Mozart, Overture to Abduction from the Seraglio

One day during my graduate studies, the orchestra conductor, Dr. George Lawner, handed me the task of creating a two-piano arrangement of this overture. He was directing a scaled down version of the opera Abduction from the Seraglio (without the orchestra). That project etched this work in my memory. It was not difficult to transfer the notes to a piano arrangement, but capturing the energy and style is another matter.

That style is known as Turkish music, a favorite genre of mine. Not music actually from Turkey, but rather the Viennese variety. To the Viennese, Turkish culture epitomized the exotic, and late 18th-century composers in particular enjoyed incorporating this style: Haydn’s “Military” Symphony, Mozart’s Rondo alla Turca, and Beethoven’s The Ruins of Athens are good examples. The style was adapted from the sound of Turkish Janizary bands. A true Janizary band would typically feature the Turkish Crescent or Jingling Johnny (discussed in a previous post), but cymbals, drums, and triangles could provide the same effect. Other stylistic features include the prominent use of piccolo and terraced dynamics (sudden shifts between loud and soft passages rather than gradual transitions).

Written in 1782, the opera Abduction from the Seraglio (Die Entführung aus dem Serail) is a Singspiel, like The Magic Flute, meaning it contains spoken dialogue as opposed to recitatives. The hero Belmonte goes in search of his financée who is being held by the Pasha in his seraglio (harem). Eastern and exotic music thus depict the setting of the plot.