze mit vielen Fischen in die Höhe.)

Aria. Davus.

Nehmet aus den alten Teichen

Karpfen, Aale, Barß und Hecht, Denn diß schuppigte Geschlecht, P eget muntrer durchzustrudeln, Und zu streichen

In den frembden Wasser=Pfudeln.

Nero zu Tiridates

Und was hat Tiridat?

Tiridates

Zwo Schnecken.

(Tiridates zieht zwo Schnecken hervor, und versammlen sich almählig viele Wolcken am Himmel.)

Davus

(Du hast es recht getroffen, Denn sie gehören auch für dir, Seht, wie die Raben=Thier Bemühet sind, die Hörner auszustecken.)

Nero

Es ist allmählig Zeit

Sich nach dem Schauspiel zu begeben. Octavia, verfüge dich ins Hortulan, Da deutet Lepidus dir unsern Willen an.

Octavia

(Ich weiß, daß meinem Leben

Schon das Verderbens=Netz gelegt.)

Nero and Ormœna (It signi es her doom.)

(Livia catches a scarus in her net.)

Fabius (to Livia)

What has my love caught then?

Livia

A scarus, most beloved dish of the Romans.

Fabius

How appropriately our lucky stars joke with us: one calls this sh “Jupiter’s Brain” and Rome calls you “the wise.”

Davus (catches a frog) What have I caught then?

Dammit! This is bad! What a pretty chorus! Five young frogs. A rare treasure, these creatures are usually good for a bit of gossip. (To the shermen) Brothers, look spritely, let’s have another round!

(The shermen hold their nets up high, with many sh in them.)

Aria. Davus.

Take from this good old lake: Carp, eels, perch, and pike, For these scaly species Are usually found swirling Around In foreign puddles.

Nero (to Tiridates) And what did Tiridates get?

Tiridates

Two snails.

(Tiridates shows his two snails while storm clouds gather in the sky.)

Davus

(You also got it right, for they are appropriate to you. Look how the little creatures stretch out their horns!)

Nero

It’s almost time for us to go to the theater. Octavia, go to the Greenhouse, there Lepidus will reveal our will to you.

Octavia

(I know that a death-trap has already been set for my life.)

Es entstehet ein erschreckliches Donnern und Blitzen, mit einem starcken Platz=Regen, worauff sie sich ins gesammt ans Land begeben. Ormœna bleibt hinter Octavia, welche sich unter einen Baum verfügen, da inzwischen die Lufft sich wieder ausheitert.

Ihr Götter, was ist diß womit der Himmel dräut, Er wird vielleicht zur Rach bewegt.

Neunter Auftritt. Octavia, Ormœna.

Ormœna Käyserin!

Octavia

Die du woll gerne wärest, Und auch vielleicht schon bist in deinem Sinn

Ormœna Käyserin!

Octavia

Ein Heuchel=Nam damit du mich verehrest.

Ormœna

Ich weiß nicht, was du sagen willt.

Octavia

Wie schön ist dein Gesicht, Du angenehmes Götter=Bild, Wie funckelt doch dein klahres Augen=Licht! Sind alle in Armenien so schön?

Ormœna

Du bist nicht minder schön, Und mich entzündet selbst dein freyes Wesen, In deinen Augen hat Cupido sich

Die Wohnung ausgelesen, (Octavia kehrt sich um.)

O Weh! Es rühren mich

Selbst ihre schwartze Flammen.

Aria. Octavia.

Die Eifersuch bläset im Hertzen zu kämpfen, Die Liebe zu dämpfen, Sie stehet zum Streit Mit iegendem Heere von Argwohn bereit, Und dräuet der Seelen mit blutiger Schlacht, So fern sie die Treue nicht waffenloß macht. (Da Capo)

A frightening bout of thunder and lightning arrives, with a downpour of rain, at which everyone ees to land. Ormœna remains behind Octavia and they take refuge under a tree. Meanwhile, the air clears again.

Ye Gods, what is this with which heaven threatens us? Perhaps it is moved to revenge.

Scene Nine. Octavia, Ormœna.

Ormœna Empress!

Octavia

Which is what you would like to become, or perhaps already are in your own mind.

Ormœna Empress!

Octavia

A hypocritical name with which you honor me.

Ormœna I don’t know what you are trying to say.

Octavia

How beautiful is your face, a truly god-like visage. How brightly your eyes shine. Are all Armenian women as beautiful as you?

Ormœna

You are no less beautiful, and even I am en amed by your free spirit; in your eyes Cupid makes his home… (Octavia turns her back.)

O my! I myself am moved by her black ames!

Aria. Octavia.

Jealousy blows into the heart— Creates war, and dampens love. It is ready for the con ict, With a ying company of suspicion at its side, And threatens the soul with a bloody battle, Unless it has already disarmed faithfulness. Jealousy blows into the heart…

Zehnter Auftritt.

Das Theatrum verändert sich in die Julianische Gasse.

Aria. Tiridates.

Tenta di spargere La Gelosia

Nell’alma mia

Freddo velen. Il cuore crede

D’esser deluso, E sta confuso

Dentro al mio sen.

Eilffter Auftritt.

Tiridates, Fabius.

Fabius

Befand der König sich auf jüngsten Ball vergnügt?

Tiridates

Vergnügt? So ja, Als wie Octavia, An Nero Hoff’ ist alles prächtig.

Fabius

Es scheint, als wenn ein Schmertz dein Hertz besiegt.

Tiridates

Wenn mein Gemahl in frembden Armen liegt.

Fabius

Die Eiffersucht ist offt zu mächtig Wenn sie Verdacht ausstreut. Wer hat es denn entdeckt?

Tiridates

Des Käysers unverwandte Blicke Die haben den Verdacht erweckt.

Fabius

Ormœna ist ja züchtig.

Tiridates

Entschuldigung, die ziemlich nichtig!

Fabius

Sey nur bedacht den Argwohn auszugähten.

Tiridates

Zu schlechtem Glücke

Hab ich das grosse Rom betreten.

Zwölffter Auftritt. Vorige. Livia.

Scene Ten.

The theater changes into a Julian alley. Tiridates alone.

Aria. Tiridates. Jealousy Tries to strew Cold poison In my soul. The heart believes It is betrayed, And is confused Within my breast.

Scene Eleven. Tiridates, Fabius.

Fabius

Did your highness enjoy the ball?

Tiridates

Enjoy? About as much as Octavia did.

Everything is wonderful at Nero’s court!

Fabius

It seems that some pain is pressing on your heart.

Tiridates

Because my wife is lying in another man’s arms!

Fabius

Jealousy is often too strong, when suspicion spreads around. Who discovered this?

Tiridates

The Emperor’s unwavering glances rst aroused my suspicions.

Fabius

But Ormœna is very chaste.

Tiridates

Excuse me, not any more!

Fabius

Be careful not to let your suspicions be known.

Tiridates

It is my great misfortune that I ever came to Rome.

Scene Twelve. Livia joins them.

Tiridates und Fabius à 2

(Ach welcher Trost!

Ich spühre, daß mein Geist nach etwas frembdes sehne.)

Livia

(Ach Livia verstelle dich!)

Scheint Fabius erbost, Der Tiridat entstellt?

Tiridates und Fabius à 2

Weil deine Schönheit mich entzündet hält.

Livia

(Es spührt mein Geist, daß er mir wohl gefällt.)

Aria. Livia.

(Wie lieblich spielt ihr, Daß sich die Seele nach euch sehne, Schöne Augen, Schöne, Schöne! Ihr stellet mir, Wenn eure blaue Kräyse schertzen, Ein Firmament mit Venus=Sternen führ, Wovon ein Strahl das Hertze trennt von Hertzen.)

Tiridates

Ach Livia, Sey doch nicht grausam gegen mir!

Livia

Was ist denn dir?

Fabius

Hast du nicht dein Gemahl?

Livia

Wo bleibt die Treu, so du Ormen versprochen?

Tiridates

Ach Leiden, ohne Zahl!

Fabius

Wird so das Band der Eh gebrochen?

Tiridates

Das längst von ihr gebrochen ist.

Livia

Bedenckstu denn nicht, wer du bist?

Tiridates

Ein König und von Königlichem Stamme.

Livia

So denck, daß dieser dich verdamme.

Tiridates and Fabius (Ah, what consolation! I feel my spirit longing for something new.)

Livia (Ah Livia, hide your feelings now!) Is Fabius angry? Is Tiridates tense?

Tiridates and Fabius

Because your beauty holds me in amed!

Livia

(My spirit feels that he is the one I really like.)

Aria. Livia. (How lovely is your playfulness, Fair eyes, that my soul longs for you. Lovely eyes. You create for me, When your blue orbs ash, The rmament of Venus’s heavenly stars. A single ray from there separates my heart from my heart.)

Tiridates

Ah Livia, do not be cruel to me!

Livia

What is it with you then?

Fabius

Do you not have your wife?

Livia

Where then is the faith you swore to Ormœna?

Tiridates

Ah, tortures without number!

Fabius

Is the marriage bond then broken thus?

Tiridates

It has long been broken by her.

Livia

But don’t you consider who you are?

Tiridates

A king and from a kingly lineage.

Livia

Then think, that this will damn you!

Tiridates

Ach Grausame, bistu nicht zu erbitten?

Livia

Vergnüge dich mit einer Schöne.

Tiridates

Ach deine Schönheit bindet mich, Dieweil mein Geist selbst ihre Bande trägt.

Fabius (Ich habe fast zu viel erlitten.)

Livia

Geh zur Ormœne, Daselbst vergnüge dich, Weil andre Glut sich in mir regt!

Fabius (Ich habe sie vielleicht bewegt.)

Tiridates

Schaustu nicht meinen Schmertzen zu, Was sagestu?

Aria. Livia.

Costante ogn’hor così Io ti dirò di nò.

Dreyzehender Auftritt.

Piso mit verschiedenen Römern.

Piso

Betrübtes Rom,

Die Freyheit muß in letzten Zügen schmachten, Ein Ohrenbläser wird geehrt, Durchlauchtigs Blut will man als knechtisch achten, Kein weiser Raht wird mehr gehört, Und diß ging Piso ein?

Nein, Nein.

Ihr, deren Eltern sind durchs Käysers Dolch gefallen, Könt’ ihr so ohn Verschulden

Das Joch des Blut=Tyrannen dulden?

Auf, krönt mit mir durch neue Sieges=Zeichen

Der Väter Leichen, Und last das Blut in euren Adern wallen!

Aria. Piso.

Ein edles Gemühte gleicht blitzenden Flammen, Es suchet die Sterne, Von welchen die Strahlen der Tugenden stammen, Und trennt sich ferne, Von denen die Kämpfe mit Lastern verdammen. Ein edles Gemühte gleicht blitzenden Flammen.

Tiridates

Ah cruel one, can you not be more kind?

Livia

Be satis ed with one beauty.

Tiridates

But your beauty binds me, and my soul is already bonded to yours.

Fabius (I have almost suffered enough.)

Livia

Go to Ormœna, and enjoy yourself with her, because another ember glows in me.

Fabius (Maybe I have nally moved her!)

Tiridates

Do you not see my pain? What do you say?

Aria. Livia. I have been constant in this Always telling you no.

Scene Thirteen. Piso with various Romans.

Piso

Miserable Rome!

Freedom is languishing in its last moments; a scandal-monger is honored, noble blood is treated as common, wise council is no longer heard, and Piso should go along with all this? No, no!

All you whose families are fallen to the Emperor’s dagger, can you without guilt tolerate the yoke of the bloody tyrant?

Stand up with me and crown a new sign of victory: the bodies of our fathers— and let that blood now swell your veins!

Aria. Piso.

A noble spirit is like a ashing ame. It seeks out the stars

From which the rays of virtue come, And separates itself widely

From those who condemn their battles with blasphemy. A noble spirit is like a ashing ame.

Vierzehender Auftritt.

Ein Gemach eines Landhauses ohnweit der Stadt, in welchem Octavia gefänglich gehalten wird. Bey Eröffnung desselben zeiget sich eine Gegend mit verschiedenen Rogis, Monumenten und Grabstädten. In der Ferne einige Rudera abgebrandter Gebäude.

Octavia in Trauer=Kleidern an einen Tisch sitzend, worauf eine Schüssel mit einem Doch und Gifft=Becher steht, von der Wache umbgeben.

Accompagnato. Octavia.

Hinweg, hinweg, du Dornen=schwangre Krone, Weg Scepter, weg, du Bild der Eitelkeit, Mich blendet nicht mehr euer Strahl, Ihr habt mich zwar geehret, Doch auch beschweret, Fahrt wohl, da mich ein Schicksal trifft!

Armseeligste Octavia!

Ergreiff nur Dolch und Gifft, Das dein vermeint=beleidigter Gemahl Für so viel Lieb und Treu dir läst zu Lohne.

Weg Scepter, weg! weg Dornen=schwangre Krone!

Aria. Octavia.

Verletzte Augen=Lichter, Ich schein’ euch ungetreu, Der Himmel ist mein Richter, Daß ich beständig sey.

Fünffzehender Auftritt.

Lepidus führt den Käyser heimlich herzu. Piso erscheinet auf der andern Seite, einander ungesehen.

Accompagnato. Octavia.

So fahre wohl, geliebter Ehgemahl, Hab ich dir weh gethan, Daß ich dich nicht nach Wunsch ergetzet, Ach so vergib, ich bin nicht Schuld daran, Vergib, so fern ich dich verletzet, Weil ich dich nicht vergnügen können, So will ich auch getrost erblassen, Drumb küss’ ich diesen blancken Stahl, Und wenn der Todt uns nun wird trennen, Will ich dich in Gedancken fassen. Vergib, und fahre wohl, verletzter Ehgemahl, Und bin ich gleich dahin, soll mein betrübter Schatten

Dir alle treue P icht abstatten.

Aria. Octavia.

Treu=geliebter, gute Nacht, Fahre wohl zu tausendmahlen, Weil der Todt uns trennen heist!

Wenn mein Geist

Mit dem Blute von mir iesset, Und die blasse Lippen schliesset,

Scene Fourteen.

A chamber in a country estate not far from the city, in which Octavia is being held captive. By the opening of this chamber, a scene is shown with various monuments and gravestones, in the distance some foundations of burnt-out houses.

Octavia in mourning clothes sitting at a table, on which a dagger and a jar of poison are placed— surrounded by guards.

Accompagnato. Octavia. Away, away! You crown of thorns! Away scepter, you symbol of vanity! Your gleam no longer blinds me. You were an honor, but also a weight; farewell, farewell, my destiny now awaits. Poor, poor Octavia!

Grasp now the dagger and the poison, which your supposedly insulted husband has given you as your reward for so much love and faithfulness. Away scepter, away crown of thorns!

Aria. Octavia. Wounded eyes, You believed I was unfaithful? As heaven is my witness, I was always true to you!

Scene Fifteen.

Lepidus secretly brings in the Emperor. Piso appears on the other side, neither seeing the other.

Accompagnato. Octavia. So farewell, beloved husband! If I have caused you pain in that I no longer pleased you as you wished, ah, please forgive me, it was not my fault. Forgive! if I wounded you, because I could no longer give you pleasure, I am happy to go to my death. Therefore I kiss this blade, and if death now separates us, let me hold on to you in my thoughts. Forgive, and farewell, my wounded husband, and once I am gone, my sad shadow will still bear you true and faithful duty.

Aria. Octavia.

Most faithfully beloved, good night! Farewell a thousand times While death now separates us. When my spirit With my blood ows away And the pale lips close forever,

Wincken die gebrochne Strahlen, Fahre wohl zu tausendmahlen, Treugeliebter, gute Nacht!

(Nero gehet mit Lepidus ab.)

Octavia

Auf dann, behertzte Faust, vollziehe den Befehl, Entweich, und stirb’, getreue Seel!

(Wie sie sich entleiben will, greifft Piso ihr in die Arme, nimmt ihr den Dolch und wirfft ihn von sich.)

Piso

Halt, halt Octavia.

Octavia

Ach wer ist da?

Ist Piso hie zugegen?

Piso

Dein Unglück muß zur Wehmuht mich bewegen.

Octavia

Wird so des Käysers Schluß erfüllt?

Piso

Kein so vollkommnes Götter=Bild

Muß sterben, (Er verschüttet den Gifft.)

Ein Wühtrich muß durch Dolch und Gifft verderben.

Octavia

Heist diß die Majestät geehrt?

Abscheuliches Verbrechen!

Piso

Gnug, daß es Piso hat begehrt, Wir wollen schon davon noch weiter sprechen.

Sechszehnder Auftritt.

Davus mit einigen Todten=Gräbern.

Davus

Der Hencker hat die Lieb’ erdacht, Was weiß man doch vor Wege?

Offt schickt man mich bey dunckler Mitternacht

Nach diese Gräber her,

Da gibt man mir ein Licht von Jungfern=Wachs gemacht, Auch manchmahl andre Zauber=Kohlen, Wenn ich soll Todten=Knochen holen, Und davon macht man einen Tranck, Der zu der Gegen=Lieb’ Artzney gewehr. So muß ich dann woll Knochen lesen, Ihr Brüder zeigt mir doch die Stege!

(Sie führen ihn herum, er stolpert über einen Gedenck=Stein.)

Yet the broken rays of my eyes still say: Farewell a thousand times, Most faithfully beloved, good night!

(Nero leaves with Lepidus.)

Octavia

Get on with it now, courageous hand! Complete your order. Die and disappear, faithful soul!

(As she attempts to stab herself, Piso grabs her by the arm, takes the dagger from her and ings it away.)

Piso

Stop, stop Octavia!

Octavia

Ah, who is there, is it Piso?

Piso

Your misfortune moves me to melancholy.

Octavia

But will the Emperor’s order then be ful lled?

Piso

No such god-like perfection should die; (he pours the poison out) a blood-thirsty tyrant is the one who should die by dagger and poison!

Octavia

Is this the way you honor your Emperor? Heinous crime!

Piso

It is enough that Piso desired it. We will surely speak of it later.

Scene Sixteen. Davus with some gravediggers.

Davus

The hangman invented love! What did one know about it before? They often send me out at black midnight to these graves here; they give me a lamp made of virgin wax and sometimes other magic coals, when I’m supposed to collect dead men’s bones; and they make a drink from them that is supposed to be a medicine against love. So then I’m supposed to read the bones. Brothers, show me the pathway! (They lead him around and he stumbles over a gravestone.)

Potzvelten, halt, was nd’ ich hier, Pfuy, welcher Stanck, Wenn eine Leiche will verwesen, Wer liegt dann hier verscharrt?

(Er liest die Grabschrifft eines Affen.)

Hier liegt ein armer Aff verscharrt, Der eben so wie du genarrt.

Wenn alle Affen nun nach ihrer Thorheit ruhn, So geh du auch zur Ruh, was hastu hie zu thun?

(Es werden ihm einige Todten=Knochen an den Kopff geworffen und erscheinen etliche Geister.)

Wie, kan man hier nicht sicher seyn? Halt ein, O Weh, Herr Geist, Herr Geist, Halt ein, halt ein, Ich weiß nicht was das spucken heist.

(Einige Todten=Gräber halten einen Tantz, unter welche sich etliche Geister mengen, die die Todten=Gräber zuletzt verjagen, und die andre Handlung beschliessen.)

Dritter Handlung.

Erster Auftritt.

Des Seneca Studier=Stube mit einem Cabinet.

Seneca Beliebte Stille,

Vergnügter Stand,

Bey dem die Tugend unser Sold, Und reiner Unschuld wahres Gold Die edle Seele schmücket!

Der, dem die stille Ruh in das Gemühte rücket, Wird von Zufriedenheit entzücket, Von keiner Lust der Welt bethöret, Weil ihn nichts irrdisches ergetzen kan; Von keinem Ungelück gestöhret; Er schaut kein Ungelück für Unglück an. Wenn bey der Ruh der Weißheit Licht In seiner Seelen Wohnung bricht, Bewaffnet er sich stets, die Sinnen zu bekriegen, Und über Wollust, Furcht, Schmertz, Hochmuht, Geitz und Haß, Als im Triumph zu siegen. So ist er stets sich gleich, und lernt ohn Unterlaß, Der Himmel auff der Welt sey ruhiges Vergnügen.

Aria. Seneca.

Ein kleiner Knabe liebt das Spielen, Ein Jüngling liebet Brunst und Wein. Die Männer p egen Lust zu führen, Daß sie geehrt und kühne seyn. Die Alten lieben gerne Geld, O schnöde Liebe dieser Welt!

Holy St. Valentine! stop, what do I see here?

Yuck, what a stink these bodies make when they decay! I wonder who lies buried here?

(He reads the headstone of an Ape.)

“Here lies buried a poor Ape, who was a fool just like you. When all the apes now rest in peace in their stupidity, so you must also go to your peace—what are you doing here?”

(Now many bones are thrown at his head and a number of ghosts appear.)

What? is one not safe here? Stop! O pain! Mr. Ghost, Mr. Ghost, stop! Stop!

I don’t know what you are doing with all this spooking around!

(Some of the gravediggers now conduct a dance, and some of the ghosts join them before they nally chase the gravediggers off, and thus ends the second Act.)

Act Three.

Scene One. Seneca’s study with a cabinet.

Seneca Beloved quiet, happy condition, in which virtue is its own reward, and innocence is the true gold which ornaments the soul. He, who cultivates inner peace shall be blessed with true satisfaction, not tempted by any of the world’s attractions, because it is not earthly delights which can please him: He cannot be bothered by any misfortune; for he doesn’t see misfortune as misfortune. When, in this condition of peace, the light of wisdom shines upon him, he girds himself to ght against his senses, and thus he triumphs over Lust, Fear, Pain, Pride, Greed, and Hate. So is he ever the same, and learns without ceasing that heaven on earth is peaceful contentment.

Aria. Seneca.

A little boy loves to play, A young man loves lust and wine. Men desire to be Honored and regarded as bold. Old men tend to love their money, O the despicable love of this world!

Anderer Auftritt.

Nero. Seneca.

Nero

Was sinnet Seneca? Fort mit dem Bücher=Kram, Du sitzest dich doch endlich lahm.

Geh in das Schau=Spiel-Haus

Da suchet unser Lepidus, Dem wir mit Sporus heut die Aufsicht aufgetragen, Dir einen Sitz=Platz aus, Wir gehn Ormœnen abzuholen.

Seneca

Ach kanstu diß so sicher wagen? Hispanien ist hin, Britannien verlohren, Rom hat, wie Gallien, zum Auffstand sich verschworen, Du läst Armenien, um deiner Liebe willen, So schändlich wieder aus den Händen.

Nero

Thu, was wir dir befohlen.

Seneca

Mein Käyser, ach, Wo will es endlich hin, denck einmahl nach, Wer wird das Ungelück von deinem Hause wenden!

Nero

Geh, unsern Willen zu erfüllen! (Geht ab.)

Seneca

Ach er verwirfft, was ihm zur Warnung dienen kan!

Dritter Auftritt.

Der gantze Schau=Platz bildet ab des Nero ComœdienHauß mit einer Par-terre, Gallerien, Logen und einem Orchester vor die Instrumentisten. Das Römische Volck nebst der gantzen Hof=statt, ausser Octavia, Fabius und Piso, haben sich bereits placirt.

Lepidus

Der Käyser kömmt, fangt nach gegebnen Zeichen an!

Sobald der Käyser angekommen, hebt man die Symphonie an, nach deren Endigung das Theatrum eröffnet wird.

Prologo

Die Schau=Bühne stellet vor den Tempel der Göttin Flora, die mit Grotesquen und Festonen gezieret, und durchaus illuminiret.

Scena I.

Flora mit einigen Winden und Amouretten, welche allerhand Blumen streuen.

Scene Two. Nero, Seneca.

Nero

What is Seneca musing about? Get rid of all this bookish nonsense! You’re going to sit so long, you’ll become lame. Go to the theater, and look for our Lepidus there, to whom we gave the responsibility today, together with Sporus, to hold a seat for you: Today we will fetch Ormœna.

Seneca

Ah, can you be so sure to dare this? Spain is collapsed, Britain is lost, Rome, like Gaul, is conspiring to revolt, and you will let Armenia so shamefully escape our hands because of your love affair?

Nero

Do what I order you to do!

Seneca

My Emperor, alas, where will it all end? Think carefully: who will prevent misfortune from falling on your head?

Nero

Go, and ful ll our wishes! (he leaves)

Seneca (Alas! He throws away the very warning that could help him!)

Scene Three.

The entire stage depicts Nero’s Theater with a parterre, galleries, loges, and an orchestra place for the instrumentalists. The Roman people along with the entire court except for Octavia, Fabius, and Piso have already taken their places.

Lepidus

Caesar comes, start at my signal.

As soon as the Emperor arrives the instruments begin a symphony at the end of which the Theater curtain is opened.

Prologue

The theater stage presents the Temple of the goddess Flora, with grotesques and festooned pillars, and brilliantly illuminated.

Scene I.

Flora with several Winds and Cupids who strew owers everywhere.

Aria. Flora.

Streu Blumen

Aus Idumen, Du kleine Liebes=Schaar.

Bekrön’ in einem Tantze Mit einem Rosen=Krantze Des Käysers güldnes Haar. Streu Blumen, &c.

Hierauf tantzen die Ze rn und Amouretten eine Entrée unter welcher sie Kräntze echten, womit sie den Käyser und Ormœna bewerffen.

Flora

Verdoppelt euren Tantz!

Unter Wiederholung dieses Tantzes höret man ein Geschrey inwendig:

Chorus

Piso lebe! Nero sterbe!

Lepidus Aufruhr, Aufruhr!

Das Geschrey wird immer stärcker, worüber sich alles in höchster Unordnung retiriret, und die Schau=Bühne wieder geschlossen wird.

Chorus

Piso lebe! Nero sterbe!

Nero Ver uchter Trotz!

Ormœna

Ver uchte Wuht!

Lepidus Verdammte Bruht!

Vierdter Auftritt. Das Theatrum verändert sich in eine Gasse, so zum Esquilino führet.

Piso mit einer Menge Soldaten, welche immer ruffen:

Chorus

Nero sterbe, Piso lebe!

Piso

Die Burg ist schon erstiegen, Der Wühtrich gehet üchtig, Auf, auf, und last uns ferner siegen, Biß man mich auf den Thron erhebt!

Aria. Flora. Strew owers

From Edom

You little ock of Cupids! As you dance, Crown Caesar’s golden locks With a garland of roses. Strew owers…

After this the zephyrs and cupids dance an Entrée during which they braid the owers into garlands with which they adorn the Emperor and Ormœna.

Flora Redouble your dance!

During the repeat of this dance a great outcry is heard.

Chorus

Long live Piso! Nero must die!

Lepidus Rebellion! Rebellion!

The outcry becomes ever louder, during which everything becomes extremely disorderly, and the theater curtain is closed.

Chorus

Long live Piso! Nero must die!

Nero Cursed insolence!

Ormœna Cursed rage!

Lepidus Damned hooligans!

Scene Four.

The theater changes into an alleyway leading to the Esquilino.

Piso with a crowd of soldiers, who continually cry:

Chorus

Nero must die! Long live Piso!

Piso

The palace is already taken, the bloody tyrant ees. Up, up and let us continue the victory until I am placed upon the throne.

Chorus

Nero sterbe, Piso lebe!

Fabius gleichfalls mit einem Troup Verräther, bistu hier?

Heist diß den Käyser treu gedient, Soll man also die Majestät verletzen, Und die gemeine Ruh gar aus den Augen setzen?

Piso

Verwegner, redtstu so mit mir?

Weistu nicht, daß allhie der Sieges=Lorbeer grünt?

Fabius

Und bistu tüchtig ...

Piso

Schweig, und gib dich gefangen!

Fabius

Getreue, auf, last uns den Sieg erlangen!

(Nach einem kleinen Scharmützel wird Piso gefangen, und sein Volck verjagt.)

Piso

Ach Unglück! Fabius, ein Wort!

Fabius

Bringt den Rebellen fort!

Piso

Ein Wort! Ein Wort!

Fabius

Aufrührer, geh’ fort leget ihn an Ketten!

Piso

Der Himmel mag das arme Rom erretten!

Fünffter Auftritt.

Fabius. Livia.

Fabius

Offt lässet sich auf Mavors Auen

Auch eine schöne Venus schauen.

Aria. Livia.

So manchesmahl

Forscht meiner Augen trüber Strahl, Wo mein geliebter Engel lebt!

Kan ich ihn nicht nden, Muß ich im Hertzen nach ihn gründen, Da er doch auf der Zunge schwebt. So manchesmahl, &c.

Chorus

Nero must die! Long live Piso!

Fabius (also with a troop of soldiers)

Traitors! Are you here?

Is this the way you give faithful service to the Emperor? Should we now do violence to majesty and lose the general peace for good?

Piso

Foolhardy wretch, you dare to speak to me like that? Did you not know that right here the victory laurel is in full bloom?

Fabius

And are you able…

Piso

Silence, give yourself up as captive.

Fabius

All you faithful, come on, let us be victorious! (After a short battle Piso is taken captive, and his men dispersed.)

Piso

Ah misfortune! Fabius, let me have a word!

Fabius

Take the rebel away!

Piso

A word! A word!

Fabius

Rebel, begone! Put him in irons!

Piso

May heaven save poor Rome!

Scene Five.

Fabius, Livia.

Fabius

Often in the meadows of Mars, a lovely Venus appears.

Aria. Livia.

Sometimes

My sad eyes seek to nd Where my beloved angel lives. If I can’t nd him, I must look for him in my heart— For he is always on the tip of my tongue.

Sometimes…

Fabius

Hör’ ich denn nun, daß dein Gemüht

Von treuer Gegen=Liebe glüht?

Livia

Ach laß mich von dir ziehn!

Fabius

Du wirst umbsonst ent iehn, Und öhestu biß an des Himmels Dach, So folgt’ ich dir gewißlich nach.

Livia

So wolte Fabius mich wol begleiten?

Fabius

Stets soll mein Fuß nach deinen schreiten, Ergib dich mir, mein werthes Leben,

Livia

Ich will den Käyser fragen.

Fabius

Weil Piso itzt von mir geschlagen, Wird er schon Ja zu meiner Liebe sagen.

Sechster Auftritt.

Seneca. Octavia.

Seneca

Ich kenne sein Gemüht, es geht gantz sicher an, Er hat mir ohne dem von dir erzehlt, Daß du ihn jüngst in einen Traum gequält, Und daß ihn dein Gespenst geführt in dunckle Schatten.

Octavia

Wenn ich ihn nur dadurch bewegen kan. Was soll ich ihm dann für Bericht erstatten?

Seneca

Halt’ ihm nur seine Wuht nachdrücklich für, Schröck ihn mit Hölle, Todt und Grab, Und bild’ ihm deine Treu wehmühtig ab.

Octavia

Mein Freund, ich dancke dir, Und folge deinen Raht.

Seneca

Die Götter segnen deine That!

Siebender Auftritt.

Ein ödes Feld mit einer elenden Stroh=Hütte, wobey eine Wasser=Grube. In der Ferne ein Dorff. Nero üchtig und masquiret, von Sporus begleitet.

Fabius

Do I now hear that your heart now glows with love in return for mine?

Livia

Ah, let me get away from you!

Fabius

You try to y from me in vain, for even if you would ee to the highest heaven, I would surely follow you there!

Livia

So, Fabius wants to accompany me?

Fabius

My foot will always follow yours. Give yourself to me, my dearest life!

Livia

I will ask the Emperor.

Fabius

Now that I have conquered Piso, he will surely say “Yes” to my love.

Scene Six. Seneca, Octavia.

Seneca

I know his mind, it certainly concerns him. Besides that, he told me that recently, in a dream, you menaced him and your ghost led him into a dark place.

Octavia

If only I could move him like that! What should I tell him then?

Seneca

Show him emphatically the results of his fury, scare him with visions of hell, death, and the grave, and also show him your faithfulness in moving sorrow.

Octavia

My friend, I thank you, I’ll follow your advice.

Seneca

May the gods bless your actions!

Scene Seven.

A drab eld with a miserable straw hut and a water hole. In the distance a village. Nero masked and fugitive, accompanied by Sporus.

Accompagnato. Nero.

Ach Nero ist nicht Nero mehr!

Armseelger Fürst, Nein, nein, armseelger Knecht!

Wo bleibet deine Würd’ und Ehr?

Verschwunden.

Verschwunden, leyder, ach, durch ungerechte Wunden!

O weh! was rüget sich in mir?

Ach zeigt sich Agrippina hier?

Antonia! zurück Antonia!

Ach Burrus! Ach Crispin!

Ach Aulus! Tuscus, ach! Ach Mutter Agrippin!

(Er steht in Gedancken.)

Wie? sind die Hencker nicht schon da, Verlassner Nero, dich zu fangen?

Ach ja! Ach ja! Was hab ich doch begangen!

Was hab ich doch vollbracht!

Vollbracht, und nie bedacht!

Wer kömmt? Was ist es, das ich hör?

Ach Nero ist nicht Nero mehr!

(Er steht wieder in Gedancken.)

Betrübte Seele, schmachtestu?

Ihr trockne Leffzen dürret ihr, Die Stimme wird mir rauch, die Zunge spaltet sich, Ach einen Trunck! Mich dürst, Ist kein Gefäß mit Weine hier?

Mich dürst, und niemand träncket mich?

Schöpff Wasser, unglückseelger Fürst!

(Er schöpfft mit der Hand Wasser aus einer Pfütze.)

Schaut, schaut, wie der bey einer Pfütze liegt, Den offtmahls nicht der beste Wein vergnügt. (Seneca kömmt und bleibt in der Ferne stehen.)

Reicht niemand nun ein Handtuch dar, Zu trocknen eines Käysers Hände, Da meiner Knaben zartes Haar Mir sonst hiezu gedient? Ist diß der Wollust Ende?

Aria. Nero.

Erstaune, sichrer Kräyß der Welt! Ihr Reich=Beherrscher, sehet, sehet, Wie hier ein grosser Käyser fällt, Wie Nero blutig untergehet!

Nero

Es regt sich was, Ihr Ohren horcht, was ists? Ein Blat von einem Baum, Ein Eschen=Laub rührt sich von ohngefehr, Ich bin nur noch als wie in einem Traum.

Accompagnato. Nero. Mein Auge starrt, der Mund wird blaß,

Accompagnato. Nero.

Alas! Nero is no longer Nero!

Miserable Prince! No, no, miserable servant! Where are your worthiness and honor now?

Gone.

Gone, regrettably, alas, through unjust wounds in icted. O misery! How do I reprimand myself?

Alas, now Agrippina appears to me!

And Antonia! Go back, Antonia!

Ah Burrus! Ah Crispin!

Ah Aulus and Tuscus! Alas, mother Agrippina!

(He stands still in thought.)

What? Are the executioners already come for me, poor abandoned Nero?

Yes, yes, what have I done!

What have I caused to happen!

Caused without a thought!

Who is coming? What is it that I hear?

Alas! Nero is no longer Nero! (He stands still again in thought.)

Sad soul, do you languish now?

You lips, are you dried out?

My voice becomes raw, my tongue splits, alas, give me a drink, I’m thirsty!

Is there no bottle with wine here?

I’m thirsty, and no one gives me anything to drink? Scoop water, miserable Prince! (He scoops water with his hands out of a puddle.)

Look, look how he now lies by a puddle, who so often was not pleased even by the best of wines. (Seneca enters but remains standing in the distance.)

Is there no one to give a towel to dry an Emperor’s hands— a service which used to be given me in the tender hair of my servant boys? Is this the end of all pleasure?

Aria. Nero.

Be astounded great circle of the world

And all you kings of the earth, see, see How a great Emperor is fallen, How Nero, bloodied, is destroyed.

Nero

Something is moving there: you ears, listen, what is it? A leaf from a tree, an ash tree moves somewhere, I feel as if I’m in a dream.

Accompagnato. Nero.

My eye stares, my mouth turns pale,

Das Hertze pocht, die Adern beben mir, Was zeigen sich vor Hencker hier?

Wer bin ich? Nero ach, du bist nicht Nero mehr.

Er entschläfft auf einem Stein unter einer stillen Music, worauf Octavia in Gestalt eines Geistes erscheinet.

Achter Auftritt.

Nero schlaffend. Seneca und Octavia.

Seneca

So blutet das Gewissen, Also muß man die Sünde büssen.

Aria. Seneca.

Wer mit Vorsatz hat gefehlet, Wird gequählet

Durch der Reue Seelen=Pein.

Deiner Boßheit Angedencken

Wird dich kräncken, Und dein eigner Hencker seyn.

Seneca

Er schläfft, du kanst nur zu ihm gehn, Ich bleibe in der Ferne steht.

Octavia

Die Rache bricht die Riegel meiner Grufft, Und ruffet mich aus meiner duncklen Höle. Schau, Blut=Fürst, diesen Schatten an, Ein irrendes Gespenst, das nicht mehr ruhen kan, Schau einen Dufft und Nebel meiner Seele, Der über dich ein lahmes Zetter ruft!

Du Hencker, du Tyran, Was hatt’ ich Arme dir gethan, Daß du mein treues Blut vergossen, Für alle Lieb und Gunst, die du von mir genossen?

Aria. Octavia.

Angenehmste Augen=Sonne, Öffnet euch, und schauet an, Wie mit Lust

Diese Brust

Euer Trost will wieder werden, Angenehmste Augen=Sonnen, Öffnet euch, und schaut mich an!

(Nero erwacht.)

Octavia (Er wachet schon.)

Ersättige den Mord=Durst deiner Wuht

In diesem schon entseelten Blut, Schau meiner Wunden Purpur=Farben, Schau, wie ihr Scharlach triumphir,

my heart throbs, and my veins tremble!

Why are all these hangmen here?

Who am I? Nero, alas, Nero is no longer Nero!

He falls asleep on a stone while a quiet music plays; Octavia in the form of a ghost appears.

Scene Eight.

Nero sleeping, Seneca and Octavia.

Seneca

Thus the conscience bleeds— thus must one pay for one’s sins.

Aria. Seneca.

He who has bad intentions, Shall be tormented

With the regretful anguish of his soul.

The souvenirs of your wickedness

Will wound you

And become your own executioners.

Seneca

He sleeps, you can go to him, I will remain here in the distance.

Octavia

Rage has broken open the bars of my crypt, and calls me forth from my dark cave. Look, bloody tyrant, at this my shadow, a wandering ghost that can nd no rest!

Look at the haze and fog which my soul has become, and which makes a crippled outcry about you!

You Hangman! you Tyrant! what did I—poor me—ever do to you, that you should spill my innocent blood, after all the love and favor which you enjoyed from me?

Aria. Octavia.

Most delightful sunny eyes, Open and see How much I desire

That this breast

Once again becomes your comfort. Most delightful sunny eyes, Open up and look at me!

(Nero awakens)

Octavia (He awakens.)

Quench the murder-thirst of your rage on this lifeless blood!

Look at the purple color of my wounds, and see how your scarlet triumphs!

Er bildet dir

Ein Brand=Mahl der Gewissens=Narben.

Sprich, Sprich, Rechtfertge dich, Wird deine Zunge nun zum Steine, Erzittert nun dein pochendes Gewissen Für dieses schlotternde Gebeine?

Was schweigstu still, Du lallest, sprechen kanstu nicht, Ein Schröcken bindet deine Rede, Und Todes=Angst macht deine Sprache blöde.

Dein Auge, das mich gern betrachten will, Schliest für Entsetzen alles Licht, Wird deinem Hertzen nun erst bange, Erhebe nur dein schamroht Angesicht, Du Scheusahl auf, was schlummerstu so lange?

Du Mord=Kind, du Verrähter, Du Ungeheur, du Ubelthäter! (Octavia und Seneca verbergen sich.)

Neunter Auftritt.

Nero allein.

Accompagnato. Nero.

Halt, halt erzürnter Geist, laß schauen deine Wunden, Bistu schon wiederum verschwunden?

Verzögre doch, ich eile nach!

(Er steht wiederum tieffsinnig.)

Ach! Ach bistu nicht mehr da, Getreues Ehgemahl, Octavia!

Aria. Nero.

Blasser Schatten, kehre wieder, Bleiche Lippen, öffnet euch. Schaut, erstarrte Augenlieder, Aus dem seel’gen Todten=Reich! Komm, ach komm, erblaste Schöne, Daß ich mich mit dir versöhne!

Nero

Mit Zittern und mit Zagen

Muß ich beklagen, Entseelter Geist, wie sehr ich dich verletzt, Da ich unkeusches Feur vor reine Glut gesetzt. Und weil mich alle Welt anitzt verlassen, So muß ich andern Anschlag fassen, (Er zieht zwo Dolche hervor.)

Die Richter kommen schon, mein blutiges Verbrechen

Durch Staupenschlag und Schwerd zu rächen, Allein ich komm euch vor, und ende meine Noht Durch einen schnellen Todt.

Aria. Nero.

Mit Trauren, Mit Schauren,

It marks the scars of your conscience. Speak! Speak! Justify yourself!

Has your tongue turned to stone? Is your throbbing conscience now trembling on your shivering legs? What, still silent?

You are just slurring, you can’t speak properly. The shock prevents you from speaking, and the fear of death has rendered you deaf and dumb. Your eyes, that want to see me, close themselves in horror.

Is your heart now afraid for the rst time?

Open your eyes, all red with shame— you monster, why do you go on sleeping?

Murderer! Betrayer! Monster! Criminal!

(Octavia and Seneca hide themselves.)

Scene Nine. Nero alone.

Accompagnato. Nero. Stop, stop angry ghost! Let me see your wounds! Are you already gone again?

Wait a bit, I’m running after you.

(He stands again deep in thought)

Alas! Are you no longer there, faithful wife, Octavia?

Aria. Nero. Pale shadow, come back! Pale lips, open again!

Look again you frozen eyes, From the realm of the dead! Come, ah come back, pallid beauty, So that I can make it up to you!

Nero

With trembling and apprehension I must lament, departed shade, how much I hurt you, because I put an unchaste lust before the pure ame of our love. And now that the whole world has abandoned me, I must now nd a new way forward.

(He brandishes two daggers.)

The judges are already arriving to punish my bloody crimes with whips and swords.

And yet, I will get there sooner, and end all my suffering with a quick death.

Aria. Nero.

With mourning And shuddering,

Mit Quälen

Der Seelen, Mit reuendem Sinn, Mit Zittern, Mit Wittern, Mit Zagen

Und Klagen

Sinckt Nero dahin!

Nero

Doch wie! soll Nero furchtsam sterben?

Nein, gar nicht, Mord=Dolch weg! Verlass’ ich gleich (Er wirfft die Dolche von sich.)

Ruhm, Kron und Reich, Soll Nero doch so schimp ich nicht verderben.

Zehnter Auftritt.

Nero, Fabius mit einigen Soldaten. (Auf Fabii Ankunfft verbirgt er sich in die Hütte.)

Fabius

Es ist ja seine Sprach, was ists, das ich erblick, Den Käyser in der Bauren=Hütte?

Nero

Nun fängt man mich, ach, wo ist nun mein Degen?

Fabius

Ihr Himmel, ja, recht in der Mitte.

Nero

Soll Fabius mich noch an Ketten legen?

Fabius

Ach, wandelbahres Glück, Nero. Käyser. Nero ... hörstu nicht?

Nero

Verzeiht, was ich begangen, Wer ist der mir das Todes=Urtheil spricht?

Fabius

Was Urtheil, es ist ja die Unruh schon gedämpfft, Der Piso selbst gefangen.

Nero

Nicht Piso, Nero ach, ist leider, nun gefangen!

Fabius

Ich habe selbst mit ihm gekämpfft, Und unterm Capitol im Kercker hingesetzt, Da wird er müssen

Die Unthat mit dem Strange büssen.

Nero

Kan ich dir glauben, Fabius?

With torture

Of the soul, With a regret- lled heart, With trembling And apprehension, With anxiety And lamentation Nero goes to his end.

Nero

But what? Shall Nero die in fear?

No, never! Murderous dagger, away! (Throws the dagger away.)

[Even if I mustgive up] my reputation, my crown, and my Empire, Nero will not die such a disgraceful death.

Scene Ten.

Nero, Fabius with some soldiers. (At Fabius’s arrival he hides himself in the hut.)

Fabius

It is his voice that I hear…but what’s this I see, the Emperor in a farmer’s hut?

Nero

Now I am captured! Ah, where is my dagger now?

Fabius

Heavens, yes, right there in the middle!

Nero

Will Fabius now put me in chains?

Fabius

Ah, changeable fortune!

Nero! Caesar! Nero…do you not hear?

Nero

Forgive what I have done! Who is the one who will condemn me to death?

Fabius

What condemnation? The rebellion has been put down, and Piso himself is imprisoned.

Nero

Not Piso, Nero, alas! is now captured!

Fabius

I myself fought with him and put him in jail beneath the capitol. He now must pay for his misdeeds at the end of a rope.

Nero

Can I believe you, Fabius?

Fabius

Ich schwere dir bey aller Götter Macht, Daß alles wahr, was ich dir vorgebracht!

Nero

Mein wehrter Freund, nimmt diesen Kuß!

Fabius

Allein, mein Käyser, höre mich.

Nero

Sprich frey, womit vergnüg’ ich dich?

Fabius

Daß du mir Livia zur Ehe giebest,

Nero

Und wenn sie meine Schwester wäre, Geb’ ich sie dir, ich weiß, daß du sie liebest,

Fabius

So sieget bey mir Lieb’ und Ehre.

Fabius und Nero à 2

Die trübe Wolcke iehet, Wenn güldner Glantz umbziehet

Olympus Sternen=Zelt.

Die Freude wird gebohren, Wenn sich das Leid verlohren, Das lauter Schatten hält.

(Da Capo)

Eilffter Auftritt.

Der Schau=Platz verwandelt sich in das Argiletum mit dem Capitolio in der Ferne. An einer Seite siehet man ein Chavot, mit einem Beil und Richt=Block. Tiridates, Ormœna, Clelia, Lepidus.

Tiridates und Ormœna à 2

Die Liebe wird den Fehler decken.

Tiridates

So ist Ormœna wieder mein?

Ormœna

Ormœna bleibt auf ewig dein!

Aria. Ormœna. Solo con te, ben mio, Son’ io.

Contento in amore, Mio Tiridato sia Alma del alma mia, E cuore del mio cuore.

(Da Capo)

Tiridates

Wo ist der Käyser, Lepidus?

Fabius

I swear to you by the power of all the gods, that what I have told you is all true.

Nero

My worthy friend, receive this kiss!

Fabius

But rst, Caesar, hear me.

Nero

Speak freely, how can I please you?

Fabius

You could give me Livia as my bride.

Nero

Even if she were my sister, I would give her to you; I know that you love her.

Fabius

So now, in me, both love and honor win!

Duet. Fabius and Nero. The sad clouds disperse, When golden sunshine covers Mount Olympus’s starry heaven. Joy is born When sorrow goes away Which contained so many shadows. The sad clouds…

Scene Eleven.

The theater changes into a spa with the Capitoline Hill in the distance. On one side one can see a scaffold, with an executioner’s axe and an execution block. Tiridates, Ormœna, Clelia, Lepidus.

Tiridates and Ormœna Love will hide the mistake.

Tiridates

Is Ormœna mine again?

Ormœna

Ormœna is forever yours!

Aria. Ormœna. Only with you, my treasure Do I nd Contentment in love.

My beloved Tiridat is The soul of my soul, And the heart of my heart. Only with you…

Tiridates

Where is Caesar, Lepidus?

Lepidus

Der tapfre Fabius

Hat ihm schon den Bericht gebracht, Daß dem Tumult das Ende sey gemacht.

Clelia

Man saget, daß im Orden

Des hohen Rahts beschlossen worden, Daß Piso wegen der gebrochnen Treu Zum Tode zu verdammen sey.

Lepidus

Man wird das Urtheil noch verschieben, Biß es der Käyser unterschrieben.

Tiridates

Ich zwei e, weil der Richt=Block schon gesetzt.

Ormœna zu Tiridates Wir wollen uns bemüh, Der Hafft ihn wieder zu entziehn.

Zwölffter Auftritt. Clelia, Lepidus.

Aria. Lepidus

Ist es war, mein Leben, Daß du nicht mehr so erbost, Und zu meinem Trost

Etwas nachgegeben?

Was sagestu?

Clelia

Nein, nein.

Lepidus

Allein

Ist es war, mein Leben!

Clelia

(Nun Tiridates fort, ist alle Hoffnung hin.)

Lepidus

Ach sprich ein süsses Ja, Und ändre doch den Felsen=harten Sinn.

Clelia

(Ich spühre, daß ich ihm nicht ungewogen bin.)

Lepidus

Was saget Clelia?

Clelia

Daß ich ...

Lepidus

Brave Fabius already brought him the news that the rebellion has been ended.

Clelia

I’ve heard that in the Senate they have already decided that Piso must be put to death for breaking his oath of loyalty.

Lepidus

They will need to delay the execution until Caesar has signed it.

Tiridates

I doubt they will, since the executioner’s block has already been put in place.

Ormœna (to Tiridates) We should make an effort to get him out of detention.

Scene Twelve. Clelia, Lepidus.

Aria. Lepidus

Is it true, my love, That you are no longer mad at me? And to my great consolation You have relented? What do you say?

Clelia

No, no, no, no!

Lepidus

But is it true, my love, is it true?

Clelia

(Now that Tiridates is lost to me, all my hope is gone.)

Lepidus

Ah, say a sweet “yes”, and change your hard heart!

Clelia

(I feel that I’m not unfavorably inclined towards him.)

Lepidus

What does Clelia say?

Clelia

That I…

Lepidus

Ach rede!

Clelia Was?

Lepidus

Was? Ja.

Clelia

Ich bin ...

Lepidus

Was bistu denn?

Clelia

Ach Lepidus, ich bin besieget, Dieß Hertz ist dein.

Lepidus

Nimm meines wieder hin.

Lepidus und Clelia à 2 Nunmehr bin ich vergnüget.

Aria. Clelia.

Schönste Seele, dich zu lieben, Bleibet dieses Hertze rein. Es ist dein, Schau hinein,

Wie die Liebe selbst geschrieben, Schönste Seele dich zu lieben!

Dreyzehnter Auftritt. Seneca, Fabius.

Seneca

Schon auf dem Capitol?

Fabius

Ja, ja, den Göttern Danck zu sagen.

Seneca

Gehts meinem Käyser wol?

Ihr Götter seyd gepriesen, Daß ihr ihm Heil und Glück erwiesen!

Fabius

Hier sieht man Block und Beil

Das den Rebellen wird zu theil.

Vierzehnter Auftritt.

Vorige. Nero kömmt vom Capitolio in voriger Pracht, begleitet von Tiridates, Ormœna, Livia, Clelia, Lepidus, Davus, Sporus, nebst verschiedenen anderen Cavalliers,

Lepidus

Ah, please speak!

Clelia

What?

Lepidus

What? Yes!

Clelia I am…

Lepidus

What are you then?

Clelia

Ah Lepidus, I am conquered, this heart is yours.

Lepidus

Take mine for yourself.

Lepidus and Clelia

Now I am happy!

Aria. Clelia.

Most beautiful soul, in loving you, My heart remains pure. It is yours, Look into it,

As love himself wrote it, Most beautiful soul, I love you.

Scene Thirteen. Seneca, Fabius.

Seneca

We are at the Capitol already?

Fabius

Yes, yes, to give thanks to the gods.

Seneca

Is my Caesar doing well?

You gods be praised, that you have preserved him in health and happiness!

Fabius

Here I see the axe and the block which will be the fate of the rebels.

Scene Fourteen.

Adding to the former: Nero comes from the Capitoline Hill in full splendor, accompanied by Tiridates, Ormœna, Livia, Clelia, Lepidus, Davus, Sporus, with various other

Dames und vielen Soldaten. Die Wache bringt Piso und andere Gefangene an Ketten geschlossen.

Aria. Nero.

Chi non sà della fortuna Ritrovar la sorte istabile, La ricerchi nel mio sen. Quante frodi in sè raduna, Come passa, e quanto è labile, Come fugge in un balen!

Nero

Aufrührer, fort, bereite dich, Daß deine Boßheit mit dem Tode büsse! Gleich legt das Haupt ihm vor die Füsse, Die andern streicht mit Ruhten.

Davus

Hier hat man Ruhten, Strang und Beil Vor alle Friedens=Stöhrer feil.

Piso

Nicht dein Befehl mein Unglück ruffet mich, Dem und nicht dir soll dieser Nacken bluten.

Nero

Du bist darum allein des Todes wehrt, Weil du, wie wir gehört, Den Tod Octaviens nicht hast gehemmt, Der Tod, der Tod ... Ach ... Der diß Hertz beklemmt! (Er steht gantz betrübt.)

Seneca

Mein Käyser, ach vergib, was Piso hat verbrochen, (kniend) Durch seine Sorgfalt ist Octavia erhalten, Und sie war selbst der Geist, der dich erschreckt.

Nero

So ist Octavia bey Leben noch geblieben?

Piso!

Piso

Ich hielte ihre Faust zurück, Da gleich der Dolch ihr Hertze sollte spalten, Diß Kleinod unser Zeit zu retten.

Nero

O Glück!

Ihr Knechte, löset ihm die Ketten, Geh, werther, hol sie her! (Piso geht ab.)

Livia

Vergönnet Eure Majestät, Daß ich in Lieb und Treu mit Fabius zu leben, Ihm mag die Hände geben?

ladies and gentlemen and many soldiers. The guard brings Piso and the other prisoners, all in chains.

Aria. Nero.

Whoever knows not how to nd an unstable fate from Fortune, should seek it in my breast: so many deceptions are gathered there! How it slips away, and how eeting it is, it is gone in a ash of lightning!

Nero

Rebel, come forward, prepare yourself to pay for your malice with your death! Soon your head will lay at the foot of him whom others tried to strike at with a rod.

Davus

Here we have for every disturber of the peace an axe, a noose, or a rod!

Piso

Not because of your command, but by virtue of my own misfortune am I called forth. It is for that, and not for you that my neck will bleed.

Nero

You are worthy of death for the simple reason that you, as we have heard, did nothing to prevent the death of Octavia, the death…the death…alas, that oppresses this heart. (He stands overcome with grief.)

Seneca

My Caesar, ah, forgive Piso his misdeeds: (he kneels) Through his care Octavia has survived, and it was she herself who haunted you as a ghost.

Nero

So is Octavia still alive, Piso?

Piso

I restrained her hand, and with it the dagger that should have pierced her heart, and thus saved this jewel of our time.

Nero

O good fortune!

You servants, unchain him. Go, my worthy, and bring her here. (Piso leaves.)

Livia

Will you grant, your majesty, that I in love and faith can live with Fabius, and give him my hand in marriage?

Nero

Noch etwas mehr, Gebt mit den Händen euch die Hertzen. (Er legt ihnen die Hände in einander.)

Lepidus

Und weil bey mir und Clelien

Die reine Loh gewünschter Liebes=Kertzen

In voller Klarheit ist zu sehn, So wollen gleichfalls wir umbs Käysers Beyfall bitten.

Davus

(Die wollen conjugatim geht.)

Nero

Die Götter wollen euch mit Segen überschütten!

Davus

(Das ist woll der Effect

Der in gedachtem Loco steckt.)

(Piso führt die Octavia herzu, Nero eilt ihr entgegen und umbarmet sie.)

Nero

Geliebter Schatz, getreues Ehgemahl, Vergib, daß du von uns beleidigt bist, Dem Himmel sey gedanckt, daß du annoch bey Leben.

Octavia

Ein Weib, das edelmühtig ist, Hegt keine Rache im Gemühte, Es preist vielmehr der Götter Gühte, Die endlich nach so langer Trauer=Nacht, In Rom die Ruh, bey uns die Gunst hat wiederbracht.

Schluß=Aria

Chorus

In Spielen und Lachen Kehrt Amor das Leid.

Octavia

Mit Schertzen

Und Hertzen

Muß Hymen den Zunder der Freuden anfachen Nach Traurigkeit.

Alle

In Spielen und Lachen Kehrt Amor das Leid.

ENDE

Nero

Also something more:

Along with your hands, give each other your hearts. (He places their hands together.)

Lepidus

And since, between me and Clelia, the pure ame of our longed-for love candles is clear to see, we also hope for the permission and good wishes of the Emperor.

Davus

(They want to go in conjugatim!)

Nero

May the gods pour out their blessings upon you.

Davus (This is the effect that is contained in the said “loco”.)

(Piso brings Octavia in, Nero rushes to her and takes her in his arms.)

Nero

Beloved treasure, faithful wife, please forgive my offenses to you! Heaven be thanked that you are still alive.

Octavia

A wife who has a noble heart, bears no grudge in her soul. Instead it celebrates the bounty of the gods which, nally after a long night of sorrow, has brought peace back to Rome, and our favor back to each other.

Finale

Chorus

Love turns all suffering Into games and laughter.

Octavia With jokes And hearts, Hymen lights the ame of joy, After every sorrow.

Tutti

Love turns all suffering Into games and laughter.

End of the Opera

SCHEDULE

MONDAY, JUNE 9

5pm ACRONYM: Amor Temporalia: Instrumental music of Bertali, Schmelzer, Valentini, Biber, Priuli, and others. New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall, 30 Gainsborough Street, Boston. $64, $49, $35, $25

8pm The Tallis Scholars, directed by Peter Phillips, and The English Cornett & Sackbut Ensemble: Jubilate! Music of Lassus, Palestrina, Gombert, Andrea Gabrieli, and Giovanni Gabrieli. New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall, 30 Gainsborough Street. $70, $55, $40, $25.

10:30pm Aaron Sheehan, tenor, and Paul O’Dette, lute: The Excellency of Wine: Songs of Love, Laughter, and Drinking – Lute songs by Dowland, Guédron, Moulinié, and Henry Lawes. New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall, 30 Gainsborough Street. $25.

MONDAY | JUNE 9

MONDAY, JUNE 9

TICKETS FOR BEMF EVENTS

TO PURCHASE TICKETS FOR BEMF EVENTS DURING FESTIVAL WEEK (JUNE 8–15), you may purchase tickets online all week long from Sunday, June 8 through Sunday, June 15 at BEMF.org. Tickets can also be purchased in person, Wednesday through Saturday from 10am to 4pm at the BEMF Welcome Center, near the entrance to the Festival Exhibition at the The Colonnade Hotel, 120 Huntington Avenue, Boston. Additionally, you may call the BEMF Box Office at 617-661-1812 for credit card sales, Monday through Saturday from 10am to 4pm. Acceptable forms of payment for purchases are American Express, VISA, MasterCard, Discover, and cash (for in-person sales). You may also purchase tickets for individual events—at their respective venues—30 minutes prior to the performance. See page 40 for concert venue box office information. An Exhibition Pass provides admission to the Exhibition and to Festival Concurrent Events, excluding pre-opera talks (see pages 49–58 and 334–339). An Exhibition Pass may be purchased for $10 at the BEMF Welcome Center in The Colonnade Hotel, Wednesday through Saturday, from 10am to 4pm daily, online at BEMF.org, or at the door of most Festival events. All sales are final. No refunds or exchanges are available for any ticket purchases.

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Amor Temporalia

ACRONYM

Sonata a8 in A minor Antonio Bertali (1605–1669)

Canzona a8 in E minor Giovanni Priuli (ca. 1575–1626)

Sonata a5 in G minor Giovanni Valentini (1582/83–1649)

Sonata a6 in E minor Bertali

Ciacona di S.M.C. in G major

Sonata a5 in D minor

Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I (1640–1705)

Johann Heinrich Schmelzer (ca. 1620–1680)

[Balletti] a9 in F major (modern premiere) Anonymous (CZ-KRa XIV:251) (late 17th c.)

Sonata a8 in A minor Alessandro Poglietti (d. 1683)

The Battle of Vienna in G minor

Heinrich Ignaz Franz Biber (1644–1704)

arranged by Andreas Anton Schmelzer (1653–1701)

Sonata Jucunda a5 in D minor Anonymous (?J. H. Schmelzer/?Biber)

W Double-manual French harpsichord by Allan Winkler, Medford, Massachusetts, 1991, X after Donzelague, property of the Boston Early Music Festival.

W Continuo organ by Bennett & Giuttari, Rehoboth, Massachusetts, X provided by New England Conservatory.

ACRONYM

Edwin Huizinga, Adriane Post & Johanna Novom, violin

Chloe Fedor & Beth Wenstrom, violin & viola

Cynthia Black, viola

Loren Ludwig, viola da gamba

Kivie Cahn-Lipman, viola da gamba & lirone

Paul Dwyer, violoncello

Doug Balliett, violone

Daniel Swenberg, theorbo & Baroque guitar

Elliot Figg, harpsichord & organ

Notes on the Program

Until its dramatic dissolution following defeat by the army of Napoleon, the Holy Roman Empire represented one of the greatest consolidations of power and wealth in the history of the West. For nearly a millennium the Empire’s purse funded some of the most lavish (and strangest!) art, architecture, and music available across Europe, expressions of both its love of—and its grip on—temporal power. A hundred years before later generations of the Hapsburg dynasty helped produce the so-called First Viennese School of Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven, three successive Holy Roman Emperors with musical predilections forged a rich musical culture in the Imperial city. Amor Temporalia presents a selection of string ensemble works commissioned by (or dedicated to—or composed by!) these men of power, all pieces that testify to a rari ed taste for extravagance and novelty.

We begin with perhaps the only musician whose employ in the Hapsburg court spanned the reigns of Ferdinand II, Ferdinand III, and Leopold I. Antonio Bertali was born in Verona, and he studied there and in Venice before nding employment in 1624 in Vienna as a violinist in the Imperial orchestra of Ferdinand II.

Ferdinand II had been crowned Holy Roman Emperor in 1619 and had brought his court to Vienna, including his Kapellmeister Giovanni Priuli and organist Giovanni Valentini. Both composers had studied in Venice with Giovanni Gabrieli and had been hired by Ferdinand in Graz several years prior to his election. Priuli, Valentini, and the young Bertali exempli ed the Italian character of Ferdinand II’s court musical culture.

The few extant compositions by Priuli consist largely of madrigals and canzonas written in Venetian polychoral style of Gabrieli and often lacking a basso continuo, exempli ed by his Canzona Prima a8 from Sacrorum Concentuum (1618). Valentini—who was promoted to Ferdinand II’s Hofkapellmeister after Priuli’s death—composed operas, oratorios, sacred songs, madrigals, and instrumental works. His Secondo libro de madrigali (1616) is the earliest known published madrigal collection to call for instruments other than continuo. His Musiche concertate (1619) includes the rst known instance of stile concitato (several years before Monteverdi’s celebrated use of it in his 1624 Combattimento) as well as a notated part for water- lled clay nightingales (unfortunately ACRONYM’s clay nightingalist won’t be able to join this afternoon’s performance because of a freak pottery accident). A number of Valentini’s instrumental pieces re ect his penchant for rhythmic, metric, and harmonic experimentation, such as the passages in 5/4 meter and moments of bracing chromaticism found in the Sonata a5 in G minor.

Ferdinand II’s son and successor, Ferdinand III, had musical inclinations which even surpassed his father’s. The new Holy Roman Emperor was an accomplished composer and the number of musicians in Imperial employ grew signi cantly during his reign. Valentini retained his post for a decade under Ferdinand III and he was eventually succeeded as Hofkapellmeister by Bertali, who had likely studied with Valentini.

Bertali’s large body of published work—now almost entirely lost—included a number of operas and oratorios. Under Ferdinand III’s son and successor,Emperor Leopold I, Bertali would re ne court musical culture and serve as one of

Leopold’s earliest music teachers. Leopold composed a sizable corpus of surprising quality, including both vocal and instrumental works. The inner voices of Leopold’s Ciacona di S.M.C. (His Imperial Majesty) might have been composed or judiciously edited by Johann Heinrich Schmelzer.

Little is known of Schmelzer’s early years. His rst surviving mention is in a marriage document from 1643, when he was already employed as an instrumental musician in a Viennese church. He was appointed as Imperial violinist in 1649— likely replacing Bertali in the foremost position of the court orchestra—and he soon established a reputation as a virtuoso on that instrument, a distinction then held almost exclusively by Italians. In the years that followed, Schmelzer achieved renown for a signi cant body of compositions representing every genre of the time, and in 1679 Leopold I appointed him Hofkapellmeister. Schmelzer was the rst homegrown Austrian to hold that title. Schmelzer’s compositions, including his Sonata a5 in D minor, often reveal metric and structural irregularities that echo the music of Valentini and Bertali.

The Holy Roman Empire’s grip on power was almost lost during the Battle of Vienna, a decisive moment in European history. The Ottoman–Hapsburg Wars had intensi ed in the years prior to 1683, when an Ottoman army of approximately

170,000 besieged Vienna. Alessandro Poglietti, Imperial organist, was killed in the battle, which ended when Polish reinforcements arrived and routed the Ottoman army.

The Battle of Vienna was commemorated in a programmatic arrangement by Schmelzer’s son, Andreas Anton Schmelzer, of the tenth “Mystery Sonata” by Heinrich Ignaz Franz Biber. Andreas made minor alterations in order to normalize the violin tuning from the original scordatura, and he gave each variation a colorful title. The movements roughly translate as The Turkish Siege — March of the Reinforcements — The Turkish Advance — Prayers of the Viennese — The Turkish Assault — The Viennese Victory.

An anonymous “battaglia” piece closes our program. Sonata Jucunda (Joyous Sonata) contains a series of melodies reminiscent of Ottoman music, and this—combined with jarring dissonances and martial effects—likely mark the work as a battle piece related to the Ottoman–Hapsburg Wars. The piece was long attributed to Biber on the basis of a brief quote from the “frog” movement of his Sonata Representativa, but it has more recently been reassigned to Johann Heinrich Schmelzer. Sonata Jucunda exempli es the Hapsburg taste for lavish (and eccentric) musical spectacle designed to artfully evoke the might of their Empire.

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Bo on Early Music Fe ival

FRIDAY, DECEMBER 5, 2025

8PM | St. Paul Church, Cambridge

The Tallis Scholars

PETER PHILLIPS, Director

Mother & Child

Jubilate! The Tallis Scholars

Peter Phillips, Director with The English Cornett & Sackbut Ensemble

Omnes de Saba Orlande de Lassus (ca. 1530/2–1594)

Laudate pueri Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina (ca. 1525–1594)

Media vita Lassus

Media vita Nicolas Gombert (ca. 1495–ca. 1560)

Lugebat David Absalom Gombert

INTERMISSION

Tribulationes civitatum Palestrina

Tribulationem et dolorem Lassus

Timor et tremor Lassus

Jubilate Deo Andrea Gabrieli (ca. 1532/3–1585)

Beata es virgo Giovanni Gabrieli (ca. 1554/7–1612)

Canzon Decima Quinta Giovanni Picchi (1572–1643)

Jubilate Deo Giovanni Gabrieli

The Boston Early Music Festival extends heartfelt thanks to An Anonymous Donor for their leadership support of tonight’s performance by The Tallis Scholars with The English Cornett & Sackbut Ensemble

W Continuo organ by Bennett & Giuttari, Rehoboth, Massachusetts, X provided by New England Conservatory.

The Tallis Scholars

Peter Phillips, Director

Amy Haworth, soprano

Emma Walshe, soprano

Daisy Walford, soprano

Victoria Meteyard, soprano

Caroline Trevor, alto

Elisabeth Paul, alto

Steven Harrold, tenor

Tom Castle, tenor

Tim Scott Whiteley, bass

Rob Macdonald, bass

The English Cornett & Sackbut Ensemble

Doron David Sherwin & Conor Hastings, cornett

Emily White, Tom Lees & David Yacus, sackbut Nicholas Perry, tenor cornett & dulcian

Silas Wollston, organ

Notes on the Program

We are likely today to associate Renaissance polyphony with the cleanly delineated textures of unaccompanied voices—a sound suggestive of “purity,” analogous to the bare stone statues which decorate the porticoes of the buildings in which it was sung. However, we now suspect that at least some of this music was accompanied by a variety of instruments, just as we now know that those bare stone statues were in fact richly, even gaudily, painted and decorated.

While scholars remain split on just how often sacred music was accompanied during the sixteenth century, a place one would almost certainly hear it done was Venice, where the Gabrielis helped invent a distinctive, polychoral tradition based in St. Mark’s Basilica (Basilica di San Marco). This program explores that soundworld, placing it alongside works by Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina (commemorating the 500th anniversary of his birth this year), and his mighty contemporaries Orlande de Lassus and Nicolas Gombert.

We begin with Lassus’s Omnes de Saba, a showcase for the festal, antiphonal style which he helped popularize, and which would soon become the basis of the Venetian School. In this case, the choir is divided in two, with each trading fragments of text before recombining in an alleluiatic hymn

of praise. The text is from Isaiah, who prophesies that great Kings of the East will come to pay homage to the Messiah— an acclamation now celebrated at the feast of the Epiphany.

Laudate pueri’s con dent opening motif introduces a motet in which Palestrina showcases a different take on the eightpart style. Here, the two choirs are less obviously separate, with the composer taking advantage of the many different permutations of voice combinations afforded by the eight parts.

Media vita takes as its subject the plainchant of the popular medieval text, a reminder of the impermanence of life and the omnipresence of death. In Lassus’s motet, each voicepart enters with the outline of the opening of the chant. Subsequently, the composer’s personality begins to assert itself: as in the quirky pro le of the “quem quaerimus” line, with its ascending scale followed by a sudden descent. In the second part, a particularly expressive soprano part descends gradually from a high F, in a stylized gesture of lament. Gombert’s setting of this text likewise opens up from the plainchant tune, but his harmonic language is sterner, a weighty unfolding of serious polyphony from start to nish.

Lugebat David Absalom is a motet usually attributed to Gombert; the piece has a curious history, and may originally

have had secular words and subsequently been given a contrafactum, or new sacred text. The new text draws on the Old Testament book of 2 Samuel, in which King David is brought the news that, following a battle, one of his sons has been killed, in a moving passage of scripture. Even though Absalom had been in open rebellion against his father, David still weeps for his loss. The result is a profound meditation on grief, painted on a broad, ten-voice canvas.

Palestrina’s Tribulationes civitatum is also from the Church’s penitential season. The composer moves seamlessly between imitative polyphony, gradually built up by introducing the voices one by one, and the homophonic declamatory style. The joins are barely noticeable, only interrupting the ow of the motet to highlight the word “timor” (fear). Both parts of the piece seem to lead inexorably to the cry of “miserere”— have mercy.

We nd Lassus in a similar frame of mind in Tribulationem et dolorem, setting verses from Psalm 114. Con ning himself to four voice-parts creates a certain austerity of texture, but the lines themselves are searching and highly expressive. The second part opens with the sort of exquisite two-part voice-against-voice polyphony of which the composer was a master.

Lassus, though well-schooled in the polyphonic techniques of his time, often pushed the boundaries of what was considered harmonically acceptable. He was associated with a musical movement that sought to enlarge the expressive power of music with unusual shifts of chromaticism or

Notes on the Instrumental Works

Giovanni Gabrieli worked at Venice’s most prestigious institutions including the Basilica di San Marco and the Scuola grande di San Rocco. Before being appointed principal organist at San Marco in 1585, following the departure of Claudio Merulo, Giovanni had worked in Munich, studying composition with Orlande de Lassus. After his return to Venice, Gabrieli became a leading light in the city’s musical life, teaching a generation of composers including the visiting Heinrich Schütz, who in turn helped popularize the Venetian style north of the Alps.

The six-voice motet Beata es virgo was published in 1597 as part of Gabrieli’s monumental collection Sacrae Symphoniae. It was commonplace at the time to perform vocal pieces instrumentally, a practice made easier thanks to the aim of all instrumentalists of the time to imitate the human voice. The opening text of the motet, “Beata es virgo Maria”

rhythm. Timor et tremor exempli es this approach. This penitential motet opens with slow-moving chords which shift uncertainly between harmonic centers. Later, at the words “non confundar,” the “confusion” nds its echo in syncopated vocal parts which collide and clash with each other, in a manner more reminiscent of a secular madrigal than a sacred motet.

Together with his nephew Giovanni, Andrea Gabrieli helped bring the polychoral style to its apotheosis, in the Venice of the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries. His setting of Psalm 100, Jubilate Deo, seems to place us directly between the choir galleries of St. Mark’s. It is distinctive for its lively approach to word-setting—just listen to the rebounding syncopations of “in exsultatione”—and the marking of climactic moments of text by bringing both the choirs together.

Giovanni Gabrieli’s Jubilate Deo offers a contrast not only of texture but of text, and indeed occasion. While it begins with the opening of Psalm 100, later verses, with their references to “binding together” are more suggestive of a marriage ceremony. This motet could have celebrated the annual “marriage” of the Venetian rulers to the sea, the Sposalizio del Mare, a traditional ceremony performed on Ascension Day in the city. Indeed, the texture, with all eight parts often sounding together, could indicate outdoor performance: an overwhelming, joyful wall of sound.

—© James M. Potter,

2025

(‘Blessed are you, O virgin Mary’) appears in all parts, at rst alternating between trios of high and low instruments until all combine to conclude more con dently with the text “Dominum Deum tuum.”

A Venetian lutenist, keyboardist, and composer, Giovanni Picchi was a proli c composer of instrumental music. He was particularly noted in his own lifetime for writing dance music, and several of his orid keyboard solos appeared in printed collections across Europe. Thanks to the survival of his 1625 collection Canzoni da sonar con ogni sorte d’istromenti, which includes his Canzon Decima Quinta a6 performed here, Picchi is acknowledged today as an in uential contributor to the emergent instrumental sonata and canzona, forms which had been re ned over the previous thirty years by his Venetian colleagues such as Giovanni Gabrieli.

—Adrian France

FESTIVAL CONCERT

Texts & Translations

Omnes de Saba — Lassus

Omnes de Saba venient, aurum et thus deferentes, Et laudem Domino annuntiantes. Alleluia.

Reges Tharsis et insulae munera offerunt.

Reges Arabum et Saba dona adducent. Alleluia.

Laudate pueri — Palestrina

Laudate pueri Dominum: laudate nomen Domini.

Sit nomen Domini benedictum, ex hoc nunc et usque in saeculum. A solis ortu usque ad occasum laudabile nomen Domini.

Excelsus super omnes gentes Dominus, super coelos gloria eius.

Quis sicut Dominus Deus noster, qui in altis habitat.

Et humilia respicit in coelo et in terra.

Suscitans a terra inopem, et de stercore erigens pauperem.

Ut collocet eum cum principibus, cum principibus populi sui.

Qui habitare facit sterilem in domo matrem liorum laetantem.

Media vita — Lassus and Gombert

Media vita in morte sumus,

Quem quaerimus adiutorem nisi te, Domine, Qui pro peccatis nostris iuste irasceris?

Sancte Deus, sancte fortis

Sancte et misericors Salvator noster

Amarae morti ne tradas nos.

Lugebat David Absalon — Gombert

Lugebat David Absalon, pius pater lium, tristis senex puerum: heu me li mi Absalon, quis mihi det ut moriar, ut ego pro te, O li mi Absalon?

Rex autem David lium cooperto ebat capite: quis mihi det ut ego moriar pro te, O li mi?

Poro rex operuit caput suum, et clamabat voce magna: O li mi Absalon.

All they from Sheba shall come, bringing gold and incense, and proclaiming the praises of the Lord. Alleluia. The kings of Tarshish and the islands will offer tribute; the kings of Arabia and Saba will bring gifts to the Lord God. Alleluia.

Praise, O ye servants of the Lord: praise the name of the Lord. Blessed be the name of the Lord, from this time forth and for evermore. From the rising of the sun unto the going down of the same the Lord’s name is to be praised. The Lord is high above all nations, and his glory above the heavens. Who is like unto the Lord our God, who dwelleth on high.

Who humbleth himself to behold the things that are in heaven, and in the earth. He raiseth up the poor out of the dust, and lifteth the needy out of the dunghill. That he may set him with princes, even with the princes of his people. He maketh the barren woman to keep house, and to be a joyful mother of children.

In the midst of life we are in death, Whom shall we ask for help if not you, O Lord, You who are justly angry on account of our sins? Holy God, holy strength

Our Holy and Merciful Savior Do not hand us over to the bitterness of death.

David mourned for Absalom, a pious father for his son, a sad old man for his boy: alas, my son Absalom, would God I had died for you.

King David covered his head and wept for his son: would God I had died for you, Absalom, my son. Then the king covered his head, and cried with a great voice: O my son, Absalom.

INTERMISSION

Tribulationes civitatum — Palestrina

Tribulationes civitatum audivimus, quas passae sunt et defecimus.

Timor et hebetudo mentis cecidit super nos et super liberos nostros.

Domine miserere!

Peccavimus cum patribus nostris, injuste egimus, iniquitatem fecimus. Domine miserere!

Tribulationem et dolorem — Lassus

Tribulationem et dolorem inveni et nomen Domini invocavi:

O Domine, libera animam meam. Misericors Dominus et justus, et Deus noster miseretur.

Convertere anima mea in requiem tuam, quia Dominus benefecit tibi, quia eripuit animam meam de morte, oculos meos a lachrymis, pedes meos a lapsu.

Timor et tremor — Lassus

Timor et tremor venerunt super me et caligo cecidit super me.

Miserere mei Domine, miserere mei, quoniam in te con dit anima mea.

Exaudi Deus deprecationem meam, quia refugium meum es tu et adjutor fortis; Domine invocavi te, non confundar.

Jubilate Deo — Andrea Gabrieli

Jubilate Deo, omnis terra: servite Domino in laetitia. Introite in conspectu ejus, in exsultatione.

Scitote quoniam ipse est Deus: ipse fecit nos, et non ipsi nos. Populus ejus, et oves pascuae ejus. Introite portas ejus in confessione, atria ejus in hymnis: con temini illi.

Laudate nomen ejus, Qoniam suavis est Dominus: in aeternum misericordia ejus, et usque in generationem et generationem veritas ejus.

Jubilate Deo — Giovanni Gabrieli

Jubilate Deo omnis terra. Exultate justi in Domino.

We have heard of the trials which the cities have suffered, and have lost heart. Fear and confusion have fallen upon us, and upon our children. Lord, have mercy! We have sinned with our forefathers, we have committed injustices, we have done wrong. Lord, have mercy!

I shall nd trouble and heaviness, and I will call upon the Name of the Lord: O Lord, I beseech thee, deliver my soul. Gracious is the Lord, and righteous: yea, our God is merciful.

Turn again then unto thy rest, O my soul: for the Lord hath rewarded thee. And why? thou hast delivered my soul from death: mine eyes from tears, and my feet from falling.

Fear and trembling have taken hold of me, and darkness has descended upon me. Have mercy upon me, O Lord, have mercy, for my soul has trusted in thee. Hear, O God, my supplication for thou art my refuge and strength; O Lord, I have called upon thee, let me never be confounded.

O be joyful in the Lord, all ye lands: Serve the Lord with gladness, and come before his presence with a song. Be ye sure that the Lord he is God; it is he that hath made us, and not we ourselves; we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture.

O go your way into his gates with thanksgiving, and into his courts with praise; be thankful unto him, and speak good of his Name. For the Lord is gracious, his mercy is everlasting; and his truth endureth from generation to generation.

O be joyful in the Lord all ye lands. Rejoice ye righteous in the Lord.

Et gloriamini omnes recti corde. Quoniam exaudivit Dominus deprecationem meam, Dominus orationem meam suscepit, O fausta dies, O laeta dies.

Haec dies quam fecit Dominus; Exultemus et laetemur in ea.

And shout, all ye of an upright heart

For the Lord has heard my prayer, The Lord has answered my prayer, O lucky day, O joyful day.

This is the day which the Lord has made; Let us rejoice and let us be glad in it.

The Excellency of Wine Songs of Love, Inspiration, and Drinking

Aaron Sheehan, tenor Paul O’Dette, lute & theorbo

Lady if you so spite me John Dowland (1563–1626)

In Darkness let me dwell Dowland

Can she excuse my wrongs? Dowland

La mia Barbara Dowland

Si jamais mon âme blessée Pierre Guédron (1564–1619/20)

Aux plaisirs, aux délices bergères Guédron

Quel espoir de guarir Guédron

Qui veut chasser une migraine Gabriel Bataille (ca. 1575–1630)

Enfin la beauté que j’adore Étienne Moulinié (1599–1676)

Quelque merveilleuse chose Moulinié

Go lovely Rose Henry Lawes (1596–1662)

I rise and grieve Lawes

No Reprieve Lawes

The Excellency of Wine Lawes

Loth to Depart Lawes

Inconstancy in Woman Lawes

A Despairing Lover Lawes

Cupid Scorned Lawes

The Boston Early Music Festival extends heartfelt thanks to Bettina A. Norton for her leadership support of tonight’s performance by Aaron Sheehan, tenor & Paul O’Dette, lute

Tonight’s performance by Aaron Sheehan and Paul O’Dette is dedicated to September 17, 1957 – February 27, 2025

Edoardo was a dear friend and cherished colleague; a wonderful performer, scholar, and teacher whose enthusiasm for music and life were infectious. Edoardo knew more about 17th-century Italian music than anyone I ever met, but it was his humanity that stood out above all else. He will be sorely missed, but his legacy will endure.

—Paul O’Dette,

BEMF Artistic Co-Director & Professor of Lute and Director of Early Music at the Eastman School of Music

Internationally renowned expert in Renaissance and Baroque keyboard repertory, performance practice, and improvisation, Edoardo Bellotti combined a wide-ranging career as an organist and harpsichordist, scholar, and pedagogue in Europe and the United States. A virtuoso performer and brilliant improviser, he made more than thirty critically acclaimed recordings on historical instruments. He published over twenty musicological articles and essays, and fteen critical editions of organ music. He edited the rst modern edition of two of the most important Baroque treatises on organ playing: Adriano Banchieri’s L’Organo suonarino (Venice, 1605), and Spiridion a Monte Carmelo’s Nova Instructio pro pulsandis organis (Bamberg, 1670). He taught historical keyboard performance and improvisation at the conservatories of Milan, Trento, Udine, Pavia, and Trossingen, and the University of the Arts in Bremen. He served as Associate Professor of Organ at Eastman School of Music, University of Rochester, from 2013 to 2018, and Associate Professor of Harpsichord from September 2023.

Edoardo Bellotti died peacefully on February 27, 2025, in his hometown of Pavia, Italy.

Notes on the Program

“But to sing to the lute is much better,… for it addeth to the words such a grace and strength that it is a great wonder. Also all instruments with frets are full of harmony, because the tunes of them are very perfect, and with ease a man may do many things upon them that ll the mind with the sweetness of music.” (Baldassare Castiglione, 1528)

The lute song is one of the most intimate of musical forms, combining lyric poetry with the delicacy and exibility of the voice and the lute. The softness of the lute allowed singers maximum freedom to express the text without concerns about projecting their voices, a point reinforced by several authors of the time. Each song is a microcosm of emotion and narrative, matched in expressive depth perhaps only by the nineteenth-century Lieder of Schubert and Schumann. They were usually performed in front of very small gatherings of select listeners allowing the complexities of the music and poetry to be conveyed with re nement and grace. While these miniatures from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries give us a glimpse into the literary and musical sensibilities of the period, they never fail to evoke heartfelt emotional responses from today’s listeners.

Songs for solo voice with lute accompaniment survive in manuscripts and prints from the late fteenth century and proliferated throughout the sixteenth century. In England, the Golden Age of the lute song began in 1597 with the publication of Dowland’s First Booke of Songes, which ushered in a profusion of publications by leading English composers of the time, with a parallel development ourishing in France at the same time. While early Renaissance lute songs were often written as four-part vocal ensemble works (madrigals, chansons, villanelle, etc.) in which the lute played the lower three vocal parts, the new generation of composers around 1600 conceived their songs as solo ayres from the outset, creating idiomatic lute parts with instrumental guration, preludes, and interludes. With the introduction of the theorbo into England in 1607, composers began to notate their accompaniments as un gured bass lines to allow performance on lute, theorbo, or guitar, placing the responsibility on the performer to fashion an interesting accompaniment, rather than it being supplied by the composer.

The most familiar songs on tonight’s program are those by John Dowland. The rst two songs on our program, Lady if you so spite me and In Darkness let me Dwell, are from A Musicall Banquet, published by Dowland’s son Robert in 1610. In Darkness let me Dwell represents the pinnacle of the

lute song genre. It is a chilling evocation of the depths of despair illustrated by grinding dissonances and lurching harmonic instability, culminating in the extraordinary inconclusive ending. Dowland appears to have modelled the declamatory passages in the song on the monodies of Giulio Caccini, which he heard in Italy during his visit in 1596. Dowland’s First Booke of Songes, rst published in 1597, was so popular that it was reprinted an unprecedented four times. It is the source of the justly famous Can she excuse my wrongs, the Earl of Essex’s complaint to Queen Elizabeth for refusing to return his affections. As Robert Spencer observed, “Such open, face-to-face complaint was acceptable in robust Elizabethan society, particularly if wrapped in the soft clothing of music”. Dowland combines memorable melodic lines with ever shifting meters, and a nal section intoned over the melody of a popular song, Will you go walk the woods so wild, presented in the lute part.

La mia Barbara is a ne pavan which exudes a tranquil beauty and con dence in its gently owing lines. While most of Dowland’s pavans begin with melancholy, descending melodies, the unidenti ed Barbara of the title seems to have inspired a surprisingly positive and sunny portrayal. This work also survives as a ve-part consort piece, but in this solo setting, Dowland employs amboyant scale passages in the repeats of each section, ascending to the highest note on the lute.

Airs de cour were the most popular form of chamber music at the French court during the reigns of Henri IV and Louis XIII. Conceived as solos songs for lute and voice, they were also frequently published in versions for a four-part vocal ensemble. Many of these songs became popular in England as well and were reprinted with texts in English! The early airs de cour were strongly in uenced by the Baïf Academy’s research into prosody, which required stressed syllables to be set to long notes, while unstressed syllables were given shorter note values. This “measured” music does not have a regular beat and must follow the declamation of the text. Singers began to ornament the longer notes to give them a freer, more uid quality. Pierre Guédron, the nest of the early air de cour composers, rose through the ranks at the courts of Henri IV and Louis XIII to eventually become surintendant des musiques de la chambre du roi, in charge of all secular music at the royal court in 1613. The two hundred surviving songs by Guédron display an extraordinary variety of styles from the musique mesurée of Si jamais mon âme blessée, to the dance-based Aux plaisirs, aux délices bergères to the Italian monody-inspired Quel espoir de guarir. In each of these idioms, Guédron demonstrates an exceptional gift for meltingly beautiful melodies. His contemporary, Gabriel Bataille, originally worked as a clerk to a member of the French Parliament, before obtaining the post of maître de musique for the Queen of France. Bataille’s airs are generally less sophisticated than those of Guédron, but they are full of

character and rhythmic vitality. Étienne Moulinié worked as the director of chamber music for the King’s brother, Gaston of Orléans, from 1628 until Gaston’s death in 1660. His songs are the most elaborate of all the airs de cour, and often feature written out preludes and interludes for the lute with arpeggiated chords, trills and ports de voix. Songs such as En n la beauté que j’adore had a strong in uence on the young Jean-Baptiste Lully, who used these airs as the starting point in developing a new French musical language which facilitated the invention of French opera in 1673. Books of airs de cour often alternated exquisite serious songs (airs sérieux) with rambunctious drinking songs (airs à boire), a concept that inspired this evening’s program.

The most proli c of all English songwriters, Henry Lawes was also among the most admired composers of the generation after Dowland. Laudatory verses were written about him by many of the leading poets of the day including Milton, who wrote: “Harry, whose tunefull and well measur’d song / First taught our English Music how to span / Words with just note and accent…” Lawes’s songs have been unjustly neglected today, due to a style which is less familiar than that of Dowland, Morley, or Purcell. Lawes’s accompaniments are notated as un gured bass lines, leaving the harmonies and rhythmic interplay with the voice up to the accompanist. In the 1980s this resulted in less than compelling performances of the songs, such that Lawes’s biographer Ian Spink questioned the enthusiasm of Milton and his contemporaries. But once performers began to understand the harmonic and rhythmic implications of Lawes’s writing, the quality of these musical gems has nally begun to reveal itself. In his own words, “the way of Composition I chie y profess…is to shape Notes to the Words and Sense.” The lyrics in question were some of the nest of his time, including poems by Carew, Herrick, Suckling, Lovelace, Waller, and Milton. The songs range from the lyrical simplicity of Go lovely Rose to the drunken exuberance of Cupid Scorned to the haunting melancholy of No Reprieve, whose mesmerizing refrain mirrors Italian laments of the early seventeenth century. In addition to his four hundred thirty English songs, Lawes also composed works in Italian, Spanish, Latin, and Greek, each written in a style modeled after the music of its home country. Lawes accompanied himself on the lute, theorbo, and guitar, performing his highly re ned songs for the amusement of his erudite patrons, including Charles I, the Earl of Bridgewater, the Countess of Carberry, Lady Herbert of Cherbury, and Lady Mary Dering. In his sonnet To Mr. H. Lawes, on his Aires, Milton wrote: “To after age thou shalt be writ the man / That with smooth Aire couldst humour best our tongue. / Thou honour’st Verse, and Verse must send her wing to honour thee.”

—Paul O’Dette

Texts & Translations

Lady if you so spite me — Dowland

Lady, if you so spite me

Wherefore do you so oft kiss and delight me?

Sure that my hart, oppressed and overcloyed, May break, thus overjoyed, If you seek to spill mee, Come kiss me sweet, and kill mee, So shall your heart be eased, And I shall rest content, and die well pleased.

In Darkness let me dwell — Dowland

In darkness let me dwell, the ground shall sorrow be, The roof despair to bar all cheerful light from me, The walls of marble black that moistened, still shall weep, My music, hellish, jarring sounds to banish friendly sleep. Thus wedded to my woes, and bedded to my Tomb, O let me living die, till death, till death do come. In darkness let me dwell.

Can she excuse my wrongs? — Dowland

Can she excuse my wrongs with virtue’s cloak: Shall I call her good, when she proves unkind. Are those clear res which vanish into smoke: Must I praise the leaves where no fruit I nd. No, no, where shadows do for bodies stand, Thou may’st be abused if thy sight be dim. Cold love is like to words written on sand, Or to bubbles which on the water swim. Wilt thou be thus abused still, Seeing that she will right thee never If thou canst not ore come her will, Thy love will be thus fruitless ever.

Was I so base, that I might not aspire

Unto those high joys which she holds from me, As they are high, so high is my desire, If she this deny what can granted be. If she will yield to that which reason is, It is reasons will that love should be just, Dear, make me happy still by granting this, Or cut off delays if that die I must. Better a thousand times to die Then for to live thus still tormented, Dear but remember it was I Who for thy sake did die contented.

Si jamais mon âme blessée — Guédron

Si jamais mon âme blessée

Loge aileurs qu’en vous sa pensée

Puissay-je estre pour chastiment Privé de tout contentement.

Si jamais l’amour d’autre dame

Eschauffe mon Coeur de sa ame, Puis-je esprouver les rigeurs

De toutes sortes de malheurs.

Bref, soyés moy toujours cruelle

Autant que vous me sembles belle, Si je mancque a vostre beauté D’amour, et de delité.

Aux plaisirs, aux délices bergères — Guédron

Aux plaisirs, aux délices, bergères, Il faut ètre du temps ménagères, Car il s’écoule et se perd d’heure en heure ;

Et le regret seulement en demeure.

A l’amour, aux plaisirs, au bocage

Employez les beaux jours de votre àge. Maintenant la saison vous convie

De passer en aimant votre vie.

Déjà la terre a pris sa robe verte, D’herbe et de eurs la campagne est couverte.

If ever my wounded soul

Should turn its thoughts to anyone but you May I be, for my punishment, Deprived of all contentment.

If ever love for another woman

Should warm my heart with its ame, May I suffer the pangs

Of every kind of misery.

In short, continue to be ever cruel to me

As cruel as you are beautiful to me, If ever I fail in devotion to your beauty

With my love and faithfulness.

To pleasures! To delights, shepherdesses, We must manage well our time, For it ows and is lost hour by hour; And only regret remains.

To loves, to pleasures, to the groves, Make use of the springtime of your life. For now the season invites you

To spend all your hours in loving. The earth has put on its green robe, Flowers and herbs cover the countryside.

A l’amour, aux plaisirs, au bocage

Employez les beaux jours de votre àge.

Du printemps les plus belles journées,

On ne voit que des feux et des dances,

On n’entend que chansons et cadences

Et le vent même écoutant ces merveilles,

Ferme la bouche, et non pas les oreilles

A l’amour, aux plaisirs, au bocage

Employez les beaux jours de votre àge.

Quel espoir de guarir — Guédron

Quel espoir de guarir

Puis-je avoir sans mourir,

D’un amoureux martire ?

Que je puis bien souffrir, Mais que je n’ose dire.

Si la mort seulement

Peut guérir mon tourment, Et l’amoureux martire

Que je puis bien souffrir, Mais que je n’ose dire.

Toute-fois il le faut,

Le sujet est trop haut

De mon cruel martire

Que je puis bien souffrir Mais que je n’ose dire.

Qui veut chasser une migraine — Bataille

Qui veut chasser une migraine

N’a qu’à boire toujours du bon, Et maintenir la Table pleine

De Servelas, & de Jambon,

L’eau ne fait rien que pourrir le poulmon ;

Boute boute boute boute compagnon, Vuide nous ce verre et nous le remplirons.

Le vin gousté par ce bon pere

Qui s’en rendit si beau garçon,

Nous fait discourir sans Grammere, Et nous rend sçavant sans leçon.

L’eau ne fait rien que pourrir le poulmon ;

Boute boute boute boute compagnon, Vuide nous ce verre et nous le remplirons.

Loth beuvant dans une caverne

De ses lles en a le sein,

Montrant qu’un cyropt de taverne

Passe celuy d’un medecin.

L’eau ne fait rien que pourrir le poulmon ;

Boute boute boute boute compagnon, Vuide nous ce verre et nous le remplirons.

Beuvons donc tous à la bonne heure

Pour nous esmouvoir le rognon, Et que celuy d’entre nous meure

Qui dedira son compagnon.

To loves, to pleasures, to the groves, Make use of the springtime of your life.

The most beautiful days of the spring

One sees nothing but res and dances, We hear nothing but songs and rhythms, And the wind herself listening to these marvels, Closes her mouth, but not her ears.

To loves, to pleasures, to the groves, Make use of the springtime of your life.

What hope can I have of healing

Without dying

Of the martyrdom of love?

Of which I must suffer

But dare not speak.

If death alone

Can heal my torment, And the martyrdom of love, Of which I must suffer

But dare not speak.

In any case, it must be so, The subject of my cruel martyrdom Is too high, Of which I must suffer

But dare not speak.

He who would chase away a headache, has but to drink good wine, and keep his table full of sausage and ham.

Water only rots the lungs— Drink, drink, drink, my friends

Let’s empty this glass and ll it again.

The wine imbibed by this good old man

Makes him a handsome youth again It lets us converse without grammar And makes us into scholars without study.

Water only rots the lungs— Drink, drink, drink, my friends

Let’s empty this glass and ll it again.

Lot, getting drunk in a cave, Made his daughters’ bellies swell, Showing that syrup from a tavern

Surpasses one from a doctor.

Water only rots the lungs—

Drink, drink, drink, my friends

Let’s empty this glass and ll it again.

Let us all drink when the time is right

To give movement to our kidneys, And let the one among us die

Who betrays his companions.

L’eau ne fait rien que pourrir le poulmon ; Boute boute boute boute compagnon, Vuide nous ce verre et nous le remplirons.

En n la beauté que j’adore — Moulinié

En n la beauté que j’adore

Me fait cognoistre en son retour, Qu’elle veut que je voye encore

Ces yeux pour qui je meurs d’amour.

Mais puis que je revoy la beauté qui m’en ame, Sortez mes desplaisirs, hostez vous de mon ame.

Mes maux changés vous en délices,

Mon cœur, arretes vos douleurs, Amour bannissez mes supplices,

Mes yeux ne versez plus de pleurs.

Mais puis que je revoy la beauté qui m’en ame, Sortez mes desplaisirs, hostez vous de mon ame.

Quelque merveilleuse chose — Moulinié

Quelque merveilleuse chose

Que l’on puisse inventer, Et quoy que l’on me propose

A n de me contenter :

Rien ne me semble delectable

Que le vin que je trouve à table.

Je mesprise la Musique,

Les machines des Ballets :

Et l’attirail magni que

Que l’on void dans les Palais.

Rien ne me semble delectable

Que le vin que je trouve à table.

J’incague la Comedie, Le Jeu, les prosperitez, Et tout ce qu’on estudie

Dans les Universitez.

Rien ne me semble delectable

Que le vin que je trouve à table.

J’abhorre les pourmenades, L’honneur qu’on trouve aux combats :

La dance, les serenades, La chasse, et tous les esbats.

Rien ne me semble delectable

Que le vin que je trouve à table.

Bref, l’entierre jouissance

Des plaisirs les plus charmants, N’aura jamais la puissance

De charmer mes sentiments.

Rien ne me semble delectable

Que le vin que je trouve à table.

Water only rots the lungs—

Drink, drink, drink, my friends

Let’s empty this glass and ll it again.

At last the beauty I worship

Shows me upon her return That she wants me to look once more upon Those eyes for which I die of love.

But since I see again the beauty which in ames me, Be gone, my displeasures, vanish from my soul.

My woes, turn yourselves into delights.

My heart, put an end to your sorrows. Love, banish my tortures.

Eyes, no longer pour forth your tears.

But since I see again the beauty which in ames me, Be gone, my displeasures, vanish from my soul.

Whatever wonderful thing

One may invent,

And whatever is offered

In order to please me:

Nothing seems as delectable to me

As the wine which I nd at my table.

I hate Music, And the machines at the Ballet; And all the magni cent gear That one sees in the palaces. Nothing seems as delectable to me

As the wine which I nd at my table.

I despise the Theater, Games, and enrichments, And everything which is studied In Universities.

Nothing seems as delectable to me

As the wine which I nd at my table.

I abhor promenades, And the honor that one nds in battle, The dance, the serenades, The hunt, and all the sports.

Nothing seems as delectable to me

As the wine which I nd at my table.

In short, the complete enjoyment

Of all the most seductive pleasures, Will never have the power

To charm my feelings.

Nothing seems as delectable to me

As the wine which I nd at my table.

—Translations by Stephen Stubbs

Go lovely Rose — Lawes

Go, lovely Rose!—

Tell her, that wastes her time and me, That now she knows, When I resemble her to thee, How sweet and fair she seems to be.

Tell her that’s young, And shuns to have her graces spied, That hadst thou sprung In deserts, where no men abide, Thou must have uncommended died.

Small is the worth

Of beauty from the light retir’d; Bid her come forth, Suffer herself to be desir’d, And not blush so to be admir’d.

Then die!—that she

The common fate of all things rare May read in thee: How small a part of time they share That are so wondrous sweet and fair!

—Edmund Waller (1645)

The whole remainder of my heart. Alas undone, to Fate, I bow my head, Ready to die, now die, and now, am dead.

You look to have an Age of trial ere you a Lover will repay, but my state brooks no more denial: I cannot this one minute stay. Alas undone, to Fate, I bow my head, Ready to die, now die, and now, am dead.

Look in my wound, and see how cold, How pale and gasping my soul lies, which Nature strives in vain to hold, Whil’st wing’d with sighs away it ies. Alas undone, to Fate, I bow my head, Ready to die, now die, and now, am dead.

See, see, already Charon’s boat, Who grimly asks why all this stay?

Hark how the fatal Sisters shout, And now they call, away, away. Alas undone, to Fate, I bow my head, Ready to die, now die, and now, am dead.

—Sir John Berkenhead (1655)

The Excellency of Wine — Lawes

I rise and grieve — Lawes

I rise and grieve, I walk and see my sorrow, I eat, I live

Perchance not till tomorrow. I lay me down to rest and then again I rise, I walk, I feed and lie in pain.

Mend thou my state

O Jove, I thee implore, Or end by fate

What thou hast made before.

Or if it be

Thy will I should endure

What unto me

Is almost past recure,

Give me but strength to undergo those pains

Which like a torrent runs through all my veins; Or mend my state

Which as my days do fade; Or end by fate

What thou before hast made.

No Reprieve — Lawes

Now, now Lucatia, now make haste, If thou wilt see how strong thou art, There needs but one frown more, to waste

—Anonymous

’Tis Wine that inspires, and quencheth Love’s res, teaches fools how to rule a State, Maids ne’r did approve it, because those that love it despise and laugh at their hate.

The Drinkers of Beer

Did ne’r yet appear In matters of any weight; ’Tis he whose design Is quickn’d by Wine That raises things to their height.

We then should it prize, For never black eyes

Made Wounds which this could not heal; Who then doth refuse To drink of this Juice, Is a Foe to the Common-weale.

—Robert Boyle (1653)

Loth to Depart — Lawes

Sweet stay awhile, why do you rise? The light you see comes from your eyes: The day breaks not; it is my heart, To think that I from you must part. O stay, or else my joys must die,

FESTIVAL CONCERT

And perish in their infancy.

O let me die on this fair breast, Far sweeter than the Phoenix’ nest. Love, raise desire with thy sweet charms Within the center of your arms: And let those blissful kisses cherish My infant joys, which else would perish.

Inconstancy in Woman — Lawes

I am con rmed a woman can Love this, or that, or any other man; This day her love is melting hot, Tomorrow swears she knows you not; Let her but a new object nd, And she is of another mind.

Then hang me, Ladies, at your door, If e’er I dote upon you more.

Yet still I love the fair one. Why? For nothing but to please my eye; And so the fat and soft-skinn’d Dame I’ll atter to appease my ame; For her that’s Musical I long, When I am sad, to sing a Song.

But hang me, ladies, at your door, If e’er I dote upon you more.

I’ll give my fancy leave to range Through every face to nd out change; The black, the brown, the fair shall be But objects of variety; I’ll court you all to serve my turn, But with such ames as shall not burn. For hang me, ladies, at your door, If e’er I dote upon you more.

—John Donne?

To see when I complain A Cruel Soul disdain, That to my grief I love, When Her no tears can move, But rival tears: Ah! ’twas ne’er heard before.

Farewell Despairing Hopes, I’ll live no more:

Ne’er atter more my sense With sweet and courteous Breath, ’Twixt outrage and offence I am condemn’d to Death. No more on Joys I dote, But with a doleful Note my Life and Death deplore.

Farewell Despairing Hopes, I’ll live no more, I’ll love no more.

Cupid

Scorned

— Lawes

In love? Away, You do me wrong, I hope I ha’ not liv’d too long Free from the treach’ry of your Eyes, Now to be caught and made a prize: No, Lady, ’tis not all your Art can make me and my freedom part.

In Love! ’tis true, with Spanish wine, Or the French juice Incarnadine, But truly not with your sweet face, This dimple, or that hidden grace; There’s far more sweetness in pure wine, Than in those lips or eyes of thine.

—Sir John Suckling

(1609–1642)

A Despairing Lover — Lawes

Farewell Despairing Hopes, I’ll love no more; Of Death I’m not afraid, My poor Heart is betrayed; She that disdains my Love, must I adore.

Farewell Despairing Hopes, I’ll live no more, I’ll love no more.

To crave from Cruel Eyes Compassion, ’tis in vain, And with Laments and Cries

To sob out Tears, the witness of my pain. No, Death shall cure my Sore: Farewell Despairing Hopes, I’ll live no more.

Your god, you say, can shoot so right He’ll wound a heart i’ the darkest night; Pray let him throw away a dart, And try if he can hit my heart: No Cupid, if I shall be thine, Turn Ganymede, and ll us wine.

Come ll’s a cup of Sherry, And let us be merry, There shall nought but pure wine, Make us love-sick, or pine; We’ll hug the cup and kiss it, We’ll sigh when e’re we miss it, For ’tis that that makes us jolly, And sing Hey, Trolly Lolly.

enor Knick Cherrywood TComfort

You will find more Mollenhauer recorders at the BEMF exhibition in the Empire Ballroom at table 37. The team from The Early Music Shop of New England will be happy to advise and support you. www.mollenhauer.com

MUSICA RARA

Standard Repertoire and Rarities of the 17th, 18th and 19th Century

May 14 - 25, 2026

Artistic Director George Petrou

May 14, 26 | Gala — 20th Anniversary of the FOG

May 15, 26 | Festival Opera (premiere)

Additional dates: May 16| 18| 24| 25

May 23, 26 | Oratorio

Advance ticket sale for the Gala, Festival Opera and Oratorio begin on November 28, 25

Experience Handel in one of the most picturesque and beautifully preserved cities in Germany. Visit our website for detailed and up-to-date information.

SCHEDULE

TUESDAY, JUNE 10

5pm Ensemble Castor, with Sherezade Panthaki, soprano: Inspiring Genius – Precious Friendships: Music of Reinhard Keiser, George Frideric Handel, Johann Sebastian Bach, and Georg Philipp Telemann. New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall, 30 Gainsborough Street. $64, $49, $35, $25.

8pm The Boston Camerata, directed by Anne Azéma: A Gallery of Kings: On the Uses and Abuses of Power, ca. 1300. New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall, 30 Gainsborough Street. $64, $49, $35, $25.

10:30pm Pacific MusicWorks, directed by Stephen Stubbs, with Danielle Reutter-Harrah, soprano: Murder, Mayhem, Melancholy, and Madness: Music of Edward Johnson, Dowland, William Lawes, Robert Johnson, Matteis, and Purcell. New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall, 30 Gainsborough Street. $25.

TUESDAY | JUNE 10

TICKETS FOR BEMF EVENTS

TO PURCHASE TICKETS FOR BEMF EVENTS DURING FESTIVAL WEEK (JUNE 8–15), you may purchase tickets online all week long from Sunday, June 8 through Sunday, June 15 at BEMF.org. Tickets can also be purchased in person, Wednesday through Saturday from 10am to 4pm at the BEMF Welcome Center, near the entrance to the Festival Exhibition at the The Colonnade Hotel, 120 Huntington Avenue, Boston. Additionally, you may call the BEMF Box Office at 617-661-1812 for credit card sales, Monday through Saturday from 10am to 4pm. Acceptable forms of payment for purchases are American Express, VISA, MasterCard, Discover, and cash (for in-person sales). You may also purchase tickets for individual events—at their respective venues—30 minutes prior to the performance. See page 40 for concert venue box office information. An Exhibition Pass provides admission to the Exhibition and to Festival Concurrent Events, excluding pre-opera talks (see pages 49–58 and 334–339). An Exhibition Pass may be purchased for $10 at the BEMF Welcome Center in The Colonnade Hotel, Wednesday through Saturday, from 10am to 4pm daily, online at BEMF.org, or at the door of most Festival events. All sales are final. No refunds or exchanges are available for any ticket purchases.

TUESDAY, JUNE 10

Inspiring Genius – Precious Friendships Ensemble Castor

Rodolfo Richter, Director & violin

Petra Samhaber-Eckhardt, violin with Sherezade Panthaki, soprano

Concerto Reinhard Keiser from Kleine theatralische Musik (1674–1739)

Liebe, sag’, was fängst du an?

Keiser from Croesus, Act II/Scene 8

Grave — Presto — Entrée Keiser from Kleine theatralische Musik

Ingrato, spietato

George Frideric Handel from Almira, HWV 1, Act I/Scene 12 (1685–1759)

Sonata a cinque Handel

Tu del ciel ministro eletto Handel from Il Trionfo del Tempo e del Disinganno, HWV 46a, Part II

Sinfonia

Georg Philipp Telemann from Orpheus, TWV 21:18, Act II/Scene 1 (1681–1767)

Die Liebe spricht Telemann from Miriways, TWV 21:24, Act I/Scene 3

Sinfonia Telemann from Orpheus, TWV 21:18, Act III/Scene 5

Concerto for Two Violins in D minor, BWV 1043

Johann Sebastian Bach Vivace — Largo ma non tanto — Allegro (1685–1750)

TUESDAY,

W Single-manual Italian harpsichord by the Zuckermann Harpischord workshop, 2015, X property of New England Conservatory.

Ensemble Castor

Rodolfo Richter, Director & solo violin

Petra Samhaber-Eckhardt, solo violin

Irma Niskanen & Martin Kalista, violin

Hana Hobiger, viola

Philipp Comploi, violoncello

Nathaniel Chase, violone

Sonja Leipold, harpsichord

with Sherezade Panthaki, soprano

Notes on the Program

Reinhard Keiser was one of the most renowned opera composers of his time and worked for twenty years at the Oper am Gänsemarkt in Hamburg. The young Handel played the violin there under his direction, and Keiser wrote many operas for Telemann’s tenure as music director starting in 1722. He also composed church music; Johann Sebastian Bach is known to have performed a Markuspassion attributed to Keiser on three occasions. This program offers a delightful and stunning journey through opera arias as well as remarkable instrumental compositions such as Johann Sebastian Bach’s moving double concerto for two violins. Together with Sherezade Panthaki and Rodolfo Richter, Castor invites you to an eventful and fascinating concert.

Keiser was hailed as “the greatest opera composer in the world” by Johann Mattheson in the obituary he wrote in 1740. Keiser wrote his rst opera for Hamburg in 1694, Basilius, and became the opera’s music director a few years later. In 1703, he became joint manager of the opera with Drüsicke, but this lasted only four years before new management was brought in. After a break, he served again as music director until 1718. He was the most frequently performed opera composer in Hamburg for more than two decades, and continued writing new operas until 1728.

Croesus, Keiser’s 1711 opera to a libretto by Lukas von Bostel, was later extensively revised by him and presented again at the Hamburg Opera in December 1730, with Telemann as music director. It is this 1730 version that survives intact. Much of the original 1711 material was discarded and is now lost. The aria Liebe, sag’, was fängst du an? is sung by Princess Elmira, who is in love with Atis, the son of King Croesus. Atis has been unable to speak since his birth, but has recently found his voice; Elmira, not knowing this, has been told that she is about to meet Atis’s

doppelganger, a peasant who can speak, and she wonders what Love has in store for her.

Kleine theatralische Musik contains Keiser’s arrangements of instrumental versions of his opera numbers. This work is a collection of “theater music” compiled by the composer from his operas written prior to 1718, and the concerto and instrumental movements performed today are taken from it.

George Frideric Handel was nineteen years old and had been working under Keiser for little more than a year in the orchestra of the Hamburg Opera, rst as a second violinist and later playing continuo harpsichord, when he was commissioned in late 1704 to compose a full-length work for the theater, Almira, Königin von Castilien. Keiser had run into nancial dif culties and left Hamburg for Weissenfels, taking his own score for Almira with him, so the remaining manager of the opera, Drüsicke, needing a replacement opera, gave Handel the libretto that Keiser had been using, written by the young theologian Friedrich Christian Feustking, who had reworked the Venetian model of L’Almira by Giulio Pancieri for Hamburg, translating most of it into German.

It was a heady opportunity for Handel; Mattheson, who played continuo harpsichord when he wasn’t singing a tenor role onstage, was already working on his own opera for Drüsicke, Cleopatra, which left him no time for a second such effort, so Handel set to work, bringing nished sections of the score to Mattheson for advice and critique. Handel’s rst operatic venture was strongly in uenced by Keiser’s and Mattheson’s compositional style, and contains a wealth of sumptuously conceived scenes. It met with great success when it premiered in January 1705. The plot is set in medieval Valladolid, the royal capital of the Castilian kings, and opens as Almira, having reached her majority, is crowned Queen of Castile. The opera has many romantic intrigues: Ingrato, spietato is a rage aria sung by Queen Almira at the end of the rst act, when she (incorrectly) believes that her secretary,

Fernando, whom she loves, is in love with Princess Edilia. (He actually loves Almira in return, though she won’t discover this until the nal act.)

Unfortunately, Handel’s Almira does not survive complete. The autograph score is missing, and the only surviving full score based on the autograph was used as a conducting score by Georg Philipp Telemann for his revival of the work for Hamburg in 1732. Telemann replaced some of Handel’s work with new music of his own, tearing out what he no longer wanted; the music of Ingrato, spietato was long thought to be lost. In 2004, a manuscript with arias from the early eighteenth century, including every aria from Almira, was discovered in the Library of the Mariengymnasium in Jever, Lower Saxony. The melody and continuo part for Ingrato, spietato found in that book allows this wonderful aria to be heard again today.

Handel’s Sonata a cinque, HWV 288, for solo violin and strings, is thought to have been composed in Italy in 1707, and remains his only extant violin concerto. The Italian in uence, especially that of Arcangelo Corelli, is noticeable. This composition belongs to a collection of early solo concertos, which preceded the Concerti Grossi Opus 3 and Opus 6. The famous melody of the Andante was used by Handel for other compositions as well.

Handel had arrived in Rome by 1707, and his keyboard playing and spectacular compositions impressed his rst patrons and supporters, including Cardinal Carlo Colonna, Cardinal Benedetto Pamphilj, and the wealthy and active Cardinal Pietro Ottoboni. Despite Handel’s Lutheran faith and staunch Protestant upbringing, the most important compositions of his early months in Rome were, intriguingly, for the Roman Catholic Church—opera was banned by the Pope—and they allowed the young composer to display his talents to their fullest extent.

Il Trionfo del Tempo e del Disinganno (‘The Triumph of Time and Disillusion’), HWV 46a, composed in the spring of 1707, was Handel’s rst allegorical oratorio, and is set to an Italian text written by Cardinal Benedetto Pamphilj. This musically adventurous work comes from the Italian tradition of moral cantatas, and Il Trionfo, a set of poems by Francesco Petrarca, was still circulating in eighteenth-century Roman literary circles.

In the oratorio, Bellezza (Beauty) is tempted to become a disciple of Piacere (Pleasure) but ultimately takes heed of the compassionate warnings of Tempo (Time) and Disinganno (Disillusion) that it is better to avoid sin and instead dedicate oneself to virtue and godliness. Handel ends the work with

Bellezza’s heart-wrenching, wafting and beautiful aria, Tu del Ciel ministro eletto (‘O thou, chosen minister of heaven’), in which she offers her heart to God, inviting the listener to aspire to a higher plane.

Georg Philipp Telemann arrived in Hamburg in September 1721 to be musical director of the city’s ve churches as well as Kantor, and had added the secular post of musical director of the Oper am Gänsemarkt by the following May. His Orpheus, originally performed in a concert version at the Opera in March 1726, is here represented by two Sinfonias. The opera had been thought lost until it was rediscovered in the late twentieth century. It has arias in German, Italian, and French. Two years later, Telemann wrote Miriways to a libretto by Johann Samuel Müller for a May 1728 premiere. Miriways, prince of Kandahar and protector of Persia, offers his support to Sophi, a son of the recently deposed and murdered Shah: he will place Sophi on the Persian throne, provided he marries a woman selected by Miriways. Sophi is a soprano role, and his aria from early in the opera, Die Liebe spricht, pits his heart—he loves Bemira—against his duty to his people and family, and the arranged marriage to an unknown woman that awaits him should duty prevail.

“In his youth, and well into old age, he played the violin with a clear, penetrating tone.” (Bach-Dokumente 801) This eyewitness account of Johann Sebastian Bach was written by his son Carl Philipp Emanuel. He even goes on to say that Bach felt better able to direct an orchestra from the violin than from the keyboard, a reminiscence of Bach’s time in charge of the Leipzig collegium musicum between 1729 and 1741.

Although Bach’s violin concertos were probably often represented on collegium programs, it is generally agreed that the concertos were originally composed while he worked in Weimar (1708–1717) and then Cöthen (1717–1723). During these years, several important collections of Italian concertos were published, in particular by Albinoni and Vivaldi. Bach de nitely knew these volumes and admired them, transcribing some pieces for his own use. Nevertheless, Bach’s own violin concertos are more adventurous in the way the solo and tutti overlap or interrupt one another. In the famous double concerto, BWV 1043, the two soloists freely share almost all their material. The slow movement is regarded as a melodic high point of the composer’s output. With the two solo violins on an equal footing, the concerto amply deserves its position as one of Bach’s most often-played and popular works.

—Petra Samhaber-Eckhardt

TUESDAY, JUNE 10

FESTIVAL CONCERT

Texts & Translations

Croesus, Andere Handlung/Achter Auftritt – Telemann

Elmira

Liebe, sag’, was fängst du an?

Soll mein Herz an diesen Knaben, Drin ich Atis sehen kann, Schmerzen oder Freude, Soll ich Schmerzen oder Freude haben?

Liebe, sag’…

—Lukas von Bostel

Almira, Erster Handlung/Zwölffter Auftritt – Handel

Almira

Ingrato, Spietato

Tosto rendi a me quel core

Che togliesti dal mio seno. Piu lasciarlo a te non vuò Alle furie lo darò, Che ne facciano veleno. Ingrato…

—Friedrich Christian Feustking

Il Trionfo del Tempo e del Disinganno, Parte Seconda –Handel

Bellezza

Tu del Ciel ministro eletto, Non vedrai più nel mio petto Voglia in da, o vano ardor.

E se vissi ingrata a Dio, Tu custode del cor mio

A lui porta il nuovo cor.

Tu del Ciel…

—Benedetto Pamphilj

Miriways, Erste Handlung/Dritter Auftritt – Telemann

Sophi

Die Liebe spricht:

„Verscherze Reich und Krone!“, Die Ehrfurcht:

„Tu es nicht!

Geschick, Geburt und P icht, Ruft dich zum Throne!“

Nur eine kann mein Schluß vergnügen: Lieb’ oder Ehrfurcht mag nun siegen, So bringt, o armes Herz, Der Sieg dir Qual und Schmerz.

—Johann Samuel Müller

Croesus, Act II/Scene 8 – Telemann

Elmira

Love, tell me, what are you starting? Should my heart be on these boys, Inside I can see Atis, Pain or joy, Should I have pain or joy?

Love, tell me…

Almira, Act I/Scene 12 – Handel

Almira

Ingrate, Ruthless man, Give back the heart

You took from my breast. I no longer wish to leave it with you I will give it to the Furies

To make their poison with it. Ingrate…

The Triumph of Time and Disillusion, Part II –Handel

Beauty

You, high minister of Heaven, Shall see no more in my heart

A treacherous wish or empty craving. And though I lived unmindful of God, May you, as guardian of my heart, Bring to Him a new heart.

You…

Miriways, Act I/Scene 3 – Telemann

Sophi

Love speaks:

“Forfeit Empire and the Crown!” Honor says:

“Don’t do it!

Ability, birth, and duty, Call you to the throne!”

Only one can delight in my conclusion: Whether Love or Honor may now win, O poor heart, The victory brings you torment and pain.

A Gallery of Kings Uses and Abuses

of Power, ca. 1300

The Boston Camerata

Anne Azéma, direction, voice & hurdy-gurdy

Michael Barrett, Joel Frederiksen, Ryan Lustgarten & John Taylor Ward, voice with Shira Kammen, vielle & harp

Dan Meyers, winds

Introit

Ich saz ûf einem steine Walter von der Vogelweide (ca. 1170–ca. 1230)

The King Is Dead – Long Live the King!

Rex in aeternum vive!

Anonymous (12th c.)

Jubilemus regi nostro Anonymous (12th c.)

Adpropinquaverant autem dies David

Plainchant (1 Kings 2:1–4, 12; Psalm 132:1)

Bel m’es, quan vei chamjar lo senorhatge Bertran de Born (1150?–before 1215)

Ecce rex Darius Anonymous (12th c.)

Rex in aeternum vive! Anonymous (12th c.)

Of Penitential Kings

De profundis clamavi ad te, Domine

Plainchant (Psalm 130)

Planctus David Pierre Abelard (1079–1142)

Cantiga – La Pitiçòn que fez el Rey (instrumental)

Of Abusive Kings

Adapted from Alfonso el Sabio, King of Castilla (1221–1284)

Deus iudicium regi da et iustitiam Plainchant (Psalm 72:1)

Lai royal (instrumental) Anonymous (13th c.?)

A toi rois Artus Anonymous (13th c.?)

Tant me sui de dire teü Anonymous (13th c.?)

En talent ai ke je die Hue de la Ferté (fl. 1220–1235)

Der kuninc Rodolp Der Unverzagte (fl. late 13th c.)

Hé diex qu’il y a de faus visages (spoken)

Gervais du Bus (fl. 1312–1345)

Se cuers/Rex beatus/Ave Anonymous (ca. 1310)

Amour

Veni de libano

Amors me fait conmencier

INTERMISSION

Plainchant (Song of Songs 4:8–9)

Thibault de Champagne, King of Navarre (1201–1253)

Lai Royal (instrumental) Anonymous (13th c.)

Empereres ne rois n’ont nul pooir

Of Courageous Kings

Quare fremuerunt

Miei sirventes vuolh far de.ls reis amdos (spoken)

Seignor, sachiés qui or ne s’en ira

To Ṣalāḥ ad-Dīn, a letter (spoken)

Cantiga – Pero que seja a gente (instrumental)

To Richard, a letter (spoken)

Thibault de Champagne

Anonymous (Paraphrase of Psalm 2)

Bertran de Born

Thibault de Champagne

Richard, King of England (1157–1199)

Adapted from King Alfonso el Sabio

Salāh ad-Dīn (1138–1193)

Ja nus hons pris King Richard

Ar ne kuth ich sorghe non

Here My Song Ends

Canticum David Domine clamavi

Anonymous (13th c.)

Plainchant (Psalm 141)

Fortz chausa es Gaucelm Faidit (ca. 1150–ca. 1220)

Cantiga – Santa Maria loei

A Short Production History:

Supertitles: Caitlin Laird

Attributed to King Alfonso el Sabio

This program was commissioned of Anne Azéma and The Boston Camerata by the Reims Festival, to honor the 800th Anniversary of its cathedral. The last of a five-program cycle, it focuses on monarchs and their powers, to mirror a part of the cathedral’s architecture—The Kings’ Gallery. The 2025 Boston Early Music Festival presents the U.S. premiere of this program.

Notes on the Program

Mistrust of power!

We see it on our screens, read about it in the papers—and feel it in our hearts: there is anxiety and incertitude abroad in the land, and much anger against political leaders and pretenders to authority. These feelings, alas, were not born yesterday, or the day before. Political authority, by its very nature, engenders a cohort of attitudes, from adhesion and admiration to rejection and rebellion. None of this is unique to our time.

The medieval songs and texts we present to you tonight deal powerfully with these perennial issues. We music lovers are perhaps more familiar with the tender strains of courtly love, passionate desire, and religious adoration from the poetmusicians and clerics of the twelfth and thirteenth century Europe. But those creators often dealt as well with other passions, illusions, and disillusions of the human soul. Close to the very circles of power we perceive sounds of dissention and indignation. Who is King? Are you sure of his legitimacy? (En talent ai ke je die)? What sort of court does he hold? (A toi rois Artus)? Is he young in body and spirit, generous and bountiful? (Bel m’es)? Louis, can and will you uphold the moral standards of your predecessor (Rex beatus)? Our medieval musician-poets cry out their yearning for worthy leadership and denounce, with unrestrained vehemence, all forms of abuse, from whatever quarter. We recognize in their dissonant verses the kind of abuse and manipulation that we, too, must undergo and their protest and indignation nds echos in our own souls. From a simple broadside against a stingy king who pays for entertainment with beer instead of hard cash (Der kuninc Rodolp) to the graver accusations of corruption and predation (Jubilemus regi nostro), these bills of attainder cover a lot of ground.

The King is anointed by God, but he is nonetheless a man. The Planctus David expresses the sorrow, verging on despair, of a monarch who has lost his son in intergenerational con ict. And the codes of love among royalty? Thibault, Count of Champagne, King of Navarre, and powerful

politician on the international scene complains: no king or emperor has power over love. Love “is extremely hard on me,” he shares, as “I am imprisoned without reward.” The power of the King bows to the power of love, and in love’s services is confronted by unrequited happiness and needs sustaining help (Empereres ne rois).

Help may not be on the way, alas, save for the Virgin Mary’s succor, she who consoles kings, her royal vassals. After violent battles, after tense negotiations (the famous letters exchanged between Ṣalāḥ ad-Dīn and Richard the Lionhearted), after the splendor of arms, standards, and fanions, comes the tragedy of prisoners and hostages (Ja nus hons pris), abandonment, solitude (Ar ne kuth), and death. The monarch, noble but humbled, prays to the Lady who has never abandoned him. He places his trust in she who made him King, as he prepares to leave behind the battles of this world (Santa Maria loei).

A word is in order about the role of instruments in this vocal repertoire. Pierre de Corbiac (Lo tezaurs – 13th century) gives us a glimpse of the kinds of skills that the minstrels of the Middle Ages would have been expected to acquire. These activities ranged from that of storyteller and poet to musician, improviser, and entertainer; and their sphere of activity encompassed different milieux, ranging from the world of the court and courtly love to the liturgical and spiritual world of the Church. In attempting to follow the traces of Peire de Corbiac, we have created this program, devised our own instrumental performance material, basing it on preexisting vocal sources, and drawing on medieval learning methods. “I know my profession well” writes the minstrel Peire, “and all kinds of people are grateful to me for this. The Lord God allows me to accomplish many things that will earn me salvation at the Day of Judgment.” We can only hope so, as we sing and play, hoping to conjure order from disorder, and in doing so, perhaps to cast out the demons from our midst, as we hope to restore a measure of sanity in our lives.

—Anne Azéma (2016–2025) Translation: Joel Cohen

FESTIVAL CONCERT

Texts & Translations

Introit

Ich saz ûf einem steine dô dahte ich bein mit beine. dar ûf sazte ich mîn ellebogen, ich hete in mîne hant gesmogen daz kinne und ein mîn wange. dô dâhte ich mir vil ange, wie man zer welte solte leben. deheinen rât kunde ich gegeben, wie man driu dinc erwurbe, der deheinez niht verdurbe. diu zwei sint êre unde varnde guot, der ietweders dem andern schaden tuot. daz dritte ist gottes hulde, der zweier übergulde. die wolte ich gerne in einen schrîn, jâ leider des mac niht gesîn, daz guot und weltlich êre und gotes hulde mêre in einen schrîn mügen komen. stîge und wege sint in genomen: untriuwe ist in der sâze, gewalt ist ûf der strâze, fride und reht sint beide wunt. diu driu habent geleites niht, diu zwei werden ê gesunt.

The King Is Dead – Long Live the King!

Rex in aeternum vive!

Jubilemus regi nostro magno ac potenti Resonemus laude digna voce competenti

Resonet jocunda turba solemnibus odis

Cytharizent plaudant manus mille sonent modis

Pater ejus destruens Judaeorum templa Magna fecit et hic regnat ejus per exempla

Pater ejus spoliavit regnum Judaeorum Hic exaltat sua festa decore vasorum

Haec sunt vasa regia quibus spoliatur

Jherusalem et regalis Babylon ditatur

Praesentemus Balthasar ista regi nostro

Qui sic suos perornavit purpura et ostro

Iste potens iste fortis iste gloriosus

Iste probus curialis decens et formosus

Jubilemus regi tanto vocibus canoris Resonemus omnes una laudibus sonoris

I sat upon a rock and crossed my legs and propped my elbow on my knee, and cradled chin and cheek upon my hand. And pondered very seriously how one should lead one’s life on earth. There was no counsel I could give on how one could bring three things together without destroying one or the other. Two are honor and our earthly possessions, which often do each other harm.

The third is God’s own grace, worth so much more than both of them. I wanted them in one shrine, all three. But sadly now, there is no way that what we own, and honor from the world, together with the grace of God, can come and meet within a single shrine. Bridges and paths are barred to them: Betrayal lurks in ambush, Violence reigns in the streets, Peace and justice are both wounded. Those three have no (free) passage, until these two are healed.

May the King live forever!

Let us be joyful in our King so great and powerful, let our trained voices resound with noble praise.

Let the happy throng resound with solemn odes, With harp-playing and hand-clapping and a thousand different sounds.

His father’s destruction of the temple of the Jews was a mighty deed, and thus he reigns following this example.

His father despoiled the kingdom of the Jews, And his feasts are now exalted by the splendor of the vessels.

These are the royal vessels that were stolen from Jerusalem and brought to Babylon in regal tribute.

Let us present them to Belshazzar, to this our King, who richly adorns his people in scarlet and purple.

This man is powerful, this man is strong, this man is glorious, this man is honest, courteous, handsome and comely.

Let us be joyful in so great a King raising our voices in song, resounding one and all in sonorous praises.

Ridens plaudit Babylon Jherusalem plorat

Haec orbatur haec triumphans Balthasar adorat

Omnes ergo exultemus tantae potestati Offerentes regis vasa suae majestati.

Adpropinquaverant autem dies David ut moreretur praecepitque Salomoni lio suo dicens

Ego ingredior viam universae terrae confortare et esto vir Et observa custodias Domini Dei tui ut ambules in viis eius et custodias caerimonias eius et praecepta eius et iudicia et testimonia sicut scriptum est in lege Mosi ut intellegas universa quae facis et quocumque te verteris

Ut con rmet Dominus sermones suos quos locutus est de me dicens si custodierint lii tui viam suam et ambulaverint coram me in veritate in omni corde suo et in omni anima sua non auferetur tibi vir de solio Israhel

Salomon autem sedit super thronum David patris sui et rmatum est regnum eius nimis

Memento Domine David et omnis ad ictionis eius.

1 Kings 2:1–4, 12; Psalm 132:1

Bel m’es, quan vei chamjar lo senhoratge, que.lh vielh laissan a.ls joves lor maisos, e chascus pot laissar en son linhatge tans lhs que l’us puoscha esser pros: adoncs m’es vis que.l segles renovel mielhs que per or ni per chantar d’auzel; e qui senhor ni donna pot chamjar, vielh per jove, be.s deu renovelar.

Joves es hom que lo sieu be engatge, et es joves, quan es be sofrachos; per jove.l tenh, quan pro.lh constan ostatge, et es joves, quan fai estragatz dos; joves, quan art s’archa ni son vaissel, joves quan vol bastir cort e cembel; per jove.l tenh, quan ben vuolha jogar, et es joves, quan sap ben domneiar.

Vielhs es ricx hom, quan re no met en gatge

E li sobra blatz e vis e bacos.

Per vielh lo tenc, quan liura huous e fromatge

A jorn carnal si e sos companhos ;

Per vielh, quan viest capa sobre mantelh

E vielh, si a caval qu’om sieu apelh.

Per vielh lo tenc, quan no·l plai domneyar

E vielh, si pot guandir ses baratar.

Mon sirventesc port de vielh e novelh

Arnautz juglars a Richart, que·l capdelh ; E ja thezaur vielh no vuelh’amassar, Qu’ab thezaur jove pot pretz guazanhar.

Babylon laughs and applauds, Jerusalem weeps; they are bereft, we in triumph adore Belshazzar.

Therefore let us all rejoice in such a powerful ruler, offering the King’s vessels to his majesty.

Now the days were drawing near for David to die, and he commanded his son Solomon, saying:

I go the way of all the earth: be thou strong therefore, and shew thyself a man;

And keep the charge of the LORD thy God, to walk in his ways, to keep his statutes, and his commandments, and his judgments, and his testimonies, as it is written in the law of Moses, that thou mayest prosper in all that thou doest, and whithersoever thou turnest thyself:

That the LORD may continue his word which he spake concerning me, saying, If thy children take heed to their way, to walk before me in truth with all their heart and with all their soul, there shall not fail thee (said he) a man on the throne of Israel.

Then sat Solomon upon the throne of David his father; and his kingdom was established greatly.

Lord, remember David, and all his af ictions.

It pleases me to see the lordship change and the old relinquishing their mansions to the young; every man can leave in his lineage enough sons so that one, at least, is brave: it is this, and not some ower or the twittering of birds, makes me feel the earth is new again.

And if a man wants to change his old lord or lady for a young one, he will be in his best days again.

A man is young when he stakes everything he has, and young when he has nothing left, young when his hospitality costs him a fortune, young when he makes reckless gifts, young when his money burns a hole in his pocket, and he wants to hold court and tournaments: and he stays young when he loves to sit down to a game, and he is young when he knows how to serve a lady well.

A man of means is old when he won’t risk a thing, and he hoards up grain and wine and bacon; and I consider him old when he puts eggs and cheese on the table for himself and his friends on meat-eating days, old when he has to wear a hood on top of his cloak, old when he owns a horse another man has trained; he is old when he wants to sit one day in peace, and old when he can pull out before he squanders everything.

Arnaut jongleur, take my sirventes about young and old to Richard, let it guide him, may he never want to pile up old-man’s treasure when he can win glory with the riches of the young.

TUESDAY, JUNE 10

FESTIVAL CONCERT

Ecce rex Darius

Venit cum principibus

Nobilis nobilibus

Ejus et curia

Resonat laetitia

Adsunt et tripudia

Hic est mirandus

Cunctus venerandus

Illi imperia

Sunt tributaria

Regem honorant

Omnes et adorant

Illum Babylonia

Metuit et patria

Cum armato agmine

Ruens et cum turbine

Sternit cohortes

Confregit et fortes

Illum honestas

Colit et nobilitas

Hic est Babylonius

Nobilis rex Darius

Illi eum tripudio

Gaudeat haec contio

Laudet et cum gaudio

Ejus facta fortia

Tam admirabilia

Simul omnes gratulemur

Resonent et tympana

Cytharistae tangant cordas

Musicorum organa

Resonent ad ejus praeconia.

Rex in aeternum vive!

Of Penitential Kings

De profundis clamavi ad te, Domine; Domine, exaudi vocem meam. Fiant aures tuae intendentes in vocem deprecationis meae.

Si iniquitates observaveris, Domine, Domine, quis sustinebit?

Quia apud te propitiatio est; et propter legem tuam sustinui te, Domine. Sustinuit anima mea in verbo ejus:

Speravit anima mea in Domino.

A custodia matutina usque ad noctem, speret Israël in Domino.

Quia apud Dominum misericordia, et copiosa apud eum redemptio.

Et ipse redimet Israël ex omnibus iniquitatibus ejus. Psalm 130

Behold King Darius comes with his nobles, a lord with his lords. And his court resounds with happiness and partying.

He is admirable and venerated by all Empires pay him tribute

The King is honored and adored by everyone.

And the land of Babylon fears him.

When his armored squadrons rush on, like a whirlwind he scatters the troops and crushes mighty men.

Honesty and nobility adorn him. This is the lord of Babylon, King Darius.

At this party all assembled rejoice in him and praise with joy his mighty acts so worthy of admiration.

Let all celebrate together as the drums resound, the harpists strike the strings, and musical instruments resound to herald him.

May the King live forever!

Out of the depths I cry to you, O Lord; Lord, hear my voice! Let your ears be attentive to my voice in supplication:

If you, O Lord, mark iniquities, Lord, who can stand?

But with you is forgiveness, that you may be revered. I trust in the Lord; my soul trusts in his word.

My soul waits for the Lord, more than sentinels wait for the dawn, let Israel wait for the Lord;

For with the Lord is kindness and with him is plenteous redemption; And he will redeem Israel from all their iniquities.

Planctus David

Dolorum solatium, Laborum remedium, Mihi mea cithara,

Nunc quo major dolor est, Justiorque moeror est Plus est necessaria.

Strages magna populi, Regis mors et lii, Hostium victoria,

Ducum desolatio, Vulgi desperatio, Luctu replent omnia.

Amalech invaluit

Israel dum corruit, In delis jubilat Philistaea

Dum lamentis macerat Se Judaea. [...]

Insultantes inquiunt: “Ecce de quo garriunt, Qualiter hos perdidit Deus summus, Dum a multis occidit Dominus prostratus.”

Quem primum his praebuit, Victus rex occubuit; Talis est electio Dei sui, Talis consecratio Vatis magni.

Saul regum fortissime, Virtus invicta Jonathae, Qui vos nequit vincere, Permissus est occidere.

Quasi non esset oleo Consecratus dominico, Scelestae manus gladio Jugulatur in praelio.

Plus fratre mihi Jonatha, In una mecum anima, Quae peccata, quae scelera, Nostra sciderunt viscera!

Expertes montes Gelboe, Roris sitis et pluviae,

As a consolation for sorrow, as a healing for distress, my harp for me—

now that sorrow is heaviest and sadness most tting become more than necessary.

The great massacre of the people, the death of the king and his son, the victory of the enemy,

the desolation of the leaders, the despair of the multitude, [these events] ll all places with mourning.

Amalek grew in strength while Israel fell to the ground: the faithless Philistine is jubilant while Judah macerates itself with lamentation. […]

The mockers say— “Behold how their God, about whom they babble, has betrayed them. Since the overthrown King is slain by the many gods.”

He whom He rst gave, the vanquished King, is dead. Thus stands the choices of their God. Thus the consecration of the Prophet.

Saul, though the mightiest of kings! O though invincible manliness of Jonathan! He who was not able to vanquish you has been allowed to slay you.

As if he had not been consecrated with the oil of the Lord, [the king] is being killed in battle by the sword of an accursed hand.

O Jonathan, more than a brother to me, one with my soul! Through what sins, what crimes was our esh turned asunder?

Mountains of Gilboa, you shall be without dew and rain,

TUESDAY, JUNE 10

FESTIVAL CONCERT

Nec agrorum primitiae

Vestrae succurrunt incolae.

Vae, vae tibi, madida Tellus caede regia!

Quare te, mi Jonatha, Manus stravit impia? [...]

Tu mihi nunc, Jonatha, Flendus super omnia, Inter cuncta gaudia

Perpes erit lacryma.

Planctus, Sion liae, Super Saul sumite, Largo cujus munere

Vos ornabant purpurae.

Heu! cur consilio

Acquievi pessimo, Ut tibi praesidio

Non essem in praelio?

Vel confossus pariter

Morirer feliciter, Quum, quod amor faciat, Majus hoc non habeat.

Et me post te vivere

Mori sit assidue, Nec ad vitam anima Satis est dimidia.

Vicem amicitiae

Vel unam me reddere, Oportebat tempore

Summae tunc angustiae;

Triumphi participem

Vel ruinae comitem, Ut te vel eriperem

Vel tecum occumberem,

Vitam pro te niens, Quam salvasti totiens, Ut et mors nos jungeret

Magis quam disjungeret.

Infausta victoria

Potitus, interea, Quam vana, quam brevia

Hic percepi gaudia!

Quam cito durissimus

Est secutus nuntius, Quem in sua anima Locuta est superbia!

and the rst fruits of your elds shall not grow for your dwellers.

Woe, woe unto you, soil still moist with kingly blood, where you also my Jonathan have been felled by an unholy hand. […]

For you, my Jonathan, above all, I will have to lament: henceforth in the midst of every joy there will always be a tear.

Daughters of Sion, lament over Saul, whose bountiful gifts, once clothed you in purple.

Alas, O why did I agree to such an evil resolution, that thus I was not able to be a shield in battle for you?

Or if also wounded, I could have then died happily, because whatever love might do, this it cannot surpass,

while my surviving you is but to die continuously, nor is half a soul enough for life.

At that time of extreme anguish, the mutual turns of friendship commended to be either a partaker in your triumph or a companion in your defeat,

so that I could snatch you away from death or rest with you among the dead, ending that life for you.

which you had saved so many times, that thus death which separates, may bind us inseparably.

Meanwhile, I obtained an ill-fated victory: so how vain and short-lived the joy I had gathered.

How swiftly followed the grimmest of messengers, one who brought death when speaking with pride in his own heart,

Mortuis quos nuntiat

Illata mors aggregat, Ut doloris nuntius

Doloris sit socius.

Do quietem dibus:

Vellem ut et planctibus

Sic possem et etibus!

Lesis pulsu manibus, Raucis planctu vocibus

De cit et spiritus.

Of Abusive Kings

Deus iudicium regi da et iustitiam tuam lio regis iudicabit populum tuum in iustitia et pauperes tuos in iudicio.

Psalm 72:1

whom death also added to the deed whose death he was reporting so that the messenger of sorrow may also be the companion of sorrow.

I give rest to my harp: would that thus I could cease my lamentations and wailing.

My hand is wounded from striking, my voice is hoarse from lamenting and my breath, too, is ceasing.

Give the king thy judgments, O God, and thy righteousness unto the king’s son.

TUESDAY, JUNE 10

A toi rois Artus, qui signeur

Jusqu’a ore tout le grigneur

Que on seüst en nule honneur, Te mant que sera le meneur.

Lonc tans as ris, or plouerras

Tant que de doeul acoieras, Ton pris, t’ounour abaisseras

Des or mais ou demouerras.

Et ta cour qui tant est joieuse

Orendroit sera doloreuse,

Sour toutes autres et ploureuse:

Fortune t’iert contralieuse.

Tant me sui de dire teü

Que bien me sui aperceü

Que me taires a aucuns neü

Pour clie soit oi mon lay, heü!

Du mauvais roi du non sachant Ki tout mal vait a soi sachant

Conmens mon lay et fas mon chant, Bien li doit dieus être trenchant.

Du plus mauvais qui soit en vie

M’est veriu falens et envie

Que je com sa mauvaïse vie, Raisons a-chestui fait m’envie.

Rois March, dolans, viex et chaitif, Ki a tout bien faire es rest[r]if, Tu es conme li gous mestif

Ki vers le lyon prent estrif.

Rois March tes oeuvres ne chelom,

Ainc si mal roi ne si felon Ne fu des le tans Absalon,

To you, king Arthur, who is lord: Until now, everything was ne. It is all in your honor, That you maintain that you will remain the leader.

You have laughed for a long time, But you will cry in sorrow; Your price, your honor, will fall From now on, without delay.

And your court, so joyful now, Will be suffering More than any other, crying: Fortune is your enemy.

For a long time I refrained from speaking But I noticed That my silence could be detrimental to some: Let my lay be heard now!

King Mark, miserable old and frail, Unable to do anything well, You are like a mutt Looking to pick a ght with a lion:

Of this king whose name we know Let’s hear all of the bad: This is how I make my lay and perform it singing; Let God decide of its fate.

From the worse one still alive Came my inspiration and desire To narrate about his bad life, That is the only reason why I do this.

King Mark, your works are horrible, There has never been more criminal king Since the times of Absalom,

FESTIVAL CONCERT

Vieuté du siecle t’apelom.

Deshonneur, vergoigne et reprouche

De chevalier en toi se couche,

Vieutes ki ens u cuer te louche

Trop s’aville chil ki t’aprouche.

Et puis que je voi que, tu vais

Tousjours empirant, ne ne fais

S’empirier non, tout a un fais

De ta honte sui bien confais.

De ta vergoigne et de ta honte

Ki toutes deshounours sourmonte

Fine mon lay que roi et conte

Metront encore en haul aconte.

Et pour che c’alas mesdisant

De chelui que tout vont prisant,

Te vois je du tout desprisant;

Chi ne li lays voir disant.

En talent ai que je die

Ce dont me sui apensez.

Cil qui tient Champaigne et Brie

N’est mie drois avoëz.

Quar puis que fu trespassez

Cuens Thiebaus a mort de vie, Sachiez, fu il engendrez.

Reguardez s’il est bien nez.

Deüst tenir seignourie

Teus hom, chastiauz ne citez, Tresdont qu'il failli d'aïe

Au roi ou il fu alez?

Sachiez s’il fust retournez,

Ne l’en portast guarantie

Hom qui fust de mere nez, Qu’il n’en fust deshiretez.

Par le x sainte Marie

Qui en la crois fu penez, Tel chose a faite en sa vie

Dont deüst estre apelez.

Sire Dex, bien le savez, Il ne s’en deffendist mie,

Quar il se sent encoupez.

Segneur baron, qu’atendez ?

Cuens Thiebaus, dorez d’envie, De felenie fretez, De faire chevalerie

N’estes vous mie alosez.

Ançois este mieus maullés

A savoir de sirurgie.

Vieus et ors et bosof és, Totes ces teches avés.

We call you the contempt of the century.

Disgrace, shame and ignominy of the knighthood rest in you, and baseness lives in your heart: he will degrade himself who gets close to you.

Old man, miserable and covered with shame You are considered the worst of them all, You have overcome all of the bad ones No good is told about you.

From your shame and embarrassment

Which are the worst of all disgrace, I nish here my lay, to which king and counts Will take into account.

And because you have spoken ill Of him who is esteemed by all, I hold you in the greatest contempt. Here ends the lay that speaks the truth.

I have the will to say What’s weighing on my spirit. He who holds Champagne and Brie Was never the true heir. For he was born long after The Count Thibault, allegedly His father, had expired: See, how well born is he!

Should he hold these domains, These castles, men and towns? When he withdrew support too soon From the late King at Avignon: If our old King returned, No man of woman born Could guarantee that he’d retain His sham inheritance.

By holy Mary’s only son Who suffered on the cross, This man has truly sinned And should be brought to justice. Lord God, you know the truth, He’d falter in his own defense, Acknowledging his guilt.

O Barons, Why should we wait?

Count Thibault, all in amed By passion, robed in crime, You haven’t garnered fame For great chivalric deeds. You’re better suited, Count and King, Old, lthy, swollen as you seem, To study medicine; you’d bring Your symptoms with you, every stain.

Der kuninc Rodolp minnet got und ist an truwen stête. der kuninc Rodolp hât sich manigen schanden wol vursaget. der kuninc Rodolp richtet wol unde hazzet valsche rete, der kuninc Rodolp ist ein helt an tugenden unvurzaget. der kuninc Rodolp ëret got unde alle werde vrouwen. der kuninc Rodolp let sich dicke in hôen ëren schouwen. ich gan im wol, daz im nach slner milte heil geschicht. der meister singen, glgen, sagen, — daz hort er gerne unde git in drumme nicht.

Di kunstelosen edelen gebent den kunstelösen lüten. daz tûnt si allez umme daz di gäbe kleine si. wâ sol man in des wizzen danc ? wer sol ir lob bedüten ? daz sol man m dem bîre, dar ist daz lob gar eren vri. sanc unde gigenmeisterkunst, dî nement ouch vil gerne in rechter nôt ein kleiniz gût; wa des noch wére zü unbérne, daz solten in dî edelen gében, unde wére vil baz bewant, dan eime kunstelösen man — bîrloter lob: daz enist nicht wîte irkant.

Daz mesteswin gelîche ich zü éime rîchen wöcherëre. der wîle der wocherêre lebet man hât sîn keinen vromen. swen aber der wöcherere stirbet, daz wtrt wite mëre. Sô müz sin wöcher unde sîn schaz an manigen erben komen. alsô geschicht dem mesteswîne swen ez hî stirbet. mit sime tôde man vil manigen gûten vrunt irwirbet. nan sendet schuldern, schinken, sulzen, brâten manigem man. is teile wir daz mesteswîn — dem wôcherêre ich ez wól gelîchen kin.

Hé diex! qu’il a de faus visages

Par tout le Royaume et en l’empire!

Faus les serjans, faus les seigneurs,

Faus les petiz, faus les greigneurs, Faus sont au jour d’ui touz et toutes.

Triplum: Se cuers joians, jonnes, jolis

Et gentis ainme, c’est raisons ; Car au joians est ses deliz

Et au jonnes sa nourreçon

Et au joli est sa droicture

Et au gentil est sa nature.

Et d’autre part n’est il nuns hons

Qui puist ne sache Amours servir

A droit, ne ses biens deservir

Sanz les dites condicions ?

Car li cuers joians lieement

Et li jennes desirramment

Seuffre, sert et set obéir ;

Et li jolis mignotement

Et li gentis courtoisement

La vie et les jours maintenir.

Comment dont s’en pourrait tenir

Cuers ennaturez telement ?

Dames, pensez d’itieus choisir !

The King Rudolf loves God and is always sincere:

The King Rudolf stays away from all kinds of shame.

The King Rudolf governs well and hates the false counselors

The King Rudolf is a hero, well blessed with virtues.

The King Rudolf honors God and all the noble ladies—

The King Rudolf shows himself well and lets himself be praised I do not doubt that he has a charitable heart: He gladly listens to singing, ddling and poetry—but gives nothing in exchange!

Artless nobility ends up with artless subjects

This is the result of small gifts.

Why should they be thanked? Why should one sing their praise? Gift of beer perhaps? But that is praise without honor. The nobility usually gladly enjoys singing and vielle playing, but for these people when in need, there is little money. This is not enough from nobility, and they would be much better off than with this beer-praise from an artless man— that goes too far.

That pig (King Rudolf) is the equal of a usurer. As long as he lives, nothing good comes of him. But when he dies, much more will come your way because the fruits of his usury go to his heirs, just as it is when the pig dies. With his death, one acquires some good friends, as you send shoulders, ham, brawn, and roasts to many people— thus we share the pig around—thus I can claw some pro t back!

O God! What great hypocrisy

Reigns far as mortal eye can see! False the privates, false the captains False the generals and the chaplains False they are, on every level; False they are, both one and several.

Triplum: If a joyous, young, handsome and kind heart loves, it is just; for to the joyous it is his delight and to the young, his guide, and to the handsome it is his uprightness and to the kind it is his nature. And furthermore, there is no man capable of serving love nor of meriting his rewards without the said conditions. For the joyous heart gaily, and the young with desire suffers, serves and know how to obey, and the handsome graciously, and the kind courteously know how to conduct life and its days. How then could a pure heart thus prevent itself from so doing? Ladies, think of choosing such a one!

FESTIVAL CONCERT

Car bien puet et doit avenir

Gentilz, jolis, jennes, joians

Au bien dont il est desirans :

N’autres ne doit d’amours joïr !

Duplum: Rex beatus, confessor domini

Ludovicus, justo regimine

Quondam pellens, sanctorum agmini

Jam conregnat in celi culmine.

Ergo vos qui sub pari nomine

Processistis ex ejus sanguine

Hoc in avo congratulamini

Sique mores ejus sequamini

Quod in vobis sancto conglutine

Vox et vita consonent sanguini.

Tenor: Ave.

Amour

Veni de Libano sponsa veni de Libano veni: vulnerasti cor meum soror mea sponsa.

Amors me fet conmencier

Une chanson novele

Qu’elle me veut ensoigner

A amer la plus belle

Qui soit ou mont vivant

C’est la bele au cors gent

C’est cele dont je chant :

Dex m’en doint tel novele

Qui soit a mon talent,

Car menu et sovent

Mes cuers por li sautele.

Bien me pourroit avancier

Ma douce dame bele,

S’ele me voloit aidier

A ceste chanconele.

Je n’ain nule rien tant

Conme li soulement

Et son afaitement

Qui mon cuer renouvele.

Amors me lace et prent

Et fait lie et joiant

Por ce qu’a soi m’apele.

Quant ne Amour me semont,

Mour me plait et agree,

Que c’est la riens en cest mont

Qu j’ai plus desirree

Or la m’estuet servir,

Ne m’en puis plus tenir,

For the kind, handsome, young and joyous can and should indeed come to the reward of which he is desirous: and others must not enjoy love!

Duplum: Saintly King, confessor of the Lord, Louis, once strong in just government now reigns with the army of the saints in high heaven!

Therefore you, who under a like name, proceed from his blood, rejoice in this ancestor so that you follow his morals for, in you, is a sacred bond, voice and life harmonize with the blood.

Tenor: Hail.

INTERMISSION

Song of Songs 4:8–9

Come with me from Lebanon, my bride: You have captivated my heart, my sister, my bride.

Love bids me begin a new song for it wishes to involve me in love of the most beautiful lady living in the world; she is the beauty with a ne body, she is the one of whom I sing: God grant me such news as is pleasing to me, for often my heart beats rapidly because of her.

My sweet beauteous lady could indeed favor me if she were willing to help me with this little song. I love no other being as much as her and her qualities, which gives my heart new vigor. Love binds me and possesses me and makes me joyous and happy and because of this calls me to itself.

When ne love summons me, it pleases and suits me well, for she is the being on earth whom I have desired the most. Now it behooves me to serve her, which I can no longer resist,

Et du tout obeir,

Plus que rien qui soit nee.

S’ele me fait languir

Et vois jusqu’au morir, M’ame en sera sauvee.

Se la meiudre de ce mont

Ne m’a s’amour donee,

Tuit li amoreus diront

Ci a fort destinee.

S’a ce puis ja venir

Qu’aie, sanz repentir,

Ma joie et mon plaisir

De li qu’ai tant amee :

Lors diront, sanz mentir,

Qu’avrai tot mon desir

Et ma queste achevee.

Bele, por cui sopir, La blonde coronee

Puet bien dire et jehir

Que por li, sans mentir,

S’est Amours mout hastee.

Empereres ne rois n’ont nul pooir

Encontre Amors ice vos vueil prover, Qu’il pueent bien doner de lor avoir,

Terres et ez et mesfaiz pardoner ;

Et Amors puet home de mort garder

Et doner joie qui dure, Plaine de bone aventure.

Amors fait bien un home mielz valoir

Que nus fors li ne porroit amender ;

Le grant desir done dou doz voloir

Tez que nus hom ne peut contrepenser

Sor toute rien doit on amors amer ; En li ne faut fors mesure

Et ce qu’ele m’est trop dure.

S’amors volsist guerredoner autant

Com ele puet, mout fust ses nons a droit, Més el ne velt, dont j’ai le cuer dolent, Qu’ensi me tient sanz guerredon destroit

Et je sui cil quieus que la ns en soit, Qui a lui servir s’otroie ; Enpris l’ai n’en requerroie.

Dame, avra ja bien qui merci atent ?

Vos savez bien de moi au parestroit

Que vostre sui, ne puet estre autrement ;

Je ne sai pas se ce mal me feroit.

De tant d’essaiz fetez petit d’esploit, Que se je dire l’osoie, Trop me demeure la joie.

and to obey totally, more than any living being. If she makes me languish and I reach the point of death, at least my soul will be saved.

If the best lady of this world has not given me her love, all lovers will say: “he is most unfortunate”; if I can unceasingly derive my joy and my pleasure from her whom I have loved so much, then they will say, in truth, that I have realized all my desires and ended my quest.

Beautiful one, for whom I sigh, the regal blonde may indeed say and avow that for her, in truth, love has acted with haste.

Neither emperor nor king has any power Compared to Love, as I will prove to you: They can give away wealth, Lands and properties, and pardon wrongdoings, Whereas Love can save a man from death, Giving him lasting joy And good fortune.

Love makes a man so praiseworthy That none other can improve him. She gives him strong desire for loving feelings, Such that a man cannot think of anything else: He must love Love above all else.

She is lacking in nothing except moderation And is extremely hard on me.

If Love wished to reward one properly, She would be well deserving of her name. But she refuses, which grieves me, For I am imprisoned without reward. And I am the one who, regardless of the outcome, Dedicated himself to her service.

I undertook this, and I will not renounce it.

Lady, will he who expects mercy ever know happiness? You know well that when all is said and done, I am yours, it cannot be otherwise; I do not know if this will bring me misfortune. From so many ordeals I gain little, Because, dare I say it, Joy is long in coming.

TUESDAY, JUNE 10

Dame, ma mort et ma vie

Est en vos, que que je die.

Raoul, cil qui sert et prie Avroit bien mestier d’aïe.

Of Courageous Kings

Quare fremuerunt gentes et populi

Quia non viderunt mostra tot oculi?

Neque audierunt in orbe seculi

Senes et parvuli prelia que gerunt

Et que sibi querunt reges et reguli

Hec, inquam, inferunt Fauvel et Fauvuli.

Seignor, sachiés qui or ne s’en ira

En cele terre ou Deus fu morz et vis

Et qui la croiz d’Outremer ne prendra

A paines més ira en Paradis.

Qui en soi pitié ne remembrance

Au haut Seigneur doit querre sa venjance

Et delivrer sa terre et son païs.

Tuit le mauvés demorront par deça

Qui n’aiment Dieu, bien ne honor ne pris;

Et chascun dit: “Ma fame que fera?

Je ne leroie a nul fuer mes amis.”

Ci sont cheoir en trop fole atendance

Q’il n’est amis fors que cils sanz dotance

Qui por nos fu en la vraie croiz mis.

Or s’en iront cil vaillant bacheler

Qui aiment Dieu et l’onour de cest mont,

Qui sagement vuelent a Dieu aler, Et li morveus, li cendreus demorront;

Avugle sont de ce ne dout je mie

Et pour si peu pert la gloire du mont.

Deus se lessa por nos en croiz pener

Et nos dira au jor ou tuit vendront:

“Vous qui ma croiz m’ aidastes a porter,

Vos en iroiz la ou mi ange sont;

La me verroit et ma mere Marie.

Et por vos par que je n’oi onques aïe

Descendroiz tuit en Enfer le parfont.”

Douce dame roïne coronee, Priez pour nos Virge bone eürée! Et puis après ne nos peut mescheoir.

Ja nus hons pris ne dira sa raison

A droitement, se dolantement non:

Mais par esfort puet il faire chançon

Lady, my death and my life Are in your hands, whatever I may say.

Raoul1, he who serves and entreats Really could use some assistance.

Why did the nations and the people complain? Because so many did not see the marvels nor did the old and young in the world hear the battles which kings and princes wage and which they seek out for themselves; These, I say, are caused by Fauvel and his tribe.

Know this, Lords: whoever does not leave now for the land in which God lived and died, whoever will not take up the cross from overseas, he will not gain paradise. Whoever has pity and reverence for our Lord must pursue revenge, and free his land and country.

All the bad ones, who love neither God, nor honor, nor country, will stay behind. Some say: “What about my wife? I will not leave behind my friends.” Those are truly mistaken, since we have no better friend than the one who died for us on the cross.

The valiant knights who love God and the honor of this world will leave right now, and will wisely go to Him. The cowards and fools will stay behind; they are blind, no doubt. Whoever refuses to help God loses the glories of this world.

God, who suffered for us on the cross, will tell us on judgment day: “You, who helped me carry my cross, will go where my angels dwell; There you shall see my mother, Mary. As for you, from whom no help came, you shall go down deep in hell.”

Sweet crowned lady, pray for us, O blessed Virgin. After this, no harm can come to us.

No prisoner can tell his honest thought Unless he speaks as one who suffers wrong; But for his comfort as he may make a song.

1 Raoul de Soissons, viscount of Cœuvres, fellow crusader and sometime debate partner of Thibault.

Mout ai amis, mais povre sunt li don

Honte i avront, se por ma reançon

Sui ça deus yvers pris.

Or sai je bien de voir, certeinnement

Que je ne pris ne ami, ne parent

Quant on me faut por or ne por argent

Mout m’est de moi, mès plus m’est de ma gent;

Qu’après ma mort avront reprochement

Se longuement sui pris.

Ce sevent bien mi home e mi baron

Ynglois, Normanz, Poitevin et Gascon

Que je n’ai nul si povre compaignon

Que je lessaisse, por avoir, en prison

Je nou di mie por nule rentrançon

Car encor sui pris.

Mes compaignons que j’amoie et que j’ain —

Ces de Cahen et ces de Percherain —

Di lor, chançon, qu’il ne sunt pas certain, C’onques vers aus ne oi faus cuer ne vain;

S’il me guerroient, il feront que vilain — Tant con je serai pris.

Contesse suer, vostre pris soverain

Vos saut et gart cil a cui je m’en clain;

E por ce que je sui pris

Je ne di mie a cele de Chartrain

La mere Loëys.

Ar ne kuth ich sorghe non, nu ich moot imane mi mon; karful, wel sor ich siche. Geltles, tholich muchel schame; help, God, for thi sweete name, king of hevene riche.

Jesu Crist, sooth God, sooth man, loverd, thu rew upon me! Of prisun that ich in am bring me ut and make free. Ich and mine feeren sume — God wot ich ne lyghe noht — for othre han misnume been in thys prisun ibroht.

Almihti, that wel lihtli — bales hal and boote, heven-king — of this woning ut us bringe moote, foryef hem, the wikke men, yef it is thi wille,

My friends are many, but their gifts are naught. Shame will be theirs, if, for my ransom, here— I lie another year.

The ancient proverb now I know for sure; Death and a prison know nor kind nor tie, Since for mere lack of gold they let me lie. Much for myself I grieve; for them still more. After my death they will have grievous wrong— If I am a prisoner long.

They know this well, my barons and my men, Normandy, England, Gascony, Poitou, That I had never follower so low Whom I would leave in prison to my gain. I say it not for a reproach to them,— But prisoner I am!

Companions whom I love, and still do love, Geoffroi du Perche and Ansel de Caieux, Tell them, my song, that they are friends untrue. Never to them did I false-hearted prove; But they do villainy if they war on me,— While I lie here, unfree.

Countess sister! Your sovereign fame May he preserve whose help I claim,— Victim for whom am I! I say not this of Chartres’ dame,— Mother of Louis!

Formerly I knew no sorrow now I must give voice to my grief; full of care, I sigh in great distress. Guiltless, I suffer great shame; Help, God, for thy sweet name, rich king of heaven.

Jesus Christ, true God, true man, Lord have pity on me: From the prison that I am in, bring me out and make me free. I and some of my companions (God know I do not lie) for the misdeeds of others have been cast into this prison.

Almighty, who very easily (remedy and cure of pain, King of heaven), out of this misery may you bring us. Forgive them, the wicked men, if it is thy will

TUESDAY, JUNE 10

FESTIVAL CONCERT

for wos gelt we been ipelt in this prisun ille.

Hope non to this live — heer ne mat he bilive; heeghe theh he astighe, deth him felleth to grunde. Nu hath man wele and blisse, rath he shal tharof misse; worldes wele, mid wisse, ne lasteth but on stunde.

Maiden that bar the heven-king, biseech thi sune, sweete thing, that he habbe of us rewsing and us bring of this woning for his muchele milse. He us bring ut of this wo and us tache werchen swo in this lif, go wusit go, that we mooten ey and o habben the eeche blisse.

Here My Song Ends

Canticum David Domine clamavi ad te festina mihi exaudi vocem meam clamantis ad te Dirigatur oratio mea sicut incensum in conspectu tuo elevatio manuum mearum sacri cium vespertinum

Pone Domine custodem ori meo serva paupertatem labiorum meorum

Ne declines cor meum in verbum malum volvere cogitationes impias cum viris operantibus iniquitatem neque comedere in deliciis eorum

Corripiat me iustus in misericordia et arguat me oleum amaritudinis non inpinguet caput meum quia adhuc et oratio mea pro malitiis eorum.

Sublati sunt iuxta petram iudices eorum et audient verba mea quoniam decora sunt

Sicut agricola cum scindit terram sic dissipata sunt ossa nostra in ore inferi

Quia ad te Domine Deus oculi mei in te speravi ne evacues animam meam

Custodi me de manibus laquei quod posuerunt mihi et de offendiculis operantium iniquitatem

Incident in rete eius impii simul ego autem transibo. Psalm 141

Fortz chausa es que tot lo major dan e-l major dol, la! q’ieu anc mais agues, e so don dei totztemps plaigner ploran, m’aven a dir en chantan e retraire — Car cel q’era de valor caps e paire lo rics valens Richartz, reis dels Engles, es mortz — Ai Deus! cals perd’e cals dans es!

for whose guilt we are thrust into this evil prison.

Let none trust in this life. Here he cannot remain; high though he ascend, death fells him to the ground. Now man has prosperity and bliss, soon he shall lose them; worldly prosperity, for certain, lasts only for an hour.

Maiden who bore the King of heaven, beseech thy son, sweet thing, that he have pity on us and bring us from this misery, of his great mercy.

May he bring us from this woe and teach us so to act in this life, however things may go, that we may for ever and ever have eternal bliss.

LORD, I cry unto thee: make haste unto me; give ear unto my voice, when I cry unto thee.

Let my prayer be set forth before thee as incense; and the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacri ce.

Set a watch, O LORD, before my mouth; keep the door of my lips.

Incline not my heart to any evil thing, to practice wicked works with men that work iniquity: and let me not eat of their dainties.

Let the righteous smite me; it shall be a kindness: and let him reprove me; it shall be an excellent oil, which shall not break my head: for yet my prayer also shall be in their calamities.

When their judges are overthrown in stony places, they shall hear my words; for they are sweet.

Our bones are scattered at the grave’s mouth, as when one cutteth and cleaveth wood upon the earth.

But mine eyes are unto thee, O GOD the Lord: in thee is my trust; leave not my soul destitute.

Keep me from the snares which they have laid for me, and the gins of the workers of iniquity.

Let the wicked fall into their own nets, whilst that I withal escape.

It is a very cruel event, the greatest misfortune and the greatest sorrow, alas, that I have ever had one which I must always lament, weeping, that I must tell and recount in song for he who was the head and father of valor, the strong, the powerful Richard, king of the English, is dead— Alas God! what a loss, what a blow!

cant estrains motz, e cant greus ad auzir! Ben a dur cor totz hom q’o pot sofrir.

Santa Maria loei e loo e loarei.

Ca, ontr’ os que oge nados son d’ omees muit’ onrrados, a mi á ela mostrados mais bêes, que contarei. [...]

Ca a mi de bôa gente fez vîir dereitamente e quis que mui châamente reinass’e que fosse rei

Santa Maria loei...

E conas sas piadades nas grandes enfermidades m’ acorreu; por que sabiades que poren a servirey. [...]

E dos que me mal querian e buscavan e ordian deu-lles o que merecian, assi como provarei.

Santa Maria loei...

Ca mi fez de bôa terra sennor, e en toda guerra m’ ajudou a que non erra nen errou, u a chamei. [...]

A mi livrou d’ oqueijôes, de mortes e de lijôes; por que sabiades, varôes, que por ela morrerei.

Santa Maria loei...

Poren todos m’ ajudade a rocar de voontade que con ssa gran piadade mi acorra, que mester ei. [...]

E quando quiser que seja, que me quite de peleja daqueste mund e que veja a ela, que sempr’ amei.

Santa Maria loei...

such a harsh statement, so painful to hear, hard of heart is any man who can endure it.

I have praised Saint Mary; I praise her now; and I shall go on praising her. For amongst the men of this world, there are many honored people, but she favored me with many bene ts, which I shall relate.

For she had me meet honorable people and desired most clearly that I should reign and be king. I have praised Saint Mary…

And thanks to her pity over my serious failings she helped me; know therefore that for this I shall serve her.

And as for those who desired evil, sought it end ordained it, she gave them what they deserved, as I shall reveal.

I have praised Saint Mary…

For over a good land she made me Lord, and in all wars, she who never fails never failed me when I called upon her.

She delivered me from dangers of death and af iction. Know, therefore, all you knights, that for her I am ready to die. I have praised Saint Mary…

Help me then, all of you, to pray most readily so that in her great pity she gives me her help, for I need it greatly.

And when she wishes it to be the moment for me to leave the battles of this world, I shall then see the one I have always loved.

I have praised Saint Mary…

—Translations © Peter Ricketts, Henry Adams, Peter Dronke, Kathleen Kulp-Hill, Samuel Rosenberg, Anne Azéma, Anonymous

Murder, Mayhem, Melancholy, and Madness Pacific MusicWorks

Danielle Reutter-Harrah, soprano

Stephen Stubbs, lute, Baroque guitar & Director

Tekla Cunningham, Baroque violin

Maxine Eilander, Baroque harp

David Morris, viola da gamba

Eliza is the fairest Queen

Melancholy

Lachrymae to the Consort

TUESDAY, JUNE 10

Edward Johnson (fl. 1572–1601)

John Dowland (1563–1626)

From silent night Dowland from A Pilgrim’s Solace, 1612

Harp Consort No. 9 in D major

William Lawes (1602–1645) Paven and Divisions

The Willow Song English Folk Ballad

Murder and Mayhem

Arm, arm

Robert Johnson (ca. 1583–1633)

So, so the deed is done (to the tune of Fain I would) English Folk Ballad

The Wind and Rain English Folk Ballad, preserved in Appalachia

Madness

Preludio

Nicola Matteis (ca. 1650–1700)

Un poco di maniera Italiana / Aria Ridicola Matteis

The Boston Early Music Festival extends heartfelt thanks to Susan L. Robinson for her leadership support of tonight’s performance by Pacific MusicWorks with Danielle Reutter-Harrah, soprano

Three songs on texts by Robert Herrick Lawes

To the Dews: I burn, I burn

On the Lilies: White though ye be

To the Sycamore: I’m sick of love

Aria amorosa / Ground after the Scotch humour Matteis

Bess of Bedlam

Henry Purcell (1659–1695)

O let me weep Purcell

W Italian “Nuovolone” triple harp (after the painting La familia del artista Brera) X by Claus Henry Hüttel, Düren, 2023, property of the Boston Early Music Festival.

Notes on the Program

First a confession: we collectively wanted to create a concert centered on the magni cent twin creations of William Lawes: his harp consorts and his songs. Yet the wisdom of “marketing” prevailed upon us to realize that the Lawes name was nothing with which to conjure an audience. Even in the context of the relatively little-known music of the English seventeenth century, Lawes is usually seen as a “transitional” gure between the musical giants John Dowland and Henry Purcell. The historical context is telling: Dowland was the preeminent lutenist and songwriter of the Elizabethan period (although never gaining employment at Elizabeth’s court), and Henry Purcell is the musical avatar of the Restoration period under Charles II (1660–1685), whereas William Lawes’s short life (1602–1645) spans the eras of King James I (1603–1625) and Charles I (1625–1649), but ends abruptly at the Civil War battle of Chester in 1645. Zooming in on this agitated period of English history, with more than its share of political and religious strife, and his own violent death, it didn’t seem a stretch to entitle the program Murder and Mayhem. Yet zooming out to view the larger patterns of English life and art from Elizabeth to Charles II, the inclusion of the particularly English inclination toward Melancholy, and the fabulous artistic embodiment of Madness during the Restoration—particularly in the hands of Purcell—it seemed that those further qualities needed to be included.

Melancholy: The English have always had a predeliction for melancholy, but it was the Elizabethan age which articulated it as a vogue or fashion. Shakespeare’s character Jacques in As you like it (1600) says he can “suck melancholy out of a song, as a weasel sucks eggs.” John Dowland (1563–1626) was the emblematic artistic embodiment of this fashion with titles like Forlorn Hope, Lachrymae (Flow my tears), Melancholy Galliard, and the title which doubled as a personal motto: Semper Dowland, semper dolens. The popularity of Timothy Bright’s A Treatise of Melancholie, from 1586, shows the the

general interest in the subject, and although Richard Burton’s magnum opus The Anatomy of Melancholy was only published in 1621, it was written in parallel with Dowland’s career. A century later, music was invoked as an antidote to the condition with Thomas D’Urfey’s Wit and Mirth: Or Pills to Purge Melancholy (six volumes, 1719–1720) with the subtitle “A collection of the best merry Ballads and Songs, old and new.” But whether indulging or avoiding the condition of melancholy, the wistful, doleful atmosphere of a song like The Willow Song (sung by Desdemona in Othello, but already considered an “old” song) holds a permanent emotional appeal.

Mayhem and Balladry: Various factors of upheaval, both political and religious, propelled the English toward their Civil War (1642–1651), and as the virulence of the opposing Roundheads (the Puritans gained this disparaging nickname for their close-cropped hair) and Cavaliers (adherents of the crown and the Church of England) increased, the Broadside Ballad became the vehicle for satirical barbs. Ballads were published as single sheets of satirical text to be sung to the tunes of well-known songs. The contemporary parallel might be found in the productions of Randy Rainbow. Character assassination by Ballad was so feared that there were many comments on the phenomenon in plays of the time. Here are some examples:

“She has told all: I shall be balladed— Sung up and down by minstrels.”

“I am afraid of nothing but I shall be balladed.”

“I will have thee Pictured as thou art now, and thy whole story Sung to some villainous tune in a lewd ballad. And make thee so notorious in the world, That boys in the street shall hoot at thee.”

Beyond the lampooning of public gures, music itself was also an object of Puritan scorn. Philip Stubbes (a possible ancestor of mine) in his Anatomy of Abuses (1583 but reprinted four times!) devotes an entire chapter against music which he says has “a certain smooth sweetness in it, like unto honey, alluring the auditory to effeminacy, pusillanimity, and loathsomeness of life.” Furthermore, it is “used in public assemblies and private conventicles as a directory to lthy dancing; and through the sweet harmony and smooth melody thereof, it estrangeth the mind, stirreth up lust, womanisheth the mind and ravisheth the heart”. As to musicians: “their heads are fraught with all kinds of lascivious songs, lthy ballads, and scurvy rhimes, serving for every purpose and every company.” William Lawes, and for that matter, I too, would have been his worst nightmares come to life!

Murder: The culmination of all this strife, as much as the war itself, was the beheading of the monarch King Charles I on January 30, 1649. A few days later on February 14, 1649, Thomas Tomkins, organist of the Royal Chapel, wrote his Sad Pavan for These Distracted Times as a direct commentary. Even more explicit was the Broadside Ballad printed on April 23, 1649, called A cof n for King Charles: A crown for Cromwell: A pit for the people sung to the tune of Fain I would. A few years earlier in 1645 at the Battle of Chester, William Lawes, the most gifted composer of both vocal and instrumental music of his generation, was shot and killed at the age of forty-three. Together with his brother Henry he had created the genre of declamatory song which was the ultimate marriage of English poetry with music— both on an equal footing—and also single-handedly created the unique instrumental form of the Harp Consort, for harp, violin, viola da gamba, and lute.

Madness: The dramatic representation of madness on the stage has deep roots in Italian culture of the Baroque period. At the end of the sixteenth century, just when all Baroque musical forms, especially opera, were being invented and established, a famous actress of the commedia dell’arte troupe I gelosi named Isabella Andreini (1562–1604), was so well known for her portrayals of madness that the troupe established a theater piece called La pazzia d’Isabella to showcase her art. An eyewitness of her performance reported this:

…Isabella, nding herself deceived by Flavio, and not knowing where to nd a remedy, let herself fall prey to her sorrow, and thus, conquered by passion, overcome with rage and fury, she went completely out of her mind, and like a madwoman, went running through the city…

stopping rst one person then another, speaking now in Greek, now in Italian, now in many other languages, but always without making any sense. Then she began to speak in French andto sing certain songs, which gave inexpressible pleasure to the Most Serene Bride.

After that she began to imitate the dialects of all her fellow actors—so naturally and with so many absurdities that words cannot describe the value and virtues of this woman!

Finally, by Magic, she returned to her rst self, and then in an elegant and learned style, explaining the passions and travails of love which everyone experiences when ensnared in Love’s net, she ended the comedy. Isabella left the audience murmuring and marveling so that her eloquence and worthiness will be praised as long as the world lasts.

At the restoration of the English crown in 1660 with the return and installation of Charles II, a number of Italian musicians arrived in England, bringing a new art of amboyant singing and playing and the most recent Italian music with them. Among them was the Neapolitan violin and guitar virtuoso Nicola Matteis. In his four extraordinary collections of music (published between 1676 and 1685) he records his wide knowledge of Italian and French style and includes a number of Scottish-inspired numbers. One piece in particular which he called Un poco di maniera Italiana / Aria Ridicola demonstrates the extreme mood swings from extreme pathos to frenetic comedy that express the “mad style” as it came down through a series of Italian operatic divas beginning with Isabella. Music like this had a direct effect on Henry Purcell who claimed that he had “faithfully endevour’d a just imitation of the most fam’d Italian Masters.” Beyond learning from the Italians, Purcell established the whole genre of the English “Mad Song” which continued well into the eighteenth century. As for his most famous mad song, both the words and music of Bess of Bedlam are inspired by the popular ballad Mad Tom of Bedlam, based on a Jacobean masque tune “Gray’s Inn Masque.”

—Stephen Stubbs, October 25, 2022

FESTIVAL CONCERT

Texts

Eliza is the fairest Queen — Edward Johnson

Eliza is the fairest Queen That ever trod upon the green. Eliza’s eyes are blessed stars, Inducing peace, subduing wars. O blessed be each day and hour Where sweet Eliza builds her bower.

From silent night — John Dowland

From silent night true register of moans, From saddest soul consum’d with deepest sins, From heart quite rent with sighs, and heavy groans, My wailing muse her woeful work begins, And to the world brings tunes of sad despair, Sounding not else but sorrow, grief, and care.

The Willow Song — English Folk Ballad

The poor soul sat sighing, by a sycamore tree, Sing willow, willow, willow, With his hand on his bosom, and his head upon his knee, Oh willow, willow, willow shall be my garland. Sing all a green willow Willow, willow, willow, Ay, me the green willow must be my garland.