The Barber of Seville, or The Useless Precaution ( ) is an opera buffa (comic opera) in two acts composed by Gioachino Rossini with an Italian libretto by Cesare Sterbini. The libretto was based on Pierre Beaumarchais's French comedy The Barber of Seville (1775). The premiere of Rossini's opera (under the title Almaviva, o sia L'inutile precauzione) took place on 20 February 1816 at the Teatro Argentina, Rome, with designs by Angelo Toselli.
Rossini's Barber of Seville is considered to be one of the greatest masterpieces of comedy within music, and has been described as the opera buffa of all "opere buffe". After two centuries, it remains a popular work.Fisher, Burton D., The Barber of Seville (Opera Classics Library Series). Grand Rapids: Opera Journeys, 2005.
Composition history
Rossini's opera recounts the events of the first of the three plays by French playwright Pierre Beaumarchais that revolve around the clever and enterprising character named Figaro, the barber of the title. Mozart's opera The Marriage of Figaro, composed 30 years earlier in 1786, is based on the second part of the Beaumarchais trilogy. (This play was originally conceived as an opéra comique, but was rejected as such by the Comédie-Italienne.) The play as it is now known was premiered in 1775 by the Comédie-Française at the Théâtre des Tuileries in Paris.
Other operas based on the first play were composed by Giovanni Paisiello (in 1782), by Nicolas Isouard in 1796, and then by Francesco Morlacchi in 1816. Though the work of Paisiello triumphed for a time, only Rossini's version has stood the test of time and continues to be a mainstay of operatic repertoire. On 11 November 1868, two days before Rossini's death, the composer (1842–1877) premiered an opera based on the same libretto as Rossini's work, bearing a dedication to Rossini. The premiere was not a failure, but critics condemned the "audacity" of the young composer and the work is now forgotten.
Rossini was well known for being remarkably productive, completing an average of two operas per year for 19 years, and in some years writing as many as four. Musicologists believe that, true to form, the music for Il barbiere di Siviglia was composed in just under three weeks,. although the famous overture was actually recycled from two earlier Rossini operas, Aureliano in Palmira and Elizabeth, Queen of England and thus contains none of the thematic material in Il barbiere di Siviglia itself."For Elisabetta et al., a Long-Overdue Introduction" by Tim Page, The Washington Post, 11 May 2003
Performance history Luigi Zamboni, for whom Rossini wrote the role of Figaro, had urged Rossini and Francesco Sforza-Cesarini, the cash-strapped impresario of the Teatro Argentina, to engage his sister-in-law, Elisabetta Gafforini, as Rosina. However, her fee was too high and in the end they settled on Geltrude Righetti.Rose, Michael (2013). The Birth of an Opera: Fifteen Masterpieces from Poppea to Wozzeck, pp. 130–131. W. W. Norton & Company. The premiere of Rossini's opera, held on 20 February 1816 at the Teatro Argentina in Rome, was a disaster: the audience hissed and jeered throughout, and several on-stage accidents occurred. Furthermore, many of the audience were supporters of one of Rossini's rivals, the veteran Giovanni Paisiello, who played on mob mentality to provoke the rest of the audience to dislike the opera. Paisiello had already composed The Barber of Seville and took Rossini's new version to be an affront to his version. In particular, Paisiello's admirers were displeased with the latter inasmuch as they "were used in the way of buffo music to the style in which the pathetic often mingles with and sometimes effaces the comic".The Barber of Seville at musicwithease.com The second performance, however, was successful. The original French play, Le Barbier de Séville, had a similar story: poorly received at first, only to become a favorite within a week."The Barber of Seville – Education Resource" by Sofia Laursen and Ioanna Salmanidis, p. 11, Victorian Opera
The opera was first performed in England on 10 March 1818 at the King's Theatre in London in Italian, soon followed on 13 October at the Covent Garden Theatre by an English version translated by John Fawcett and Daniel Terry. It was first performed in America on 3 May 1819 in English (probably the Covent Garden version) at the Park Theatre in New York. It was given in French at the Théâtre d'Orléans in New Orleans on 4 March 1823, and became the first opera ever to be performed in Italian in New York, when Manuel Garcia (who played Almaviva) and his Italian troupe opened their first season there with Il barbiere on 29 November 1825 at the Park Theatre. The cast of eight had three other members of his family, including the 17-year-old Maria-Felicia, later known as Maria Malibran.
The role of Rosina was originally written for a contralto. According to music critic Richard Osborne, writing in The New Grove Dictionary of Opera, "it is important to record the degree to which singers have sometimes distorted Rossini's intentions. The most serious distortion has been the upward transposition of the role of Rosina, turning her from a lustrous alto into a pert soprano." However, it has also been noted that Rossini, who frequently altered his music for specific singers, wrote a new aria for the second act for Joséphine Fodor-Mainvielle, a soprano who had sung Rosina in the 1818 London premiere, and sang the new aria c. 1820 at the Théâtre-Italien in Paris, where it was published.The aria is included as an appendix to the critical edition of the opera edited by Patricia Brauner. See , on the new critical edition of Il barbiere di Siviglia; see also "Fodor-Mainvielle, Joséphine" in . According to Alberto Zedda, the author of the first critical edition of the opera, 'the transposition of the part of Rosina from contralto to soprano entails the need to transfer to a lower voice the role of the seconda donna, Berta, written by Rossini for a soprano voice. A mezzo-soprano Berta will find the tessitura of her aria "Il vecchiotto cerca moglie" uncomfortable, and the climb to C6 required at the conclusion of the grand concertato of the first-act finale rather difficult to achieve'.
The singing lesson in act 2 has often been turned into "a show-stopping cabaret". Adelina Patti was known to include Luigi Arditi's "Il bacio", the Bolero from Verdi's I vespri siciliani, the Shadow Song from Meyerbeer's Dinorah, and Henry Bishop's "Home! Sweet Home!". Nellie Melba followed suit, accompanying herself on the piano in the final song. Pauline Viardot began the practice of inserting Alexander Alyabyev's "Nightingale". In a recording of a La Scala performance in 1956, Maria Callas sang a shortened version of "Contro un cor", transposed up a tone, in E."Review" by Richard Osborne, Gramophone
Once, after Patti had sung a particularly florid rendition of the opera's legitimate aria, "Una voce poco fa", Rossini is reported to have asked her: "Very nice, my dear, and who wrote the piece you have just performed?"
"Cessa di più resistere," Count Almaviva's bravura aria at the end of act 2, was omitted from most performances starting shortly after the opera's premiere and is missing from many older "complete" recordings. (The 1959 Metropolitan Opera set is an exception, though Cesare Valletti, who sang the aria for the studio recording, never did so when he performed the role live at the Met.) More recently it has tended to be included more often than not, and audiences and home listeners have grown to expect it.
The piece is a staple of the operatic repertoire Because of a scarcity of true contraltos,Myers, Eric, "Sweet and Low: The case of the vanishing contralto , Opera News, December 1996. the role of Rosina has most frequently been sung by a coloratura mezzo-soprano (with or without pitch alterations, depending on the singer), and has in the past, and occasionally in more recent times, been sung by coloratura sopranos such as Marcella Sembrich, Maria Callas, Roberta Peters, Gianna D'Angelo, Victoria de los Ángeles, Beverly Sills, Lily Pons, Diana Damrau, Edita Gruberová, Kathleen Battle and Luciana Serra. Famous recent mezzo-soprano Rosinas include Marilyn Horne, Teresa Berganza, Frederica von Stade, Lucia Valentini Terrani, Susanne Marsee, Cecilia Bartoli, Joyce DiDonato, Jennifer Larmore, Elīna Garanča, Isabel Leonard, Vesselina Kasarova and Aigul Akhmetshina. Famous contralto Rosinas include Ewa Podleś, who made her stage debut in that role."Ewa Podleś", Royal Opera House
Roles +RoleRoles are listed as given in the 1816 libretto (Rome: Crispino Puccinelli).Voice typeThe voice types given here refer to the original cast as listed in a 2010 program book from Fondazione Teatro La Fenice di Venezia (see Il barbiere di Siviglia, p. 37 [pdf p. 51]), except for Figaro. Although the program book lists Figaro as a bass, all other sources cited here have baritone.Premiere cast, 20 February 1816Conductor: Gioachino Rossini Count Almaviva tenor Manuel Garcia Bartolo, doctor of medicine, Rosina's guardian bass Bartolomeo Botticelli Rosina, rich pupil in Bartolo's house contraltoOriginally written for contralto according to a 2010 program book from La Fenice, as well as . Contemporary printed scores tend to list Rosina as a mezzo-soprano role, and the role is listed as mezzo-soprano by ; ; and . Actual casting practice of opera houses varies widely. Some mezzo-sopranos can sing it as originally written without alteration, but a popular transposed version is often used when a soprano is cast in the role. Singers of all three voice types have found considerable success with the role (). Geltrude Righetti-Giorgi Figaro, barber baritoneListed as baritone by ; ; ; and . In 1816 "baritone" had yet to become recognized as a separate vocal register, so Rossini (like Mozart and Beethoven before him) designated as "basses" roles generally considered today to be baritone parts. Luigi Zamboni Basilio, Rosina's music teacher bass Berta, old governess in Bartolo's house sopranoAlso listed as soprano by ; ; and . In modern performance the role of Berta is also sung by mezzo-sopranos, and it is listed as mezzo-soprano by . See also, Il barbiere di Siviglia on the MetOpera Database (performance archives of the Metropolitan Opera) Elisabetta Loyselet Fiorello, Almaviva's servant bassAlso listed as bass by ; ; and . Listed as baritone by . Paolo Biagelli Ambrogio, Bartolo's servant bassThe very elderly servant yawns aloud a few times, and speaks one or two words expressing his desire to sleep. Police Sergeant ("Officer") bassHe has only one solo line, but it's a very significant one. A notary silentChorus: Officers, soldiers, street-musicians
Synopsis Place: Seville, SpainThe plot synopsis is partly based on , with updates, clarifications, and modifications to its often out-of-date language. Time: 17th century
Act 1 The square in front of Bartolo's house
In a public square outside Bartolo's house a band of musicians and a poor student named Lindoro are serenading, to no avail, the window of Rosina ("Ecco, ridente in cielo"; "There, laughing in the sky"). Lindoro, who is really the young Count Almaviva in disguise, hopes to make the beautiful Rosina love him for himself – not his money. Almaviva pays off the musicians who then depart, leaving him to brood alone. Rosina is the young ward of the grumpy, elderly Bartolo and she is allowed very little freedom because Bartolo plans to marry her once she is of age and thus appropriate her considerable dowry.