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Tancredi
''Tancredi'' is a ''melodramma eroico'' ('' opera seria'' or heroic opera) in two acts by composer Gioachino Rossini and librettist Gaetano Rossi (who was also to write ''Semiramide'' ten years later), based on Voltaire's play ''Tancrède'' (1760). The opera made its first appearance at the Teatro La Fenice in Venice on 6 February 1813, and because ''Il signor Bruschino'' premiered in late January, the composer must have completed ''Tancredi'' in less than a month. The overture, borrowed from ''La pietra del paragone'', is a popular example of Rossini's characteristic style and is regularly performed in concert and recorded. Considered by Stendhal, Rossini's earliest biographer, to be "high amongst the composer's masterworks", and describing it as "a genuine thunderbolt out of a clear, blue sky for the Italian lyric theatre," his librettist Gaetano Rossi notes that, with it, "Rossini rose to glory".Rossi, in Osborne, Richard 2007, p. 199 Richard Osborne proclaims it to be "his f ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gioachino Rossini
Gioachino Antonio Rossini (29 February 1792 – 13 November 1868) was an Italian composer who gained fame for his 39 operas, although he also wrote many songs, some chamber music and piano pieces, and some sacred music. He set new standards for both comic and serious opera before retiring from large-scale composition while still in his thirties, at the height of his popularity. Born in Pesaro to parents who were both musicians (his father a trumpeter, his mother a singer), Rossini began to compose by the age of 12 and was educated at music school in Bologna. His first opera was performed in Venice in 1810 when he was 18 years old. In 1815 he was engaged to write operas and manage theatres in Naples. In the period 1810–1823 he wrote 34 operas for the Italian stage that were performed in Venice, Milan, Ferrara, Naples and elsewhere; this productivity necessitated an almost formulaic approach for some components (such as overtures) and a certain amount of self-borrowing. During ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Philip Gossett
Philip Gossett (September 27, 1941 – June 12, 2017) was an American musicologist and historian, and Robert W. Reneker Distinguished Service Professor of Music at the University of Chicago. His lifelong interest in 19th-century Italian opera began with listening to Metropolitan Opera broadcasts in his youth. ''Divas and Scholars: Performing Italian Opera'', a major work on the subject, won the Otto Kinkeldey Award of the American Musicological Society as best book on music of 2006. Philip Gossett's contributions to opera scholarship and how they can influence operatic performance may best be summed up by ''Newsdays comment that "some encomiasts claim that soprano Maria Callas did as much for Italian opera as Arturo Toscanini or Verdi. Musicologist Philip Gossett arguably has done as much for Italian opera as any of those geniuses." Career Gossett earned degrees from the Juilliard School, Amherst College, and Princeton University. He studied in Paris on a Fulbright Scholarship. At ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Semiramide
''Semiramide'' () is an opera in two acts by Gioachino Rossini. The libretto by Gaetano Rossi is based on Voltaire's tragedy ''Semiramis'', which in turn was based on the legend of Semiramis of Assyria. The opera was first performed at La Fenice in Venice on 3 February 1823. ''Semiramide'' was Rossini's final Italian opera and according to Richard Osborne, "could well be dubbed ''Tancredi Revisited''". As in ''Tancredi'', Rossi's libretto was based on a Voltaire tragedy. The music took the form of a return to vocal traditions of Rossini's youth, and was a melodrama in which he "recreated the baroque tradition of decorative singing with unparalleled skill". The ensemble-scenes (particularly the duos between Arsace and Semiramide) and choruses are of a high order, as is the orchestral writing, which makes full use of a large pit. After this splendid work, one of his finest in the genre, Rossini turned his back on Italy and moved to Paris. Apart from ''Il viaggio a Reims'', which i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Comédie-Italienne
Comédie-Italienne or Théâtre-Italien are French names which have been used to refer to Italian-language theatre and opera when performed in France. The earliest recorded visits by Italian players were commedia dell'arte companies employed by the French court under the Italian-born queens Catherine de Medici and Marie de Medici. These troupes also gave public performances in Paris at the theatre of the Hôtel de Bourgogne, probably the earliest public theatre to be built in France. The first official use of the name Comédie-Italienne was in 1680, when it was given to the commedia dell'arte troupe at the Hôtel de Bourgogne, to distinguish it from the French troupe, the Comédie-Française, which was founded that year, and just as the name Théâtre-Français was commonly applied to the latter, Théâtre-Italien was used for the Italians. Over time French phrases, songs, whole scenes, and eventually entire plays were incorporated into the Comédie-Italienne's performances. B ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Adelaide Malanotte
Adelaide Malanotte (1785 – 31 December 1832) was an Italian operatic contralto who performed in major opera houses in Italy from 1806–1821. She is best known for creating the title role in the world premiere of Gioachino Rossini's ''Tancredi'' in 1813. After her marriage, she performed under the name Adelaide Montresor. Her son, Giovanni Battista Montresor, had a career as a tenor and impresario in the United States. From 1812 until her death 20 years later she carried on an extra-marital affair with the poet Luigi Lechi. p. 151 Life and career Born in , Malanotte made her professional opera debut in her native city in 1806. In 1808 she was heard at the ...[...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gaetano Rossi
Gaetano Rossi (; 18 May 1774 – 25 January 1855) was an Italian opera librettist for several of the well-known ''bel canto''-era composers including Gioachino Rossini, Gaetano Donizetti, and Saverio Mercadante in Italy and Giacomo Meyerbeer in one of his early Italian successes. Other composers with whom he worked included Simon Mayr, a composer and Donizetti's teacher, as well as the prolific Giovanni Pacini. Biography Born in Verona, Rossi was writing religious verse by the time that he was 13 years old. He wrote libretti for about 60 years, beginning in 1797 with mostly farsas. Rossi wrote the texts for some significant operas by the well-known composers of the era. These included ''Tancredi'' and ''Semiramide'' for Rossini and '' Il crociato in Egitto'' for Meyerbeer, as well as later operas for Donizetti such as ''Maria Padilla'' (as co-author) and ''Linda di Chamounix''. In addition to his writing, he also worked for a time as the stage director for the Teatro Filarmonico ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tancrède (tragedy)
'' Tancrède '' is a tragedy in five acts by Voltaire that premiered on 3 September 1760. Action The character names Tancrède and Aménaïde are taken from Torquato Tasso's ''Jerusalem Delivered'', but the plot does not owe anything to this work. The action takes place in the year 1005 in Norman-ruled Syracuse at the time Sicily was throwing off the rule of the Saracens. Aménaïde, daughter of Argire, is betrothed to Orbassan. However she loves Tancrède, who has gone onto hiding after being placed under Imperial ban at the initiative of Orbassan. A letter from Aménaïde to Tancrède is intercepted and falsely said to be intended for the Saracen Solamir; she is then held prisoner until she can be tried. Tancrède, thinking he has been deceived by Aménaïde, seeks death in an attack on Solamir, whom he kills. As Tancrède too dies, Aménaïde declares her innocence and her love before escaping her father and dying of a broken heart next to Tancrède's body. Composition ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Voltaire
François-Marie Arouet (; 21 November 169430 May 1778) was a French Age of Enlightenment, Enlightenment writer, historian, and philosopher. Known by his ''Pen name, nom de plume'' M. de Voltaire (; also ; ), he was famous for his wit, and his criticism of Christianity—especially Criticism of the Catholic Church, of the Roman Catholic Church—and of slavery. Voltaire was an advocate of freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and separation of church and state. Voltaire was a versatile and prolific writer, producing works in almost every literary form, including stageplay, plays, poems, novels, essays, histories, and scientific Exposition (narrative), expositions. He wrote more than 20,000 letters and 2,000 books and pamphlets. Voltaire was one of the first authors to become renowned and commercially successful internationally. He was an outspoken advocate of civil liberties and was at constant risk from the strict censorship laws of the Catholic French monarchy. His polemics ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Teatro La Fenice
Teatro La Fenice (, "The Phoenix") is an opera house in Venice, Italy. It is one of "the most famous and renowned landmarks in the history of Italian theatre" and in the history of opera as a whole. Especially in the 19th century, La Fenice became the site of many famous operatic premieres at which the works of several of the four major bel canto era composers – Rossini, Bellini, Donizetti, Verdi – were performed. Its name reflects its role in permitting an opera company to "rise from the ashes" despite losing the use of three theatres to fire, the first in 1774 after the city's leading house was destroyed and rebuilt but not opened until 1792; the second fire came in 1836, but rebuilding was completed within a year. However, the third fire was the result of arson. It destroyed the house in 1996 leaving only the exterior walls, but it was rebuilt and re-opened in November 2004. In order to celebrate this event the tradition of the Venice New Year's Concert started. Histor ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fanny Corri-Paltoni
Fanny Corri-Paltoni (born Frances or Francesca Corri) (1801 – 13 July 1861) was a celebrated British operatic soprano active in Europe between 1818 and 1835. It was said that she possessed a voice of remarkable beauty and that she had a fine singing technique. She particularly excelled in the operas of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Gioachino Rossini. Biography Born Frances or Francesca Corri in Edinburgh, she was the daughter of Italian composer Natale Corri (1765–1822). Her uncle Domenico Corri (1746–1825) was an important singing master and composer in Edinburgh. Her cousin Sophia Dussek (''née'' Corri) was a famous soprano. Corri-Paltoni studied singing first with her father and then with Angelica Catalani and John Braham in London. She toured Continental Europe with Catalani in 1815–1816. She was committed to the King's Theatre in London between 1818–1820, making her professional opera debut at the theatre as the Countess in ''Le Nozze di Figaro'' on 17 January 1 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Her Majesty's Theatre
Her Majesty's Theatre is a West End theatre situated on Haymarket, London, Haymarket in the City of Westminster, London. The present building was designed by Charles J. Phipps and was constructed in 1897 for actor-manager Herbert Beerbohm Tree, who established the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art at the theatre. In the early decades of the 20th century, Tree produced spectacular productions of William Shakespeare, Shakespeare and other classical works, and the theatre hosted premieres by major playwrights such as George Bernard Shaw, J. M. Synge, Noël Coward and J. B. Priestley. Since the First World War, the wide stage has made the theatre suitable for large-scale musical productions, and the theatre has accordingly specialised in hosting musical theatre, musicals. The theatre has been home to record-setting musical theatre runs, notably the First World War sensation ''Chu Chin Chow''Larkin, Colin (ed). ''Guinness Who's Who of Stage Musicals'' (Guinness Publishing, 1994) and the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
University Of Chicago
The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, U of C, or UChi) is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois. Its main campus is located in Chicago's Hyde Park neighborhood. The University of Chicago is consistently ranked among the best universities in the world and it is among the most selective in the United States. The university is composed of an undergraduate college and five graduate research divisions, which contain all of the university's graduate programs and interdisciplinary committees. Chicago has eight professional schools: the Law School, the Booth School of Business, the Pritzker School of Medicine, the Crown Family School of Social Work, Policy, and Practice, the Harris School of Public Policy, the Divinity School, the Graham School of Continuing Liberal and Professional Studies, and the Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering. The university has additional campuses and centers in London, Paris, Beijing, Delhi, and Hong Kong, as well as in downtown ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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