Donizetti Grande Offertorio

Donizetti began writing his Requiem Mass after the death of fellow composer and friend Bellini. Ironically it was not performed until after Donizetti's death in 1848. Lacking a 'Sanctus', 'Benedictus' and 'Agnus Dei', the work is nevertheless a large-scale, powerful and compelling work which is one of Donizetti's most important non-operatic compositions.

After Il Fortunato inganno and La Zingara, the Martina Franca Festival has revived another neglected masterpiece by Donizetti, Pietro il Grande o sia il Falegname di Livonia. First staged in Venice in 1819, this work met with good success and was performed until 1827. The silence that followed is justifiable only on account of the enormous success reaped by works such as Elisir d'amore, Don Pasquale and Lucia di Lammermoor, for in Pietro il Grande there is no lack of inspiration and Donizetti's creativity is, quite the opposite, generous and surprising.

Donizetti considered Dom Sébastien, Roi de Portugal (1843), his final completed opera written for the Paris Opéra, to be his masterpiece. In spite of its relative obscurity, on the basis of this recording, one is inclined to agree with him. The opera has several attributes that in the past have proved to be obstacles to its popularity. The first is its length – it's in five substantial acts and lasts three hours, but that's not so onerous for contemporary audiences accustomed to Wagner and Strauss. Besides, the composer created an abbreviated version for Viennese audiences, who at that time wanted to be out of the theater by 10 p.m., and that version could be used if necessary.

Donizetti's three-act tragic opera Belisario was a resounding success in its day, driven by its composer’s superlative theatrical instinct and his skilful interweaving of intense tragic narrative and emotional pathos. Belisario is betrayed by his wife Antonina, who falsely accuses him of high treason. Belisario is blinded and exiled, with proof of his innocence coming too late, and is mortally wounded during a final military victory. This production was performed and recorded without an audience in Bergamo during the Covid-19 lockdown in November 2020 – a moving performance reflecting a spirit of defiance amidst ruin and darkness.

In the summer of 1830 the impresarios of Teatro Carcano contacted Donizetti and asked him to compose a new opera for the season’s opening. At the moment of signing the contract Donizetti still ignored the subject of the new opera; but he knew that the librettist would be Felice Romani and the female protagonist Giuditta Pasta. Success was resounding and unanimous, also with the critics. Donizetti had indeed reached artistic maturity. Anna Bolena tells of a human drama of solitude and oppression; it is a work of psychological introspection centred.

The drama of 'Gemma di Vergy', like that of 'Anna Bolena', 'Maria Stuarda' and 'Roberto Devereux', unfolds at court, where reason of State interwines with sentiments of passion and love. Gemma is repudiated by her husband, the Count of Vergy, baritone, while the "antagonist" is Tamas (tenor), the Arab slave, locked in unrequited love. The vocal composition for the role of Gemma moves with sudden jumps between the central and the high regusters. "It is as difficult as three Normas put together", maintained Montserrat Caballé.

In its original form, Maria di Rohan was without doubt the most audacious result – pre-Verdi – of aesthetic transformation beyond the courtly dramas of “long Italian classicism”. The opera’s intrigue develops like an unstoppable machine: the fatal triangle formed by Maria, Chalais and Chevreuse being the work of Richelieu’s absolute power (despite never appearing on stage). Like trapped animals, the characters hopelessly search for a way out, and they devour each other in turn. Recorded at the Bergamo Donizetti Festival, October 2011, this is the first DVD release of Donizetti’s 1843 opera.

In July 1835 Donizetti was to have staged the first of the three new operas for which he had signed a contract with the management of the San Carlo theatre; but things, as so often happens in the world of opera, did not work out as the composer had intended. The subject - Walter Scott’s The Bride of Lammermoor - had long since been chosen but the direction had not provided for having the libretto written so that it could be read and approved by the censor by the beginning of March, four months before the scheduled date of the première, as the contract stipulated. At the end of May, at the composer’s urgent bidding, the writing of the libretto was entrusted to Salvatore Cammarano, destined to become one of the composer’s favourite working partners: yet the date of the première, inevitably, had to be postponed. After many problems, Lucia di Lammermoor was at last staged on the evening of 26th September 1835.

Composed in 1838, Poliuto is a masterpiece from Donizetti's mature years. It is rarely performed because the title role - the most dramatic part which Donizetti ever wrote for a tenor - is so difficult to sing. The opera was forbidden by the Naples censors and was finaly staget only after Donizetti had died.