Featuring 2024–2025 William Gammon Henry Concerto Competition winners Xiajing Luo, soprano & Cecil Garrison, tenor

Gioachino Rossini (1792–1868) straddled the late Classical and early Romantic periods, laying the groundwork for many of the composers on tonight’s program with his emphasis on advancing the drama of his operas through the music itself, rather than relying more heavily on just the libretto. La gazza ladra (The Thieving Magpie) (1817) is a prime example of opera semiseria, which mixes comic and dramatic elements. Written in two acts, the opera centers on a servant girl named Ninetta who is falsely accused of stealing silver and summarily condemned to death. She is saved at the last minute when the actual culprit, a wily magpie, is found with its nest full of contraband booty. The overture begins with a pair of snare drums and is followed by an introductory march before the more bright and cheerful melody begins.

In Carmen (1875), one of the greatest operas of the 19th century, Georges Bizet (1838–1875) helped transform opéra comique into a more passionate and realistic genre with his tragic tale of love and obsession. French in origin, opéra comique, unlike Italian opera semiseria, features spoken dialogue and arias; the term really has more to do with the Paris theatre of the same name in which it was developed than it does with comedy or shallowness of content. Carmen, after all, is the story of a free-spirited and beautiful young Gypsy woman whose life is cut short by Don Jóse, her jealous lover. Bizet’s friend, Ernest Guirard, composed two suites drawn from the opera’s orchestral music in 1881 and 1887. On the program tonight is the Carmen Suite No. 1. 

Written in the 19th century’s grand opera style with five acts and a large-scale cast and orchestra, Rienzi, der Letzte der Tribunen (Rienzi, the Last of the Tribunes) is the third opera by German composer Richard Wagner (1813–1883). Rienzi, Wagner’s first major success, is based on a late Medieval Roman populist political figure who overthrows the ruling families only to be eventually killed by the very people he freed from the oppressive nobles. The opera premiered in Dresden in 1842. The overture opens with a trumpet call and features the melody of Rienzi’s prayer, which will later return at the beginning of Act V as the aria “Allmächt’ger Vater” (“Almighty Father, look down on me”).

The first of four arias on tonight’s program by Giacomo Puccini (1858–1924) comes from Turandot (1926). “Signore, ascolta!” (“My lord, listen!”), from Act I, is sung by the slave girl Liù to Prince Calaf, whom she secretly loves. The second Puccini aria is one of his most well-known and comes from the comic opera Gianni Schicchi (1918). Based on an incident mentioned in Dante’s Divine Comedy, Gianni Schicchi’s “O mio babbino caro” is sung by Lauretta, as tensions between her father and the family of the boy she loves threatens to break the young couple apart.

Pietro Mascagni (1863–1945), like his friend Puccini, was smitten with the music of Wagner. Unlike Puccini, though, Mascagni was a one-hit wonder with Cavalleria Rusticana (1890), which made the 26-year-old an overnight sensation. The one act opera . . . wait for it . . . is about love, betrayal and revenge. Are you sensing a recurring theme here? The beautiful, lush “Intermezzo” from the opera is an orchestral interlude between acts which provides a sense of peace before a coming tragedy. Cavalleria Rusticana often shares the bill with Pagliacci, as both exemplify the increasingly popular verismo style of the 1890s in which the stage portrays the gritty, everyday life of the lower classes. 

Ruggero Leoncavallo (1857–1919) composed Pagliacci, his second opera, in 1892 in an attempt to capitalize on and surpass the success of Cavalleria Rusticana. Written as a prologue and two acts, Pagliacci focuses on Canio, a theatre actor who jealously murders his wife and her lover on stage during a performance. “Vesti la giubba” describes how Canio, dressed as a clown, has to force himself to “put on the costume” and entertain the audience in the throes of his own suffering.   

Another leading 19th century Italian opera composer mentioned above is Gaetano Donizetti (1797–1848), whose Linda di Chamounix (1842) is a semiserious melodramatic love story about a naïve heroine, her proud parents, a nobleman in disguise who falls for her, a villain, and the local man she’s supposed to marry. “O luce di quest’anima,” which translates as “Oh light of this soul,” is another aria describing a lover’s longing and hope. 

The program concludes with a return to the music of Puccini—the famous aria “Nessun Dorma” (“None Shall Sleep”) from Turandot made famous to modern audiences by Luciano Pavarotti, and the romantic duet which closes Act I of La bohème, “O soave fanciulla” (“O gentle maiden”) from 1896.