I puritani - WikiHQ

thumb|upright|Vincenzo Bellini

' (The Puritans) is an 1835 opera by Vincenzo Bellini. It was originally written in two acts and changed to three acts before the premiere on the advice of Gioachino Rossini, with whom the young composer had become friends. The music was set to a libretto by Count Carlo Pepoli, an Italian émigré poet whom Bellini had met at a salon run by the exile Princess Belgiojoso, which became a meeting place for many Italian revolutionaries. The opera is based on Têtes Rondes et Cavaliers (Roundheads and Cavaliers), a historical play written by Jacques-François Ancelot and Joseph Xavier Saintine and set in the English Civil War. Except for its title, the opera is not in any way based on Walter Scott's 1816 novel Old Mortality (translated into Italian in 1825 as I Puritani di Scozia), despite some claims to the contrary.

When Bellini arrived in Paris in mid-August 1833, he had intended to stay only about three weeks, the main aim being to continue the negotiations with the Paris Opéra which he had begun on his way to London a few months earlier. These negotiations came to nothing, but by October he had decided to spend the winter in Paris, especially as both Il pirata and I Capuleti e i Montecchi were to be given by the Théâtre-Italien that season. The offer from the Théâtre came in January 1834; he accepted because "the pay was richer than what I had received in Italy up to then, though only by a little; then because of so magnificent a company; and finally so as to remain in Paris at others' expense."

Taking from April until its premiere the following January, Bellini had time to ensure that the opera was as close to perfection as possible. After the premiere, Bellini reported to his friend Francesco Florimo in Naples that:

<blockquote>The French had all gone mad; there were such noise and such shouts that they themselves were astonished at being so carried away ... In a word, my dear Florimo, it was an unheard of thing, and since Saturday, Paris has spoken of it in amazement</blockquote>

It was to be Bellini's final work; he died in September 1835 at the age of 33.

Composition history

Search for a suitable source for a libretto

thumb|upright|Cristina Trivulzio Belgiojoso 1832, by [[Francesco Hayez (detail)]]

Upon his arrival in Paris, Bellini quickly entered into the fashionable world of the Parisian salons, including that run by Princess Belgiojoso whom he had met in Milan. In addition to the many writers of the time, among the musical figures which he would have encountered were several Italians such as Michele Carafa and Luigi Cherubini, then in his seventies. Thus, for most of the remainder of 1833, Bellini's musical activity was very limited. He pleaded guilty in the letter to Florimo in March 1834 noting that the city's attractions were immense.

thumb|left|In 1829 the [[19th-century Théâtre-Italien|Théâtre-Italien was performing in the first Salle Favart]]

The contract to write a new opera for the Théâtre-Italien, which was signed in January 1834, called for it to be presented at the end of that year. Once it was signed, Bellini began to look around for a suitable subject and, in a letter to Florimo of 11 March 1834, he expresses some frustrations, noting: "I am about to lose my mind over the plot of the opera for Paris, as it has been impossible to find a suitable subject for my purpose and adaptable to the company". The chosen source of the libretto was identified as a play performed in Paris only six months before in September 1833. When first shown the play and other possible subjects by Pepoli, in the opinion of writer William Weaver, "it was clearly the heroine's madness that attracted the composer and determined his choice.

Working with Pepoli

thumb|upright|Librettist Carlo Pepoli

In his letter to Ferlito of 11 April, Bellini provides a synopsis of the opera, indicating that his favourite singers, Giulia Grisi, Luigi Lablache, Giovanni Battista Rubini, and Antonio Tamburini, would all be available for the principal roles, and that he would begin to write the music by 15 April if he had received the verses. Before the collaboration had got underway and initially impressed by the quality of Pepoli's verses in general, Bellini had prepared the way for his librettist by providing him with a scenario of thirty-nine scenes (thus compressing the original drama into manageable proportions), reducing the number of characters from nine to seven and at the same time, giving them names of a more Italianate, singable quality. For Bellini, the process of both overseeing the writing of the libretto and working with Pepoli was a struggle, added to by a period of illness. But, to balance the situation, William Weaver comments that "to some extent Bellini could compensate for Pepoli's deficiencies with his own first-hand theatrical experience" and suggests that some of that experience had been "acquired from Romani." At the same time, he laid out one basic rule for the librettist to follow:

<blockquote>Carve into your head in adamantine letters: The opera must draw tears, terrify people, make them die through singing

When nothing came of negotiations with Naples for a new opera, Bellini composed an alternative version intended for the famous Maria Malibran, who was to sing Amina (in La sonnambula) at the Teatro di San Carlo in Naples in 1835. However, she died exactly a year to the day after the composer, and so this version was not performed on stage until 10 April 1986 at the Teatro Petruzzelli in Bari, with Katia Ricciarelli in the title role.

Critical reaction to Pepoli's work on Puritani

thumb|Drawing for a cover of I puritani (undated)

Given Bellini's own expressions of frustration at working with a new librettist for the first time, one musicologist, Mary Ann Smart, provides a different point of view in regard to Pepoli's approach to writing a libretto. Firstly, she addresses the issue of Pepoli's inexperience:

<blockquote>An address that Pepoli delivered to prize-winning students in Bologna in 1830 reveals not only a surprisingly broad grasp of operatic repertoire but also some forceful ideas about how music could provoke political feeling. Pepoli adopts a modern aesthetic agenda, condemning vocal ornamentation as a dilution of dramatic sense and attacking imitation as cheapening music's inherent, nonverbal language. After touching on exemplary passages from operas by Francesco Morlacchi, Nicola Vaccai, and Vincenzo Bellini, Pepoli turns to the "Marseillaise", arguing that it melds music and poetry perfectly to arouse feeling and provoke action.</blockquote>

Quoting Pepoli, Smart continues: "for this song [the "Marseillaise"] the people fight, win, triumph: Europe and the world shouted Liberty!". Smart then examines the relationship between Pepoli's 1830 views and how they appear to be manifested in what he wrote for I puritani:

<blockquote>The Italian phrase Pepoli uses here, [i.e. in discussing the "Marseillaise"] gridavano Libertà, strikingly anticipates the duet "Suoni la tromba" in I puritani, in which the two basses step outside of the opera's dreamy and non teleological plot for an isolated moment of patriotic fervor. For their homeland they will take up arms and gladly face death: Suoni la tromba, e intrepido/ Io pugnerò da forte/ Bello è affrontar la morte gridando "Libertà" ("Let the trumpet sound, and fearless I'll fight with all my strength. It is beautiful to face death shouting 'liberty')."</blockquote>

Then she recounts how Bellini reacted to what she describes as Pepoli's "hotheaded patriotism" which appears in librettist's poetry. When he wrote to Pepoli that his "liberal bent..terrifies me", Bellini's other concern, which proved to be correct, was that words such as libertà would have to be removed if the opera was to be performed in Italy.

Nevertheless, the Suoni la tromba which Bellini described as his "Hymn to Liberty" and which had initially been placed in the opera's first act was enthusiastically received by the composer: "My dear Pepoli, I hasten to express my great satisfaction with the duet I received by post this morning ... the whole is magnificent..."

Perceived competition from Donizetti

Around the middle of April 1834, Bellini became concerned when he learned that Gaetano Donizetti would be composing for the Théâtre-Italien during the same season as the one for which he was writing. According to Weinstock, quoting letters sent to Florimo in Italy at around that time (and continuing almost up to I puritanis premiere), Bellini perceived this to be a plot orchestrated by Rossini and expressed his frustrations in a long, rambling letter of 2,500 words to Florimo of 11 March 1834. As it transpired, Bellini's total success vastly outshone Donizetti's moderate one (Marin Faliero, given in March 1835, two months after I puritani).

The score is completed

By September Bellini was writing to Florimo of being able to "polish and re-polish" in the three remaining months before rehearsals and he expresses happiness with Pepoli's verses ("a very beautiful trio for the two basses and La Grisi") and by around mid-December he had submitted the score for Rossini's approval.

Rossini is known to have recommended one change to the placement of the "Hymn to Liberty", which had initially appeared in the first act but which Bellini had already realised could not remain in its written form if the opera was to be given in Italy. Instead of two acts, with the "Hymn" appearing midway in the second act, Rossini proposed that it be a three-act opera with Suoni la tromba ending act 2, arguing that the effect would always be likely to create an ovation, something which he rightly foretold. Later, the successful dress rehearsal, he wrote: "... my very dear Rossini ... now loves me as a son".

With rehearsals planned for late December/early January,

Roles

thumb|upright=0.8|Antonio Tamburini sang Riccardo – Lithograph by [[Josef Kriehuber]]

{|class="wikitable"

!Role

!Voice type

!Premiere cast, 24 January 1835

|Lord Arturo Talbo

|tenor

|Elvira, betrothed to Arturo

|soprano

|Giulia Grisi

|Sir Riccardo Forth, the Puritan leader in love with Elvira

|baritone

|Antonio Tamburini

|Sir Giorgio Valton,

But, she continues to analyse other aspects of the duet:

<blockquote>We should also factor in the force of Pepoli's verses with their promotion of martyrdom and the utter regularity of the music's march-like phrasing, rare in Bellini's ethereal style. Suoni la tromba is a perplexing historical anomaly: an almost isolated example of an extroverted, overtly political statement heard at the Théâtre-Italien, and an equally rare link between Pepoli's political persona and his role as poet-for-hire. But such overt calls for revolution represent just one possible 'political' style. They are not necessarily the most forceful or influential variety of intervention.

In the film Fitzcarraldo, the cast of I puritani are being transported on Fitzcarraldo's boat. They perform parts of the opera in full costume and sing "A te, o cara" (from act 1, scene 3) as Fitzcarraldo makes his triumphal return to Iquitos.

References

Notes

Cited sources

External links

Libretto (in Italian) on opera.stanford.edu
Italian libretto with English translation on archive.org
Pardo, Daniel, "Bellini: I puritani", Opera Today online, 11 January 2006