An Evening of Opera Favourites
Program Notes
Notes by Anita Brooks Kirkland
Gioachino Rossini (1792-1868) Overture to La Gazza Ladra
Written in 1817 for the famous La Scala opera house, La Gazza Ladra (The Thieving Magpie) is a great example of Rossini’s signature style, with beautiful melodies to be sure but characterized by rhythmic energy from the orchestra. Rossini’s music challenged the existing conventions of opera buffa (comic opera). The composer is regarded as the creator of bel canto, a style of opera that emphasizes beautiful singing.
Rossini was legendary for the speed at which he composed, purportedly saying, “Give me a laundry list, and I will set it to music.” (Classic FM). Speed doesn’t always translate to promptness, and Rossini was also known for missing deadlines. Such was the case with the overture to La Gazza Ladra. With the premiere looming for the following day and a very fed-up conductor waiting for the overture, the exasperated manager at La Scala reportedly locked Rossini in an upper room at the famous opera house, under guard, to force Rossini to just get it done. The story goes that as the composer finished each page of the score, he dropped the sheet out the window so that copyists could create the orchestral parts. True to his reputation the composer completed the overture in the middle of the night, just in time for the opera’s premier performance the following evening.
W. A. Mozart (1756-1791) Così fan tutti: “Come scoglio”
This work’s full title is Così fan tutti, ossia la scuola degli amanti, which means “women are like that, the school for lovers”. The opera predictably focusses on the fickleness of women and uses the plot convention of “fiancé swapping” that had been around for centuries. How fortunate we are that Mozart’s music transcends the plot. The aria Come scoglio is notoriously challenging, with a virtuosic melody that moves rapidly back and forth from the lowest to the highest notes in the soprano’s range. As legend has it, Mozart included these leaps to gently mock the soprano debuting the role’s habit of tucking her head down for low notes and pointing her chin up for high notes. The aria’s frequent leaps made her head bobbing up and down look like a chicken. “I promise not to look like a chicken!”, says our guest soprano, Cassandra Amorim.
Vincenzo Bellini (1801-1835) Overture to Norma
Bellini is known as the premier composer writing in the bel canto or “beautiful singing” style, characteristic of opera composed in the early part of the nineteenth century. His opera Norma is set in Gaul (modern France), under Roman occupation in the first century BC. Against the background of the Gallic people’s uprising against their suppressors, the high priestess Norma finds herself in the middle of a love triangle, a situation that does not end well for her. The beautiful overture foreshadows the tragedy.
Vincenzo Bellini Norma: “Casta diva”
Bellini is known for the way his music exploits the expressive colours and powers of the soprano voice. Casta diva is one of his most beautiful arias. Norma, the titular “chaste goddess”, prays to the moon goddess begging for peace between her father’s rebels and the Roman occupiers.
P. I. Tchaikovsky (1840-1893) Eugene Onegin: “Waltz, Act II”
The opera Eugene Onegin is Tchaikovsky’s musical interpretation of the eponymous novel by Alexander Pushkin. Tchaikovsky’s music connects with audiences with its emotional appeal, orchestral colour, and resounding tunefulness. The famous waltz that opens the second act of the opera showcases his mastery of writing for the dance and colourful orchestration.
Intermission
Giuseppe Verdi (1813-1901) Overture to Nabucco
The incomparable opera composer Giuseppe Verdi’s music is quintessentially Italian. Verdi was both a musician and a politician, known for his role in the “Risorgimento” movement, rousing the Italian nationalism that led to the reunification of Italy in 1861. Verdi’s opera Nabucco (Nebuchadnezzar), premiering in 1842, told the story of displaced people grieving for their homeland. The opera’s music became a soundtrack for citizens of the disjointed Italian city states, fed up with foreign occupation. The overture quotes the chorus Va, pensiero from the third act, which has become an unofficial anthem of the Italian people, sung by the hundreds of thousands of people who assembled in the streets to observe Verdi’s funeral procession in 1901.
Gustave Charpentier (1860-1956) Louise: “Depuis le jour”.
French composer Gustave Charpentier is best known for his opera Louise, which portrays Parisian working-class life, and is based on texts by Voltaire and Beaudelaire. The opera was quite scandalous at the time, portraying female desire and rebellion against parents. It was rejected by several opera houses before it was staged at the Opéra Comique national theatre in 1900.
Our soloist Cassandra Amorim says that Depuis le jour has been one of her go-to audition pieces for the past two years. “It is such a beautiful piece and has such lush orchestration. It will be so exciting to sing it with the full orchestra.”
Pietro Mascagni (1863-1945) Cavalleria rusticana: “Intermezzo”
Mascagni began working on Cavalleria rusticana as an entry in a music publisher’s competition for a one-act opera. Unhappy with the work he intended for the competition, he put it aside. Little did he know that his wife submitted the manuscript on his behalf, and it was awarded first prize. The opera’s premiere in Rome in 1890 was tremendously successful, with Mascagni purportedly receiving 40 curtain calls.
Cavalleria rusticana (Rustic Chivalry) is one of the first verismo operas, focussing on the raw, gritty drama of everyday life and featuring ordinary people rather than historic or mythological characters. The opera takes place on Easter Sunday. Following the early, intense drama of love and betrayal, the orchestral Intermezzo suggests the peace of the village setting but also the intense emotions of the characters, foreshadowing the tragedy yet to unfold.
Giacomo Puccini (1858-1924) Tosca: “Vissi d’arte”
Arguably the most popular and frequently performed opera composer of all time, Giacomo Puccini wrote in the opera verismo style pioneered by Mascagni. His opera Tosca tells the story of opera singer Floria Tosca’s plight to save her lover the artist Cavaradossi from the sadistic and manipulative police chief Scarpia, who not only wants to see the artist hang for treason, but also has designs on Tosca herself.
In the aria Vissi d’arte (I lived for art), Tosca desperately sings a prayer when she is forced to choose between yielding to Scarpia’s advances or watching Cavaradossi face execution.
Giacomo Puccini Gianni Schichi: “Oh! Mio Babbino Caro”
Late in his life Puccini composed a trio of one-act operas, all with stories based on the concealment of death. Il tabarro is the dramatic first opera of Il trittico, followed by the tragedy of Suor Angelica. The final opera is the comedy Gianni Schichi. The aria Oh! Mio Babbino Caro is the young Lauretta’s appeal to her father to not separate her from the young man she loves because of the tensions between their two families over class, money, and honour.