Italian muses were plentiful for Handel, and entire programs can be based on such noteworthy composers as Carissimi, Alessandro Scarlatti, Steffani, Legrenzi, Stradella, and Bononcini. For continuity's sake, and to keep with our operatic focus, we've opted to promote one neglected Italian master, Marc Antonio Cesti. In the late 17th C, it would have been difficult to escape the influence of Cesti, one of the most celebrated Italian musicians of his age. When Handel arrived in Venice in 1707 (at age 22), Cesti's reputation resonated through revivals of his operas, notably Orontea, in the many public theaters of the city and throughout Italy.
Cesti, along with his contemporary Cavalli, continued to carry the flame of Monteverdi's once revolutionary expressive style. Refining on Monteverdi's vocal techniques, Cesti used recitatives strictly to propel narration, story, and dialogue; he then used arias to illustrate a character's emotional or intellectual state of being. This, in short, was the emergence of a standardized opera structure that all composers of the genre, including Handel, would take to be their own. A master of connecting text to music, Cesti naturally excelled at two dramatic genres: the opera and the solo cantata. Besides his vast output of over 100 solo cantatas, none of which were published in his lifetime, and his 24 stage works, Cesti created in 1667 the grandest Baroque spectacle that the age had ever seen.
Il pomo d'oro was very unlike the Venetian operas that made Cesti famous. It was not composed for the public houses of Venice, but for the court of the Hapsburg Empire, and intended for the marriage of Leopold I to Spain's Margarita. Cesti, an official Hapsburg composer at the time, was commissioned by the Emperor himself to create this monumental wedding gift (which due to many postponements became Margarita's monumental birthday gift). The elaborate stage designs of Burnacini, the surviving music, and the contemporary accounts of the performance attest to Cesti's opera being the most spectacular Baroque entertainment ever conceived. It was so vast in scope that the initial performance occurred over two days.
Despite its size, Il pomo d'oro hearkened back to opera's very beginnings. One can hear in the sumptuous instrumental sonatas that Il pomo d'oro is based on the tradition of Monteverdi's Orfeo, but it is a tradition developed to its final point. Considering the overwhelming expense in labor and finance it placed on the spectacle-obsessed Hapsburg Empire, it is regrettable to realize that this opera may never again be produced in the same capacity as it was in 1668. Due to its unique purpose and its incredible expense, Il pomo d'oro was the last of a kind; Italian opera could never be like this again.
From the largest Baroque opera ever conceived, we move to the smallest genre of Baroque musical drama, the solo cantata, as we hear Cesti's "Aspettate". And while we may never be witness to glory of Il pomo d'oro, narrative cantatas such as "Aspettate" are indeed operatic. All of the drama, plot, and most importantly, vivid characterizations of an opera are here in miniature form. Cesti's dramatic genius is found here too, as he pairs words and music with affect, irony, and humor. The result is one of complete dramatic believability - the cantata's unnamed character is as real as any one sitting next to us.
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