Verdi's "Il trovatore" : the quintessential Italian melodrama
Author(s)
Bibliographic Information
Verdi's "Il trovatore" : the quintessential Italian melodrama
（Eastman studies in music, v. 93）
University of Rochester Press , Boydell & Brewer, 2012
Note
Bibliography: p. [145]-151
Discography and videography: p. [127]-143
Includes index
Description and Table of Contents
Description
The first comprehensive study of Verdi's perennially popular opera Il trovatore, written by one of the world's great Verdi authorities.
No full-length study has ever been written on Il trovatore, in his day Verdi's most successful stage work. This book by one of the world's great Verdi authorities fills that gap, providing a comprehensive look at the opera,from its genesis and structure to its early performance history and critical reception.
Starting with the background of the opera, the volume traces the origins of the original play by Antonio Garcia Gutierrez, El trovador, and offers a new, more credible source for the drama. In addition, it examines the evolution of the libretto, the music, and the arrangement of the narrative, revealing innovative musical and dramatic features not seenby other critics. The book also includes a discussion of contemporary reviews and a section on some of the important performers in the twentieth century (for example, Toscanini and Caruso), as well as a consideration of several ofthe more unusual stagings of the work mounted during the final decades of the century.
With these and other explorations, Martin Chusid offers a thorough survey of Verdi's Il trovatore and in the process deepens and enhances our encounter with one of the mainstays of the operatic reparatory.
Martin Chusid is Professor Emeritus of Music, New York University, and founding director of the American Institute for Verdi Studies.
Table of Contents
The Spanish Background and the Play El trovador
Cammarano's Role in Shaping the Libretto andVerdi's Emendations
New Wine in Old Bottles: The Drama and the Music
The Scene of the "Miserere"
The Reception and Diffusion of Il trovatore
by "Nielsen BookData"