Johann Adolf Hasse

This composer is bathed in almost total obscurity these days -and yet merits over 8 full pages of entry in The New Groves! That implies his significance to music history is considerably greater than his popularity with the music-listening public. “Adolph” is given as a bracketed alternative spelling for his middle name, but “Adolf” is clearly the more authoritative version: his portrait, shown at the left, makes it clear he was known to contemporaries as “Adolfo”, in the Italiante fashion.

He was born near Hamburg around March 1699 (we know his baptism date, but not his actual birth date). He was to die in Venice in December 1783, making him well advanced in years -but also making him someone who lived through Lully, Rameau, Bach, Handel, Haydn and Mozart. For several decades from the 1730s he was the most admired writer of opera seria in Italy and Germany: his finest were written between the late 1730s and early 1760s. His style was distinctly neo-classical.

Once Gluck's revolution in opera's dramaturgical practices was underway, Hasse's popularity sank without trace and none of his operas remained in the repertoire until some late 20th Century revivals somewhat salvaged his reputation. As the New Groves puts it, “few composers have been as famous as Hasse and yet as quickly forgotten”. His sacred works continued to be performed in Dresden (where he had worked for several protacted periods throughout his life), however.

Summing him up, The New Groves states: “The German-born Hasse's central place in Italian mainstream music represents one of the most intriguing chapters in 18th-Century musical history, the more so since he was the favourite composer of Metastasio, the leading Italian librettist of the period. Hasse's operas were very often performed in Naples; and his almost complete control of opera in Dresden also recommended him to all the other operatic capitals. When in the 1760s he became an important influence at the Vienna court, the excellence of his achievements seemed to find its ultimate recognition. It is no surprise that his music served several generations of singers as a touchstone for their abilities: his arias were thought perfect vehicles for vocal display.

---