La vestale | |
---|---|
Tragédie lyrique by Gaspare Spontini | |
Caroline Branchu in the title role of Julia, on a poster for the premiere | |
Librettist | Étienne de Jouy |
Language | French |
Premiere |
La vestale (The Vestal Virgin) is an opera composed by Gaspare Spontini to a French libretto by Étienne de Jouy. It takes the form of a tragédie lyrique in three acts. It was first performed on 15 December 1807 by the Académie Impériale de Musique (Paris Opera) at the Salle Montansier and is regarded as Spontini's masterpiece. [1] The musical style shows the influence of Gluck and looks forwards to the works of Berlioz, Wagner, and French Grand Opera. [2]
Opera is a form of theatre in which music has a leading role and the parts are taken by singers, but is distinct from musical theater. Such a "work" is typically a collaboration between a composer and a librettist and incorporates a number of the performing arts, such as acting, scenery, costume, and sometimes dance or ballet. The performance is typically given in an opera house, accompanied by an orchestra or smaller musical ensemble, which since the early 19th century has been led by a conductor.
Gaspare Luigi Pacifico Spontini was an Italian opera composer and conductor.
A libretto is the text used in, or intended for, an extended musical work such as an opera, operetta, masque, oratorio, cantata or musical. The term libretto is also sometimes used to refer to the text of major liturgical works, such as the Mass, requiem and sacred cantata, or the story line of a ballet.
Spontini had finished La vestale by the summer of 1805 but had faced opposition from leading members of the Opéra and rivalry from fellow composers. [3] The premiere was made possible with the help of Spontini's patron, the Empress Josephine, but only after being rearranged by Jean-Baptiste Rey and Louis-Luc Loiseau de Persuis. [4] La vestale was an enormous success, enjoying over two hundred performances by 1830. [5]
Jean-Baptiste Rey was a French conductor and composer.
Louis-Luc Loiseau de Persuis was a French violinist, conductor, choirmaster, teacher, composer, and theatre director.
Its fame soon spread abroad; it first appeared on the Italian stage in Naples in 1811, and it was performed in Stockholm in 1823. It was premiered in the United States in French at Théâtre d'Orléans in New Orleans on 17 February 1828. [6] Important 20th-century revivals include the 1954 production at La Scala with Maria Callas in the title role, which was the first opera staging by the famous film director Luchino Visconti. [7] La vestale is famous in historical terms but is only very infrequently performed. Two of its arias (translated to Italian and recorded by Maria Callas and Rosa Ponselle), "Tu che invoco" and "O Nume tutelar", are better known than the work as a whole. In recognition of its role in the development of Richard Wagner's third opera, Rienzi , it was performed in concert form in Dresden's Semperoper in the Summer of 2013, conducted by Gabriele Ferro and starring Francisco Araiza as Cinna, Maria Agresta as Julia, and baritone Christopher Magiera as Licinius.
Naples is the regional capital of Campania and the third-largest municipality in Italy after Rome and Milan. In 2017, around 967,069 people lived within the city's administrative limits while its province-level municipality has a population of 3,115,320 residents. Its continuously built-up metropolitan area is the second or third largest metropolitan area in Italy and one of the most densely populated cities in Europe.
Stockholm is the capital of Sweden and the most populous urban area in the Nordic countries; 962,154 people live in the municipality, approximately 1.5 million in the urban area, and 2.3 million in the metropolitan area. The city stretches across fourteen islands where Lake Mälaren flows into the Baltic Sea. Just outside the city and along the coast is the island chain of the Stockholm archipelago. The area has been settled since the Stone Age, in the 6th millennium BC, and was founded as a city in 1252 by Swedish statesman Birger Jarl. It is also the capital of Stockholm County.
The Théâtre d'Orléans was the most important opera house in New Orleans in the first half of the 19th century. The company performed in French and gave the American premieres of many French operas. It was located on Orleans Street between Royal and Bourbon. The plans for the theatre were drawn up by Louis Tabary, a refugee from the French colony of Saint-Domingue (Haiti). Construction began in 1806, but the opening was delayed until October 1815. After a fire, it was rebuilt and reopened in 1819, led by another émigré from Saint-Domingue, John Davis. Davis became one of the major figures in French theatre in New Orleans. The theatre was destroyed by fire in 1866, but the ballroom is still used.
Role | Voice type [8] | Premiere cast [9] 15 December 1807 (Conductor: Jean-Baptiste Rey) |
---|---|---|
Licinius, Roman general | tenor | Étienne Lainez |
Cinna, head of a legion | tenor | François Lays or Lay |
Chief Priest | bass | Henri-Étienne Dérivis |
Julia, young vestal | soprano | Alexandrine-Caroline Branchu |
The Great Vestal | mezzo-soprano | Marie-Thérèse Maillard |
Chief of the Aruspices | bass | Duparc |
A consul | bass | Martin |
Returning to Rome after a victorious campaign, Licinius finds his beloved Julia has become a priestess of Vesta. Although Julia attempts to avoid going to Licinius's triumph, she is delegated to present him with a wreath. He tells her that he intends to kidnap and reclaim her.
Vesta is the virgin goddess of the hearth, home, and family in Roman religion. She was rarely depicted in human form, and was often represented by the fire of her temple in the Forum Romanum. Entry to her temple was permitted only to her priestesses, the Vestals, who tended the sacred fire at the hearth in her temple. As she was considered a guardian of the Roman people, her festival, the Vestalia, was regarded as one of the most important Roman holidays. During the Vestalia matrons walked barefoot through the city to the sanctuary of the goddess, where they presented offerings of food. Such was Vesta's importance to Roman religion that hers was one of the last republican pagan cults still active following the rise of Christianity until it was forcibly disbanded by the Christian emperor Theodosius I in AD 391.
The Roman triumph was a civil ceremony and religious rite of ancient Rome, held to publicly celebrate and sanctify the success of a military commander who had led Roman forces to victory in the service of the state or, originally and traditionally, one who had successfully completed a foreign war.
In the temple of Vesta, Julia guards the eternal flame and prays to be freed of temptation. Licinius arrives; during their rapturous reconciliation, the flame expires. Licinius is advised by Cinna to flee. Julia is interrogated by the High Priest but refuses to name Licinius. She is sentenced to death for licentiousness.
Despite the pleas of Licinius, Julia is to be buried alive; even when he admits his intrusion to the Temple, Julia claims not to recognise him. A thunderstorm ensues, during which lightning reignites the sacred flame. Recognising this as a sign from the Gods, the High Priest and Vestal Priestess release Julia who is then married to Licinius.
A thunderstorm, also known as an electrical storm or a lightning storm, is a storm characterized by the presence of lightning and its acoustic effect on the Earth's atmosphere, known as thunder. Relatively weak thunderstorms are sometimes called thundershowers. Thunderstorms occur in a type of cloud known as a cumulonimbus. They are usually accompanied by strong winds, and often produce heavy rain and sometimes snow, sleet, or hail, but some thunderstorms produce little precipitation or no precipitation at all. Thunderstorms may line up in a series or become a rainband, known as a squall line. Strong or severe thunderstorms include some of the most dangerous weather phenomena, including large hail, strong winds, and tornadoes. Some of the most persistent severe thunderstorms, known as supercells, rotate as do cyclones. While most thunderstorms move with the mean wind flow through the layer of the troposphere that they occupy, vertical wind shear sometimes causes a deviation in their course at a right angle to the wind shear direction.
Lightning is a violent and sudden electrostatic discharge where two electrically charged regions in the atmosphere temporarily equalize themselves, usually during a thunderstorm.
Luchino Visconti di Modrone, Count of Lonate Pozzolo, was an Italian theatre, opera and cinema director, as well as a screenwriter. He is best known for his films Ossessione (1943), Senso (1954), Rocco and His Brothers (1960), The Leopard (1963) and Death in Venice (1971).
Lucio Silla, K. 135, is an Italian opera in three acts composed by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. The libretto was written by Giovanni de Gamerra, revised by Pietro Metastasio.
François Antoine Habeneck was a French classical violinist and conductor.
Vittorio Gui was an Italian conductor, composer, musicologist and critic.
Ebe Stignani was an Italian opera singer, who was pre-eminent in the dramatic mezzo-soprano roles of the Italian repertoire during a stage career of more than thirty years.
Cesare Valletti was an Italian operatic tenor, one of the leading tenore di grazia of the postwar era. He was much admired for his polished vocal technique, his musical refinement and elegance, and beauty of tone.
José Francisco Araiza Andrade, is a Mexican operatic tenor and lied singer who has sung as soloist in leading concert halls and in leading tenor operatic roles in the major opera houses of Europe and North America during the course of a lengthy career. Born in Mexico City, he studied singing at the Conservatorio Nacional de Música de México and later in Germany, with Mozartian tenor Richard Holm, and lieder interpretation with Erik Werba. He made his operatic debut in 1970 in Mexico City as First Prisoner in Beethoven's Fidelio. Araiza initially came to international prominence singing in Mozart and Rossini operas, but in the 1980s broadened his repertoire to include Italian and French lyric tenor roles and Wagnerian roles such as Lohengrin and Walther von Stolzing. He was made a Kammersänger of the Vienna State Opera in 1988. Now retired from the opera stage, he teaches singing and serves on the juries of several international singing competitions.
Carlo Pietro Tagliabue was an Italian baritone.
Les Abencérages, ou L'étendard de Grenade is an opera in three acts by Luigi Cherubini with a French libretto by Etienne de Jouy, based on the novel Gonzalve de Cordoue by Jean-Pierre Claris de Florian. It was first performed on 6 April 1813 by the Académie Impériale de Musique at the Salle Montansier, with Napoleon and his wife, the Empress Marie-Louise, in the audience. The opera was initially a success but its popularity waned after the fall of Napoleon.
Gianni Raimondi was an Italian lyric tenor, particularly associated with the Italian repertory.
Fernand Cortez, ou La conquête du Mexique is an opera in three acts by Gaspare Spontini with a French libretto by Etienne de Jouy and Joseph-Alphonse Esménard. It was first performed on 28 November 1809 by the Académie Impériale de Musique at the Salle Montansier.
Olimpie is an opera in three acts by Gaspare Spontini. The French libretto, by Armand-Michel Dieulafoy and Charles Brifaut, is based on the play of the same name by Voltaire (1761). Olimpie was first performed on 22 December 1819 by the Paris Opéra at the Salle Montansier. When sung in Italian or German, it is usually given the title Olimpia.
Giuseppe Nessi was an Italian operatic tenor.
La vestale is an opera by the Italian composer Saverio Mercadante. It takes the form of a tragedia lirica in three acts. The libretto, by Salvadore Cammarano, was influenced by Victor-Joseph Étienne de Jouy's libretto for Spontini's more famous 1807 opera of the same name.
Irina Iordachescu is a Romanian soprano opera singer.
Enzo Sordello was an Italian operatic baritone.
Maria Dragoni is an Italian operatic soprano active international career in major opera house from 1984 to present.
Henri-Étienne Dérivis was a French operatic bass. For 25 years he was a leading singer at the Paris Opéra where he made his debut in 1803. He was born in Albi and died in Livry-Gargan at the age of 75.
Médée is a French language opéra-comique by Luigi Cherubini. The libretto by François-Benoît Hoffman was based on Euripides' tragedy of Medea and Pierre Corneille's play Médée. It is set in the ancient city of Corinth.
Notes
Sources
Wikimedia Commons has media related to La vestale . |