to the present period and to the next, but who may well be considered here because expressive of the tendency toward the grand historical opera.
Giacomo Meyerbeer [properly Jacob Meyer-Beer, the 'Meyer' being adopted
at the wish of a rich relative] (d. 1864) was born at Berlin in 1791 of wealthy
and cultivated Jewish parents, who gave him every opportunity. He early
studied with Lauska and Clementi, becoming a concert-pianist at 6, and with
Zelter, B.A. Weber and, in 1810-2, Vogler. While at Darmstadt with the
latter and having as fellow-pupils Weber and Gänsbacher, he wrote an oratorio
(1811, Berlin) and two contrasted operas, one sacred, the other comic
(both 1813, Munich). In 1814, when the latter, Abimelek or Die beiden Kalifen,
was repeated at Vienna, Meyerbeer heard Hummel play and forthwith
proceeded to reconstruct his own style to match, with good public success.
But dramatic composition was his ambition, and he accepted Salieri's advice
to make his style more fresh, elastic and vocal by Italian study.
From 1815 he was in Venice, carried away by Rossini's warmth and fluency and winning a series of local triumphs with some 5 Italian operas, of which Romilda e Costanze (1815, Padua) was the first and Margherita d' Angiù (1820, Milan) the best. He also wrote a German opera, Das brandenburger Thor (not given), in connection with which his German friends, especially Weber, sought to recall him from his path of imitation, the result being in Il crociato in Egitto (1824, Venice) a signal triumph, with some indications of his later power. This work was given by Rossini at Paris in 1826, which fact led to Meyerbeer's going thither to live, producing nothing for several years.
Having made exhaustive studies in the literature of French opera and having joined forces with the librettist Scribe, Meyerbeer now advanced by a single stride to his most characteristic style in Robert le Diable (1831, Paris), which is both romantic and historical in topic and both Italian and French in detail, with a bold and novel richness of total effect. This was followed by the epoch-making Les Huguenots (1836, Paris), and after a time by Le Prophète (completed 1843, but not given till 1849), the two strongest illustrations of his genius.
About this time he became court-choirmaster at Berlin, there bringing out Das Feldlager in Schlesien (1843), without much success until the advent of the brilliant Swedish soprano Jenny Lind, who for several years was closely connected with his fortunes. He also displayed power in the music for his brother's tragedy Struensee (1846), and exerted his commanding influence to revive Weber's Euryanthe (1845) and to gain a hearing for Wagner's Rienzi (1847).
About 1850, doubtless owing to the unremitting labor and anxiety involved in his habits of work, his health became precarious. But he still continued to produce at intervals, notably L'étoile du Nord (1854, Paris) and Le pardon de Ploërmel or Dinorah (1859, Paris), both attempts to compete with French writers of opéra comique on their own ground. Finally came L'africaine (begun 1838, developed during the whole 25 years following, first given 1865), which is dramatically composite, though musically full of interest. He wrote
