Between Opera and Oratorio. The Pasticcio Oratorios in Prague and Brno ca 1720–1760

The phenomenon of the pasticcio oratorio was quite widespread in the Czech Lands around the middle of the eighteenth century. The first evidence of this practice was a Latin oratorio based on opera arias by George Frideric Handel (Prague 1725). In Brno, the capital of Moravia, the performances of oratorios were supported by Bishop Wolfgang Hannibal Schrattenbach, who was also an important patron of Italian opera. Therefore, opera arias were frequently interpolated into the Italian oratorios produced in his palace every week during Lent. Some works from the 1730s were even created as pasticcios composed of contrafacted opera arias. The only surviving score, La vittima d’amore by Joseph Umstatt (Brno 1741) with music by Caldara, Hasse, Leo, Feo, Porta and Pescetti, shows the process of creating this type of oratorio in detail. The reprise of this work by the Crusaders in Prague on Good Friday 1744 and its favourable reception stimulated the considerable development of this practice in the mentioned church. Between 1749 and 1758, at least six pasticcio oratorios were performed here. The music was selected not only from the works of popular composers of the time (Hasse, Jomelli, Graun), but also from the compositions of the older generation (Fux, Lotti, Conti, Porpora). Based on an analysis of librettos and music sources, the paper shows some examples of this phenomenon, crossing the boundaries between the opera and the oratorio in both directions.