ABSTRACT

Opera in Spain was nearly always received as a genre supported by the elite and promoted by foreigners, such that its status as an "appropriate" national genre has been a matter of continued controversy. Opera has always presented a problem for historians of Spanish music. Opera was an exceptional genre in the context of Spanish culture only because it involved a dramatic text wholly performed in song. Operas were indeed fitting musical companions to the many works of art that celebrated the same political events. Although opera was the genre chosen, Spanish elegance prevailed in the work of Calderon and his composer. Calderon's mythological court plays included operatic scenes with sung dialogue in which recitative was reserved for the elevated discourse or speech-song of the gods. The purpose of mythological stories, according to Calderon's contemporary Pérez de Moya, was to allow the poet to edify and instruct through "hidden morals" and "worthy doctrine" presented "with some resemblance to reality.".