Category Archives: Rossini

Mosè in Egitto – Dal tuo stellato soglio

Mosè in Egitto was written in 1818 for the San Carlo in Naples. Rossini added the prayer that is this subject of this piece the following year. In 1827 he extensively revised the work into what became Moïse et Pharaon (a four act work) for the Paris Opera. Below is a synopsis of Act 3,…


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Finale 5 – William Tell Act 1

William Tell is an Italian opera; no matter that Rossini wrote it to a French script. It’s as Italian as mozzarella. The finale to act 1 sets a model for many of the Italian operas which followed Rossini’s final work. This version of this finale is taken from the performance of Tell in 2013 at the…


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Finale 2 – Tancredi Act 1

Now for another first act finale by Rossini written at about the same time as the one from L’Italiana. Tancredi was Rossini’s first big success. It was premiered in Venice at La Fenice a few months before L’Italiana. It’s an opera seria, though the finale we’re about to hear could just as well come from…


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Finale 1 – L’Italiana in Algeri Act 1

I decided to post, from time to time, a finale from an Italian opera (all the really good ones are Italian). It can be from either a comic or serious opera. My only criterion is that it be really good. I’ll start with the finale to Act 1 of Rossini’s L’Italiana in Algeri. Rossini was…


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La Donna Del Lago – Tanti Affetti

Someone recently said that there’s more to Rossini’s La Donna Del Lago than ‘Tanti Affetti’, the aria for the opera’s title character that concludes the work. Well if there is, it doesn’t amount to much. The opera might best be considered an exercise book for bel canto singing rather than an emotionally and artistically rewarding…


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Recording of the Week: Matilde di Shabran

Written in in 1820 for Rome and then revised in 1821 for Naples, Matilde di Shabran is Rossini’s last semiseria opera. A semiseria opera combines opera buffa with melodrama. Basically, it can be both silly and serious as long as everyone ends up alive at the final curtain. If you wish to see and hear…


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Cenerentola Sextet

I just came across this video of the second act sextet from Rossini’s Cenerentola. It’s from a 1981 movie of the opera directed by Jean-Pierre Ponnelle. The singers are Francisco Araiza, Claudio Desderi, Paolo Montarsolo, Margherita Guglielmi, Laura Zannini, and Frederica von Stade. Claudio Abbado conducts. It’s a gem both musically and visually.


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William Tell in Munich

Yesterday the Bavarian State Opera streamed a telecast of its new production of Rossini’s William Tell. The production team, lead by Antú Romero Nunes, was booed during their curtain calls. This was a show was best audited with the picture off. The time was moved to what could have been that of the Nazis. There…


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Ciro in Babalonia – Rossini Opera Festival

Here is a complete performance of Rossini’s early opera from the Rossini Festival in Pesaro last Summer. The three principals are splendid. The fabulous (at age 60 she’s still unique) Polish contralto Ewa Podles takes the title role. The American tenor Michael Spyres continues to dazzle in rare roles; he’s the villain of the piece – Baldassare (Belshazzar)….


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Le Comte Ory in HD

Rossini’s penultimate opera, Le Comte Ory, received its first staging at the Metropolitan Opera this season. This is a charming work that is Rossini just below his best – which means that it’s very good, indeed. The opera needs three virtuoso singers well versed in the bel canto style. In Juan Diego Flórez, Joyce DiDonato,…


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