Pavlos Carrer

Pavlos Carrer

Pavlos Carrer ( Greek Παύλος Καρρέρ , Greek Karreris (Καρρέρης), Italian Paolo Carrer ; born May 12, 1829 in Zakynthos ; † June 7, 1896 ibid) was a Greek composer. He is considered the most important opera composer of the early Ionian School and the first to bring modern Greek history to the opera stage.

Among Carrer's teachers were Giuseppe Cricca and Francesco Mirangini, the directors of the Philharmonic Society of Zakynthos, and, according to Spyros Motsenigos, Nikolaos Mantzaros in Corfu. 1850–57 Carrer studied in Milan with Raimondo Bosserone, Pietro Tassistro and Winter. This is where his first opera, Dante e Beatrice (1852), premiered at the Teatro Carcano in 1852. Isabella d'Aspeno followed in 1854 at the Teatro San Giacomo in Corfu, La rediviva (1856) again in Milan.

First page of the Isabella d'Aspeno manuscript , dedicated to the Zakynthos Philharmonic Society

In 1857 Carrer returned to Zakynthos and also performed the stage works he had composed there. He married the soprano Isavella Iatra, who had sung the title roles in his operas. He also dealt with his first opera material from the history of the Greek War of Independence - excerpts from his opera Markos Botsaris were presented to King Otto in Athens in 1858, but initially there was no performance because the young Greek state was patriotic out of consideration for the European Powers did not appear opportune and a performance in the United States of the Ionian Islands, under British protectorate, as a possible demonstration for unification with Greece was undesirable. It was not premiered in Patras until 1861, and the performance in Athens in 1875 was a triumphant success and established Carrer's success as a composer throughout Greece. Other works with similar subjects followed: Frossini (1879 Patras) and Despo o L'eroina di Suli (“Despo or Die Heldin von Souli ”, 1883 Patras), which were extremely successful throughout Greece and both are available on CD (Label Lyra ). At the same time, Carrer began to teach in Zakynthos, where he was temporarily director of the Philharmonic Society. In Zakynthos, Carrer had a villa built based on a design by the architect Ernst Ziller .

Anthos ke Avgoula . Song after Dionysios Solomos

As a composer, Carrer forms the bridge between composers of the early Ionian school such as Iosif Liveralis and the second great Greek opera composer, Spyros Samaras , who has also become internationally known . His style, which is comparable to that of early Verdi , developed increasingly personal traits as he turned to Greek subjects. After 1910, the extraordinary success of Carrer's compositions gradually waned; Almost half of the 13 Opera Carrers have been lost. In 2003 the incomplete opera Marathon Salamis was premiered in its completed version at the Teatro Olympia in Athens.

During his time in Milan, Carrer also wrote a number of chamber music works, namely operatic paraphrases for flute and piano. In addition to his operas, he left behind an extensive oeuvre of songs, as well as piano music and liturgical choral music.

literature

• Giorgos Leotsakos : Pavlos Carrer , in: The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians , London 2001, ISBN 0-333-60800-3

Web links

• Article about Pavlos Carrer on the pages of the Greek music library "Lilian Voudouri" with numerous music examples (Greek)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Article about Carrer at the Greek Music Library "Lilian Voudouri" (Greek)
2. ↑ Friedbert Ficker Gert Morzinek, Barbara Mazurek: Ernst Ziller - A Saxon architect and architectural historian in Greece; The Ziller family. Fink, Lindenberg i. Allgäu 2003, p. 4, ISBN 3898700763 .
3. ↑ Criticism of the performance ( Memento of the original from May 15, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (engl.)