| Page Views: 189 Last Visit to Aachen: April, 2009 | Singing in the reign . . . by Nemorino - last update: May 20, 2009 |
. . . of Lucio Silla, not Charlemagne | Three Countries Corner, near Aachen |
Aachen is a border city just six kilometers away from the Three Countries' Corner, which is a place up in the woods where the borders of Germany, the Netherlands and Belgium all come together.
As in most border towns, the people tend to be monolingual and not very interested in the languages and cultures of their neighbors just up the road. (It would be great if somebody from Aachen could write me a comment contradicting this statement, in case it's not true.) |
| Aachen Cathedral, where Charlemagne was buried |
But Aachen wasn't always as peripheral as it is today. A mere twelve centuries ago Aachen was the center of a mighty empire during the reign of Charles the Great (742-814), better known as Charlemagne.
While I don't know much about Charlemagne or his empire, I am quite familiar with the opera Fierrabras, by Franz Schubert (1797-1828), which features Charlemagne as one of the main characters. This is an opera which is very seldom performed -- up to now there have been only four productions of it altogether, two of which I have seen. I have described one of these on my Zürich intro page. |
The opera I saw on my recent visit to Aachen was not about Charlemagne but about a very different ruler, a dictator named Lucius Cornelius Sulla who reigned in Rome around 82 or 81 BC. In the opera he goes by his Italian name of Lucio Silla.
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791) was only sixteen when he composed Lucio Silla in 1772, but it was already his eighth opera. This was the third of three operas that he composed in Milan, Italy, for the “Regio Ducal Teatro”, which was Milan's opera house at the time. Like the other two it was a huge success, as I have described in a tip called Mozart in Milan.
The Aachen production was the second staging of Lucio Silla that I have seen so far. We had a beautiful production of it in Frankfurt am Main from 1993 to 1995, and I was also quite satisfied with the Aachen production, which was part of a series of four Mozart operas all involving rulers who at first seem to be vicious tyrants but turn out to be lenient and kind-hearted in the end. This was a common ending for opera plots in the 17th and 18th centuries, since the local rulers were often the ones who paid for the operas -- but today it's very hard for the stage director to make the ruler's sudden change of heart appear plausible on stage! |
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Nemorino's Aachen Travel Tips
 Comments for Nemorino about Aachen | | | | |
Redang Wed Oct 21, 2009 16:12 UTC
Look fordward to visiiting thst city! | garridogal Sat Sep 12, 2009 00:02 UTC
I only spent one afternoon and night in Aachen but was very impressed at how pretty it is. I'd love to return some day and really get to know it! | JLBG Fri Jun 5, 2009 05:53 UTC
It is amazing how what was once the center of the Western world has shifted on border(s) that are now almost in the center again! Great that there were so many cyclists at Three Countries Corner! | Bwana_Brown Thu Jun 4, 2009 04:17 UTC
Very interesting tips on Charlemagne and the music scene in interesting little Aachen! The surrounding countryside looks like a nice place to enjoy an invigorating bicycle ride. Well done, Don. |
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