Editing Opera in German (section)

===Hamburg 1678–1738===
Another important development was the founding of the [[Oper am Gänsemarkt|Theater am Gänsemarkt]] in [[Hamburg]] in 1678, aimed at the local middle classes who preferred opera in their own language. The new opera house opened with a performance of [[Johann Theile]]'s ''Der erschaffene, gefallene und aufgerichtete Mensch'', based on the story of [[Adam and Eve]]. The theatre, however, would come to be dominated by the works of [[Reinhard Keiser]], an enormously prolific composer who wrote over a hundred operas, sixty of them for Hamburg. Initially, the works performed in Hamburg had all been on religious themes in an attempt to ward off criticisms by [[Pietism|Pietist]] church authorities that the theatre was immoral, but Keiser and fellow composers such as [[Johann Mattheson]] broadened the range of subject matter to include the historical and the mythological. Keiser drew on foreign operatic traditions, for instance he included dances after the model of the French tradition of [[Jean-Baptiste Lully|Lully]]. The [[recitative]] in his operas was always in German so the audience could follow the plot, but from ''Claudius'' in 1703 he began to include arias in Italian which allowed for florid vocal display. The hallmark of the Hamburg style was its eclecticism. ''[[Orpheus (Telemann)|Orpheus]]'' (1726) by [[Georg Philipp Telemann|Telemann]]<ref>Another prolific composer, Telemann began to eclipse Keiser as the leading opera composer in Hamburg from 1717.</ref> contains arias in Italian setting texts taken from famous [[George Frideric Handel|Handel]] operas as well as choruses in French to words originally set by Lully. Hamburg opera might also include comic characters (Keiser's ''Der Carneval von Venedig'' of 1707 has them speaking in the local Lower Saxon dialect), marking a great contrast to the elevated new style of [[opera seria]] as defined by [[Metastasio]]. Yet the immediate future belonged to Italian opera. The most famous German-born opera composer of the era, Handel, wrote four operas for Hamburg at the beginning of his career but soon moved on to write opera seria in Italy and England.<ref>Only one of Handel's German-language operas, ''Almira'', survives in a reasonably intact state.</ref> In 1738, the Theater am Gänsemarkt went bankrupt and the fortunes of serious opera in German went into decline for the next few decades.<ref>On the Hamburg opera: {{harvnb|Parker|1994|pp=32, 77–79}}</ref>{{sfn|Grout|2003|loc=Section on Keiser, pp. 176ff}}{{sfn|Holden|1993|loc=Articles on Keiser, Mattheson and Telemann}}<ref>Booklet notes to the recording of Keiser's opera ''Croesus'' by René Jacobs.</ref>

Other early opera houses in Germany included the [[Oper am Brühl]] in [[Leipzig]] and the [[Opernhaus vorm Salztor]] in [[Naumburg (Saale)|Naumburg]] in 1701. Both played during the trade fairs in the towns, presenting both German and Italian opera, and a combination of both. While the house in Leipzig was financed by the town of Leipzig, the house in Naumburg was initiated and supported by the ruler, [[Moritz Wilhelm, Duke of Saxe-Zeitz]], but offered public performances.