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Paperback Opera - Aroldo - Rec.Turin1951

Artist Maria Vitale / Vasco Campagnano / Rolando Paneral / Gianfelice De Manuelli / Aldo Bertocci / Tommaso Soley / Arturo Basile / Orchestra and Chorus of Radio Italiana, Turin
Title Paperback Opera - Aroldo - Rec.Turin1951
Release Date Thursday, May 27, 2010
Genre Opera > Opera
Composer Giuseppe Verdi
Songwriter Giuseppe Verdi
Copyright © Preiser Records
Country AUSTRIA

Promotion Text

Paperback Opera

“Stiffelio” (premiered in 1850) had provoked the censorship board because of “the immoral and rough” plot since it involved a Protestant minister of the church with an adulterous wife, and a final church scene in which he forgives her with words quoted from the New Testament. Also the German characters did not please the Italian audience. A revised version of the opera, entitled “Guglielmo Wellingrode” (with the hero a German Prime Minister), was presented in 1851, without either Verdi or his librettist Piave being responsible for it since Verdi had rejected a request to write a new last act for the Wellingrode-version. By spring 1856, in collaboration with his original librettist, Piave, Verdi decided to rewrite the story line and make a considerable amount of musical changes and additions. He decided to rewrite the plot, drawing inspiration from two novels: “The Betrothed” by Walter Scott and “Harold” by Edward Bulwer-Lytton. The action transferred to thirteenth-century England, and the final scene was entirely replaced by a wholly new fourth act. After a year of revision, “Aroldo” was ready to be staged and Verdi chose Bologna as the location for the premiere. But Ricordi, his publisher and friend, suggested that the premiere be staged in Rimini on the occasion of the inauguration of the Teatro Nuovo in 1857. Later it was presented in Bologna followed by performances in Turin and Naples. Its success varied considerably, especially in Milan in 1859, where “it was a fiasco. It now was the public, not the censors, who found it unacceptable”. “Aroldo” remained one of Verdi’s very rarely performed operas, especially since the rediscovery of its parent work “Stiffelio” in the late 1960s