Son Escapes Fratricide by High Priestess Sister in 1779

Les Remords d’Oreste (1862), William-Adolphe Bouguereau
"Ô malhereuse Iphigénie" sung by Violeta Urmana

Iphigénie en Tauride (Iphigenia in Tauris) is an opera by Christoph Willibald Gluck in four acts. It was his fifth opera for the French stage. The libretto was written by Nicolas-François Guillard. With Iphigénie, Gluck took his operatic reform to its logical conclusion. The recitatives are shorter and they are récitatif accompagné (i.e. the strings and perhaps other instruments are playing, not just continuo accompaniment). The normal dance movements that one finds in the French tragédie en musique are almost entirely absent. The drama is ultimately based on the play Iphigenia in Tauris by the ancient Greek dramatist Euripides which deals with stories concerning the family of Agamemnon in the aftermath of the Trojan War. Iphigénie en Tauride was first performed in Paris on May 18, 1779, and was a great success. Some think that the head of the Paris Opéra, Devismes, had attempted to stoke up the rivalry between Gluck and Niccolò Piccinni, an Italian composer also resident in the French capital, by asking them both to set an opera on the subject of Iphigenia in Tauris. In the event, Piccinni's Iphigénie en Tauride was not premiered until January 1781 and did not enjoy the popularity that Gluck's work did. [Source]

Plot summary after the jump.

Lovelorn Venetian Singer Commits Suicide in 1876

La Gioconda is an opera in four acts by Amilcare Ponchielli set to an Italian libretto by Arrigo Boito, based on Angelo, tyran de Padoue, a play in prose by Victor Hugo, dating from 1835. (This is the same source as Gaetano Rossi had used for his libretto for Mercadante's Il giuramento in 1837). First performed in 1876, La Gioconda was a major success for Ponchielli, as well as the most successful new Italian opera between Verdi's Aida (1871) and Otello (1887). It is also a famous example of the Italian genre of grand opera, the equivalent of French Grand-Opéra. La Gioconda was first performed at the Teatro alla Scala, Milan, on April 8, 1876. It was especially successful in its third and final version first seen at the same theatre on March 28, 1880. The opera made its United States debut at the Metropolitan Opera on December 20, 1883. [Source]

"Suicidio" - Maria Callas


"E un anatema" - Aprile Millo and Dolora Zajick


"Voce di donna o d'angelo" - Margaret Harshaw

Greek Sorceress Murders Her Own Children in 1797

Medea (1964), Bernard Safran

"Médée is a French language opéra-comique by Luigi Cherubini. The libretto by François-Benoît Hoffmann (Nicolas Étienne Framéry) was based on Euripides' tragedy of Medea and Pierre Corneille's play Médée. The opera was premiered on March 13, 1797, at the Théâtre Feydeau, Paris. It met with a lukewarm reception and was not immediately revived. During the nineteenth- and most of the twentieth-century, it was usually performed in Italian translation as Medea, with the spoken dialogue replaced by recitatives not authorised by the composer." [Source]
Overture

Gwyneth Jones "Dei tuoi figli la madre"

Anna-Caterina Antonacci "Dei tuoi figli la madre"

Eileen Farrell "Dei tuoi figli la madre"

Sylvia Sass "E che? Io son Medea"

Leonie Rysanek "E che? Io son Medea"

Maria Callas "Del fiero duol che il cor frange"

Violeta Urmana "Del fiero duol che il cor frange"

Bonus clips of Giasone, Neris and Glauce arias and original French-version arias after the jump.

A Pastoral Ode, Biblical Plot, Spanish Brouhaha and Mad Sister

On March 9, many wonderful (and diverse) compositions had their first performance. Celebrating those works are some audio clips below.

1740: L'Allegro, il Penseroso ed il Moderato (Händel) at Lincoln's Inn Fields Theatre

"But oh, sad virgin, that thy pow'r" sung by Kathleen Battle

1842: Nabucco (Verdi) at Teatro alla Scala

"Ben io t'invenni o fatal scritto...Salgo già del trono aurato" sung by Maria Callas

1844: Ernani (Verdi) at Teatro La Fenice

"Sorta la notte...Ernani, involami" sung by Leona Mitchell

1868: Hamlet (Thomas) at Paris Opéra

"A vos jeux, mes amis...Partagez-vous mes fleurs!...Et maintenant écoutez ma chanson!"
sung by June Anderson
[Click photo to launch audio]

Courtesan With Bad In-law Relations Coughed Up Lung in 1853

La Traviata is an opera in three acts by Giuseppe Verdi set to an Italian libretto by Francesco Maria Piave. It is based on La dame aux Camélias (1852), a play adapted from the novel by Alexandre Dumas, fils. The opera was originally entitled Violetta, after the main character. The first performance of the opera was on March 6, 1853, at the La Fenice opera house in Venice. [Source]

Portrait of a Roman Lady by Lord Frederic Leighton

"Libiamo ne' lieti calici" (Cheryl Studer & Luciano Pavarotti)


"È strano!...Ah, fors'è lui...Sempre Libera" (Maria Callas)


"Di Provenza il mar" (Dmitri Hvorostovsky)


"Lunge da lei...O mio rimorso!" (Ismael Jordi)


"Teneste la promessa...Addio del passato" (Rosanna Carteri)


"Parigi o cara" (Plácido Domingo & Ileana Cotrubas)

February Was a Good Month For Georg Friedrich Händel

Whether it was the season calendar that dictated dates of premieres or Händel just loved winters in London, the German composer had a plethora of his operas debut in the month of February over three decades. A look at some of the operas celebrating the anniversary of their first performances this month are listed below along with a history of the King's Theatre, eerily similar to New York City Opera problems of late, and listening clips after the jump. Also worth noting is that Händel filed for (and received) British citizenship on February 24, 1727.

Rinaldo and Armida in the Garden by Giambattista Tiepolo (c. 1752)

Nero (February 25, 1705)*
Rinaldo  (February 24, 1711)**
Giulio Cesare (February 20, 1724)
Rodelinda (February 13, 1725)
Siroe (February 17, 1728)
Partenope (February 24, 1730)
Poro (February 2, 1731)
Sosarme (February 15, 1732)
Giustino (February 16, 1737)***
Alessandro Severo (February 25, 1738)
All operas were performed at the King's Theatre unless otherwise indicated. *Hamburg, Theater am Gänsemarkt **London, Queen's Theatre ***London, Covent Garden Theatre

Suicidal French Poet Pursues Married Woman in 1892

Werther is an opera in four acts by Jules Massenet to a French libretto by Édouard Blau, Paul Milliet and Georges Hartmann based on the German epistolary novel The Sorrows of Young Werther by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. Although Massenet wrote and completed his opera in 1887, it did not receive any performance until it premiered at the Imperial Theatre Hofoper in Vienna on February 16, 1892, in a

Shakespearean Murder Thrills Milan In 1887

Otello is an opera in four acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Arrigo Boito, based on Shakespeare's play Othello.
Otello.................Francesco Tamagno
Desdemona.......Romilda Pantaleoni
Iago....................Victor Maurel
Emilia................Ginevra Petrovich
Cassio................Giovanni Paroli
Roderigo...........Vincenzo Fornari

Conducted by Franco Faccio

It was Verdi's penultimate opera, and was first performed at the Teatro alla Scala, Milan, on February 5, 1887.  Audio tributes after the jump.[Source]

The Rent Was Too Damn High, Especially For Bohemians in 1896

The world premiere performance of Puccini's La bohème was in Turin on February 1, 1896, at the Teatro Regio and was conducted by 29-year old Arturo Toscanini. 

Although everyone has a favorite singer or conductor for this classic, this particular clip is interesting because there is something very bohemian about these young singers at what was the blossoming of their singing careers. Enjoy!

Convent-bound Material Girl Dies Outside Big Easy in 1893

The first performance of Puccini's Manon Lescaut took place at the Teatro Regio in Turin on February 1, 1893.

Fiancée Swapping Sisters In 1790 Vienna

Sisters (Ray Caesar, 2005)


Kiri Te Kanawa, Frederica von Stade, Jules Bastin
"Soave il vento"

The first performance of Mozart's Così fan tutte took place at the Burgtheater in Vienna on January 26, 1790. The subject matter did not offend Viennese sensibilities of the time, but throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries it was considered risqué. The opera was rarely performed, and when it did appear it was presented in one of several bowdlerised libretti. After World War II, it regained its place in the standard operatic repertoire. It is frequently performed and appears as number fifteen on Opera America's list of the 20 most-performed operas in North America.

Knight of the Rose Sells Out in 1911

Kathleen Battle, Frederica von Stade, Renée Fleming
"Marie Thérèse! Hab' mir's gelobt"

Der Rosenkavalier (Op. 59) (The Knight of the Rose) is a comic opera in three acts by Richard Strauss to an original German libretto by Hugo von Hofmannsthal. It is loosely adapted from the novel Les amours du chevalier de Faublas by Louvet de Couvrai and Molière’s comedy Monsieur de Pourceaugnac. It was first performed at the Königliches Opernhaus in Dresden on January 26, 1911 under the direction of Max Reinhardt. Until the premiere, the working title was Ochs von Lerchenau. (The choice of the name Ochs is not accidental, for in German Ochs is translated as ox, which depicts the character of the Baron throughout the opera.)

Elektra Brings Her Complex to Dresden in 1909

"Allein! Weh, ganz Allein"
Hildegard Behrens

Elektra is a one-act opera by Richard Strauss, to a German-language libretto by Hugo von Hofmannsthal adapted from his drama of 1903—the first of many such collaborations between composer and librettist. It was first performed at the Dresden State Opera on January 25, 1909 conducted by Ernst von Schuch. The cast included Annie Krull (Elektra), Margarethe Siems (Chrysothemis), Ernestine Schumann-Heink (Klytämnestra) and Karl Perron (Orest). The plot of Elektra is based upon the great Greek tragedy of the same name by the tragedian Sophocles. The unrelenting gloom and horror that permeate the original play produce, in the hands of Hofmannsthal

The Troubadour Takes the Apollo in 1853

Callas: "D'amor sull'ali rosee"

"Il Trovatore (The Troubadour) is an opera in four acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Salvadore Cammarano, based on the play El Trovador (1836) by Antonio García Gutiérrez. Cammarano died in mid-1852 before completing the libretto. This gave the composer the opportunity to propose significant revisions, which were accomplished under his direction by the young librettist, Leone Emanuele Bardare, and they are seen

King: "Di quella pira"

largely in the expansion of the role of Leonora. The opera was first performed at the Teatro Apollo, Rome, on January 19, 1853 where it 'began a victorious march throughout the operatic world.' Today it is given very frequently and is a staple of the standard operatic repertoire. It appears at number 17 on Opera America's list of the 20 most-performed operas in North America." [Source]