Il furioso all'isola di San Domingo

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Work data
Title: Il furioso all'isola di San Domingo
Title page of the libretto, Rome 1833

Title page of the libretto, Rome 1833

Shape: Opera semiseria in two acts
Original language: Italian
Music: Gaetano Donizetti
Libretto : Jacopo Ferretti
Literary source: Episode from El ingenioso hidalgo Don Quixote de la Mancha by Miguel de Cervantes
Premiere: January 2, 1833
Place of premiere: Rome, Teatro Valle
Playing time: approx. 2 ¼ hours
Place and time of the action: Santo Domingo , 16th century
people
  • Cardenio ( baritone )
  • Eleonora, his wife ( soprano )
  • Fernando, Cardenio's brother ( tenor )
  • Bartolomeo Merfoles, a merchant ( bass )
  • Marcella, his daughter (soprano)
  • Kaidamà, her servant ( bass buffo )
  • Country people, fishermen ( choir )

Il furioso all'isola di San Domingo (English: The madman on the island of San Domingo ) is an opera semiseria in two acts by Gaetano Donizetti . The libretto was written by Jacopo Ferretti . It was Donizetti's first opera in which a baritone sang the lead role.

history

After the completion of L'elisir d'amore , Donizetti traveled to Rome with his wife Virginia, where he signed the contract for Il furioso , then the couple traveled on to Naples, where the premiere of Sancia di Castiglia was to take place in November . In August Donizetti received the libretto, interrupted work on Sancia and began composing.

The successful premiere took place on January 2, 1833 in the Teatro Valle in Rome. Elisa Orlandi (Eleonora), Filippo Valentini (Bartolomeo), Marianna Franceschini (Marcella), Lorenzo Salvi (Fernando) and Ferdinando Lauretti (Kaidamà) sang. The then 22-year-old Giorgio Ronconi , for whom Donizetti had written the role, sang the Cardenio .

The opera became a great success and was one of Donizetti's most frequently performed works in the following decades. After a performance in Trieste in 1889 , the opera was no longer performed until 1958 (Siena). Today the opera has practically been forgotten and is only rarely played. The last recording was made in 1987 under Carlo Rizzi with Luciana Serra as Eleonora. In 2006 the opera was given in the Musiktheater im Revier in Gelsenkirchen.

action

first act

Bartolomeo catches his daughter Marcella, who wants to bring the crazy Portuguese Cardenio food. This had been betrayed by his wife Eleonora and had fled into madness on the island of San Domingo. A ship sank off the coast. Among the survivors is Eleonora, who, plagued by remorse, wants to ask Cardenio for forgiveness. Bartolomeo and his daughter Marcella take care of them, and Eleonora confides their secrets to Marcella.

Bartolomeo's servant Kaidamà comes to Cardenio, but in his madness he is first mistaken for his former lover and caressed, then again for his rival and beaten up.

A second ship arrives. In it is Cardenio's brother Fernando, who was sent by his mother because she wants to see her son Cardenio again before she dies.

Bartolomeo has decided to look after Cardenio himself and he tells him his life story. Elenora, Fernando, Kaidamà and Marcella listen to him. Cardenio is happy to see his brother again, but he has to be prevented from attacking Eleonora with a knife.

Second act

Eleonora dares to approach Cardenio again, but he does not recognize her. Shortly thereafter, he clears up and takes her for a walk and explains that he forgives her. But suddenly he pulls out the dagger again, which his brother can steal from him. Eleonora flees. Cardenio plunges into the sea, Fernando follows him and they both reach the beach safely. Fernando still hopes to turn around in his brother's fate.

Bartolomeo sends Kaidamà to a tribal chief to get two pistols. He meets Cardenio, who in a clear moment asks his forgiveness for his beating. But Kaidamà does not forgive him. Cardenio licks the two pistols from him and takes them to Eleonora. He refuses to start a new life with her and instead proposes a solemn double suicide. To atone for her guilt, she agrees, but Fernando intervenes just in time. Cardenio is ready to atone for his wife's guilt and to take his own life into his own hands again. Everything will be fine.

orchestra

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

literature

  • Robert Steiner-Isenmann: Gaetano Donizetti. His life and his operas. Hallwag, Bern 1982. ISBN 3-444-10272-0 , pp. 142ff, 446ff

Web links

Commons : Il furioso all'isola di San Domingo  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Luciana Serra's discography , accessed February 24, 2016.
  2. ↑ Peter Bilsing: Donizetti flies over the cuckoo's nest. Review of the Gelsenkirchen performance on September 2, 2006 in Online Musik Magazin , accessed on February 24, 2016.
  3. ^ Norbert Miller : Il furioso nell'isola di San Domingo. In: Piper's Encyclopedia of Musical Theater . Volume 1: Works. Abbatini - Donizetti. Piper, Munich / Zurich 1986, ISBN 3-492-02411-4 , pp. 751-753.