(''Madmen by Design'') is a

farsa Farsa (Italian, literally: ''farce'', plural: ''farse'') is a genre of opera, associated with Venice in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. It is also sometimes called ''farsetta''. Farse were normally one-act operas, sometimes performed to ...

in one act by

Gaetano Donizetti Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti (29 November 1797 – 8 April 1848) was an Italian composer, best known for his almost 70 operas. Along with Gioachino Rossini and Vincenzo Bellini, he was a leading composer of the '' bel canto'' opera style dur ...

to a libretto by Domenico Gilardoni. The first performance took place at the

Teatro di San Carlo The Real Teatro di San Carlo ("Royal Theatre of Saint Charles"), as originally named by the Bourbon monarchy but today known simply as the Teatro (di) San Carlo, is an opera house in Naples, Italy, connected to the Royal Palace and adjacent t ...

on 6 February 1830 and was followed by its second presentation on 7 February at the

Teatro del Fondo The Teatro del Fondo is a theatre in Naples, now known as the Teatro Mercadante. It is located on Piazza del Municipio, Naples, Piazza del Municipio #1, with the front facing the west side of Castel Nuovo, Naples, Castel Nuovo and near the Molo (Doc ...

.Black 1982, pp. 24—25: Black deals specifically with the error and details performances at both houses in 1830 and 1831. At the 1830 performance in Naples, some great singers of the time such as Boccabadati and

Luigi Lablache Luigi Lablache (6 December 1794 – 23 January 1858) was an Italian opera singer of French and Irish ancestry. He was most noted for his comic performances, possessing a powerful and agile bass voice, a wide range, and adroit acting skills: Lepo ...

performed it in a charity event, but despite the exceptional cast, the audience was really very meager. The work, carried by two women surrounded by five heavy voices, was divided into seven numbers linked by dry ("secco") or accompanied recitatives. It revealed the purest farcical style of the composer, containing the characters and forms typical of that style. It was performed a few more times in Naples and Palermo up until 1845, and then forgotten until 1977.

Performance history

In 1977 a new revision, edited by Maestro Bruno Rigacci of Florence and using the original score which had been preserved at the Conservatorio S. Pietro a Majella in Naples, was presented as part of the

Opera Barga Festival The Opera Barga Festival is an annual opera festival held in July in the town of Barga, Italy, founded in 1967 by Peter Hunt and Gillian Armitage together with Peter Gellhorn as musical director and Lorenzo Malfatti, head of didactics. Its performa ...

. It was a resounding success with the public and the critics.

Roles

* Darlemont, directore of a mental hospital, uncle of Norina - bass * Norina, wife of Blinval -

soprano A soprano () is a type of classical female singing voice and has the highest vocal range of all voice types. The soprano's vocal range (using scientific pitch notation) is from approximately middle C (C4) = 261 Hz to "high A" (A5) = 880&n ...

* Blinval, colonel -

bass-baritone A bass-baritone is a high-lying bass or low-lying "classical" baritone voice type which shares certain qualities with the true baritone voice. The term arose in the late 19th century to describe the particular type of voice required to sing thr ...

* Cristina, a young girl, in love with Blinval -

mezzo-soprano A mezzo-soprano or mezzo (; ; meaning "half soprano") is a type of classical female singing voice whose vocal range lies between the soprano and the contralto voice types. The mezzo-soprano's vocal range usually extends from the A below middle C ...

* Venanzio, stingy old man, guardian of Cristina - bass * Eustachio, trumpeter of Blinval's regiment -

baritone A baritone is a type of classical male singing voice whose vocal range lies between the bass and the tenor voice-types. The term originates from the Greek (), meaning "heavy sounding". Composers typically write music for this voice in the r ...

* Frank, servant of Darlemont - bass-baritone

Synopsis

:Place: A hospital for the insane in Paris :Time: Early 19th Century The hospital's director, Darlemont, has a niece, Norina, married to Blinval, a colonel of dragoons. The remoteness of the man from his beloved wife due to military reasons and mutual jealousy are the causes of series of actions when the two meet again. Since the meeting takes place in the hospital which is managed by Norina's uncle, the two alternately pose themselves as crazy to find out the true feelings of each other, causing frantic carousel of deceptions and misunderstandings. Added to all this is a very babbler and an all-too-sincere servant, (Frank), a deserter trumpeter who pretends to be a doctor (Eustace), a beautiful young girl (Christina), former lover of the colonel, who tries to escape from her old guardian (Venanzio). He in turn tries to make her go mad so that he can take her dowry. These very well-matched ingredients result in a farce with all its rules. At the well-designed end, peace and moral obligation are restored.

Recordings

References

Notes Sources *Allitt, John Stewart (1991), ''Donizetti: in the light of Romanticism and the teaching of Johann Simon Mayr'', Shaftesbury: Element Books, Ltd (UK); Rockport, MA: Element, Inc.(USA) * Ashbrook, William (1982), ''Donizetti and His Operas'', Cambridge University Press. *Ashbrook, William (1998), "Donizetti, Gaetano" in

Stanley Sadie Stanley John Sadie (; 30 October 1930 – 21 March 2005) was an influential and prolific British musicologist, music critic, and editor. He was editor of the sixth edition of the '' Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians'' (1980), which was publ ...

(Ed.), ''

The New Grove Dictionary of Opera ''The New Grove Dictionary of Opera'' is an encyclopedia of opera, considered to be one of the best general reference sources on the subject. It is the largest work on opera in English, and in its printed form, amounts to 5,448 pages in four volu ...

'', Vol. One. London: Macmillan Publishers, Inc. *Ashbrook, William and Sarah Hibberd (2001), in Holden, Amanda (Ed.), ''The New Penguin Opera Guide'', New York: Penguin Putnam. . pp. 224 – 247. *Black, John (1982), ''Donizetti’s Operas in Naples, 1822—1848''. London: The Donizetti Society. *Loewenberg, Alfred (1970). ''Annals of Opera, 1597-1940'', 2nd edition. Rowman and Littlefield * Osborne, Charles, (1994), ''The Bel Canto Operas of Rossini, Donizetti, and Bellini'', Portland, Oregon: Amadeus Press. *

Sadie, Stanley Stanley John Sadie (; 30 October 1930 – 21 March 2005) was an influential and prolific British musicologist, music critic, and editor. He was editor of the sixth edition of the '' Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians'' (1980), which was publ ...

, (Ed.); John Tyrell (Exec. Ed.) (2004), ''

The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians ''The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians'' is an encyclopedic dictionary of music and musicians. Along with the German-language ''Die Musik in Geschichte und Gegenwart'', it is one of the largest reference works on the history and theo ...

''. 2nd edition. London: Macmillan. (hardcover). (eBook). * Weinstock, Herbert (1963), ''Donizetti and the World of Opera in Italy, Paris, and Vienna in the First Half of the Nineteenth Century'', New York: Pantheon Books.

External links

Donizetti Society (London) website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Pazzi per progetto, I 1830 operas Operas by Gaetano Donizetti One-act operas Operas set in Paris Operas