Guglielmo Ratcliff

Last updated

Guglielmo Ratcliff is a tragic opera in four acts by Pietro Mascagni to an Italian libretto by Andrea Maffei, translated from the German play Wilhelm Ratcliff (1822) by Heinrich Heine. Mascagni had substantially finished the composition of Ratcliff before the success of his first opera, Cavalleria rusticana .

Contents

After the composition and performance of further operas L'amico Fritz in 1891 and I Rantzau in 1893, Ratcliff eventually premiered on 16 February 1895 at the Teatro alla Scala in Milan and has been revived a number of times since, including a concert performance in 2003 at the Alice Tully Hall in New York and a staged performance at Wexford Festival Opera in 2015, conducted by Francesco Cilluffo. [1] [2]

Mascagni often wrote that Ratcliff was his best opera. However, it has not entered the standard operatic repertoire, in part because the title role is one of the most taxing tenor parts ever written. It is especially known for its act 3 Intermezzo , which features prominently in the Martin Scorsese film Raging Bull . [3] (Heine's play, which was never performed during his life, was also used as the basis for César Cui's 1869 opera of the same name and for Volkmar Andreae's 1914 opera Ratcliff. [4] )

Roles

Roles, voice types, premiere cast
Role Voice type Premiere cast, 16 February 1895 [5]
Conductor: Pietro Mascagni
Guglielmo Ratcliff tenor Giovanni Battista De Negri
Maria soprano Adelina Stehle
Count Douglas, betrothed to Maria baritone Giuseppe Pacini
Margherita, Maria's nurse mezzo-soprano Della Rogers [lower-alpha 1]
MacGregor, a Scottish lord, Maria's father bass Giuseppe De Grazia
Lesley, Ratcliff's friendtenorGaetano Matteo Mazzanti
Tom, an innkeeperbassGiovanni Scarneo
Willie, Tom's young son contralto Armida Parsi-Pettinella
Robin, a thiefbassRaffaele Terzi
Dick, a thieftenorAristide Masiero
Bell, a thiefbaritoneG. Calvi
John, a thiefbassGiuseppe Rosci
Taddie, a thieftenorGiovanni Francesco Fabbri
A servanttenorA. Degani
  1. ↑ Renata Vidal was originally scheduled to sing the role and sang it in subsequent performances in the opening run, but was indisposed on the opening night. See Venturi.

Synopsis

Place: The North of Scotland
Time: Early 19th century

Act 1

Count Douglas, Maria's betrothed, arrives at the Castle of Maria and her father MacGregor. He tells them how he was attacked by bandits near the castle but saved by an unknown knight. Maria faints, and then recovers. MacGregor tells Douglas about Gugliemo Ratcliff, whom Maria had rejected as a suitor. Ratcliff's revenge was to challenge her next two suitors to duels in which he killed them. Count Douglas then receives a message from Ratcliff delivered by his friend Lesley challenging him to a similar duel at Black Rock.

Act 2

In an inn frequented by thieves and swindlers, the innkeeper Tom, is holding his son, Willie on his knees. When he asks the child to recite the Pater Noster , he repeatedly stumbles on the line "And lead us not into temptation". Tom grows increasingly angry with the boy, tells him that he will end up like the clientele of the inn, and eventually sends him from the room. Ratcliff then tells Lesley how Maria's rejection of him led to his compulsion to kill any man who succeeded in winning her love. Ratcliff is disturbed by the appearance of strange figures who, unbeknownst to him, are the ghosts of Maria's dead suitors.

Act 3

Douglas arrives at Black Rock for his duel with Ratcliff. The two strange figures who have been following Ratcliff briefly appear and then disappear. When Ratcliff arrives, Douglas realises that he is the knight who had saved him from the bandits, and when he gets the better of Ratcliff in the duel refuses to kill him. Ratcliff is left lying on the ground where he is again visited by the ghostly figures.

Act 4

In her room, Maria is preparing for her wedding to Douglas. Her nurse, Margherita, tells Maria the story of her mother Elisa's death. Before she married MacGregor, Elisa had been in love with Edward, Guglielmo Ratcliff's father, but both married others. Edward and Elisa later realised their mistake and became lovers. When MacGregor found out, he murdered Edward, and Elisa died from grief. Gugliemo Ratcliff then bursts into Maria's room covered in blood from his unsuccessful duel with Douglas and begs Maria to run away with him. With her mother's story still on her mind and thinking that she might be making the same mistake, Maria at first feels pity for Guglielmo, but then asks him to leave. Her refusal drives Guglielmo mad. He kills both Maria and her father who rushes into the room after hearing her calls for help. Ratcliff then commits suicide. The opera ends with his dying words "O Maria, vengo a te! Son qui, soave Maria!" (Oh Maria, I'm coming to you. I'm here my sweet Maria!).

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pietro Mascagni</span> Italian composer

Pietro Mascagni was an Italian composer primarily known for his operas. His 1890 masterpiece Cavalleria rusticana caused one of the greatest sensations in opera history and single-handedly ushered in the Verismo movement in Italian dramatic music. While it was often held that Mascagni, like Ruggero Leoncavallo, was a "one-opera man" who could never repeat his first success, L'amico Fritz and Iris have remained in the repertoire in Europe since their premieres.

<i>Mignon</i> Opera by Ambroise Thomas

Mignon is an 1866 opéra comique in three acts by Ambroise Thomas. The original French libretto was by Jules Barbier and Michel Carré, based on Goethe's 1795-96 novel Wilhelm Meisters Lehrjahre. The Italian version was translated by Giuseppe Zaffira. The opera is mentioned in James Joyce's "The Dead" (Dubliners) and Willa Cather's The Professor's House. Thomas's goddaughter Mignon Nevada was named after the main character.

<i>Il re pastore</i> Opera by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Il re pastore is an opera, K. 208, written by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart to an Italian libretto by Metastasio, edited by Giambattista Varesco. It is an opera seria. The opera was first performed on 23 April 1775 in Salzburg in the Rittersaal of the Residenz-Theater in the palace of the Archbishop Count Hieronymus von Colloredo.

Iris is an opera in three acts by Pietro Mascagni to an original Italian libretto by Luigi Illica. It premiered on 22 November 1898 at the Teatro Costanzi in Rome. The story is set in Japan during legendary times.

<i>Nina</i> (opera)

Nina, o sia La pazza per amore is an opera, described in 1790 as a commedia in prosa ed in verso per musica, in two acts by Giovanni Paisiello to an Italian libretto by Giovanni Battista Lorenzi after Giuseppe Carpani's translation of Benoît-Joseph Marsollier's Nina, ou La folle par amour, set by Nicolas Dalayrac in 1786. The work is a sentimental comedy with set numbers, recitative and spoken dialog. It is set in Italy in the 18th century. Nina was first performed in a one-act version at the Teatro del Reale Sito di Belvedere in Caserta, San Leucio on 25 June 1789. The revised and familiar two-act work was presented at the Teatro dei Fiorentini in Naples in the autumn of 1790.

<i>William Ratcliff</i> (Cui) Opera by César Cui

William Ratcliff is an opera in three acts, composed by César Cui during 1861–1868; it was premiered on 14 February 1869 at the Mariinsky Theatre in Saint Petersburg under the conductorship of Eduard Nápravník. Although it was revived in Moscow in 1900 under Mikhail Ippolitov-Ivanov, it never became part of the standard operatic repertoire either in Russia or in the West. Nevertheless, this opera has considerable significance in the history of Russian art music, not only for the fact that it was the first opera by a member of The Five to reach the stage, but also for musical features that suggest experimentation and interrelationships among The Five.

<i>Maria Padilla</i> Opera by Gaetano Donizetti

Maria Padilla is a melodramma, or opera, in three acts by Gaetano Donizetti. Gaetano Rossi and the composer wrote the Italian libretto after François Ancelot's play. It premiered on 26 December 1841 at La Scala, Milan. The plot is loosely based on the historical figure María de Padilla, the mistress of Pedro the Cruel, King of Castile.

Silvano is a dramma marinaresco or opera in two acts by Pietro Mascagni from a libretto by Giovanni Targioni-Tozzetti, based on a novel by Alphonse Karr. It received its first performance on 25 March 1895 at La Scala, Milan. Although rarely performed today, the music is of some technical accomplishment, and when revived, Silvano has been favourably received. The barcarolle from Silvano features prominently in a montage during the Martin Scorsese film Raging Bull.

<i>Enrico di Borgogna</i> Opera by Gaetano Donizetti

Enrico di Borgogna is an opera eroica or "heroic" opera in two acts by Gaetano Donizetti. Bartolomeo Merelli, wrote the Italian libretto based on Der Graf von Burgund by August von Kotzebue.

<i>Chérubin</i> Opera by Jules Massenet

Chérubin is an opera in three acts by Jules Massenet to a French libretto by Francis de Croisset and Henri Cain after de Croisset's play of the same name. It was first performed at the Opéra de Monte-Carlo on 14 February 1905, with Mary Garden in the title role.

<i>La cambiale di matrimonio</i> Opera by Gioachino Rossini

La cambiale di matrimonio is a one-act operatic farsa comica by Gioachino Rossini to a libretto by Gaetano Rossi. The libretto was based on the play by Camillo Federici (1791) and a previous libretto by Giuseppe Checcherini for Carlo Coccia's 1807 opera, Il matrimonio per lettera di cambio. The opera debuted on 3 November 1810 at the Teatro San Moisè in Venice. It had a run of thirteen performances at Teatro San Moisè.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lina Bruna Rasa</span> Italian operatic soprano

Lina Bruna Rasa was an Italian operatic soprano. She was particularly noted for her performances in the verismo repertoire and was a favourite of Pietro Mascagni who considered her the ideal Santuzza. Bruna Rasa created the roles of Atte in Mascagni's Nerone, Cecilia Sagredo in Franco Vittadini's La Sagredo and Saint Clare in Licinio Refice's 1926 oratorio, Trittico Francescano. She also sang the role of Tsaritsa Militrisa in the Italian premiere of Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov's The Tale of Tsar Saltan.

<i>Cavalleria rusticana</i> Opera by Pietro Mascagni

Cavalleria rusticana is an opera in one act by Pietro Mascagni to an Italian libretto by Giovanni Targioni-Tozzetti and Guido Menasci, adapted from an 1880 short story of the same name and subsequent play by Giovanni Verga. Considered one of the classic verismo operas, it premiered on 17 May 1890 at the Teatro Costanzi in Rome. Since 1893, it has often been performed in a so-called Cav/Pag double-bill with Pagliacci by Ruggero Leoncavallo.

Pinotta is an idillio or opera in 2 acts by Pietro Mascagni from an Italian libretto by Giovanni Targioni-Tozzetti. The opera received its first performance on 23 March 1932 at the Teatro del Casinò in San Remo.

<i>Zanetto</i> Opera by Pietro Mascagni

Zanetto is an opera in one act by Pietro Mascagni to an Italian libretto by Giovanni Targioni-Tozzetti and Guido Menasci. It received its first performance on 2 March 1896 at the Liceo Musicale Rossini in Pesaro. Only 40 minutes long and with cast of two singers, Zanetto was originally described by its composer as a scena lirica rather than an opera. It is set in the countryside near Florence during the Renaissance and tells the story of an encounter between a beautiful courtesan, Silvia, and a young wandering minstrel, Zanetto. The libretto was adapted from an Italian translation by Emilio Praga of François Coppée's play Le passant in which the young Sarah Bernhardt had won fame in the en travesti role of Zanetto.

<i>Elisa e Claudio</i>

Elisa e Claudio, ossia L'amore protetto dall'amicizia is a two-act melodramma semiseria by the 19th Century Italian composer Saverio Mercadante from a libretto by Luigi Romanelli based on the play, Rosella by Filipo Casari. It received its premiere performance at La Scala in Milan on 30 October 1821.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Angiolina Ortolani-Tiberini</span> Italian opera singer

Angiolina Ortolani-Tiberini was an Italian soprano who sang many leading roles in European opera houses during a career spanning over twenty years. After their marriage in 1858, her career was closely entwined with that of her husband, the tenor Mario Tiberini, with the couple often appearing together on stage. Amongst the roles she created was Ofelia in Franco Faccio's Amleto.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Maria Carbone</span> Italian operatic soprano

Maria Carbone was an Italian operatic soprano. She created the lead female roles in two of Gian Francesco Malipiero's operas: the title role in Ecuba and Cleopatra in Antonio e Cleopatra.

<i>Regina Diaz</i>

Regina Diaz is an opera in two acts composed by Umberto Giordano to a libretto by Giovanni Targioni-Tozzetti and Guido Menasci. It premiered on 5 March 1894 at the Teatro Mercadante in Naples. The libretto is based on Lockroy's and Edmond Badon's Un duel sous le cardinal de Richelieu, which was also the source of Donizetti's 1843 opera Maria di Rohan, although the setting for Giordano's version was moved from 17th-century Paris to 18th-century Naples. The opera was a failure at its premiere and withdrawn after the second performance. Giordano's patron and publisher, Edoardo Sonzogno, blamed the failure on the poor libretto. Giordano blamed it on Sonzogno's interference in the production.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Concepció Bordalba</span>

Concepció Bordalba i Simón was a Catalan operatic soprano who performed under the name Concetta Bordalba outside her native Spain. She spent most of her career in Italy or with touring Italian opera companies and was particularly known for her performances as Elsa in Wagner's Lohengrin and Margherita in Boito's Mefistofele.

References

Notes

Sources

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.