Aroldo

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Work data
Title: Aroldo
Title page of the libretto, Milan 1857

Title page of the libretto, Milan 1857

Shape: Opera in four acts
Original language: Italian
Music: Giuseppe Verdi
Libretto : Francesco Maria Piave
Literary source: The Betrothed by Walter Scott and Harold, the Last of the Saxon Kings by Edward Bulwer-Lytton
Premiere: August 16, 1857
Place of premiere: Teatro Nuovo , Rimini
Playing time: about 2 hours
Place and time of the action: Egbert's Castle in Kent; Scotland, around 1200
people
  • Aroldo, Saxon crusader ( tenor )
  • Mina, his wife, Egbert's daughter ( soprano )
  • Egberto, an old knight, vassal of Kenth ( baritone )
  • Briano, pious hermit ( bass )
  • Godvino, adventurer, Egbert's guest (tenor)
  • Enrico, Mina's cousin (tenor)
  • Elena, Enrico's cousin ( mezzo-soprano )
  • Jorg, servant of Aroldo (silent role)
  • Knights, ladies, crusaders, squires, hunters, people ( choir and extras ).

Aroldo is an opera in four acts by Giuseppe Verdi based on a libretto by Francesco Maria Piave . Behind Aroldo is the reworked and completely redesigned opera Stiffelio , which, under pressure from the censors, was only allowed to be performed in a distorted form in Italy. The first performance of Aroldo took place on August 16, 1857 in the Teatro Nuovo in Rimini . The Betrothed by Walter Scott and Harold, the Last of the Saxon Kings by Edward Bulwer-Lytton served as the literary template for the new plot .

action

prehistory

After the Third Crusade under Richard the Lionheart (1st act, 2nd appearance), the crusader Aroldo returned from Palestine to the castle of his father-in-law Egberto in Kent. One of his companions is the pious hermit Briano, who saved his life near Ascalon in Palestine and is now his spiritual aid. During Aroldo's absence, the adventurer Godvino, who was a guest at Egberto's castle, seduced Aroldo's wife Mina.

first act

First picture: Hall in Egberto's castle. Table with writing implements

After a nine-minute sinfonia (overture), the actual plot begins. A choir celebrates Aroldo's return from an adjoining room where a banquet is being held in honor of Aroldo. Mina is plagued by remorse and desperately rushes out of the banquet room. Aroldo comes in, accompanied by Briano. Aroldo once again confesses his love, which kept him alive in Palestine. When Aroldo notices Minas' disturbance, he thinks of today's wedding day and reproaches her for not wearing his mother's ring anymore. Mina is desperate, but cannot find any explanatory words. After a trumpet signal announcing the arrival of Aroldo's entourage, Aroldo and Briano hurry away, leaving Mina alone. Egberto, Mina's father, who has since become suspicious, comes in as a surprise. Mina wants to confess everything to Aroldo in one letter, but Egberto snatches the letter from her and, for the sake of honor and duty, demands that Mina stay with Aroldo, Aroldo say nothing and bear her shame alone.

Second picture: Festively illuminated hall suite. A large book with a lock is on top of a piece of medieval furniture

Godvino, feeling abandoned by Mina, sneaks in and puts a letter in the book. Briano surprises him, but does not recognize him as he disappears among the guests pouring in. When Enrico enters with the guests and takes the book, Briano says that it is Enrico and briefly informs Aroldo. The guests surround Aroldo and force him to recount his adventures on the crusade. Aroldo tells of a villain in Palestine who treacherously defiled his friend's honor and put a love letter in a locked book. Then Aroldo takes the book and demands that Mina open it. When she refuses, he breaks the lock and a letter falls from the book. Egberto takes the letter and tears it up. Aroldo snaps at him angrily, but Mina intervenes. Egberto hisses at Godvino that he challenges him to a duel with swords at the cemetery and insults him as a traitor ("traditor").

Second act

Old graveyard. In the middle a cross, on the right the gate of a church, in the background on the left Egberto's castle. Pale moonlight

Mina prays for forgiveness at her mother's grave. Godvino arrives and confesses his love to her. At her request to give her back the ring, the pledge of a sinful love, and to leave, he refuses. Egberto, armed with two swords, steps in and sends Mina away. Godvino refuses to fight until Egberto insults him as a shameful coward. Aroldo, stepping out of the church, discovers the fighters and forbids them to fight against each other, especially on consecrated ground. He disarms Godvino and extends his hand. When Godvino tries to take his hand, Egberto berates him for being the one who betrayed Aroldo. When Mina joins them, Aroldo learns the truth. Aroldo, who still does not want to believe it, begs Mina to justify himself, but she is silent. Aroldo now wants to fight Godvino himself and swears revenge. A chant sounds from the church. Briano, stepping out of the church, reminds Aroldo of his vows as a crusader and knight. When Mina, Godvino, Egberto and Briano again ask Aroldo for forgiveness, he wants to curse Mina. Briano points to the cemetery cross and Aroldo passes out at the foot of the cross.

Third act

Anteroom in Egberto's castle. Table with writing implements

Godvino has fled and has sent Mina a letter asking her to follow him. Egberto, who intercepted the letter, sees himself again dishonored and wants to take his own life with poison from a ring, but first writes a farewell letter to Aroldo. As he holds the ring to his lips, Briano enters in search of Aroldo and informs Egberto that he has tracked down Godvino. Egberto swears revenge again and leaves. Aroldo and after him Godvino enter. Godvino declares himself ready for a duel. Aroldo on the other hand asks him what he would do if he released Mina and both were allowed to spend a guilt-laden freedom together. Godvino hesitates. Aroldo has Mina called and urges Godvino into a side room so that he can overhear the conversation. After Mina enters, he gives her the letter of divorce (sic!) And demands that she sign it. Mina signs. Since she no longer feels bound by the promise made to her father, she calls Aroldo as a judge and confesses to him that she has always loved him and that she was seduced by Godvino. Aroldo swears revenge again, but Egberto forestalled him, enters with a bloody sword and says that he killed Godvino. Briano wants to take Aroldo, who still refuses to forgive Mina, to church. Aroldo speaks of a curse-laden house that he wants to escape from. Mina doesn't believe in forgiveness for her unwanted sin.

Fourth act

Landscape at Loch Lomond in Scotland. View of the lake and a hut

Aroldo and Briano settled down as hermits by the lake. The act begins with an evening choir of shepherds, reapers and hunters. Aroldo cannot overcome Mina's infidelity and vacillates between love and hatred. Briano urges him to pray at the evening bell. At night a storm breaks in, a half-destroyed boat threatens to capsize, and some men pull the wreck ashore with a rope. Egberto and Mina get out of the boat and ask to be admitted to the hut. When Aroldo recognized Mina, he was furious again. At that moment Briano steps out of the hut and quotes from the Bible “Il giusto un di ha detto…” (The righteous once said: The first stone should be cast by those who have never sinned. The woman rose and she was forgiven.) Egberto and Briano ask Aroldo several times to forgive Mina. Finally Aroldo overcomes himself and forgives. The opera closes with the words: “Trionfi la legge divina d'amor!” (The divine law of love wins!).

Instrumentation

The orchestral line-up for the opera includes the following instruments:

Work history

Emergence

The original version of Aroldo , Verdi's opera Stiffelio , was written between Luisa Miller and Rigoletto . The plot of the work, which was premiered in 1850 and dealt with the adultery of a Protestant pastor's wife, met with rejection even before the premiere in Trieste and had to be changed under pressure from the censors. At other Italian opera houses, too, the stiffelio was only allowed to be performed in mutilated and distorted form. As early as 1851 Verdi considered rewriting the work, but initially did not find the time. Nevertheless, Verdi was attached to this opera and wrote in 1856: “I can safely forget some of my operas that are not in circulation, because the choice of material was a mistake. However, there are two that I would not like to see forgotten: Stiffelio and La battaglia di Legnano . "

After Piave had rewritten, expanded and relocated the libretto to the time of the Crusades , Verdi began to rework the Stiffelio into Aroldo in the spring of 1856 and forbade his publisher Ricordi to continue to publish the sheet music for Stiffelio . Verdi composed some numbers from scratch. The decisive change compared to the Stiffelio was the relocation of the plot to the Middle Ages with the scenes in Kent and Scotland in the time after the Third Crusade under Richard the Lionheart . The priest Stiffelio became the crusader Aroldo, where Bulwer-Lyttons Harold was the namesake. A fourth act was added to the originally three-act opera.

Verdi interrupted the revision of the Stiffelio in 1856 in order to compose Simon Boccanegra . Thus, the final version of Aroldo was only completed before the composition of the masked ball .

Reception and classification

The world premiere of Aroldo at the Teatro Nuovo in Rimini under the conductor Angelo Mariani was a great success, and the opera was performed on almost every stage in Italy, including Vienna, New York, Spain and South America. Nevertheless, the work could not prevail and was hardly performed after 1870.

In Rolf Fath's opinion, Aroldo was the only one of Verdi's reworkings to remain “behind the first version of the opera” and “became more conventional”. The Verdi researcher Julian Budden also sees the Aroldo as "the least successful revision of Verdi" and a return to conventionality, whereby "the overall effect of the Aroldo [...] is far weaker than that of the Stiffelio".

In addition, the libretto suffers from weaknesses. Some scenes of the opera, especially in the 2nd and 3rd act, seem anachronistic , improbable and not very believable because the main character is contradicting itself and the Stiffelio shimmers through again and again .

Since the discovery of the original score of the Stiffelio in the late 1960s and the revival of the Stiffelio in 1968, it has been given preference over Aroldo in stage performances . Despite all objections, Budden sees an improvement in the musical flow of the Aroldo compared to the Stiffelio , so that the Aroldo "will always deserve its place in the Verdi canon".

Discography (selection)

literature

  • Julian Budden: Verdi. Leben und Werk , 2nd revised edition, Philipp Reclam jun., Stuttgart 2000, ISBN 3-15-010469-6 , pp. 253-254
  • Julian Budden (translator Christine Frobenius): Aroldo: The new version of an opera , supplement to the CD, Philips 2001
  • Rolf Fath: Reclam's Kleiner Verdi-Opernführer , Philipp Reclam jun., Stuttgart 2000, ISBN 3-15-018077-5 , pp. 85-86
  • Sebastian Werr, in: Anselm Gerhard and Uwe Schweikert (eds.): Verdi Handbuch , Metzler, Kassel 2002, ISBN 3-476-01768-0 , and Bärenreiter, Stuttgart and Weimar 2002, ISBN 3-7618-2017-8 , p 380-385
  • Heinz Wagner: The great manual of the opera , 2nd edition, Florian Noetzel Verlag, Wilhelmshaven 1995, ISBN 3-930656-14-0 , p. 744

Web links

Commons : Aroldo  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Julian Budden: Aroldo: The new version of an opera , supplement to the CD, Philips 2001, p. 30.
  2. ↑ a b German text in the translation by Gudrun Meier, in: Supplement to CD Aroldo, Philips 2001, p. 156.
  3. ↑ Michela Garda: Stiffelio / Aroldo. In: Piper's Encyclopedia of Musical Theater. Volume 6: Works. Spontini - Zumsteeg. Piper, Munich / Zurich 1997, ISBN 3-492-02421-1 , p. 429
  4. ↑ a b Quotation from Rolf Fath, Reclam's Kleiner Verdi-Opernführer , p. 85.
  5. ^ Letter to Cesare De Sanctis dated July 6, 1854, see Sebastian Werr in: Anselm Gerhard and Uwe Schweikert (eds.): Verdi Handbuch , p. 384.
  6. ^ Rolf Fath, Reclam's Little Verdi Opera Guide , p. 85.
  7. ↑ Sebastian Werr, in: Anselm Gerhard and Uwe Schweikert (eds.): Verdi Handbuch , p. 385.
  8. ^ Julian Budden: Verdi. Life and Work , Philipp Reclam 2000, p. 253.
  9. ^ Julian Budden: Verdi. Life and Work , Philipp Reclam 2000, p. 254.
  10. ↑ Extensive in Julian Budden: Aroldo: Die Neuaufnahm einer Oper , supplement to the CD, Philips 2001, pp. 32–33.
  11. ^ Julian Budden: Aroldo: The new version of an opera , supplement to the CD, Philips 2001, p. 33.
  12. ^ Quote from Julian Budden: Aroldo: The new version of an opera , supplement to the CD, Philips 2001, p. 34.