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.
Giuseppe Gazzaniga was a member of the Neapolitan school of opera composers. He composed fifty-one operas and is considered to be one of the last Italian opera buffa composers.
L'Olimpiade is an opera libretto in three acts by Metastasio originally written for an operatic setting by Antonio Caldara of 1733. Metastasio’s plot vaguely draws upon the narrative of "The Trial of the Suitors" provided from Book 6 of The Histories of Herodotus, which had previously been the base for Apostolo Zeno's libretto Gli inganni felici (1695). The story, set in Ancient Greece at the time of the Olympic Games, is about amorous rivalry and characters' taking places to gain the loved one. The story ends with the announcement of two marriages.
Pasquale Anfossi was an Italian opera composer. Born in Taggia, Liguria, he studied with Niccolò Piccinni and Antonio Sacchini, and worked mainly in London, Venice and Rome.
Antonio Maria Gasparo Gioacchino Sacchini was an Italian composer, best known for his operas.
Joachim Albertini or Gioacchino Albertini was an Italian-born composer, who spent most of his life in Poland. His opera Don Juan albo Ukarany libertyn was performed in the 1780s with both Italian and Polish libretti.
Giuseppe Farinelli was an Italian composer active at the end of the 18th century and the beginning of the 19th century who excelled in writing opera buffas. Considered the successor and most successful imitator of Domenico Cimarosa, the greatest of his roughly 60 operas include I riti d'Efeso, La contadina bizzarra and Ginevra degli Almieri. More than 2/3 of his operas were produced between 1800-1810 at the height of his popularity. With the arrival of Gioachino Rossini his operas became less desirable with the public, and by 1817 his operas were no longer performed. His other compositions include 3 piano forte sonatas, 3 oratorios, 11 cantatas, 5 masses, 2 Te Deums, a Stabat mater, a Salve regina, a Tantum ergo, numerous motets, and several other sacred works.
Vincenzo Fabrizi was an Italian composer of opera buffa.
The Teatro Valle is a theatre and former opera house in Rome, Italy. It was built in 1726 for the Capranica family. In the middle of the 19th century, it switched from staging opera and theatre to only performances of spoken drama. After closing down in 2010, it was squatted in 2011, then evicted in 2014.
Giacomo Domenico Mario Antonio Pasquale Giuseppe Tritto was an Italian composer, known primarily for his fifty-four operas. He was born in Altamura, and studied in Naples; among his teachers were Nicola Fago, Girolamo Abos, and Pasquale Cafaro. Amongst his pupils were the young Vincenzo Bellini around 1821, plus Ferdinando Orlandi. He died in Naples.
Carlo Franchi was an Italian opera composer known for his opere buffe. He belonged to the Neapolitan school of composers and it is likely that he was born in or near Naples, where his first opera La vedova capricciosa had its premiere in 1765. Subsequent works were performed in Rome, Venice, Mantua, Turin, Florence, and outside Italy in places such as Dresden and Lisbon.
Gaetano Monti was an Italian composer. His name is first recorded in 1758, when he was eight years old, singing in a small part in a performance of Il curioso del suo proprio danno by Niccolò Piccinni. His first opera, Adriano in Siria, was performed in Modena in 1775, and he was later named organist of the Treasury Chapel at Naples Cathedral; there he remained until 1788. Moreover, in 1776 he became an impresario at the Teatro San Carlo. Most of his works were opere buffe, and were seen in theatres in Rome, Venice, and Naples. His most popular works were Le donne vendicate and Lo studente. It was believed at one time that he was the brother of the poet Vincenzo Monti, but this is uncertain.
Pietro Chiarini was an Italian composer.
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.
The Teatro Capranica is a theatre situated at 101 Piazza Capranica in the Colonna district of Rome. Originally constructed in 1679 by the Capranica family and housed in the early Renaissance Palazzo Capranica, it was the second public theatre to open in Rome. It was the site of many premieres of Baroque operas including Caldara's Tito e Berenice, Scarlatti's Griselda, and Vivaldi's Ercole su'l Termodonte. The Capranica ceased operating as a full-scale theatre and opera house in 1881 and in 1922 was converted into a cinema. Following the closure of the cinema in 2000, it has functioned on a hire basis as a conference and performance venue.
La Salustia is a 1732 opera in three acts by Giovanni Battista Pergolesi to a revised text, possibly by Sebastiano Morelli, after Apostolo Zeno's famous 1716 libretto Alessandro Severo, which was also later adapted by Handel. The production was marred when the leading man Nicolo Grimaldi "Nicolini" fell fatally ill before the performance and an inexperienced substitute Gioacchino Conti "Gizziello" had to be called in at the last minute. La Salustia was Pergolesi's first opera seria. The story is based on the life of the Roman emperor Alexander Severus and his wife Sallustia Orbiana.
La contadina astuta, or Livietta e Tracollo, is an opera buffa composed by Giovanni Battista Pergolesi to a libretto by Tommaso Mariani. It was originally composed as an intermezzo for Pergolesi's opera Adriano in Siria but subsequently became popular in its own right and was performed throughout Europe. It premiered along with Adriano in Siria on 25 October 1734 at the Teatro San Bartolomeo in Naples.
Ipermestra is an opera libretto by Pietro Metastasio first set by Johann Adolph Hasse 8 January 1744, and in the November of the same year by Christoff Willibald Gluck.
Antonia Bernasconi (1741–1803) was a German operatic soprano, appearing in opera houses in Vienna, Milan, Venice, Naples and London.
