Overture from Opera "The Impresario"

The overture to the one-act zingspiel The Impresario (K. 486) was first performed on February 7^th, 1786 in the conservatory of the Schönbrunn Palace in Vienna. The work was commissioned by Emperor Joseph II, who decided to organise an entertainment in honour of the Governor-General of the Netherlands, Albert von Sachsen-Teschen, and his wife, Archduchess Christina. To make the entertainment even more spicy, he arranged a competition between the two opera schools which have existed back then in Vienna, the German and the Italian. Accordingly assigned to two rival composers: Mozart and Salieri. Antonio Salieri created the comic opera First the Music, Then the Speech, Amadeus - The Impresario ("a comedy with music consisting of an overture, two arias, a terzet and a vaudeville"). The Italian won (also a prize of 100 ducats), Mozart got 50. He worked on the libretto with the actor Johann Gottlieb Stefani (who also wrote the poetic text of his opera Abduction from the Seraglio). The music and the cheerful spoken dialogues reveal the intrigues and mores of the opera world: the impresario Frank is recruiting a troupe for Salzburg. To attract an audience he needs the best singers and character actors. The banker Eiler is willing to sponsor him, but only if he takes his wife into the troupe. The main rivals in the casting are the singers Madame Hertz (the surname translated from German means "heart") and Mademoiselle Zilberklang (respectively "silver sound"). Their fussy squabble for supremacy escalates into a tercet. The impresario, unable to endure the battle of the prima donnas any longer, calls for a truce in the name of art. Mozart built a fine musical comedy, and the parody overture is the key to this story.