One of the earliest German kapellmeisters and opera composers was Johann Adolf Hasse, who was born in Dresden about 1700.  To show the foundation upon which Gluck built, we will look at opera as it existed in Hasse’s time.  In 1727 Hasse married at Venice, Faustina Bordoni, the foremost singer of the time.  He wrote over one hundred operas for her, and had a salary of thirty-six thousand marks, or nine thousand dollars, yearly.  Now these operas were very different from those we know.  The arias in them (and, of course, the whole opera was practically but a succession of arias) were only sketched in an extremely vague manner.  Much was left to the singer, and the accompaniment was sparsely indicated by figures written above a bass.  The recitative which separated one aria from another was improvised by the singer, and was accompanied on the harpsichord by the kapellmeister, who was naturally obliged to improvise his part on the spur of the moment, following the caprice of the singer.  There was no creating an atmosphere for a tragic or dramatic situation by means of the accompaniment; as soon as the situation arrived, an aria was sung explaining it.  Now, as the singer was given much latitude in regard to the melody, and absolute liberty in regard to the recitative, it is easy to see that, with the astounding technical perfection possessed by the singers of the time, this latitude would be used to astonish the hearers by wonderful vocal feats intermingled with more or less passionate declamation.

The composer was merely the excuse for the opera; but he needed to be a consummate musician to conduct and accompany this improvised music, of which his written score was but the nucleus.  The wretched acting of opera singers in general has been rather humourously traced back to this epoch.  Nowadays, in an opera, when, by way of example, a murder is to be committed, the orchestra paints the situation, and the act is accomplished without delay.  In those olden days a singer would have indignantly refused to submit to such a usurpation of his rights; he would have raised his dagger, and then, before striking, would have sung an aria in the regular three parts, after which he would have stabbed his man.  The necessity for doing something during this interim is said to be responsible for those idiotic gestures which used to be such a seemingly necessary part of the equipment of the opera singer.

In the ordinary opera of the time there was the custom of usually having about from twenty to thirty such arias (Hasse’s one hundred operas contain about three thousand arias).  Now these arias, although they were intended to paint a situation, rapidly became simply a means to display the singer’s skill.  The second part was a melody with plenty of vocal effects, and the third part a bravura piece, pure and simple.  So there only remained the recitative in which true dramatic art could find place.  As this, however, was invariably improvised by the singer, one can see that the composer of music had his cross as well as his brother the dramatist.  The music having no vital connection with the text, it is easy to see how one opera could be set to several texts or vice-versa, as was often done.