Francesco Cilea

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Francesco Cilea. 1910

Francesco Cilea (born July 23, 1866 in Palmi , Reggio Calabria province ; † November 20, 1950 in Varazze , Savona province ) was an Italian composer , music teacher and director of musical training centers.

Live and act

As he remembers, Francesco Cilea made the decision to devote himself to music as a boy after seeing the finale of the opera Norma by Vincenzo Bellini (1801–1835) - played by the municipal band in his hometown of Palmi. On the advice of Francesco Florimo (1800-1888) he studied from 1879 at the Conservatory "San Pietro a Majella" in Naples with Beniamino Cesi (1845-1907) and Paolo Serrao (1830-1907), where he stood out for his hard work and intelligence. He received a gold medal from the Ministry of Public Education and an appointment as first master student. At the end of his studies in Naples he wrote the opera Gina in 1889 , which was successfully performed in the conservatory's small theater. This little opera, in which the naivety of the libretto competes with the music, was so appreciated by the critic and publisher Edoardo Sonzogno that he commissioned another opera from Cilea called La Tilda , based on the libretto by Angelo Zanardini , based on the style the Verism should follow the model of the Cavalleria rusticana by Pietro Mascagni (1863-1945).

After completing his studies in Naples, Cilea worked from 1889 to 1898 at the same institute as a teacher of piano and harmony . It was during this time that his second opera La Tilda was successfully performed on April 7, 1892 at the Teatro Pagliano in Florence . Performances in many other Italian theaters followed. On September 24th of the same year La Tilda was performed in the exhibition theater in Vienna , where other operas from the Sonzogno house could also be heard. Cilea herself had valued his second opera less; rather, he accepted the performance successes for the sake of Sonzogno, also in order not to miss the opportunity to become known. The orchestral score has been lost so that La Tilda can no longer be performed in our time, but the fresh and catchy melodies are recognizable in the surviving piano reduction (vocal parts and piano). Cilea's third opera, L'Arlesiana , based on the drama by Alphonse Daudet (1840–1897), was performed on November 27, 1897 with the libretto by Leopoldo Marenco at the Teatro Lirico in Milan . The name of the then very young Enrico Caruso (1873–1921) stands out on the cast list for this performance, who sang the included piece Il lamento di Federico with unusual success - a romance that is still considered a “pulling piece” for tenors today. Overall, however, L'Arlesiana was more of a failure at the time. Cilea, however, was convinced of the value of this opera and tried to improve it right after the premiere right into the last years of his life. This applied to fine details, but he wasn't afraid of drastic interventions either. Today you can hardly find a measure that corresponds to the first version. Yet this opera was not a lasting success; with the exception of the 1930s, where a decree by the dictator Benito Mussolini , who ordered after the Italian conquest of Ethiopia and the subsequent sanctions of other countries, that only operas from those countries may be performed which did not join the sanctions. Cilea said literally: "I was lucky on this occasion."

After working in Naples, Cilea took over the position of teacher for harmony at the Instituto Musicale in Florence from 1898 to 1904 . It was during this time that his fourth opera, Adriana Lecouvreur, premiered at the Teatro lirico in Milan on November 6, 1902, again with Enrico Caruso as the singer. It is a stage work based on the libretto by Arturo Colautti based on a play by Eugène Scribe (1791–1861), which takes place in 18th century France. This work is the best known opera by Cilea among today's theater audiences, which is based on the successful combination of melodic spontaneity according to the Neapolitan school and a modern harmonic spelling based on the more recent French model.

Cilea's last opera, Gloria , was first performed on April 15, 1907 at the Teatro alla Scala in Milan under the direction of Arturo Toscanini (1867–1957). It is a tragedy in three acts based on the libretto by Colautti , based on a play by Victorien Sardou (1831–1908). It shows a remarkable compositional further development of Cilea compared to his contemporaries (apart from Giacomo Puccini ), which made it difficult for the audience to understand. Despite its value and certain relative successes, the opera was therefore not a success overall and was boycotted by the publisher Ricordi in Milan, although the publisher Sonzogno did little to counteract this. This caused Cilea to finally give up opera. There is evidence from 1909 for a planned opera called Il matrimonio selvaggio , but it was not performed and sketches of libretti for Il ritorno dell'amore (by Renato Simoni ) and Malena and La rosa di Pompei (both by Ettore Moschino ) , dated “Naples, May 20, 1924”; but they were not followed up.

Cilea continued his work with the composition of vocal and instrumental chamber music as well as symphonic music. From 1913 to 1916 he took over the management of the Vincenzo Bellini Conservatory in Palermo . In 1913 the performance of a symphonic poem on the text by Sem Benelli (1877-1949) in honor of Giuseppe Verdi (1813-1901) at the Carlo Felice Theater in Genoa . In 1916, Cilea returned to his first place of study in Naples, the Conservatory of San Pietro a Majella , and headed this institute until 1938, when he finished teaching at the age of 72, having received the honorary title of Accademico d'Italia . Cilea spent the last years of his life, which were overshadowed by illness and financial worries, in Rome and finally in the small Ligurian town of Varazze , where he was an honorary citizen. He died there on November 20, 1950. In memory of him, the Conservatory and Theater in Reggio Calabria are named after him; in addition, a mausoleum was built for him in his native Palmi and a street in the historic city center was named.

meaning

Francesco Cilea felt himself to be the last representative of the Neapolitan school ; accordingly, influences of this old school can be felt alongside an elegance that seems French. According to the musicologist Roman Vlad , the early version of Cilea's Cello Sonata (1888) even anticipated Maurice Ravel (1875–1937) stylistically . On the other hand, in his main work, the opera Adriana Lecouvreur , clear echoes of Jules Massenet (1842–1912), who valued him, can be heard. Cilea is also often referred to as a generation comrade of Pietro Mascagni and Umberto Giordano (1867–1948) as a composer of the veristic style, but this is only partially true; rather, echoes of Vincenzo Bellini and Edvard Grieg (1843–1907) are recognizable in his music . In Cilea's best operas, the bel canto vocal line predominates, as well as harmonic sophistication, tonal transparency and a fine melancholy mood. His opera Adriana Lecouvreur was largely forgotten after the first successful years and did not return to the repertoire of opera houses until the 1980s.

Works (selection)

  • Stage works
    • Gina (text: Enrico Golisciani based on Catherine ou La Croix d'or von Mélésville ), melodramma idillico in three acts, first performed in Naples in 1889
    • La Tilda (text: Anneldo Graziani [Angelo Zanardini] ), melodramma in three acts, first performance in Florence 1892
    • L'Arlesiana (text: Leopoldo Marenco based on Alphonse Daudet ), dramma lirico in four acts, world premiere in Milan 1897; 2nd version: three acts, performed in 1898, ibid. Version 3: three acts, performed in Naples in 1912
    • Adriana Lecouvreur (text: Arturo Colautti based on Eugène Scribe and Ernest-Wilfrid Legouvé ), commedia-dramma in four acts, first performance in Milan 1902
    • Gloria (text: Arturo Colautti ), dramma lirico in three acts, first performed in Milan in 1907, revised there in 1931
  • Vocal music
    • Il matrimonio selvaggio (1909, not performed)
    • Two litanies for male choir and organ (1887)
    • Il canto della vita (text: Sem Benelli ) for tenor, choir and orchestra (Genoa 1913), reworked in 1934 as an Ode sinfonica with a new text by Ettore Moschino
    • Songs for voice and piano, including Lontananza (text: Romeo Carugati , before 1904), Due liriche: Nel ridestarmi (text: Felice Soffrè ) and Vita breve (text: Annie Vivanti ) (both Naples 1923); the orchestral version from 1945 is unpublished
    • Dolce amor di povertate (Text: Iacopone da Todi ) (Milan 1949)
    • Tre vocalizzi da concerto for voice and piano (Milan 1930)
  • Instrumental music
    • Scherzo in D flat major for piano (1883)
    • Piano Trio (1886)
    • Suite for orchestra (Naples 1887); only the first two of the four movements are published
    • Tre piccoli pezzi for piano (Naples 1888)
    • Berceuse for piano op.20 (1895)
    • Trois petit morceaux op.28 (1895)
    • Cello Sonata in D major op.38 (1888)
    • Suite (vecchio stile) for piano op.42 (Milan 1916)
    • Invocazione for piano (Milan 1922)
    • Tre pezzi op.43 (Naples 1923)
    • Tema con variazioni for violin and piano (Milan 1932)
    • Piccola Suite for Orchestra (Milan 1936)
    • Suite in E major for violin and piano (Milan 1948)
    • Album with ten piano pieces for the youth

literature

  • Ettore Moschino: Sulle opere di Francesco Cilea , Milan 1932
  • M. Pilati: Francesco Cilea , in Bollettino bibliografico musicale 7 No. 6, June 1932, pages 5 to 16
  • Gajanus: Francesco Cilea e la sua opera , Bologna 1939
  • A. della Corte: Appunti per una biografia di Francesco Cilea in Scenario 8, Rome 1939
  • R. de Rensis: Francesco Cilea , Rome, NeoClassica, 2016 (I ed. Palmi 1950) ISBN 978-88-9374-007-4 .
  • R. Meloncelli in the Dizionario biografico degli Italiani , so far 42 volumes, Rome 1960 and following
  • R. Mariani: Francesco Cilea, ultimo campione di una grande scuola in Verismo in musica e altri studi , Florence 1976
  • E. Voss: Francesco Cilea, "L'Arlesiana" and "Adriana Lecouvreur" in Piper's Enzyklopädie des Musiktheater, 6 volumes, Munich / Zurich 1986–1997
  • Ritorno di Cilea , Congress Report Varezze 1989, published Rome 1991
  • “La dolcissima effigie”. Studi su Francesco Cilea , edited by Gaetano Pitarresi, Reggio Calabria 1994, second edition 1999, with a detailed catalog raisonné of the manuscripts kept in Palmi
  • H.-J. Wagner: Foreign worlds. The Opera of Italian Verismo , Stuttgart-Weimar 1999, pages 293 to 322
  • Giuseppe Naccari: Francesco Cilèa. Controluce . Laruffa, Reggio Calabria 2006, ISBN 88-7221-293-6 .
  • Gaetano Pitarresi (Ed.): Francesco Cilea e il suo tempo. Atti del Convegno internazionale di studi . Edizioni del Conservatorio di musica Francesco Cilea, Reggio Calabria 2002, ISBN 88-87970-01-7 , (Conservatorio di musica Francesco Cilea, Istituto superiore di studi musicali, Reggio Calabria: Sopplimenti musicali Ser. 1 .: Documenti e studi musicologici 5) , (Congress October 20-22, 2000).
  • Francesco Cilea: Composizioni vocali da camera / Vocal Chamber Music. Edited by Giuseppe Filianoti . Ricordi , Milan 2016, ISBN 979-0-04-141384-6 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Music in the past and present (MGG). Volume 4, Bärenreiter-Verlag , Kassel and Basel 2000, ISBN 3-7618-1114-4
  2. ^ Marc Honegger, Günther Massenkeil : The great lexicon of music. Volume 2, Herder Verlag , Freiburg im Breisgau 1976, ISBN 3-451-18052-9
  3. ^ Enciclopedia della musica. Volume 1, Ricordi Verlag , Milan 1963/64
personal data
SURNAME Cilea, Francesco
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Italian composer and music teacher
DATE OF BIRTH July 23, 1866
PLACE OF BIRTH Palmi , Reggio Calabria Province
DATE OF DEATH November 20, 1950
Place of death Varazze , Savona Province