Johann Adolf Hasse (1699-1783); DEU

Johann Adolf Hasse (1699–1783) was born near Hamburg and became one of the most celebrated opera composers of the eighteenth century. Initially trained as a singer, he traveled to Italy in the 1720s and studied in Naples, where his career as an opera composer rapidly developed. His marriage to the renowned soprano Faustina Bordoni formed one of the century’s most prominent musical partnerships. Hasse spent many years in the service of the Saxon court at Dresden while maintaining an international career that took him repeatedly to Italy, Vienna, and other European centers. His operas were performed by the leading singers of the age and admired by figures including Mozart.

Hasse was a supreme representative of Italian opera seria, prized for elegant melody, graceful vocal writing, and a sensitive accommodation of music to the virtuosity and expressive gifts of individual singers. He set numerous librettos by Pietro Metastasio, including Artaserse, Cleofide, and Didone abbandonata, and also wrote sacred music, cantatas, and instrumental works. Although changing operatic tastes caused his reputation to decline sharply after his death, his music exemplifies the refined international style that dominated European court opera in the decades before Gluck’s reforms.

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Read biography at allmusic.com.