Attilio Regolo
Music by Johann Adolf Hasse · libretto by Pietro Metastasio · premiered 1750 · at Opernhaus am Zwinger
Attilio Regolo is an Italian-language opera seria by Johann Adolph Hasse based on the story of Marcus Atilius Regulus, a Roman general taken prisoner in Carthage who elects death rather than ransom. It has been acknowledged as a masterpiece of libretto writing, and is a paragon for the genre of opera seria. Pietro Metastasio wrote the libretto in 1740 for the name day of the emperor Charles VI, but the emperor's illness, then death, prevented the opera from being performed.
Metastasio continued to work on the libretto intermittently over the next nine years, having it performed several times under Empress Maria Theresa as a spoken play. In 1749, at the request of King Frederick Augustus II of Saxony, Metastasio famously supplied exacting notes to Hasse for its setting in music, despite the composer's having set several Metastasio librettos before. Hasse completed the score within three months of these instructions. It was not until 12 January 1750 that the premiere took place, at the Opernhaus am Zwinger in Dresden. The role of Regolo was taken by the castrato Domenico Annibali, while the role of Attilia was composed for Hasse's wife Faustina Bordoni.
Text from the Wikipedia article "Attilio Regolo (Hasse)", licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.
About the Composer
Johann Adolf Hasse is the composer of record for this opera.
Text from the Wikipedia article "Johann Adolf Hasse", licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.
Other Operas by Johann Adolf Hasse
- Cleofide
- Enea in Caonia (1727)
- Artaserse (1730)
- Didone abbandonata (1742)
- Leucippo (1747)
- Il Ruggiero (1771)
- Ipermestra (2012)