In early 1782 Mozart left his position with the dictatorial Archbishop of Salzburg and moved to Vienna with high hopes of making a reputation as a freelance musician. One of his first public triumphs was the Singspiel (comic opera with spoken dialogue) The Abduction from the Seraglio.

Vienna was the perfect venue for the opera. On the eastern edge of Europe, the city had been the principal stronghold against the advances of the Ottoman Turks since the sixteenth century. (Recently, we have witnessed the tragic long-term fallout of Turkish expansionism in the ethnic conflicts in the former Yugoslavia.) In Mozart’s time, however, Europe was fascinated by the music of the Janissaries, the elite unit of the Ottoman military forces, often made up of troops who had been abducted as children from the Balkans. Their music, with its bass drums, cymbals and triangles with jangling rings attached, became all the fashion and led to the enlargement of the percussion section of European orchestras. Many composers in the eighteenth century incorporated their ideas of Janissary music into their composition, the most famous being Haydn’s Symphony No. 100, the “Military”, the final movement of Mozart’s Piano Sonata, K. 331 (the Rondo alla turca) and his Violin Concerto No. 5. Among other spinoffs from the European Orientalist fad are tulips, now associated exclusively with Holland.

Die Entführung aus dem Serail tells the story of a Spanish nobleman’s attempt to rescue his fiancée from Turkish captivity. The short overture alternates loud “Turkish” music with softer, more European music. A quiet middle section that includes the theme of the opening aria of the opera’s hero.