Cavalleria rusticana
Opera in 1 act
Libretto: Giovanni Targioni-Tozzetti and Guido Menasci [Based: adapted from a Sicilian short story written by Giovanni Verga]
First performance: May 17, 1890, Teatro Costanzi in Rome
Pagliacci
Opera in a prologue and 2 acts
Libretto: Ruggero Leoncavallo
First performance: May 21, 1892, Teatro Dal Verme in Milan
Recorded: December 2003, Teatro Comunale in Foggia
Cavalleria Rusticana
Santuzza - Madelyn Monti
Turiddu - Antonio de Palma
Alfio - Mauro Buda
Mamma Lucia - Ambra Vespasiani
Lola - Angela Bonfitto
Pagliacci
Canio - Giuseppe Giacomini
Nedda - Elisabetta Martorana
Tonio - Mauro Buda
Beppe - Silvano Paolillo
Silvio - Massimiliano Valeggi
For some time now the extraordinary success of Cavalleria Rusticana has found a satisfactory explanation: it is a revolutionary opera. Not even the author could immagine he was creating the opera which would surpercede romanticism and open the door to the verist period when he started to compose his Cavalleria for the Concorso Sonsogno. Mascagni was still thinking of romanticism which, for him, meant Guglielmo Ratcliff, the opera of his heart, the enduring passion of his whole life.
In 1888, however, the young Livornese composer had accepted the advice of Giacomo Puccini who directed him toward a dramatically more effective work as Mascagni revealed in a letter of March 7, 1889 to his friend Gianfranceschi: "Last year I went to Naples to meet Puccini who was giving Le Villi at the San Carlo. He said: and you, do you always have the idea of Ratcliff? Listen. This Guglielmo can never be a first work for you: first make yourself a name by sacrificing your ideals and afterwards you will be able to impose yourself (...) Thus the idea of attempting another work, bit by bit took root in me."...... |
[ NTSC ]