| Arianna | |
|---|---|
| Opera by Alexander Goehr | |
 The composer in 2007 | |
| Librettist | Ottavio Rinuccini |
| Language | Italian |
| Based on | Libretto for L'Arianna |
| Premiere | |
Arianna is an opera in eight scenes by the British composer Alexander Goehr, premiered at the Royal Opera House, London, in 1995. It is set to the libretto (in Italian), by Ottavio Rinuccini, used by Claudio Monteverdi in his 1608 opera, L'Arianna . The opera is Goehr's op. 58.
Although Rinuccini's libretto survives, the greater part of Monteverdi's music for the opera, originally performed in Mantua in 1608, has been lost. All that remains is Arianna's lament , a solo aria which Monteverdi published separately in 1623. Goehr sets most (but not all) of the original libretto, (which is based on the classical story of Ariadne and Theseus from Ovid's Heroides ), preserving the lament but interspersing it with choral episodes. The orchestration is contemporary, including contrabassoon, saxophone, Akai sampler and electric guitar, as is the harmonic language. [1]
| Role | Voice type | Premiere cast 15 September 1995 (Conductor: Ivor Bolton) (Director: Francesca Zambello) [2] |
|---|---|---|
| Arianna | mezzo-soprano | Susan Graham |
| Amore | soprano | Anna Maria Panzarella |
| Venere/Dorilla | contralto | Sheila Nadler |
| Teseo | tenor | J. Patrick Raftery |
| Bacco | countertenor | Axel Köhler |
| Giove | bass | Gidon Saks |
| Consigliero | baritone | David Wilson-Johnson |
| Soldato Primo/Pescatore | tenor | Timothy Robinson |
| Soldato Secondo/Pescatore | tenor | Christopher Ventris |
The composer wrote in the programme notes of the premiere 'It was surely an act of faith - if not of folly - for me to choose Rinuccini's old Arianna libretto, when I could barely make out the meaning of the words. Yet I knew it was right for me[...]'. [2] Critics tended to agree more with the first part of this statement. The review in the Musical Times for example commented '[the] setting imitates Monteverdi, but feels unnatural. [...] The opera reached its nadir in Goehr's setting of the great surviving fragment itself [..] the harmonic implications of Goehr's bass-line distortions destroyed the dramatic build-up' [3] Meanwhile, Opera News called it a "waste of mezzo Susan Graham's talent in the title role" and "perfunctory." [4]
A recording of the opera, with Ruby Philogene in the title role, was issued in 1998. [5]
Claudio Giovanni Antonio Monteverdi was an Italian composer, choirmaster and string player. A composer of both secular and sacred music, and a pioneer in the development of opera, he is considered a crucial transitional figure between the Renaissance and Baroque periods of music history.
Stuart Oliver Knussen was a British composer and conductor.
L'Orfeo, sometimes called La favola d'Orfeo, is a late Renaissance/early Baroque favola in musica, or opera, by Claudio Monteverdi, with a libretto by Alessandro Striggio. It is based on the Greek legend of Orpheus, and tells the story of his descent to Hades and his fruitless attempt to bring his dead bride Eurydice back to the living world. It was written in 1607 for a court performance during the annual Carnival at Mantua. While Jacopo Peri's Dafne is generally recognised as the first work in the opera genre, and the earliest surviving opera is Peri's Euridice, L'Orfeo is the earliest that is still regularly performed.
Peter Alexander Goehr is an English composer and academic.
Dafne is the earliest known work that, by modern standards, could be considered an opera. The libretto by Ottavio Rinuccini survives complete; the mostly lost music was completed by Jacopo Peri, but at least two of the six surviving fragments are by Jacopo Corsi. Dafne was first performed during Carnival of 1598 at the Palazzo Corsi.
Marco da Gagliano was an Italian composer of the early Baroque era. He was important in the early history of opera and the development of the solo and concerted madrigal.
Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patria is an opera consisting of a prologue and five acts, set by Claudio Monteverdi to a libretto by Giacomo Badoaro. The opera was first performed at the Teatro Santi Giovanni e Paolo in Venice during the 1639–1640 carnival season. The story, taken from the second half of Homer's Odyssey, tells how constancy and virtue are ultimately rewarded, treachery and deception overcome. After his long journey home from the Trojan Wars Ulisse, king of Ithaca, finally returns to his kingdom where he finds that a trio of villainous suitors are importuning his faithful queen, Penelope. With the assistance of the gods, his son Telemaco and a staunch friend Eumete, Ulisse vanquishes the suitors and recovers his kingdom.
L'incoronazione di Poppea is an Italian opera by Claudio Monteverdi. It was Monteverdi's last opera, with a libretto by Giovanni Francesco Busenello, and was first performed at the Teatro Santi Giovanni e Paolo in Venice during the 1643 carnival season. One of the first operas to use historical events and people, it describes how Poppaea, mistress of the Roman emperor Nero, is able to achieve her ambition and be crowned empress. The opera was revived in Naples in 1651, but was then neglected until the rediscovery of the score in 1888, after which it became the subject of scholarly attention in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Since the 1960s, the opera has been performed and recorded many times.
The Tempest is an opera by English composer Thomas Adès with a libretto in English by Meredith Oakes based on the play The Tempest by William Shakespeare.
L'Arianna is the lost second opera by Italian composer Claudio Monteverdi. One of the earliest operas in general, it was composed in 1607–1608 and first performed on 28 May 1608, as part of the musical festivities for a royal wedding at the court of Duke Vincenzo Gonzaga in Mantua. All the music is lost apart from the extended recitative known as "Lamento d'Arianna". The libretto, which survives complete, was written in eight scenes by Ottavio Rinuccini, who used Ovid's Heroides and other classical sources to relate the story of Ariadne's abandonment by Theseus on the island of Naxos and her subsequent elevation as bride to the god Bacchus.
Ariane is a one-act opera by Bohuslav Martinů to a French libretto by the composer drawn from the second, third and fourth acts of the 1943 play Le Voyage de Thésée by Georges Neveux, who had supplied the text to the composer's earlier opera Julietta.
La Dafne (Daphne) is an early Italian opera, written in 1608 by the Italian composer Marco da Gagliano from a libretto by Ottavio Rinuccini. It is described as a favola in musica composed in one act and a prologue. The opera is based on the myth of Daphne and Apollo as related by Ovid in the first book of the Metamorphoses. An earlier version of the libretto had been set to music in 1597–98 by Jacopo Peri, whose Dafne is generally considered to be the first opera.
Il ballo delle ingrate is a semi-dramatic ballet by the Italian composer Claudio Monteverdi set to a libretto by Ottavio Rinuccini. It was first performed in Mantua on Wednesday, 4 June 1608 as part of the wedding celebrations for Francesco Gonzaga and Margaret of Savoy. Both Vincenzo and Francesco Gonzaga took part in the dancing. Monteverdi also composed the opera L'Arianna and the music for the prologue to Guarini's play L'idropica for the occasion.
Geoffrey Alvarez is a British/Nicaraguan composer and conductor. He chairs the annual international composition competition run by the Alvarez Chamber Orchestra. He is also a writer on music and inventor of Gravesian Analysis.
Salvatore Di Vittorio is an Italian composer and conductor. He is music director and Conductor of the Chamber Orchestra of New York. He has been recognized by Luigi Verdi as a "lyrical musical spirit, respectful of the ancient Italian tradition… an emerging leading interpreter of the music of Ottorino Respighi".
Axel Köhler is a German countertenor and opera director. In 1994, he won the Handel Prize. Since 2009, he has been Artistic Director of the Halle Opera House.
The Italian composer Claudio Monteverdi (1567–1643), in addition to a large output of church music and madrigals, wrote prolifically for the stage. His theatrical works were written between 1604 and 1643 and included operas, of which three—L'Orfeo (1607), Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patria (1640) and L'incoronazione di Poppea (1643)—have survived with their music and librettos intact. In the case of the other seven operas, the music has disappeared almost entirely, although some of the librettos exist. The loss of these works, written during a critical period of early opera history, has been much regretted by commentators and musicologists.
This discography is a partial list of recordings of "Lamento d'Arianna", the only surviving fragment of music from the lost opera L'Arianna (1608) by Claudio Monteverdi (1567–1643). The lament was saved from oblivion by the composer's decision to publish it independently from the opera; in 1614 as a five-voice madrigal, and in 1623 as an accompanied solo. The madrigal version was included in Monteverdi's Sixth Book of Madrigals. It appears in recordings of that collection, and in other madrigal selections.
Virginia Ramponi-Andreini, also known by her stage name "La Florinda" was a celebrated Italian actress and singer. She was known for her performances in commedia dell'arte plays, many of them written for her by her husband Giambattista Andreini, and for having created the title role in Claudio Monteverdi's lost opera L'Arianna. She was born in Northern Italy in either Milan or Genoa. The exact date and place of her death are unknown.