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Opera in the piazza of Castel di Fiori

2008

Amici di Castel di Fiori and Opera Scalza

present

in the piazza of Castel di Fiori on Friday 1st (pre-view) and Saturday 2nd August 2008

in aid of the Castel di Fiori community recreational hall building fund.

The piazza of Castel di Fiori during the 2006 performance of Cosi fan tutte.

More photos of the 2006 performance of Cosi fan tutte.

Synopsis of La Cenerentola

Montefiascone as it is today.

The opera in two acts is traditionally set in the late eighteenth or early nineteenth century at Montefiascone on the shores of Lake Bolsena but be prepared for some surprises in the production in the piazza of Castel di Fiori.

The castle at Montefiascone

Don Magnifico, Baron of Montefiascone, lives in a run-down palazzo with his two daughters, Clorinda and Tisbe, and his stepdaughter Cenerentola (Cinderella), whose given name is Angelina.

Act One a room at the castle of Don Magnifico....... photos

The opera opens with Clorinda and Tisbe trying on their jewels while Cenerentola, who serves as the family maid, sings a forlorn song about a king who found his wife among the common folk.

A beggar (Alidoro, the Prince's tutor in disguise) appears and Cenerentola's stepsisters want to send him away, but Cenerentola offers him bread and coffee. While he stands by the door, several courtiers arrive to announce that Prince Ramiro will soon pay a visit to Don Magnifico. The Prince is looking for the most beautiful girl in the land to be his bride. The sisters order Cenerentola to fetch them their finery.

Don Magnifico, awakened by the commotion, comes to investigate, scolding his daughters for interrupting his dream of a donkey that sprouted wings. When he learns of the Prince Ramiro's visit, he exhorts the girls to save the family fortunes by capturing the young man's fancy.

All retire to their rooms, and Prince Ramiro - disguised as his own valet - arrives alone, to see the women of the household incognito. Cenerentola is startled by the handsome stranger, and each admires the other. Asked who she is, Cenerentola gives a flustered explanation about her mother's death and her own servile position, then excuses herself to respond to her stepsisters' call. When Don Magnifico enters, Ramiro, still in disguise, says the Prince will be along shortly.

Don Magnifico fetches Clorinda and Tisbe, and they greet Dandini, the Prince's valet, who is disguised as the Prince. Dandini plays his role to the hilt as he searches for the fairest in the realm. The sisters fawn over Dandini, who invites them to a ball.

Don Magnifico prepares to leave, arguing with Cenerentola, who does not want to be left behind. Prince Ramiro notes how badly Cenerentola is treated.

His tutor, Alidoro reads from a census list and asks for the third daughter of the household. Don Magnifico denies she is still alive. Once Dandini has left with Don Magnifico, Alidoro (once more the beggar) tells Cenerentola she is to accompany him to the ball. Casting off his rags, he identifies himself as a member of the court, promising her riches, and assures the girl that heaven rewards the pure of heart.

Dandini, still posing as the Prince, escorts the two sisters to the royal country estate and offers Don Magnifico a tour of the wine cellar, hoping to get him drunk on the local Est! Est! Est! wine. Dandini disentangles himself from the sisters and says he will see them later.

Act One at the Prince's Palace......photos

Don Magnifico is hailed as the Prince's new wine counselor. No one, he decrees, shall mix a drop of water with any Est! Est! Est! wine for the next fifteen years.

Looking forward to the feast, he and his attendants leave. Dandini reports to the Prince with his negative opinion of the two sisters. This confuses Prince Ramiro, who has heard Alidoro, his tutor, speak well of one of Don Magnifico's daughters.

Clorinda and Tisbe rejoin Dandini, still disguised as the Prince. When he offers Prince Ramiro, also in disguise, as an escort for one of them, they turn their noses up at a mere groom.

Alidoro announces the arrival of an unknown, veiled lady. Prince Ramiro recognizes something in her voice. When she lifts her veil, he and Dandini, as well as the sisters, sense something familiar about her appearance. Their confusion is shared by Don Magnifico, who comes to announce supper and notices the newcomer's resemblance to Cenerentola. All feel they are in a dream but on the verge of being awakened by some rude shock.

Don Magnifico stews over this new threat to his daughters' marriage prospects, telling them not to forget his importance when either of them ascends the throne. He leaves with the girls, whereupon Prince Ramiro wanders in, smitten with the newly arrived guest because of her resemblance to the girl he met that morning.
He conceals himself as Dandini arrives, still dressed as the Prince, with the magnificently attired Cenerentola. Dandini courts her.

She politely declines, saying she is in love with someone else - his groom. Hearing this the delighted Prince Ramiro steps forth. To test his sincerity, Cenerentola gives him one of a pair of matching bracelets, saying that if he really cares for her, he will find her. After she leaves, Prince Ramiro, with Alidoro's encouragement, calls his men together, so that the search can begin

Act Two at the Prince's palace.......photos

Once again the Prince's valet, Dandini, faces Don Magnifico, who still believes he is the Prince and insists he decide which daughter to marry. Dandini confesses he is a valet. When Don Magnifico turns indignant, Dandini orders him out of the palace.

Act Two back at Don Magnifico's castle....... photos

Cenerentola, once more in rags, tends the fire and sings her ballad. Don Magnifico and the sisters return, all in a vile mood, and order Cenerentola to prepare supper.

She obeys, as a thunderstorm rages.

Dandini appears at the door, saying the Prince's boat on Lake Bolsena has run aground. Cenerentola, bringing a chair for the Prince, realizes he is Ramiro. He in turn recognizes her bracelet. Confusion reigns as Don Magnifico and his daughters smart from their defeat.

Act Two at Prince Ramiro's palace ....... photos

Prince Ramiro angered by their meanness, threatens them, but Cenerentola asks him to show mercy. Her family still against her, Cenerentola leaves with the Prince, while Alidoro chides the dejected sisters and gives thanks to heaven for this happy outcome.

Don Magnifico curries favor with the newly created Princess, but she asks only to be acknowledged at last as his daughter. Secure in her happiness, she asks the Prince to forgive Don Magnifico and the two stepsisters as she rejoices that her days of sitting by the fire are over.

Gioachino Rossini’s Opera La Cenerentola (Cinderella) was composed in 1816-17.

First Performance: January 25, 1817, Teatro Valle, Rome (Italy)

Libretto: Giacomo (Jacapo) Ferretti, based on Charles Perrault’s Cendrillon

The Main Characters in La Cenerentola (Cinderella) ---- I Personaggi

• Angiolina - La Cenerentola, (Cinderella), stepdaughter of Don Magnifico (mezzo-soprano) (sotto nome di Cenerentola, figliastra di Don Magnifico) - Elizabeth Spencer (photos)

• Don Ramiro, Prince of Salerno (tenor) - (Il Principe, Don Ramiro) - Hugo Tucker (photos)

• Dandini, the Prince’s valet (bass), (suo cameriere) - Peter Brown (photos)

• Don Magnifico, Baron of Montefiascone and Cenerentola’s stepfather (bass) (Don Magnifico, barone di Monte Fiascone). - Giles Dawson (photos)

• Clorinda, daughter of Don Magnifico and step sister of Angelina, (sue figlie, sorellastre di Angelina) - Claire Evans (photos)

*Tisbe, daughter of Don Magnifico and step sister of Angelina, (sue figlie, sorellastre di Angelina) - Kipper Chipperfield (photos)

• Alidoro, a philosopher and tutor to Prince Ramiro (bass), (filosofo, maestro di Don Ramiro) - Birnie Evans (photos)

* Courtiers (chorus) (Coro di cavallieri del principe, cortigiani e dame della corte):

Shirley Davey-Elliott, Hannah Davey, Mikael Onelius, Magnus Clarholm;
Christopher Watson, Jonathon Willson; Pamela Rose, Anne Watson, Belinda Willson (photos)

Maestra del coro - Kate Billimore

Orchestra ....(photos)

Violino 1 - Frances Barlow
Violino 2 - Frances Poole
Viola - Nick Hugh
Violoncello - Elizabeth Nevrkla
Contrabasso - Diana Bickley
Flauto - Miranda Jackson
Oboe - Nick Murray
Clarinet 1 - Barbara Wyllie
Clarinet 2 - John Cook
Fagotto - Jonathan Burton
Corno 1 - Joanna Towler
Corno 2 - Ann-Marie Jackman
Trombone - John Rees
Continuo - Peter Cowdrey
Direttore d'orchestra - Chris Davey

Lights, Luci - John Bradford
Costumes, Costumi - Kipper Chipperfield (photos)
Scenery, Scene - Kipper Chipperfield, Claire Evans, Belinda Willson
Stage, Costruzione - Brian Chatterton (photos), Birnie Evans, Jonathon Willson
Dietro le quinte - Lesley Brown
Programme, Programma - Lynne Chatterton (photos)
Director, Regia - Gaie Houston (photo)
Direzione co-ordinazione - Lynne Chatterton & Claire Evans
Messa in scena - Claire Evans (photos)

Photographs of the opera: Miles Davey.

Opera Scalza ringrazia sinceramente gli abitanti di Castel di Fiori per la loro accoglienza ed ospitalita' durante quest'ultima settimana.

Con ringraziamenti a Birmingham Opera per il prestito della nuova versione de la riduzione orchestrale da Jonathan Dove.

Elizabeth Spencer - Laureata in violino e canto, stasera debutta come prima donna. Di solito lavora in un ospedale londinese.

Kipper Chipperfield - ha studiato pittura e musica e continua ad intrecciarle con l'insegnamento, il restauro e il giardinaggio.

Claire Evans - e' stata imbrogliata in varie opere in Italia ed in Inghilterra - come sempre, quest'opera sara' l'ultima che fa.

Hugo Tucker - Professore di Francese all'Universita' di Reading. Canta regolarmente a Oxford e altrove per amore della musica.

Peter Brown - Professore di Letterature Classica all'Universita' di Oxford. Fa parte di diversi gruppi di cantanti a Oxford.

Giles Dawson - Tutore e scrittore nel campo classico. Partecipava nel coro del Festivale Rossiniano a Pesaro nei primi anni: 1981-2

Birnie Evans - Dilettante anziano maritato con Claire

Review of the performance on the web site Tellusfolio.it

Portrait of Gioachino Rossini by Francesco Hayez (1870) Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan

Background to La Cenerentola

    The story of Cinderella has a long literary history, even preceding its inclusion in Perrault's Mother Goose stories published in the 17th century. Its longevity is based on the universal appeal of its theme - the put-upon child unfairly treated by a parent, finding magical escape to a better life.
    Jacopo Ferretti, Rossini's librettist for La Cenerentola (premiered in 1817), based his version on an earlier and long forgotten French opera written several years earlier (not to be confused with Massenet's Cendrillon of 1899). The essence of the story in Jocopo Ferretti's libretto is the same but with the magical fantasy deleted. There is no fairy godmother, no pumpkins turned to coaches and, instead of the glass slipper, a more realistic matching bracelet for the Prince to identify the mysterious beauty for whom he has fallen.
    But Cinderella still has a mean step-father (Don Magnifico) and two nasty, vain step-sisters. She is relegated to the position of disdained maid while Don Magnifico fritters away her inheritance on finery for the vain sisters. Rossini and Ferretti turn the story into satire, making Don Magnifico and the sisters into deliciously comic figures while retaining the romance and idealism of a fable. The kind, forgiving Cinderella triumphs in the end with grace and charm, not to speak of coloratura melodies to make a songbird envious.

More about Gioachino Rossini

Gioachino Antonio Rossini was born into a family of musicians in Pesaro, a town on the Adriatic coast of Italy. His father, Giuseppe, was a horn player and inspector of slaughterhouses, his mother, Anna, was a singer and baker's daughter. Rossini's parents began his musical training early, and by the age of six he was playing the triangle in his father's band.

Rossini's father was sympathetic to the French Revolution and welcomed Napoleon's troops when they arrived in Northern Italy. This became a serious political problem when the Austrians restored the old regime. Rossini's father was sent to prison, and his mother took the young Rossini to Bologna, earning her living as a leading singer at various theatres of the Romagna region, where she was ultimately joined by her husband. During this time, the young Rossini was frequently left in the care of his aging grandmother, who was unable to effectively control the boy.

He remained at Bologna in the care of a pork butcher, while his father played the horn in the orchestras of the theatres at which his wife sang. The boy had three years' instruction in the harpsichord from Prinetti of Novara, who combined his profession of a musician with the business of selling liquor, and fell asleep while he stood to the ridicule of his critical pupil.

Rossini was taken from Prinetti and apprenticed to a smith.

In Angelo Tesei he found a congenial master, and learned to sight-read music, to play accompaniments on the pianoforte, and to sing well enough to take solo parts in the church when he was ten years old. At thirteen he appeared at the theatre of the Comune in Paër’s Camilla — his only public appearance as a singer (1805). He was also a capable horn player in the footsteps of his father.

In 1806, age 14, Rossini became a student of the cello under Cavedagni at the Conservatorio of Bologna.

In 1807 he was admitted to the counterpoint class of Padre P. S. Mattei. He learned to play the cello with ease, but the pedantic severity of Mattei's views on counterpoint only served to drive the young composer's views toward a freer school of composition.

His insight into orchestral resources is generally ascribed not to the strict compositional rules he learned from Mattei, but to knowledge gained independently while scoring the quartets and symphonies of Haydn and Mozart. At Bologna he was known as "il Tedeschino" ("the Little German") on account of his devotion to Mozart.

His early career as a composer

Through the friendly interposition of the Marquis Cavalli, Rossini's first opera, La Cambiale di Matrimonio, was produced at Venice when he was a youth of only eighteen.

Two years before this he had received the prize at the Conservatorio of Bologna for his cantata Il pianto d'Armonia sulla morte d’Orfeo.

Between 1810 and 1813, at Bologna, Rome, Venice, and Milan, Rossini produced operas of varying success.

All memory of these works is eclipsed by the enormous success of his opera Tancredi.
The libretto was an arrangement of Voltaire’s tragedy by A. Rossi. Traces of Paër and Paisiello were undeniably present in fragments of the music. Any critical feeling on the part of the public was drowned by appreciation of such melodies as "Di tanti palpiti... Mi rivedrai, ti rivedrò," which became so popular that the Italians would sing it in crowds at the law courts until called upon by the judge to desist.

Rossini continued to write operas for Venice and Milan during the next few years, but their reception was tame and in some cases unsatisfactory after the success of Tancredi.

In 1815 he retired to his home at Bologna, where Barbaja, the impresario of the Naples theatre, concluded an agreement with him by which he was to take over the musical direction of the Teatro San Carlo and the Teatro Del Fondo at Naples, composing for each of them one opera a year. His payment was to be 200 ducats per month; he was also to receive a share of Barbaja's other business, popular gaming-tables, amounting to about 1000 ducats per annum. This was an extraordinarily lucrative arrangement for any professional musician at that time.

Some older composers in Naples, notably Zingarelli and Paisiello, were inclined to intrigue against the success of the youthful composer but their hostility was defused by the enthusiasm which greeted performance of his Elisabetta, Regina d'Inghilterra, in which Isabella Colbran, who subsequently became the Rossini’s wife, took a leading part. The libretto of this opera written by Schmidt was in many aspects an anticipation the libretto of Kenilworth written a few years later by Sir Walter Scott’s. The opera was the first in which Rossini wrote the ornaments of the airs instead of leaving them to the fancy of the singers, and also the first in which the recitativo secco was replaced by a recitative accompanied by a string quartet.

The Barber of Seville (Il barbiere di Siviglia)

Rossini's most famous opera Il barbiere di Siviglia was produced in the Carnival of 1816 in Rome. The libretto by Sterbini, a version of Beaumarchais' infamous stage play Barbier de Seville, was the same as that already used by Giovanni Paisiello in his own Barbiere, an opera which had enjoyed European popularity for more than a quarter of a century.

Much is made of how fast Rossini's opera was written, scholarship generally agreeing upon two weeks, considered miraculous by any standard. Later in life, Rossini claimed to have written the opera in twelve days, a feat so remarkable as to be unbelievable, though Rossini was widely known for his speed in composition.

When the opera made its debut as Count Almaviva on February 20, 1816, Paisiello’s admirers were extremely indignant, sabotaging the production by whistling and shouting during the entire first act. However, not long after the second performance, the opera became so successful that the fame of Paisiello's opera was transferred to Rossini's, to which the title The Barber of Seville passed as an inalienable heritage.

Rossin's marriage and mid-career

Between 1815 and 1823 Rossini produced 20 operas. Of these Otello formed the climax to his reform of serious opera, and offers a suggestive contrast with the treatment of the same subject at a similar point of artistic development by the composer Giuseppe Verdi. In Rossini’s time the tragic close was so distasteful to the public of Rome that it was necessary to invent a happy conclusion to Otello.

The spirit of the times (1817) is illustrated by Rossini’s acceptance of the subject of Cinderella for a libretto only on the condition that the supernatural element should be omitted. The opera La Cenerentola was as successful as Barbiere. The absence of a similar precaution in the production of his Mosè in Egitto led to disaster in the scene depicting the passage of the Israelites through the Red Sea, when the defects in stage contrivance always raised a laugh, so that the composer was at length compelled to introduce the chorus "Dal tuo stellato Soglio" to divert attention from the dividing waves.

In 1822, four years after the production of this work, Rossini married the coloratura soprano Isabella Colbran. In the same year, he directed his Cenerentola in Vienna, where Zelmira was also performed.

After this he returned to Bologna and then received an invitation from Prince Metternich to come to Viena and "assist in the general re-establishment of harmony." It was too tempting to refuse, and he arrived there when the Congress of Viena opened on October 20, 1822. Here he made friends with Chateaubriand and Dorothea Lieven.

In 1823, at the suggestion of the manager of the King’s Theatre, London, he came to England, being much fêted on his way through Paris. In England he was given a generous welcome, which included an introduction to King George IV and the receipt of £7000 after a residence of five months.

In 1824 he became musical director of the Théâtre Italien in Paris at a salary of £800 per annum, and when the agreement came to an end he was rewarded with the offices of Chief Composer to the King and Inspector-General of Singing in France, to which was attached the same income. At the age of 32, Rossini was able to go into semi-retirement with essentially financial independence.

End of his career

The production of his Guillaume Tell in 1829 brought his career as a writer of opera to a close. The libretto was by Étienne Jouy and Hippolyte Bis, but their version was revised by Armand Marrast. The music is remarkable for its freedom from the conventions utilized by Rossini in his earlier works, and marks a transitional stage in the history of opera. Though a very good opera, it is rarely heard uncut today, as the original score runs more than four hours in performance.

In 1829 he returned to Bologna. His mother had died in 1827, and he was anxious to be with his father. Arrangements for his subsequent return to Paris on a new agreement were upset by the abdication of Charles X and the July Revolution of 1830. Rossini, who had been considering the subject of Faust for a new opera, returned to Paris in the November of that year.

Six movements of his Stabat Mater were written in 1832 and the rest in 1839, the year of his father's death. The success of the work bears comparison with his achievements in opera but his comparative silence during the period from 1832 to his death in 1868 makes his biography appear almost like the narrative of two lives — the life of swift triumph, and the long life of seclusion, of which biographers give us pictures in stories of the composer's cynical wit, his speculations in fish culture, his mask of humility and indifference.

Later years

His first wife died in 1845, and political disturbances in the Romagna area compelled him to leave Bologna in 1847, the year of his second marriage with Olympe Pélissier, who had sat for Vernet for his picture of Judith and Holofernes. After living for a time in Florence he settled in Paris in 1855, where his house was a centre of artistic society. He died at his country house at Passy on Friday November 13, 1868 and was buried in Père Lachaise Cemetery, Paris, France. In 1887 his remains were moved to the Basilica of S. Croce in Florence, where they now rest.

Honors

He was a foreign associate of the Institute, grand officer of the Legion of Honour, and the recipient of innumerable orders.

Notes

In his compositions Rossini plagiarized even more freely from himself than from other musicians, and few of his operas are without such admixtures introduced in the form of arias or overtures. For example, in Il Barbiere there is an aria for the Count (often omitted) 'Cessa di piu resistere', which Rossini used (with minor changes) in Le Nozze di Teti e di Peleo and in La Cenerentola (the cabaletta for Angelina's Rondo is almost unchanged).

A characteristic mannerism in his orchestral scoring, a long, steady build of sound, creating "tempests in teapots by beginning in a whisper and rising to a flashing, glittering storm" earned him the nickname of "Monsieur Crescendo".

Operas by Rossini

* La cambiale di matrimonio (The Bill of Marriage) - 1810
* L'equivoco stravagante - 1811
* Demetrio e Polibio - 1812
* L'inganno felice - 1812
* Ciro in Babilonia (or La caduta di Baldassare) - 1812
* La scala di seta (The Silk Ladder) - 1812
* La pietra del paragone - 1812
* L'occasione fa il ladro (or Il cambio della valigia) - 1812
* Il Signor Bruschino (or Il figlio per azzardo) - 1813
* Tancredi - 1813
* L'italiana in Algeri (The Italian Girl in Algiers)- 1813
* Aureliano in Palmira - 1813
* Il turco in Italia (The Turk in Italy) - 1814
* Sigismondo - 1814
* Elisabetta, regina d'Inghilterra (Elizabeth, Queen of England) - 1815
* Torvaldo e Dorliska - 1815
* Il barbiere di Siviglia (The Barber of Seville) (or L'inutile precauzione) - based on the play Le Barbier de Séville (also known as Almaviva) - 1816
* La Gazzetta (or Il matrimonio per concorso) - 1816
* Otello (or Il moro di Venezia) - 1816
* La Cenerentola (Cinderella, or La bontà in trionfo) - 1817
* La gazza ladra (or The Thieving Magpie) - 1817
* Armida - 1817
* Adelaide di Borgogna or Ottone, re d'Italia - 1817
* Mosè in Egitto (Moses in Egypt) - 1818
* Adina or Il califfo di Bagdad - 1818
* Ricciardo e Zoraide - 1818
* Ermione - 1819
* Eduardo e Cristina - 1819
* La donna del lago (The Lady of the Lake) - 1819
* Bianca e Falliero (or Il consiglio dei tre) - 1819
* Maometto secondo - 1820
* Matilde di Shabran (Mathilde di Shabran, or Bellezza e Cuor di Ferro) - 1821
* Zelmira - 1822
* Semiramide - 1823
* Il viaggio a Reims (Journey to Reims) (or L'albergo del giglio d'oro) - 1825
* Le siège de Corinthe - 1826 (a revision of Maometto secondo)
* Moïse et Pharaon (or Le passage de la Mer Rouge) - 1827 (a revision of Mosè in Egitto)
* Le comte Ory - 1828
* Guillaume Tell (William Tell)

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