In the booklet for this CD, Sir Peter Jonas – Director of the Bayerische
Staatsoper and inspirational headmaster of the Baroque era at the Münchner
Nationaltheater: “In this unique CD, Axel Wolf records opera arias from Johann
Adolf Hasse who, following the rediscovery of Handel, Monteverdi and Cavalli,
is finally receiving the recognition he deserves.”
Hasse, born in Bergedorf near Hamburg, was employed at the court of the
Electoral Saxonian in Dresden for over thirty years following engagements in
Braunschweig and Naples. A manuscript from an unknown hand dated to that
era transposed the arias of Hasse’s operas, which were popular at the time, for
the lute. Thereby the arranger kept with the fashion of the time by arranging the
piece for chamber music and private performances. Axel Wolf is a regular guest
at the Bayerische Staatsoper and performs as a soloist in concert as well as with
ensembles such as the Musica Fiata (Cologne), the Freiburger Barockorchester,
the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment and the Gabrieli Consort & Players
London.
Sir Peter Jonas on this CD
During the past 25 years, not only has baroque
music become “in”, it moves, provokes
and excites increasing numbers of listeners.
Everyone who has experienced the Bavarian
State Opera’s highly praised baroque productions
in the 1990s and the first years of the

new millennium could see how the orchestra’s
continuo group and members of the Bavarian
State Opera Orchestra have developed a new
and unmistakable Munich baroque style.
This baroque renaissance in Munich is
especially noteworthy because so many individual
instrumentalists have remained true to
this path – and one of the most prominent is
lutenist Axel Wolf.
On this unique CD, he has recorded opera
arias by Johann Adolph Hasse, a baroque
composer who – after the rediscovery in Germany
of Handel, Monteverdi and Cavalli – is
now receiving the admiration he is due. These
lute arrangements of opera arias, sinfonias
and sonatas are no fly-by-night caprice or
misleading metamorphosis of baroque music
in our time – done simply to make it more easily
accessible. Such arrangements were not
only performed by professionals during their
period of origin, but also by amateurs, at home
in their elegant living rooms, even as “musique
de table”. Apart from musical enjoyment, this
recording also thus gives us insights in the domestic
musical arts of the 18th century.
Axel Wolf presents this music with taste,
charm and the same virtuosity and professionalism
that we participants in the Munich
baroque scene have experienced from him
during the last fifteen years.
Sir Peter Jonas was general manager
of the Bavarian State Opera
from 1993 until the end
of the 2005/06 season
Johann Adolph Hasse (1699–1783)
“Opera for lute”
Johann Adolph Hasse, born in Bergedorf
near Hamburg, began his career as a singer.
He went first to Hamburg and subsequently
to the court at Braunschweig. His first known
composition, Antioco, a dramma per musica,
was performed there in 1721. Soon afterwards,
however, he left for Italy, where his series of
triumphs would make him the most famous
opera composer of the age. His first stop was
Naples, where he converted to Catholicism
and became a student of Alessandro Scarlatti.
At the 1725 performance of his serenata Marc’
Antonio e Cleopatra at the country home of a
royal Neapolitan councilor, star singers Vittoria
Tesi and the castrato Farinelli were cast
in the title roles. In the end, Hasse advanced
to become Farinelli’s favorite composer. During
the course of his career, the castrato was
repeatedly celebrated for his performances
of arias from Hasse’s opera Artaserse, which
first premiered in Venice in 1730. These were
even said to have had therapeutic success:
Farinelli sang arias from Artaserse every night
for Spanish King Philipp V to ward off the
melancholy, performances which apparently
worked from time to time. Now employed
at the court of Naples, Hasse married
the already heavily pregnant mezzo-soprano
Faustina Bordoni in 1730 in Venice. He also
reneged on a contract planned for the same
year to begin as Dresden’s court kapellmeister
– presumably at his wife’s request. But in
July 1731, both went to Dresden for a guest
appearance lasting several months, whose
brilliant climax was the premiere of Hasse’s
opera Cleofide with Faustina in the title role.
This triumph probably contributed to the fact
that after the death of Augustus II the Strong
in 1733, Hasse did obtain the position in Dresden
under Augustus’s son Friedrich August II.
Hasse’s contract was exceptionally attractive
and gave him a great deal of freedom; his requirement
to remain on location was limited
and allowed him to take lengthy trips. Of the
30 years this position lasted, Hasse spent only
approximately 17 of them in Dresden.
As an opera composer, Hasse fulfilled an
important function within the royal household,
for in a baroque court, music – and opera
above all – served to represent power. It illuminated
the court’s brilliance far afield and
– according to absolutistic thinking – reflected
the significance of the ruler.
The important position that Hasse and his
wife held at the Dresden court is shown by the
fact that they were godparents to over 30 children
during their stay, including a son of Silvius
Leopold Weiss. In doing this, the Hasses
not only fulfilled a social convention – also illustrated
by the circumstance that they served
as godparents for a foundling discovered by
Faustina, which was baptized significantly under
the name Philipp Maria Stradello.
After the death of Friedrich August II in
1763, Hasse was let go by the new prince
elector due to austerity measures the devastating
results of the Seven Years’ War had
necessitated for Saxony. He was afterwards
employed primarily by the emperor’s court
in Vienna. As of 1773, the Hasses spent their
last years in Venice. Johann Adolph Hasse
outlived his wife by almost two years and died
on October 16, 1783 in the lagoon city. That
Hasse’s time – as well as that of the opera
seria – was over, is illustrated by the fact that
composer Otto Carl Erdmann von Kospoth,
who had been living in Venice since the end
of July 1783, didn’t hear about Hasse’s death
until two days afterwards, and had never even
visited Hasse while he was in Venice.
The arias and sinfonia performed on this
recording come from a manuscript preserved
in the city of Leipzig’s music library (catalog
number: Ms. III.11.46a) entitled Opern Arien
auf die Laute versezet. Ao. 1755. di R, although
no satisfactory identification of the person behind
the “R” has yet been accomplished.
All works from this manuscript are taken
from Hasse operas performed between 1747
and 1755 at the Dresden court. It is quite possible
that the arranger heard these performances
because the manuscript includes the
names of the singers of the respective arias.
A first version of the opera Leucippo, with its
wonderful aria “Pupille Care” was performed
on October 7, 1747, the birthday of the prince
elector, in Huburtusburg palace; a second version
was performed during the 1751 carnival
season. A further opera, Ciro riconosciuto,
was likewise performed in carnival 1751 barely
two weeks later.
Solimano impressed Dresden audiences
during carnival 1753 not only with its Oriental
theme, but also with the premiere’s enormous
splendor, which included circa 600 supernumeraries
as well as elephants, camels and
horses. For the prince elector’s birthday that
year, the opera L’eroe cinese was performed,
followed by Artemisia during carnival 1754.
The arias “Vi fida lo sposo”, “Gia del mio zelo
antico” and “Quanto mai felice” come from
Hasse’s second setting of Ezio, which premiered
on January 20, 1755 in Dresden, also
with an incredibly opulent production that
used over 400 supernumeraries and nearly 120
live animals.
The Suonata III in F Major is found in another
manuscript in the Leipzig library (catalog
number: Ms. III.11.46b), likewise from the
hand of the copyist of the aria manuscript. It
contains arrangements of harpsichord sonatas
by Hasse and is entitled IV Suonate di
Hasse accom[m]odate per il Liuto fatte per
La Real Delfina die Francia. Quite possibly,
the “Suonate” – as the dedication suggests –
were written in connection with a trip to Paris
taken by the Hasses in summer 1750, following
an invitation by Maria Josepha, a daughter of
the Saxon prince elector who was married to
the French crown prince.
The works in both Leipzig manuscripts
place high technical demands on the
performer, greatly exceeding the abilities of any amateur
lutenist. Low bass strings must constantly
be plucked as well as 16th-note figures in this
range – and even rapid parallel octaves in the
lowest strings of the lute are required, as can
be heard in the third movement of the Suonate
in F Major.
Lute arrangements of this type were not unusual
for this time. We assume that in addition
to the Leipzig settings, further arias were arranged
for lute, particularly arias from Hasse
operas, most of which are lost today. These
were certainly created to preserve the “hits”
from spectacular musical events – which
Hasse’s operas always were – as well as
relive them through one’s own performance.
Today, in an age of nearly unlimited electronic
reproduction of music, this phenomenon is
still apparent.
Frank Legl
Translation: Elizabeth Gahbler