Opera premieres from Vienna to Paris

Monday, March 23, 2015

Two rarely-heard operas are enjoying premieres now - and there are interesting sources for both in RISM.

Performances of Gli uccellatori (The Birdcatchers) by Florian Leopold Gassmann (1729-1774) started yesterday at the Theater an der Wien. There are three sources for the overture in the RISM online catalog, two in Sweden (Uppsala and Stockholm) and one at the Fürst Thurn und Taxis Hofbibliothek und Zentralbibliothek in Regensburg, Germany. The libretto by Carlo Goldoni (1707-1793) was also set to music by Franz Xaver Süßmayr (1766-1803).

Tonight, Le Pré aux Clercs by Ferdinand Hérold (1791-1833) will open at the Opéra comique in Paris. Among the 25 sources is one digital copy. The performance material from the Dresden Opera dates from 1836, just four years after the world premiere. That this opéra comique was popular in the mid-nineteenth century can be seen in piano pieces from the time, such as the variations by Carl Czerny (1791-1857) and the cottillon by Johann Strauss the elder (1804-1849).

Image: Title page to Le Pré aux Clercs by Ferdinand Hérold, vocal score, ca. 1840. Scan: University of Toronto, from IMSLP.

Category: Events