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Authors: Henry W. Simon
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knows that he will have the last laugh and that Marie will never be a “bartered bride.”
ACT III
Alone on the town square, Wenzel bewails his failure to make love successfully in a comic aria marked lamentoso . Suddenly, with trumpets and drums, a circus troupe appears at the inn. Wenzel is childishly delighted. He hears Springer, the leader of the troupe, announce a performance that very afternoon, and he is enchanted—as is every audience—with the Dance of the Comedians . He also falls in love at first sight with Esmerelda, the pretty tightrope walker. But Muff, another member of the troupe, rushes in to announce that the fellow who plays the bear is hopelessly drunk. No one else of the right size can be found, and so Springer and the pretty Esmerelda persuade Wenzel to join the troupe—to learn to dance—and to be the bear!
Before he can go off with them, his parents interrupt. Agnes, Misha, and the marriage broker Kezal try to persuade Wenzel to sign the contract to marry Marie. But for once the boy knows his own mind: he absolutely refuses—and he runs off. Now it is Marie’s turn to be persuaded to agree to the marriage. Even her own parents join in, and when they show her the paper that her lover Hans has signed, her heart is broken. Pitifully she asks a few minutes to think it over. In a lovely sextet, the older people agree to give her some time, but they will soon return.
Marie now has a mournful aria, and she is not at all cheered up by Hans, who joins her in an annoyingly cheerful frame of mind. He, of course, knows that everything will turn out all right, but he does not have time to explain it to his girl. In fact, he only makes matters rather worse in their brief duet. So, when Kezal offers him his money (according to the contract), he agrees readily, and everyone in the village is sure that Marie will make a lovely bride for Wenzel. At this point Wenzel’s parents enter, see Hans for the first time, and greet him as Misha’s long lost son. Thus everything is cleared up for the lovers, for the contract calls for Marie to marry Misha’s son, and it doesn’t say which son. Marie chooses Hans, and Kezal is laughed off the scene.
Now there are shouts: “Save yourselves! A bear’s got loose!” But it is only Wenzel, disguised in his bear’s suit. His mother drags him off; Misha blesses the happy young couple; and the opera ends as everyone joins in a chorus: Hurray for the bartered bride!
BASTIEN UND BASTIENNE
Light opera in one act by Wolfgang Amadeus
Mozart with libretto in German by F. W.
Weiskern, based on Marie Justine Benoîte
Favart’s parody of Jean Jacques Rousseau’s
Le devin du village
BASTIEN , a shepherd
Tenor
BASTIENNE , a shepherdess
Soprano
COLAS , a magician
Bass
Time: 18th century
Place: outside a European village
First performance at Vienna, probably in September 1768
Mozart, as everyone knows, was a child prodigy. He composed Bastien und Bastienne at the age of twelve. It was commissioned by no less a personage than Dr. Anton Mesmer, the inventor of mesmerism—a kind of hypnotism used for curing people of all sorts of diseases. Later on his mesmerism came to be generally regarded as something like quackery, but in 1768 the good doctor was a highly respected and wealthy practitioner in Vienna, and Bastien und Bastienne was presented at a garden party he gave that fall. Its libretto was a parody of another famous little musical work— Le devin du village , by Jean Jacques Rousseau. Apparently Bastien und Bastienne was not too great a success, for it was not given a second performance till Mozart had been in his grave almost a century. It was, therefore, impossible for Ludwig van Beethoven, born two years after Mesmer’s party, to have heard the overture. I mention this fact because the main theme ofMozart’s little opening music is almost note for note the same as the main theme of the great Eroica symphony. Just one of those amusing accidents.
The story
ACT III
Alone on the town square, Wenzel bewails his failure to make love successfully in a comic aria marked lamentoso . Suddenly, with trumpets and drums, a circus troupe appears at the inn. Wenzel is childishly delighted. He hears Springer, the leader of the troupe, announce a performance that very afternoon, and he is enchanted—as is every audience—with the Dance of the Comedians . He also falls in love at first sight with Esmerelda, the pretty tightrope walker. But Muff, another member of the troupe, rushes in to announce that the fellow who plays the bear is hopelessly drunk. No one else of the right size can be found, and so Springer and the pretty Esmerelda persuade Wenzel to join the troupe—to learn to dance—and to be the bear!
Before he can go off with them, his parents interrupt. Agnes, Misha, and the marriage broker Kezal try to persuade Wenzel to sign the contract to marry Marie. But for once the boy knows his own mind: he absolutely refuses—and he runs off. Now it is Marie’s turn to be persuaded to agree to the marriage. Even her own parents join in, and when they show her the paper that her lover Hans has signed, her heart is broken. Pitifully she asks a few minutes to think it over. In a lovely sextet, the older people agree to give her some time, but they will soon return.
Marie now has a mournful aria, and she is not at all cheered up by Hans, who joins her in an annoyingly cheerful frame of mind. He, of course, knows that everything will turn out all right, but he does not have time to explain it to his girl. In fact, he only makes matters rather worse in their brief duet. So, when Kezal offers him his money (according to the contract), he agrees readily, and everyone in the village is sure that Marie will make a lovely bride for Wenzel. At this point Wenzel’s parents enter, see Hans for the first time, and greet him as Misha’s long lost son. Thus everything is cleared up for the lovers, for the contract calls for Marie to marry Misha’s son, and it doesn’t say which son. Marie chooses Hans, and Kezal is laughed off the scene.
Now there are shouts: “Save yourselves! A bear’s got loose!” But it is only Wenzel, disguised in his bear’s suit. His mother drags him off; Misha blesses the happy young couple; and the opera ends as everyone joins in a chorus: Hurray for the bartered bride!
BASTIEN UND BASTIENNE
Light opera in one act by Wolfgang Amadeus
Mozart with libretto in German by F. W.
Weiskern, based on Marie Justine Benoîte
Favart’s parody of Jean Jacques Rousseau’s
Le devin du village
BASTIEN , a shepherd
Tenor
BASTIENNE , a shepherdess
Soprano
COLAS , a magician
Bass
Time: 18th century
Place: outside a European village
First performance at Vienna, probably in September 1768
Mozart, as everyone knows, was a child prodigy. He composed Bastien und Bastienne at the age of twelve. It was commissioned by no less a personage than Dr. Anton Mesmer, the inventor of mesmerism—a kind of hypnotism used for curing people of all sorts of diseases. Later on his mesmerism came to be generally regarded as something like quackery, but in 1768 the good doctor was a highly respected and wealthy practitioner in Vienna, and Bastien und Bastienne was presented at a garden party he gave that fall. Its libretto was a parody of another famous little musical work— Le devin du village , by Jean Jacques Rousseau. Apparently Bastien und Bastienne was not too great a success, for it was not given a second performance till Mozart had been in his grave almost a century. It was, therefore, impossible for Ludwig van Beethoven, born two years after Mesmer’s party, to have heard the overture. I mention this fact because the main theme ofMozart’s little opening music is almost note for note the same as the main theme of the great Eroica symphony. Just one of those amusing accidents.
The story
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