A Riot, a Harangue, and a (Failed) Uprising: Three Scenes from Nineteenth-Century Operas

Abstract

In most operatic riots or uprisings, one group attacks another group or an individual, but here it is a free-for-all. Appropriately, the musical setting is of great complexity, far greater than anything to be encountered in nineteenth-century French or Italian opera. In much political thought before the end of the nineteenth century, these strands are fused: it was Edmund Burke's swinish multitude and Cesare Lambroso's criminal class that formed violent crowds. Although Prophete premiered in 1849, it was essentially completed years before. The postponement of the opera's premiere until after the 1848 revolution gave it added relevance: the speeches of the Anabaptists were compared to those of the Communists. The scene with the Anabaptists in Act I - No 3 Le Preche Anabaptiste (morceau d'ensemble) - more than any other operatic scene the author thinks of, effectively shows the chorus gradually brought to the boiling point. Keywords:Italian opera; Le Preche Anabaptiste; nineteenth-century; operatic riots