Die lustigen Weiber von Windsor (The Merry Wives of Windsor), a comical-fantastical opera in three acts with dance.
Guglielmo Tell: Melodramma tragico in four acts
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.
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
Victorien Sardou (1831-1908) was a popular French dramatist during the later half of the 19th Century. He, along with Eugène Scribe, combined melodrama and realism to a produce a more serious form of drama that emphasized careful plot construction.
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.
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
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.
Aleksandr Sergeevich Pushkin (1799-1837) is generally considered Russia’s greatest poet. According to Andrew Kahn, his contemporaries held him “above all the master of the lyric poem, verse that is famous for its formal perfection and its reticent lyric persona, and infamous for its resistance to translation.” [Alexander Pushkin, The Queen of Spades and Other Stories, trans. Alan Myers, Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1997]
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.
Don Pasquale, Dramma buffo in three acts.
Music by Gaetano Donizetti. Libretto by Giovanni Ruffini and the composer after Angelo Anelli’s libretto for Stefano Pavesi’s Ser Marcantonio (1810), which was derived from Epicœne or The Silent Woman by Ben Jonson (1609).
First Performance: 3 January 1843 at Théâtre Italien, Paris.
Principal Characters:
| Don Pasquale, an elderly bachelor | Bass |
| Dr. Malatesta, his physician | Baritone |
| Ernesto, his nephew | Tenor |
| Norina (Sofronia), a youthful widow and Ernesto’s beloved | Soprano |
| A Notary, Malatesta’s cousin, Carlino | Bass |
Time and Place: Mid-19th Century Rome at Don Pasquale’s villa and adjacent garden.
Synopsis:
Act I
Don Pasquale is an elderly and rich landowner. His nephew, Ernesto, will be his heir, if he marries a woman chosen by Don Pasquale. But Ernesto loves Norina, a young, attractive and vivacious widow, who is anything but rich. Ernesto refuses to obey to his uncle, who decides to disinherit him and to find a wife for himself so that he may sire an heir. Doctor Malatesta, Don Pasquale's friend, devises a plan to help the two young people. He suggests to Don Pasquale his sister, Sofronia, as a wife, expounding upon her dowry. Don Pasquale is elated and immediately ejects Ernesto from his house. Meanwhile, Malatesta instructs Norina to impersonate Sofronia and to marry Don Pasquale in a mock wedding ceremony. She is then to turn into a virago, thereby reducing Don Pasquale to desperation.
Act II
Ernesto, unaware of the plan of Malatesta, is desperate. He resolves to leave for foreign parts. Malatesta and Norina (wearing a veil to disguise herself as Sofronia) arrive. Don Pasquale is immediately enamored, which only increases when she lifts the veil. They sign a marriage contract before Malatesta's cousin posing as a notary. The agreement gives her half of Don Pasquale's possessions. Ernesto arrives and is appalled; but, Malatesta draws him aside and explains things. Sofronia, until then timid and docile, changes her behavior. She becomes arrogant and temperamental; and, she orders extravagant expenditures that terrorize Don Pasquale.
Act III
Sofronia increases her tantrums. When she slaps Don Pasquale, he demands a divorce. She then connives to make him believe she has a lover. Exasperated, Don Pasquale asks Malatesta to help him. Malatesta puts his scheme to Ernesto, who is to pose as the lover of Sofronia. That evening in Don Pasquale's garden, Ernesto arrives and sings a serenade to Sofronia. They then both sing a love duet. Seeing this from a distance, Don Pasquale erupts. At the suggestion of Malatesta, he declares that Ernesto will marry Norina, who will thereupon become the mistress of the household. Don Pasquale is convinced by Malatesta that this will result in Sofronia leaving his household. At this point, the plot is revealed. Relieved that he is not married to the diabolical Sofronia, Don Pasquale forgives all and consents to the marriage of Ernesto and Norina.