Guglielmo Tell: Melodramma tragico in four acts
Idomeneo, rè di Creta. Dramma per musica in tre atti (K. 366).
Music composed by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. Libretto by Giovanni Battista Varesco after Idomenée by Antoine Danchet.
Faust, Opéra en cinq actes
Music composed by Charles Gounod. Libretto by Jules Barbier and Michel Carré after Faust by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
La damnation de Faust, Légende dramatique en quatre parties
Music composed by Hector Berlioz. Libretto by Hector Berlioz, Almire Gandonanière and Gérard de Nerval after Faust by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Mefistofele, Opera in un prologo, quattro atti e un epilogo
Music and libretto by Arrigo Boito (1842-1918), based on Faust: Eine Tragödie by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
La Forza del Destino, a melodramma in quattro atti
Music composed by Giuseppe Verdi. Libretto by Francesco Maria Piave based on the drama Don Alvaro o La fuerza del sino by Angel Perez de Saavedra
Martha, an opera in four acts.
Music composed by Friedrich von Flotow. Libretto by Wilhelm Friedrich.
First performance: 25 November 1847 at Theater an der Wien, Vienna.
La serva padrona, intermezzo in two parts
Music composed by Giovanni Battista Pergolesi. Libretto by Gennar'antonio Frederico.
First performance: 28 August 1733, Teatro San Bartolomeo, Naples.
Fidelio, an opera in two acts
Here we offer three selections from Macbeth with Maria Callas performing the role of Lady Macbeth. These are from a live performance given on 7 December 1952 at La Scala. Victor de Sabata conducts the Orchestra del Teatro alla Scala, Milano.
VERDI: Macbeth, melodramma in quattro parti.
Music composed by Giuseppe Verdi. Libretto by Francesco Maria Piave, based on the play by William Shakespeare.
Music composed by Johann Strauss II.
Libretto by Richard Genée based on Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy/Karl Haffner.
First performance: 5 April 1874 at the Theater an der Wien, Vienna.
Die lustigen Weiber von Windsor (The Merry Wives of Windsor), a comical-fantastical opera in three acts with dance.
Fedora, a melodrama in three acts.
Umberto Giordano, composer. Arturo Colautti, librettist, based on the play with the same name by Victorien Sardou
First performance: 17 November 1898 at Teatro Lirico Internazionale, Milan
Tosca, a melodrama in three acts
Giacomo Puccini, composer. Libretto by Luigi Illica and Giuseppe Giacosa, based on the play La Tosca by Victorien Sardou.
First performance: 14 January 1900 at Teatro Costanzi, Rome
A few years ago, I had the rare experience of attending a performance of Tosca in a small farm community where opera was a fairly new commodity. After the second act ended, with Scarpia's corpse lying center stage, I happened to overhear a young, wide-eyed woman say to her companion, "I knew she was upset, but I didn't think she'd KILL him!"
Mozart and Salieri, an opera in one act consisting of two scenes.
Nicolai Rimsky-Korsakov (1844-1908), composer. Libretto derived from Alexander Puskhin's play of the same name.
First performance: 7 December 1898 in Moscow.
Eugene Onegin, lyrical scenes in three acts and seven tableaux.
Pyotr Il’yich Tchaikovsky, composer. Libretto by the composer, based on the verse novel by Aleksandr Sergeevich Pushkin.
First performance: 29 March 1879 at the Maliy Theatre, Moscow.
The Queen of Spades (Pique Dame), an opera in three acts.
Pyotr Il’yich Tchaikovsky, composer. Modest Tchaikovsky and composer, librettists.
First performance: 19 December 1890 at the Mariinsky Theatre, St. Petersburg.
Manon Lescaut, dramma lirico in quattro atti
Giacomo Puccini (1858-1924), composer. Luigi Illica and Domenico Oliva, librettists.
First performance: 1 February 1893 at Teatro Regio, Turin.
Boris Godunov, an opera in four acts with prologue
Modest Mussorgsky, composer. Libretto by the composer, based on Alexander Pushkin's drama Boris Godunov and Nikolai Karamazin's History of the Russian Empire
First performance: 8 February 1874 at the Mariinsky Theatre, St. Petersburg
Streaming Audio
Principal Characters
| Boris Godunov | Baritone |
| Fyodor, his son | Mezzo-soprano |
| Xenia, his daughter | Soprano |
| Xenia's nurse | Low mezzo-soprano |
| Prince Vasiliĭ Ivanovič Shuĭskiĭ | Tenor |
| Andreĭ Ščelkalov, council secretary | Baritone |
| Pimen, chronicler, anchorite | Bass |
| Pretender (False Dimitriĭ, Grigoriĭ) | Tenor |
| Marina Mnishek, daughter of the governor of Sandomir | Mezzo-soprano or dramatic soprano |
| Rangoni, conspiratorial Jesuit | Bass |
| Varlaam, itinerant monk | Bass |
| Misail, itinerant monk | Tenor |
| Hostess of the inn | Mezzo-soprano |
| Simpleton (Yurodivyĭ) | Tenor |
| Mikitič, police officer | Bass |
Time and Place
1598-1605, Russia and Poland
Summary
Boris Godunov, the regent of the young Tsar Fyodor, has arranged the assasination of the Tsar's half-brother and heir Dimitriĭ, in order to seize power. When the Tsar himself dies Boris pretends to decline the crown, but his agents incite the Muscovite crowd to acclaim him as the new Tsar. Though racked with guilt, Boris is crowned. In the monastery of Chudov an old monk Pimen is writing a chronicle of Russia. He tells his novice Grigoriĭ of the history surrounding Boris, and Grigoriĭ resolves to avenge the murdered Dimitriĭ. Leaving the monastery Grigoriĭ claims to be the dead Tsarevich and with two vagabond friars Varlaam and Misail escapes across the border into Lithuania. In his Kremlin rooms Boris learns of the pretender. His councillor Shuĭskiĭ aims to reassure him by recounting the murder of Dimitriĭ but this throws Boris into a state of hallucination.
In Poland, Grigoriĭ's lover Marina dreams of becoming tsarina and her Jesuit confessor Rangoni exhorts her to support the Catholic cause. Marina joins Grigoriĭ in a moonlit rendezvous and she drives him forward with his ambitions.
In the Kromy forest the people are in disordered revolt against Boris but rally behind Grigoriĭ's call to follow him to Moscow. A simpleton is left behind bewailing the fate of the Russian people. The boyars hold an emergency meeting in the council hall in Moscow and Shuĭskiĭ describes the Tsar's unstable mental state, confirmed when Boris enters. Pimen arrives to describe a miraculous cure performed at the tomb of Dimitriĭ, causing the Tsar to collapse. Boris bids farewell to his son, prays for Russia, and dies.
Schematic (Rimsky-Korsakov Edition, 1908)
| Prologue | |
| Scene 1. | At the Novodeviči Cloister |
| Chorus of Wandering Holy Beggars | |
| Scene 2. | Kremlin. Coronation |
| Act I | |
| Scene 1. | Monk's Cell. Night |
| Scene 2. | Inn near the Lithuanian Border |
| Hostess' Song | |
| Varlaam's Song | |
| Act II | |
| In Boris' Apartment | |
| Song about the Gnat | |
| Clapping Game | |
| Boris' Recitative and Aria | |
| Chiming Clock | |
| Act III | |
| Scene 1. | Marina's Boudoir. Chorus of Girls of Sandomir |
| Marina's Aria | |
| Scene 2. | Night, Garden, Fountain |
| Polonaise with Chorus | |
| Duet | |
| Act IV | |
| Scene 1. | Near Kromy |
| Scene 2. | Session of the Council of Boyars. Death of Boris |
| Pimen's Narrative |
Additional Resources