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Media related to Impresarios at Wikimedia Commons - Entrepreneur
An impresario (from Italian impresa, 'an enterprise or undertaking') [1] is a person who organizes and often finances concerts, plays, or operas, performing a role in stage arts that is similar to that of a film or television producer.
The term originated in the social and economic world of Italian opera, in which from the mid-18th century to the 1830s, the impresario was the key figure in the organization of a lyric season. [2] The owners of the theatre, usually amateurs from the nobility, charged the impresario with hiring a composer (until the 1850s operas were expected to be new) and the orchestra, singers, costumes and sets, all while assuming considerable financial risk. In 1786 Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart satirized the stress and emotional mayhem in a single-act farce Der Schauspieldirektor (The Impresario). Antonio Vivaldi was unusual in acting as both impresario and composer; in 1714 he managed seasons at Teatro San Angelo in Venice, where his opera Orlando finto pazzo was followed by numerous others.
Alessandro Lanari (1787–1852), who began as the owner of a shop that produced costumes, eliminated the middleman in a series of successful seasons he produced for the Teatro della Pergola in Florence. He presented the premieres of the first version of Giuseppe Verdi's Macbeth , two of Vincenzo Bellini's operas and five of Gaetano Donizetti's, including Lucia di Lammermoor . Domenico Barbaia (1778–1841) began as a café waiter and made a fortune at La Scala, in Milan, where he was also in charge of the gambling operation and introduced roulette.
Duchess Elisabeth Sophie of Mecklenburg [3] was a harpsichordist who also presided over seventeenth-century North German court music as an impresario.
The traditional term is still used in the entertainment industry to refer to a producer of concerts, tours and other events in music, opera, theatre, [4] and even rodeo. [5] Important modern impresarios in the traditional sense include Thomas Beecham, Rudolf Bing, Sergei Diaghilev, Richard D'Oyly Carte, Fortune Gallo, Sol Hurok, Sarah Caldwell, Andrew Lloyd Webber, Aaron Richmond, and jazz festival producer George Wein. Bill Graham, who produced music shows at The Fillmore Auditorium in San Francisco, was known as a rock music impresario.[ citation needed ]
The term is occasionally applied to others, such as independent art museum curators, [6] event planners, and conference organizers [7] who have a leading role in orchestrating events.
Jacques Cousteau said of himself that he was an impresario of scientists [8] as an explorer and filmmaker who worked with scientists in underwater exploration. Nicholas Wade described James Watson and E. O. Wilson in The New York Times as impresarios of Charles Darwin's works. [9]
Media related to Impresarios at Wikimedia Commons
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.
Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti 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 during the first half of the nineteenth century and a probable influence on other composers such as Giuseppe Verdi. Donizetti was born in Bergamo in Lombardy. At an early age he was taken up by Simon Mayr who enrolled him with a full scholarship in a school which he had set up. There he received detailed musical training. Mayr was instrumental in obtaining a place for Donizetti at the Bologna Academy, where, at the age of 19, he wrote his first one-act opera, the comedy Il Pigmalione, which may never have been performed during his lifetime.
La Scala is a historic opera house in Milan, Italy. The theatre was inaugurated on 3 August 1778 and was originally known as il Nuovo Regio Ducale Teatro alla Scala. The premiere performance was Antonio Salieri's Europa riconosciuta.
The Real Teatro di San Carlo, as originally named by the Bourbon monarchy but today known simply as the Teatro (di) San Carlo, is a historic opera house in Naples, Italy, connected to the Royal Palace and adjacent to the Piazza del Plebiscito. It is the oldest continuously active venue for opera in the world, having opened in 1737, decades before either Milan's La Scala or Venice's La Fenice.
Comic opera, sometimes known as light opera, is a sung dramatic work of a light or comic nature, usually with a happy ending and often including spoken dialogue.
Teatro Regio di Parma, originally constructed as the Nuovo Teatro Ducale, is an opera house and opera company in Parma, Italy.
Nabucco is an Italian-language opera in four acts composed in 1841 by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Temistocle Solera. The libretto is based on the biblical books of 2 Kings, Jeremiah, Lamentations, and Daniel, and on the 1836 play by Auguste Anicet-Bourgeois and Francis Cornu. However, Antonio Cortese's ballet adaptation of the play, given at La Scala in 1836, was a more important source for Solera than the play itself. Under its original name of Nabucodonosor, the opera was first performed at La Scala in Milan on 9 March 1842.
Clelia Maria Giuseppa (Giuseppina) Strepponi was a nineteenth-century Italian operatic soprano of great renown and the second wife of composer Giuseppe Verdi.
I masnadieri is an opera in four acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Andrea Maffei, based on the play Die Räuber by Friedrich von Schiller. As Verdi became more successful in Italy, he began to receive offers from other opera houses outside the country. The London impresario Benjamin Lumley had presented Ernani in 1845 and, as a result of its success, commissioned an opera from the composer which became I masnadieri. It was given its first performance at Her Majesty's Theatre on 22 July 1847 with Verdi conducting the first two performances.
Casa Ricordi is a publisher of primarily classical music and opera. Its classical repertoire represents one of the important sources in the world through its publishing of the work of the major 19th-century Italian composers such as Gioachino Rossini, Gaetano Donizetti, Vincenzo Bellini, Giuseppe Verdi, and, later in the century, Giacomo Puccini, composers with whom one or another of the Ricordi family came into close contact.
The Teatro dell'Opera di Roma is an opera house in Rome, Italy. Originally opened in November 1880 as the 2,212 seat Costanzi Theatre, it has undergone several changes of name as well modifications and improvements. The present house seats 1,560.
The Teatro Lirico Giuseppe Verdi is an opera house located in Trieste, Italy and named after the composer Giuseppe Verdi. Privately constructed, it was inaugurated as the Teatro Nuovo to replace the smaller 800-seat "Cesareo Regio Teatro di San Pietro" on 21 April 1801 with a performance of Johann Simon Mayr's Ginevra di Scozia. Initially, the Nuovo had 1,400 seats. In 1821, it became known as the Teatro Grande.
Radmila Bakočević, is a Serbian operatic soprano who had a major international opera career that began in 1955 and ended upon her retirement from the stage in 2004. During her career, she sang at most of the world's important opera houses, including performances throughout Europe, North and South America. She forged important long-term artistic partnerships with two opera houses during her career: the National Theatre in Belgrade and the Vienna State Opera.
Alessandro Polonini was an Italian bass-baritone. He created the roles of Benoît and Alcindoro in Puccini's opera La bohème, as well as Geronte de Ravoir in his Manon Lescaut. Polonini also created the role of the surgeon in Verdi's La forza del destino.
Antonio Selva was an Italian operatic bass who had an active international career from the 1840s through the 1870s. He was particularly associated with the works of Giuseppe Verdi.
Opera management is the management of the processes by which opera is delivered to audiences. It is carried out by an opera manager, also called a general manager, managing director, or intendant. A multifaceted task, it involves managing an opera company, primarily the singers and musicians who perform the operas, but in many cases also involves managing the opera house in which the company performs.
Risorgimento! is an opera in one act by Lorenzo Ferrero set to an Italian-language libretto by Dario Oliveri, based on a scenario by the composer. It was completed in 2010 and first performed at the Teatro Comunale Modena on 26 March 2011.
L'impresario delle Isole Canarie, also known as L'impresario delle Canarie or Dorina e Nibbio, is a satirical opera intermezzo libretto attributed to Metastasio, written in 1724 to be performed between the acts of Metastasio's opera seria Didone abbandonata. The first performance of the work was on February 1, 1724, in Naples, Italy, at Teatro San Bartolomeo. The first composer to set this libretto to music was Domenico Sarro, also known by the name Sarri, who also revised the work in 1730. The role of Dorina was first sung by the contralto Santa Marchesini, and Nibbio by the basso buffo singer Gioacchino Corrado. Later versions of this libretto appear with the titles L'impresario, L'impresario e la cantante and others.
Filippo Andrea Francesco Coletti was an Italian baritone associated with Giuseppe Verdi. Coletti created two Verdi roles: Gusmano in Alzira and Francesco in I masnadieri. Verdi revised the role of Germont in La traviata for Coletti, whose interpretation re-defined the role as it is known today. Coletti was, with Antonio Tamburini (1800–1876) and Giorgio Ronconi (1810–1890), one of the three leading baritones of 19th century Italy, an early model of a 'Verdi baritone'.
Mario Tiberini was an Italian tenor who sang leading roles in the opera houses of Europe and the Americas in a career spanning 25 years. Known for his advanced singing technique and dramatic ability, he sang the role of Alvaro in the premiere of the revised version of Verdi's La forza del destino and created several roles in operas by lesser-known composers, including the title role in Faccio's Amleto.
