- matic style by setting a German version of Rinuccini's Dafne (1627) and by a
ballet, Orpheus und Eurydice (1636), the music of which is lost. Sigmund Staden (d. 1655), a Nuremberg organist, wrote the earliest German musical drama that is now extant, Das geistliche Waldgedicht, Seelewig (1644), nominally 'in the Italian manner,' but lacking many usual Italian features, while showing the German taste for orderly and expressive song. There are but scattered references to other works before 1675.
Important advance waited for the opening of the Hamburg opera-house in 1678, where the writers of singspiele included Nikolaus Adam Strunck (d. 1700), an extraordinary violinist employed at various courts (Brunswick, Celle, Hanover, Dresden), and writing for Hamburg several German dramas (1678-83) and for Leipsic, where in 1691 he built an opera-house, about 15 more in Italian; Johann Theile (see sec. 96), supplying 2 singspiele (1678); Johann Wolfgang Franck of Hamburg, who wrote 14 (1679-86), besides many sacred songs (1681-1700); Johann Georg Conradi, court-choirmaster at Oettingen and Kusser's predecessor at Hamburg, with 7 (1691-3), one or two of which were later revived by others; and Philipp Krieger (d. 1725), organist or choirmaster at various courts (Copenhagen, Bayreuth, Halle, Weissenfels), where from 1679 he brought out a great many singspiele, two of which were repeated at Hamburg (1694).
The prominence of Vienna as a headquarters of Italian opera
was due to the exceptional musical enthusiasm of the Emperors
during the 17th and 18th centuries. In the 17th, two of these,
Ferdinand III. (1637-57) and Leopold I. (1657-1705), were
composers of ability, besides being lavish in their patronage.
The court singers and players sometimes numbered as many as
a hundred. Besides the chief organist and director and their
assistants, toward the end of the century a court-composer
was appointed. Distinguished composers and performers were
often brought to Vienna by imperial invitation for special undertakings.
Besides the imported performances of works by Cavalli (possibly in 1642,
'50, certainly in 1662, at Innsbruck) and by Cesti (1665-9), the following resident
composers, all Italians, are noteworthy:—
Antonio Bertali (d. 1669), for over 30 years in the imperial service, with 8 operas (from 1653); Antonio Draghi (d. 1700), still longer at the court, with the incredible number of over 170 operas, festal plays, serenatas, ballets, prologues, etc. (from 1661, mostly 1669-95), in many cases with arias by the Emperor Leopold inserted; Giovanni Felice Sances (d. 1679), in the Chapel from 1637 and Bertali's successor as choirmaster in 1669, with 1 (1670); and Carlo Agostino Badia (d. 1738), the first court-composer, with 20 operas and many lesser dramatic works (from 1697)—not to mention others whose stay at Vienna was briefer. In 1696 the powerful composer Fux appeared, opening the series of important 18th-century writers (see secs. 121, 125).
