Opera on the Move in the Nordic Countries during the Long 19th ...

52 Marianne Tråvén
most of them were actors who also taught declamation and acting skills.
Most were also products of the French acting tradition introduced by Monvel
(Luterkort 1998, pp. 15-30). Monvel had worked with and taught the
Desguillons (1792–1800), 4 Maria Kristina Franck (1819–1828) and Gustaf
Åbergsson (1828–1831). Both Lovisa Sofia Gråå (1804–1812) and Karolina
Bock (1831–1834, 1841–1856) were students of the Desguillons, and Nils
Vilhelm Almlöf (1834–1840) and Vilhelm Carl Arnold Svensson (1840–
1841) were students of Maria Kristina Franck. Although one should always
be careful in placing too much weight on such relationships, as aesthetics
change over time, it is clear in the contemporary critique that a certain acting
style associated with the French school was recognised as emanating
from the opera school (Luterkort 1998, pp. 23, 144).
The only directors who were trained primarily as singers were Almlöf,
who studied with the singing master Carl Magnus Craelius, and Carolina
Müller (1812–1815), who had studied with Giuseppe Sarti and Michelangelo
Potenza in Copenhagen. Her contract specified that she should teach
acting and rehearse roles with the students. Possibly she also assisted with
vocal tuition (Luterkort 1998, p. 21).
The singing masters
During the eighteenth century and the first decades of the nineteenth, a
system of employing two singing masters was used. 5 This stopped in the
1830s, possibly as a result of financial constraints. The first singing master
would teach the older students and help the singers at the opera, whereas
the second singing master would teach the younger students. In some periods
the choirmasters would also help with the younger students. Since
most of the students also sang in the choir, this was a logical division of
work, but it also created tension among the singing masters. Some of the
4 An annotation in a notebook kept by the poet Abraham Niclas Edelcrantz, known
as Clewberg, dated 4 September 1789, preserved in the Royal Library in Stockholm,
shows that Madame Marcadet probably taught acting in a class for the younger students
from 1790.
5 At first students were assigned to individual teachers under the supervision of the
academy. This was true of both actors and singers and well into the nineteenth century
the school did not divide the students at first, but they learned together, although they
were placed in different classes. The school of Vogler is called a national music school,
and unfortunately, we have no means of learning about its curriculum because there are
no known sources. In 1792, however, there is proof of a more organised school, but still
actors and singers studied together, and the singing masters educated both.