"While the Italians may take the greatest pains in the world with their symphonies and concertos, which are, to be sure, of very great beauty, a brisk French overture is doubtless to be preferred to them all. For, in addition to the composition of such a work with its suite à la Francoise, the interpretation which the Frenchmen give of such pieces is so admirable, so unified and so firm that nothing can be more perfect than this."

Steffani was born in Castelfranco in 1654 and spent his childhood years in Padua, where his family originally came from. In 1667 the Bavarian Elector Ferdinand Maria took note of the talented boy chorister and brought him to his court in Munich, Steffani's rapid career thus began in the German?speaking countries ?a career that led him to occupy the highest musical and political offices in three of the most important German courts: Munich (1667?1688), Hanover (1688?1703) and Düsseldorf (1703?1709). He was subsequently appointed Apostolic nuncio for large parts of northern Germany. The beginning of his career was marked by music. He took his first lessons in Padua before studying for three years in Munich with Johann Kaspar Kerll. In 1672 Steffani was sent to Ercole Bernabei in Rome and returned with him to Munich in 1674, where Bernabei was appointed Bavarian court music director. In 1678/79 Steffani undertook a lengthy study trip to Paris and Turin. He performed for Louis XIV in Paris and certainly became familiar with the operas and the orchestral performance style of Jean?Baptiste Lully. A catalog of his personal library shows that he had many books on music and theater in France, which confirms that he also learned about the French style through secondary sources. When Steffani learned that his career was at a standstill in Munich (he was not named court music director after Bemabei's death, as he had hoped for), he moved to the Guelph court in Hanover in 1688, where Prince Elector Ernst August had already reorganized his court orchestra in accordance with the French model. In addition to excellent winds, it also had a "tres bonne bande de violons", which was led by the Grenoble?born Jean?Baptiste Farinelli who, in spite of his Italian name, practiced the French style of orchestral direction. Not merely content with this, Ernst August hired some talented Italian singers in 1689 and completed that same year a new opera house able to seat 1300 people. The inaugural work, "Enrico Leone", was written by A. Steffani.

A short look at the tale surrounding the actual 12th?century Guelph Duke "Heinrich der Löwe" will serve to illustrate how the orchestral segments are integrated into the course of the opera. On his return from a pilgrimage of many years to the Holy Land, Heinrich's ship is caught in a storm and sinks. He is fished out of the water by a griffin that takes Heinrich to its nest as food for its young birds. Heinrich kills the brood and conquers the adult griffin as well when it attacks a lion that is about to eat the young birds. The lion decides to join Heinrich out of gratitude. In the meantime, Heinrich's wife Metilda, who has lost all hope that her husband will return to the court of Lüneburg, has agreed to marry Almaro, who has supported her in her disputes with Emperor Friedrich Barbarossa and with the rebellious town of Bardowick. Shortly before the wedding, Heinrich is carried by a cloud to his home in Kalkberg near Lüneburg, where he is attacked by a demon but defended by the lion. Heinrich makes himself known at court and reconciles with Almaro, who returns to his beloved Idalba. The two men than subjugate Bardowick, thus restoring the old order and allowing everyone to enjoy the triumph of love. The orchestra underscores not only the entrance scenes and the ballet inserts of the nymphs and sylvan gods, devils and furies, heroes and amazons, but it also accompanies the episodes in which the stage machinery more or less takes over the leading role through its special effects. The first action of this kind appears at the very beginning, when Heinrich's ship effectively breaks apart in the storm. More machines are used during Heinrich's flight into the griffin's nest and during his battle with the griffin at the end of the first act, as well as during his landing on the Kalkberg and the raging of the demon (which tosses the lion into the air). All of this is musically accompanied by the orchestra. The wind machines and thunder sheets additionally used in this recording are to be understood as acoustical standings for a stage machinery that was much more elaborate in reality. Steffani had a brilliant idea for the overture, landing a dramaturgical coup where the audience traditionally expects only an instrumental performance before the closed curtain: already during the repetition of the fugato, we begin to hear the singing of the desperate sailors caught in the storm Whether this chorus is to be seen as a part of the overture, or the overture at this point to be viewed as part of the action, is all a matter of perspective. It is not surprising that the Amsterdam printer did not include this chorus in the context of the purely orchestral suites, what is surprising, however, is that the successful opera was played in other theaters without the opening chorus.

In "Amor vien dal destino ", Steffani, who was now in the service of Prince Elector Johann Wilhelm of the Palatinate in Düsseldorf, wrote another ouverture with chorus. The topic this time was two factions of Olympian gods arguing over the fate of Aeneas. Interestingly, this piece also had a "nautical" theme.

"Niobe" is Steffani's last Munich opera. It revolves around Niobe, the self?assured Queen of Thebes, Amphion's wife, who has insulted Latona, the mother of Apollo and Diana, and must pay for this with the death of her children. The splendid overture to this blood?curdling story shows that Steffani had already acquired expertise in the style of French orchestral music at the Bavarian court. As in his choral overtures, he was also able to anticipate the action ora the stage by interweaving trumpet fanfares into the music.

The opera "I trionfi del fato", the source for the second suite ora this recording, describes episodes from Virgil's epic concerning Aeneas' voyage to Italy. Among them is Aeneas' romance with Dido in Cathage, his visit to the underworld ("Les ombres") and, after several battles in Italy, his marriage to Lavinia, the daughter of King Latinus. As in "Henrico Leone", the orchestral pieces were drawn here too chiefly from the entrante scenes and ballet inserts. In ali of his instrumental pieces, Steffani emerges as a musician who had a peerless command of the compositional means of his time. He speaks ara elegant melodic idiom, captures the characteristically springing and virtually physical nature of French dance rhythms, and betrays a finely tuned sensibility for sonorities in the disposition of the additional ensemble sections (chorus, trumpets). Perhaps the outstanding quality of these orchestral pieces in the French style will incite the listener to discover their respective Italian?language operas.

Dr. Thomas Drescher
Translation: Roger Clément