Book contents
- The Cambridge Companion to The Magic Flute
- Cambridge Companions to Music
- The Cambridge Companion to The Magic Flute
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Musical Examples
- Contributors
- Acknowledgments
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- Part I Conception and Context
- Part II Music, Text, and Action
- 5 Music as Stagecraft
- 6 Enduring Portraits: The Arias
- 7 “All Together, Now”? Ensembles and Choruses in The Magic Flute
- 8 Musical Topics, Quotations, and References
- 9 Instrumentation, Magical and Mundane
- 10 The Dialogue as Indispensable
- 11 Music, Drama, and Spectacle in the Finales
- Part III Approaches and Perspectives
- Part IV Reception, Interpretation, and Influence
- Further Reading
- Index
8 - Musical Topics, Quotations, and References
from Part II - Music, Text, and Action
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 24 November 2023
- The Cambridge Companion to The Magic Flute
- Cambridge Companions to Music
- The Cambridge Companion to The Magic Flute
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Musical Examples
- Contributors
- Acknowledgments
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- Part I Conception and Context
- Part II Music, Text, and Action
- 5 Music as Stagecraft
- 6 Enduring Portraits: The Arias
- 7 “All Together, Now”? Ensembles and Choruses in The Magic Flute
- 8 Musical Topics, Quotations, and References
- 9 Instrumentation, Magical and Mundane
- 10 The Dialogue as Indispensable
- 11 Music, Drama, and Spectacle in the Finales
- Part III Approaches and Perspectives
- Part IV Reception, Interpretation, and Influence
- Further Reading
- Index
Summary
The Magic Flute stands out for its eclectic blend of musical styles. While only one scene – the duet of the Armored Men in Act 2 – includes a confirmed musical quotation, some scholars have posited that the opera contains a multitude of musical borrowings and allusions. Flute’s referential character owes much to Mozart’s ingenious use of musical topics. However, allusions to specific works have also been proposed throughout the opera’s history. In 1950, A. Hyatt King assembled an inventory of Flute’s “sources and affinities,” suggesting many plausible but largely unsubstantiated melodic precedents in works by Mozart and others. Scholars have particularly disagreed about the “source” from which Mozart allegedly derived Papageno’s aria “Ein Mädchen oder Weibchen.” As in the case of the duet of the Armored Men (which quotes a Lutheran chorale), the desire to link Mozart and J. S. Bach has led to divergent claims about the melody’s provenance.
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- The Cambridge Companion to The Magic Flute , pp. 132 - 147Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2023