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Belisario

Music by Gaetano Donizetti · libretto by Salvadore Cammarano · premiered 1836 · at Teatro La Fenice

Belisario (Belisarius) is a tragedia lirica (tragic opera) in three acts by Gaetano Donizetti. Salvadore Cammarano wrote the Italian libretto after Luigi Marchionni's adaptation of Eduard von Schenk's play, Belisarius, first staged in Munich in 1820 and then (in Italian) in Naples in 1826. The plot is loosely based on the life of the famous general Belisarius of the 6th century Byzantine Empire. It premiered to critical and popular success on 4 February 1836 at the Teatro La Fenice, Venice, and was given many additional performances that season, although Donizetti scholar William Ashbrook notes that there would have been more had the opera not been presented so late in the season. However, in spite of its initial short-term success and critical reaction, as represented by a review in La Gazzetta privilegiata which stated that "A new masterwork has been added to Italian music...Belisario not only pleased and delighted, but also conquered, enflamed and ravished the full auditorium", in the long run, had "Donizetti poured music of the calibre of his Lucia di Lammermoor into the score of Belisario the shortcomings of its wayward plot and dramatic structure would matter less". By April 1836, even the composer himself recognized that the work stood below Lucia in accomplishment.

Text from the Wikipedia article "Belisario", licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.

About the Composer

Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti (29 November 1797 – 8 April 1848) was an Italian composer, best known for his over 70 operas. Along with Gioachino Rossini and Vincenzo Bellini, he was a leading composer of the bel canto opera style during the first half of the nineteenth century and a probable influence on other composers such as Giuseppe Verdi. Donizetti was born in Bergamo in Lombardy. At an early age he was taken up by Simon Mayr who enrolled him with a full scholarship in a school which he had set up. There he received detailed musical training. Mayr was instrumental in obtaining a place for Donizetti at the Bologna Academy, where, at the age of 19, he wrote his first one-act opera,…

Text from the Wikipedia article "Gaetano Donizetti", licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.

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Other Operas by Gaetano Donizetti