Rossini was considered
to be Europe’s most famous composer
of the first half of the nineteenth
century, lauded far and wide beyond
Italy. He was, for instance, received
by George IV at the court in Brighton
and amassed a small fortune during his
time in London in 1824 before arriving
in Paris. Such was his fame and influence
that Schubert’s stage music was side-lined
in Vienna to make way for Rossini productions.
It seems incredible, therefore, that
his music went into such a steep decline
from the closing decades of the nineteenth
century to the middle of the twentieth.
Little other than The Barber
of Seville and a handful of overtures
were maintained in the repertoire of
those days. This scholarly, extensive
overview of Rossini’s operas, liturgical
works and piano and vocal works reflects
the dramatic turnaround in appreciation
that has occurred in the last fifty
years or so.
Richard Osborne’s article
‘Rossini’s Life’ opens the collection
of articles and charts the composer’s
life path through, from his formative
years in Pesaro to his training in Bologna.
We learn that he was an outspoken Republican,
and was briefly imprisoned by the Austrians
in 1799. His operatic successes came
in Venice and Milan, Naples and Rome
before turning to Paris where he wrote
his final opera William Tell
in 1829. By then he had composed thirty-nine
operas over nineteen years. Osborne
goes on to cover Rossini’s long ‘retirement’,
living for periods in Bologna, Florence
and Paris, often in ill-health, yet
turning, occasionally, to composition
eg. Stabat mater, the
piano pieces and songs that he dubbed,
‘Sins of Old Age’, and the Petite
messe solenelle. Rossini, retiring
and jealousy of his privacy, is not
the easiest subject for a biographer,
he hid behind wit and frivolity so that
much of his life remains hidden. Osborne
sketches well, the man, his romances,
his attitudes and ailments but one or
two more less serious anecdotes might
not have gone amiss. We know for instance
that he disliked writing overtures but
had to bow to theatre directors’ and
producers’ orders. [He was locked in
a room with only a bowl of macaroni
to compose the overture to Otello,
and he was locked in a dusty attic in
the roof of La Scala until he had written
the Overture to The Thieving Magpie.]
Benjamin Walton concentrates
on Rossini’s career in France and we
note that the Parisians took him so
much to heart that the composer was
laid to rest in Père-Lachaise,
Paris’s grandest cemetery, but later
his remains were disinterred and removed
to Italy, to Santa Croce in Florence,
a temple to the glories of the young
Italian nation, modelled on London’s
Westminster Abbey.
Charles Brauner concentrates
on the Rossini revival listing the ever-increasing
performances from 1949 to 1990 (By 1989,
for instance, Semiramide had
had 48 performances and La gazza
ladra 21. Brauner comments: "The
post-war Rossini Renaissance was slow;
at first led, it would seem, not by
singers or audiences but by a few dedicated
conductors, Vittorio Gui for opera
buffa and then Tullio Serafin and
Gabriele Santini …" Brauner also
details the growing appreciation and
re-assessment by critics and commentators
and the contribution of talented singers:
Renata Tebaldi, Teresa Stich-Randall,
Eileen Farrell, Janet Baker, Joan Sutherland
and most importantly, according to Brauner,
Marilyn Horne.
Part II of this compendium
is devoted to ‘Words and Music’. First
there is Paolo Fabbri’s detailed examination
of the work of Rossini’s army of librettists
(often working stably in a specific
city), their specialisations, strengths,
weaknesses and how Rossini worked with
and related to them, and how the libretti
were moulded to the capabilities of
the singers and the exigencies of the
opera plots (by type: Farse, Opera
buffe, Opera serie and Opera
semiserie, plus, in a special section,
French operas). Philip Gossett contributes
an article on Rossini’s composition
methods, quoting an anecdote – "...
implicitly emphasising his sloth, Rossini
was said to have composed in bed."
– hardly likely considering the composer’s
vast and speedy operatic output! The
article covers Rossini’s preliminary
sketches, skeleton scores and self-borrowings
and use of collaborators. Also in this
section is Marco Beghelli’s assessment
of ‘The dramaturgy of the operas’, Damien
Colas on Rossini’s ‘Melody and ornamentation’
and Richard Osborne’s coverage of the
‘Off the stage works’ from Rossini’s
student works and cantatas, through
the Messa di Gloria (1820), and
Stabat mater, to the songs including
the twelve comprising Soirées
musicales (1835) and Péchés
de vieillesse (Sins of Old Age)
and, finally, Petite messe solenelle.
A section headed Representative
operas comprises in depth analyses of
stories, (and, as relevant, their political
implications) and their derivations,
libretti vocal types and styles utilised,
and musical dramaturgy etc. of: Tancredi
and Semiramide by Heather Hadlock,
Il Barbiere di Siviglia by Janet
Johnson, and Guillaume Tell by
Cormac Newark
A final section has
Leonella Grasso Caprioli writing on
‘Singing Rossini’ that gives an insight
into the composer’s relationships with,
and his expectations of his singers
and his predilection for ‘cantare che
nell’anima si sente’ (singing that you
can feel in your soul). The article
includes an annotated list of contemporary
Rossinian singer-teachers. Mercedes
Viale Ferrero contributes ‘Staging Rossini’
that covers staging conventions and
practices in Italy in Rossini’s day:
set designs and costumes (great efforts
were made to ensure accuracy extending
even to sending to England for accurate
costume patterns for Elisabetta regina
d’Inghilterra, illustrated) The
article also includes nine other illustrations
of opera sets and costumes including
those for Tancredi, Semiramide
and sumptuously detailed sets for William
Tell and Le Siège de Corinthe.
Pen portraits of Rossini’s leading set
designers are also included.
Patricia B. Brauner
concludes with an article on the challenges
of ‘Editing Rossini’. A list of works
and a bibliography round off the book.
An intensive, yet readable
study revealing many facets of Rossini’s
art.
Ian Lace
