Книга: Vincenzo Bellini, Felice Romani «Norma: Tragedie Lyrique En Deux Actes...»

Vincenzo Bellini

Vincenzo Salvatore Carmelo Francesco Bellini (November 3, 1801 – September 23, 1835) was a Sicilian opera composer. Known for his flowing melodic lines, Bellini was the quintessential composer of Bel canto opera.

Life

Born in Catania, Sicily, Bellini was a child prodigy from a highly musical family and legend has it he could sing an aria of Valentino Fioravanti at eighteen months, began studying music theory at two, the piano at three, and by the age of five could, apparently, play well. His first composition is said to have dated from his sixth year. Regardless of the veracity of these claims, it is certain that Bellini grew up in a musical household and that a career as a musician was never in doubt.

Having learned from his grandfather, Bellini left provincial Catania in June 1819 to study at the conservatory in Naples, with a stipend from the municipal government of Catania. By 1822 he was in the class of the director Nicolò Zingarelli, studying the masters of the Neapolitan school and the orchestral works of Haydn and Mozart. It was the custom at the Conservatory to introduce a promising student to the public with a dramatic work: the result was Bellini's first opera "Adelson e Salvini" an "opera semiseria" that was presented at the Conservatory's theater. Bellini's next opera, "Bianca e Gernando", met with some success at the Teatro San Carlo, leading to an offer from the impresario Barbaia for an opera at La Scala. "Il pirata" was a resounding immediate success and began Bellini's faithful and fruitful collaboration with the librettist and poet Felice Romani, and cemented his friendship with his favored tenor Giovanni Battista Rubini, who had sung in "Bianca e Gernando".

Bellini spent the next years, 1827–33 in Milan, where all doors were open to him. Sparking controversy in the press for its new style and its restless harmonic shifts into remote keys, "La straniera" (1828) was even more successful than "Il pirata", and allowed Bellini to support himself solely by his opera commissions. The composer showed the taste for social life and the dandyism that Heinrich Heine emphasized in his literary portrait of Bellini ("Florentinische Nächte", 1837). Opening a new theater in Parma, his "Zaira" (1829) was a failure at the Teatro Ducale, but Venice welcomed "I Capuleti e i Montecchi", which was based on the same Italian sources as Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet".

The next five years were triumphant, with major successes with his greatest works, "La sonnambula", "Norma" and "I puritani", cut short by Bellini's premature death.

Bellini died in Puteaux, near Paris of acute inflammation of the intestine, and was buried in the cemetery of Père Lachaise, Paris; his remains were removed to the cathedral of Catania in 1876. The Museo Belliniano housed in the Gravina Cruyllas Palace, in Catania, preserves memorabilia and scores.

Works

Bellini's complete works are to be published in "Edizione critica delle opere di Vincenzo Bellini", Milan: Ricordi 2003-

Operas

* "Adelson e Salvini" (12? February 1825 Teatro del Conservatorio di San Sebastiano, Naples)
* "Bianca e Gernando" (30 May 1826, Teatro San Carlo, Naples)
* "Il pirata" (27 October 1827, Teatro alla Scala, Milan)
* "Bianca e Fernando" (7 April 1828, Teatro Carlo Felice, Genoa) [rev of Bianca e Gernando]
* "La straniera" (14 February 1829, Teatro alla Scala, Milan)
* "Zaira" (16 May 1829, Teatro Ducale, Parma)
* "I Capuleti e i Montecchi" (11 March 1830, Teatro La Fenice, Venice)
* "La sonnambula" (6 March 1831, Teatro Carcano, Milan)
* "Norma" (26 December 1831, Teatro alla Scala, Milan)
* "Beatrice di Tenda" (16 March 1833, Teatro La Fenice, Venice)
* "I puritani" (24 January 1835, Théâtre Italien, Paris)

Other important Bel Canto opera composers

*Gioacchino Rossini
*Gaetano Donizetti
*Saverio Mercadante

External links

* [http://cylinders.library.ucsb.edu/search.php?query=Bellini%2C+Vincenzo&queryType=%40attr+1%3D1 Bellini cylinder recordings] , from the Cylinder Preservation and Digitization Project at the University of California, Santa Barbara Library.
*IMSLP|id=Bellini%2C_Vincenzo
*IckingArchive|idx=Bellini|name=Vincenzo Bellini
* [http://www.teatromassimobellini.it/ Teatro Massimo Bellini, Catania]

Источник: Vincenzo Bellini

Felice Romani

Felice Romani (January 31, 1788 — January 28, 1865) was an Italian poet and scholar of literature and mythology who wrote many librettos for the opera composers Donizetti and Bellini. Romani was considered the finest Italian librettist between Metastasio and Boito.

Biography

He later joined the faculty of the University of Genoa and, while there, translated French literature. With a colleague, he prepared at six-volume dictionary of mythology and antiquities, including the Celtic history in Italy. Romani's expertise in French and antiquity is reflected in the libretti he wrote; the majority are based on French literature and many, such as "Norma", use mythological sources.

Romani travelled widely in Spain, Greece, Germany, and France. In 1814, he established himself in Milan, where he became friends with important figures in the literary and musical world. He turned down the post of court poet in Vienna, and began instead a career as opera librettist. He wrote two librettos for the composer Johann Simon Mayr, which resulted in his appointment as the librettist for La Scala. Romani became the most highly regarded of all Italian librettists of his age, producing nearly one hundred. In spite of his interest in French literature, he refused to work in Paris.

As a rule, Romani did not create his own stories; he kept up with what was happening in the Paris theatre and adapted plays which were popular there, but this wasn't always a safe strategy, given the vague intellectual property rights legislation of the time. In one case, Romani prepared a libretto based on the play "Lucrezia Borgia" by Victor Hugo for the opera "Lucrezia Borgia" by Donizetti, but when it was staged in Paris in 1840, Hugo obtained an injunction against further productions. The libretto was then rewritten and retitled "La Rinegata", with the Italian characters changed to Turks.

Romani wrote the librettos for Bellini's "Il pirata", "La Straniera", "Zaira", "I Capuleti e i Montecchi", "La Sonnambula", "Norma" and "Beatrice di Tenda", for Rossini's "Il Turco in Italia" and "Bianca e Falliero", and Donizetti's "Anna Bolena" and "L'elisir d'amore" (which he adapted from Eugene Scribe's "Le philtre"). He also wrote a libretto (originally for composer Adalbert Gyrowetz) that Verdi used for his early comedy "Un giorno di regno".

Romani was considered an ideal match for Bellini, who is quoted as having said: "Give me good verses and I will give you good music". Dramatic, even extravagant "situations" expressed in verses "designed to portray the passions in the liveliest manner" was what Bellini was looking for in a libretto, according to a letter to Florimo, August 4, 1834, and he found them in Romani.

But the two had a falling out over missed deadlines for "Beatrice di Tenda.". After setting "I Puritani" to a libretto by Carlo Pepoli, Bellini was determined not to compose any more Italian operas with anyone but Romani. "I Puritani" was his last opera; he died less than a year after its premiere. Romani mourned him deeply and wrote an obituary in which he expressed his profound regrets over their disagreement.

In 1834 Romani became editor of the "Gazzetta Ufficiale Piemontese" to which he contributed literary criticism. He retained the post, with a break 1849–1854, until his death, in Moneglia, (in the region of Liguria, Italy). A volume of his lyric poems was published in 1841.

Источник: Felice Romani