The Premiere of Le Nozze di Figaro in 1786

On the 1st of May, 1786, at the Burgtheater in Vienna, the audience, which included Emperor Joseph II of Austria, were treated to the premiere of what would come to be regarded as one of the world's greatest and most beloved of all operas, Mozart's Le Nozze di Figaro. The premiere actually didn't go all that smoothly and was fraught with intrigue. Neither was it given as many performances, only nine in its first run, (with a tenth given at the Emperor's palace theater at his country estate in Laxenburg), as Mozart and his librettist, Lorenzo Da Ponte had hoped for. However, despite it's rough beginnings, it still stands as the most performed opera in the entire opera repertoire. 

As the first of the three collaborations of the great team of Mozart and Da Ponte, Figaro stood out among the three as the most successful. While Don Giovanni is regarded by musicologists as probably the greatest opera in history, and Cosi Fan Tutte contains some of Mozart's most divinely inspired music, their Viennese premiere runs were even shorter than Figaro's and audience favor less enthusiastic. After the first two performances (both conducted by Mozart himself), in which the audiences demanded that all numbers be encored, the Emperor had to order an edict that only the ensemble pieces could be repeated, in order that the performances not last six hours.


The reviews were for the most part, outstanding. The newspaper, Weiner Realzeitung, printed a review on 11 July, 1786 that referred to the hired cabals and disruptions from some of the singers themselves in the first performance (probably paid by the Spanish composer, Martín y Soler, who was upset that his new opera, Una Cosa Rara hadn't been chosen as the season opener).

Mozart's music was generally admired by connoisseurs already at the first performance, if I except only those whose self-love and conceit will not allow them to find merit in anything not written by themselves.
The public, however ... did not really know on the first day where it stood. It heard many a bravo from unbiassed connoisseurs, but obstreperous louts in the uppermost storey exerted their hired lungs with all their might to deafen singers and audience alike with their St! and Pst; and consequently opinions were divided at the end of the piece.
Apart from that, it is true that the first performance was none of the best, owing to the difficulties of the composition.
But now, after several performances, one would be subscribing either to the cabal or to tastelessness if one were to maintain that Herr Mozart's music is anything but a masterpiece of art.
It contains so many beauties, and such a wealth of ideas, as can be drawn only from the source of innate genius.

The Hungarian poet, Ferenc Kazinczy, was present in one of the May performances and later recalled the impressions that Nancy Storace in the role of Susanna, as well as Mozart's score made on him.

Storace, the beautiful singer, enchanted eye, ear, and soul. – Mozart directed the orchestra, playing his fortepiano; the joy which this music causes is so far removed from all sensuality that one cannot speak of it. Where could words be found that are worthy to describe such joy? 

To this day, the role of Susanna is regarded as the consummate soprano role and some of the world's greatest sopranos have begun their careers singing it. It was the first role in opera history to be completely constructed around a singer's personality, thus forming a tribute to the original Susanna, Nancy Storace.

When one sees Susanna, one sees Nancy Storace herself, and in a very real sense, Nancy is resurrected each time the opera is performed.

On this, the 228th anniversary of the premiere of Le Nozze di Figaro, I hope that if you've never seen the opera that you will carve out some time to watch it. And if you have seen it ( and in my case performed in it as well as seen it more times than I can count), I hope that you will take the time to enjoy it once again, for every time it is seen its magic is only increased and Mozart and his beloved Susanna live again.


The 1994 Glyndebourne performance of Le Nozze di Figaro starring Alison Hagley as Susanna.

Nancy Storace Sings Handel's Messiah

In the spring of 1787, just after Nancy's arrival back in London from Vienna, she was engaged in a performance of the annual Handel Commemoration Festival at Westminster Abbey in which a large group of musicians gathered to sing the very popular oratorio, Messiah. She was to sing the popular soprano solo, I know that my Redeemer liveth. It was written by several of London's music critics, that in this particular setting, Nancy's voice was never more beautiful and that the acoustical conditions at Westminster provided a perfect atmosphere for her warm voice quality. One critic wrote, "She sung to best effect: in my opinion she rarely appeared to greater advantage, for in that space the harshness of her voice was lost, while its power and clearness filled the whole of it".

It was during a performance in another year at the Three Choirs Festival in Salisbury when a female Quaker heckler, who was disgruntled with the fact that a "sinful" theater actress was engaged to sing the sacred work, stood in the middle of Nancy's performance and shouted "O fie on thee! Shame! Shame! It is rank idolatry!" The woman was escorted out of the church and the performance continued.

Featured here is soprano, Lynne Dawson, singing I know that my redeemer liveth, from Messiah in a very similar setting as that in which Nancy Storace sang this same piece two-hundred years before.

So Faithful a Heart: Book III, A Prequel

When I finished the second book of the So Faithful a Heart series, I thought the story was finished, until someone came to me recently and asked when I was going to write the book about Nancy's childhood. The first book began in 1783, when Nancy was seventeen years old and getting ready to go to Vienna, where she had been hired as the prima buffa of Emperor Joseph II's new Italian Opera company. It wasn't long after I published it, that a friend came to me and asked if I was going to write a second book about the rest of Nancy's life. Out of that was born book II, When Love Won't Die, and I believed then, that it was truly finished.

Now I have been challenged to write a prequel, turning the two-book series into a trilogy. I've decided that it will begin in the summer of 1765, just before the Mozarts, who traveled to London in 1764 with young Wolfgang and his sister, Nannerl, leave to return to their home in Salzburg. Eight-year-old Wolfgang meets Stefano Storace who gives him lessons in the bass violin and is so impressed with the Mozart children that he decides that he will raise three-year-old Stephen and his then unborn child (Ann), in the same manner as Leopold Mozart raised his two "wonder children". The story will follow Nancy through her early years and her first Italian tour up until 1783, just before she leaves for Vienna, as well as following Mozart through his travels in Italy as an adolescent, his courtship and breakup with Aloysia Weber, and his courtship with Aloysia's younger sister, Constanze. All of this will serve as a lead-up to their meeting upon Nancy's arrival in the Austrian capital city and Mozart's desire to compose an opera for her that will make the Viennese stand up and take notice.


In this book I will introduce several new characters including, the young English musical prodigy, Thomas Linley, Stephen and Nancy Storace's Italian father, Stefano, Mozart's older sister, Nannerl, and their father, Leopold Mozart, as well as reintroduce the reader to Nancy's dear friend, Michael Kelly.

I'll keep you up with the developments! This may prove to be the most challenging and exciting book yet!

Women's History Month - Ann "Nancy" Storace: A Woman Who Made Theater History

Although opera and musical theater were very popular forms of entertainment in the 18th and early 19th centuries, the women who took up the profession of acting were considered little more than common prostitutes. Many, if not most of them were pretty girls who came from lower class poor families and saw a way to get out of poverty by acting on the stage. If they were lucky, they'd capture the attention of some nobleman and become his mistress and he, in turn, would make her a star. Few had any formal education, and most were illiterate. If they landed a wealthy, noble patron, they could be the beneficiary of learning to read, and sometimes they would be sent to "finishing school" where they'd receive lessons in singing and perhaps playing the fortepiano, and sometimes acting.

When Nancy Storace arrived from London in Naples, Italy in 1778 at the age of 13, she already had the benefit of a formal education with studies in several languages, including Latin, Italian, and French as well as extensive training in singing and a formal musical education that included theory and composition, playing the fortepiano, harpsichord, and guitar, as well as study of the popular operatic literature of the time. Her father, Stepfano, was a musician and the director of the theater orchestra at the Marylebone Pleasure Gardens in London. Nancy's mother's family had been the proprietors of the gardens for years and had established themselves as one of the wealthiest and most successful educated working class families in London. When Leopold Mozart brought his wife and two young children, Nannerl and Wolfgang to London in 1764, they met Stefano Storace, who gave young Wolfgang lessons on the bass violin and pointers on composing for theatrical orchestras. Stefano was impressed with the Mozart children and the manner in which they were educated and he was determined to raise his children in the same way. His son, Stephen, was only two years old at the time and Nancy arrived in October of 1765. Like the Mozart children, both Stephen and Nancy displayed prodigious musical abilities.

After a successful performance tour of Italy, Nancy landed a prestigious position as the prima buffa of the newly-formed Italian Opera Company which was housed in the Burgtheater of the court of Emperor Joseph II in Vienna, Austria. Nancy was the highest-paid performer in all of Europe at the age of 17, and was celebrated for her intelligent and informed acting as well as her musical skill and education, which was
virtually unheard of for a woman of the theater in her time. It was there that she captured the attention of Wolfgang Mozart who was interested in composing an Italian comic opera that would showcase the popular singer. It was in 1786 that Nancy premiered the role of Susanna in Mozart's comic opera "Le Nozze di Figaro" (The Marriage of Figaro). Susanna has since been regarded as the quintessential Mozart soprano role. It is no secret that Mozart admired her for her intelligence and her professionalism, and when she returned to London in early 1787, he wanted to go with her.

After her return to London, she starred on the stages of Drury Lane and Covent Garden in her brother's operas, which were all composed especially for her. Her professional stage career ended when she retired in 1803, having been regarded as the first truly professional stage actress who won her acclaim and recognition through her own merits, skill, and efforts. She died a wealthy woman at her country estate in Dulwich on August 24, 1817 and was regarded as one of London's most beloved and respected singers and stage actresses of all time.

© K. Lynette Erwin, 2014

Irish tenor, Michael Kelly: Mozart's original Don Basilio and Don Curzio

Looming large in the Mozart and Storace stories is the Irish tenor, Michael Kelly. Born December 25th, 1762, Kelly first met Stephen and Nancy Storace when he was 18 years old at the harbor in Liverno, Italy. Kelly recounted in his Remininscences that Nancy, upon seeing his long, flowing locks of blond hair, mistook him for a girl and shouted out loud, "Look at that girl dressed in boy's clothes!" In typical flamboyant Michael Kelly fashion, he turned to her with a flourish and replied, "You are mistaken, Miss, for I am a very proper he animal and quite at your service!" He stated that the incident embarked them upon a friendship that lasted their entire lives. It was actually Kelly who first called Ann Storace,"Nancy" and it became the name that history remembered her by. Kelly later traveled with his friend, Nancy Storace, to Vienna in January of 1783 where they had been hired as premiere singers in Emperor Joseph II's brand new Italian Opera Company. It was during their time in Vienna that they met and befriended Wolfgang Mozart and later starred in his comic opera, The Marriage of Figaro. In February of 1787, the Storaces and Kelly returned together to London, where they finished out the rest of their careers together in London's theaters and opera houses in Covent Garden and Drury Lane.

In Mozart legend, Kelly was known as the creator of the part of the "stuttering judge" in The Marriage of Figaro, named Don Curzio. Kelly recounted that he and Mozart actually had words over his giving the judge a stutter. Mozart objected, fearing that it took away from the music. However, Kelly won the argument because of the audience's favorable response to the hilarious effect, and so it stayed. Consequently, the part of Don Curzio has always been played with a stutter.

Kelly played a double role in Figaro. In addition to the stuttering Don Curzio, he also played the lecherous music instructor, Don Basilio. The following is a performance of Basilio's rarely performed Act IV aria, "In quegl'anni, in cui val poco".

© K. Lynette Erwin, 2014

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