This celebrated hymn was written about the close of the Thirteenth Century, and is probably the work of one Jacobus de Benedictis, a Franciscan monk. It gets its title from the opening words, " Stabat mater dolorosa " (" The mourning mother was standing "), and describes the lamentations of the Virgin Mary as she stood beside the cross upon which her son was crucified. In the Roman Catholic service this hymn of the Virgin Mary at the crucifixion is sung after the Epistle on the Feasts of the Seven Dolors of the Blessed Virgin, on the Friday before Good Friday, and on the third Sunday in September.
This well known hymn has been set to music by many renowned composers, chief among whom may be mentioned Palestrina, Pergolesi, Haydn, Steffani, the Bohemian musician Dvorák, and Rossini. Pergolesi's, which is written for two voices with a musical accompaniment, is the most celebrated for church service, but of all distinguished musical settings of the " Stabat Mater," none is more famous than that of Gioacchino Rossini, a work well calculated to win a world always childishly grateful for pure ear-delighting melody, and preferably melody from which the sensuous is not absent. In this case the solemnity of the subject which is not promiseful of brilliance and voluptuousness gives the result something the aspect of forbidden fruit, which is proverbially pleasant.
Rossini's " Stabat Mater " has a romantic history. In 1829 at the age of thirty-seven, this most picturesque figure in the gay and glittering history of Italian opera, suddenly, and without apparent reason, severed his connection with the stage, and this connection he made no effort to resume in the many remaining years of a long life. These years were almost without musical activity save for the composition of the " Stabat Mater," and an almost equally celebrated " Messe Solennelle." The former was written in 1832. In that year Rossini, who was traveling in Spain, was prevailed upon by Señor Aguado, a prominent Spanish banker, whose friendship he made there, to write a " Stabat Mater " for the Abbé Varela (Don Francisco Fernandez Varela). Rossini consented to write the work and to dedicate it to the Abbé, but with the understanding that it was not to be made public. Two months later it was begun at Rossini's home in Bologna; but when part of the numbers were done, the composer became seriously indisposed and asked his friend Tadolini, vocal conductor of the Théâtre Italien of Paris, to finish it. Before Tadolini had quite done this, however, Rossini recovered and finished it himself. The " Stabat Mater was sent to Spain, the composer receiving in recompense a snuff-box valued at five thousand francs; and the matter seems for the time to have been forgotten even by Rossini. Nine years afterward the Abbé Varela died and Rossini was soon after startled by the announcement for publication of a " Stabat Mater " by himself, and investigation brought to light the fact that the Abbé's heirs had sold the work for two thousand francs. Rossini at once entered suit for the copyright, declaring that they had sold property he had merely dedicated to the Abbé Varela and of which he had reserved the right to publish when he saw fit. The circumstance disturbed him a good deal, for four of the numbers were not his own, and he knew that the very simple proportions to which he had purposely reduced the orchestra would scarcely satisfy the public, of whose opinion he was not careless. With characteristic facetiousness he reinforced the protest of his lawsuit by
private declarations that he would pursue to death any publisher who persisted in this knavery.
The matter caused a great sensation in Paris, for the fame of " Guillaume Tell," at first received so coldly, had been steadily growing, and Rossini by no means was for-gotten in his retirement. During the legal proceedings a copy of the work was procured, and the six Rossinian numbers were given Oct. 3, 1841, at the salon of Mr. Henri Herz, before a small company of distinguished artists and leading representatives of the press. M. Th. Labarre presided at the piano, the chorus was directed by M. Panseron and M. Girard, and the soloists were Mme. Viardot-Garcia, Mme. Labarre, M. Alexis Dupont and M. Géraldy. Everybody was delighted, and as the brothers Escudier put it in their biography; " The next day all Paris knew Rossini had composed a new masterpiece." These brothers graphically describe the suspense and breathless curiosity of the town over the fact that there existed a religious composition by the author of " Guillaume Tell," which but fifty persons at most had heard.
At last Rossini won his action, replaced the four pieces of Tadolini by four of his own, strengthened the orchestral parts, and sold the rights of performance for a prescribed time to the Escudiers for eight thousand francs, they in turn selling it to the Théâtre Italien for twenty thousand francs. Our biographers relate in somewhat aggrieved fashion that even now the "Stabat Mater" was not destined for a career of unadulterated peace and prosperity, the combat being transferred to the arena of the critics, some, " a weak minority, pretending that it was not religious music." " Oh these sanctimonious ones ! exclaim the brothers in disgust, " Give them, these stubborn Puritans, their plain-song with serpent accompaniment ! "
But the battle is still waged about Rossini's Stabat Mater," although the " weak minority " of doubters has been swelled to a mighty host who, while they frankly acknowledge their enjoyment of the music as music, question its appropriateness to the text and are fearful that its gayness, its brilliant loveliness and sensuousness is the reverse of reverent and religious, which is doubtless what Edwards refers to as " the gloomy, church-warden point of view." There have always been many eager to defend the " Stabat Mater." Conspicuous among them is the poet Heine, who appeared in the Allgemeine Zeitung in 1842 in a long and impassioned article from which the following is an extract : "As among the painters, so among the musicians, there is an entirely false idea as to the proper manner of treating religious subjects. Painters think that in truly Christian subjects, the figures must be represented with cramped, narrow contours, and in forms as bleached and colorless as possible. . . . The true character of Christian art does not reside in thinness and paleness of the body, but is a certain effervescence of the Soul, which neither the musician nor the painter can appropriate to himself either by baptism or by study; and in this respect I find the Stabat' of Rossini more truly Christian in character than is the ` Paulus' of Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy, an oratorio which the adversaries of Rossini point to as a model of the Christian style."
Perhaps after all it is a good deal to ask of this incomparable master of opera buffa that he should be doleful or even serious. He certainly did not lose his individuality in his " Stabat Mater," which the world in general still delights in hearing as much as it did in the Mid-nineteenth Century.
Nearly every number of this most operatic " Stabat Mater " is generally familiar. The work opens with an orchestral prelude of brilliant character, to which succeeds the fine opening chorus, " Stabat Mater Dolorosa." Among the most terrestrial of the numbers is the next, the famous tenor aria, " Cujus Animam," whose value from the viewpoint of the professional singer has made it familiar as a concert piece.
Upon this ensues the lovely, but much embellished soprano duet, " Quis est homo," closing in frankly theatrical fashion with a cadenza. This number was sung by Patti and Alboni at Rossini's funeral at the Church of the Trinity, Paris, Nov. 21, 1868. Far more congruous is the bass aria, " Pro peccatis," in which Rossini seems to find for a moment the religious spirit.
Following these are a fine unaccompanied chorus and recitative, " Eia Mater fons amoris;" the beautiful quartet, " Sancta Mater ; " and the soprano cavatina, " Fac ut Portem." The climax is reached in the splendid " Inflammatus," a soprano obbligato with choral accompaniment. A brilliant vocal part designed for a marvelous voice, a rich and changing choral background, together with a charming orchestral accompaniment combine in gloriously beautiful effect, but an effect which by no means reflects the spirit of the words. These enchanting strains give place to one of the most meritorious of the numbers, the unaccompanied quartet, " Quando Corpus Morietur." An elaborate fugued "Amen " concludes this celebrated work.
Its first public performance in the new form was given at the Salle Ventadour Jan. 7, 1842, the chief singers being Grisi, Albertazzi, Mario and Tamburini. " Toute Paris " was in transports of enthusiasm. The name of Rossini was shouted in the applause, and a demand was made for the repetition of three pieces, the " Pro peccatis," the unaccompanied quartet, and the " Inflammatus." It was heard many times thereafter in that season.
