The Classical Music Book

BAROQUE 1600 –1750 77

descriptions of “valor,” “torment,”

and Dido “languishing” in grief in

her recitative “Whence could so

much virtue spring.” Purcell also

intentionally creates dissonance

(disharmony between notes) in

the string parts during Dido’s

lament, to express the queen’s

extreme anguish in one of the

most moving musical statements of

grief ever composed. The last death

scene is remarkable, too, in an era

when operatic heroes or heroines

seldom perished. In Cavalli’s

Didone, Dido is saved from herself

and marries someone else.

A lasting legacy

Little is known about performances

of Dido and Aeneas in Purcell’s

lifetime. It was revived on the

London stage in 1700 and again in

1704, yet these productions seem

to have been the last until the

late 19th century. Increasingly

performed ever since, it is now

regularly presented by schools and

amateurs as well as in the world’s

great opera houses.

The accession of William III to

the throne in 1689 diminished

court patronage, although Purcell

wrote fine odes for William’s consort

Queen Mary until 1694. Theatre

work dominated Purcell’s last years.

Here the chief form was that of

dramatic or semi-opera. This very

English type of entertainment

comprised a play with interludes of

songs, dances, and choruses at the

ends of acts; these had little direct

connection to the play and were

performed by a separate company

of singers and dancers. The best

known examples are King Arthur

(1691), to a text by the poet John

Dryden, and The Fairy Queen

(1692), whose spoken text is an

adaptation by the actor-manager

Thomas Betterton of Shakespeare’s

A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

Purcell’s other works ranged

from church and chamber music

to songs and formal odes. His Dido

and Aeneas suggests, however,

that, but for his early death at the

age of 36, Purcell could have laid

the ground for an English operatic

tradition. That space would

eventually be filled by the German-

born George Frideric Handel, who

would compose his own operas in

London between 1711 and 1741. ■

The score of Dido and Aeneas uses

a simple bass line which may have

been provided by cello, bassoon, double

bass—or bass viol, as shown here by

Dutch artist Caspar Netscher (1639–84).

Compositional devices in 

Dido’s Lament

Music is yet but in its

nonage, a forward child,

which gives hope of what it

may be hereafter in England,

when the masters of it shall

find more encouragement.

Henry Purcell

A five-bar bass

repeated throughout

suggests inevitability.

Appoggiatura

(short “leaning” note)

suggests sobbing.

Falling phrases and

dissonance to

indicate anguish.

“Remember me” motif

lends a sense

of yearning.

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