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Verdi's La Traviata and Bellini's La Sonnambula

Classical Music Milestone: March 6

Verdi's La Traviata and Bellini's La Sonnambula first performed the same day


This day on March 6, 1831, the opera La Sonnambula by Vincenzo Bellini premieres in Milan's Teatro Carcano. Opera La Traviata by Giuseppe Verdi is also performed for the first time, March 6, 1853, at Teatro la Fenice in Venice.

La sonnambula (The Sleepwalker) is a two-act  opera in semi-seria, with music in Bellini's tradition in bel canto to an Italian libretto by Felice Romani.  It is based on a a ballet-pantomime called La somnambule, ou L'arrivée d'un nouveau seigneur  by Eugène Scribe and Jean-Pierre Aumer.

La traviata is a three-act opera by Giuseppe Verdi. It is set to an Italian libretto by Francisco Maria Piave, based on  La dame aux Camélias (1852), a play adapted from the novel by Alexandre Dumas, fils. The title La traviata means literally The Fallen Woman, or The Woman Who Goes Astray.  Originally, it was entitled Violetta, after the Verdi's main character.

Bellini: la Sonnambula, 2010, Nathalie Dessay, air final


Video Credit: Bellini's Opera La Sonnambula - youtube.com, uploaded by MrClifton68.
Retrieved March 6, 2013.


Dame Joan Sutherland and Luciano Pavarotti - 'Parigi, o cara' Verdi's La Traviata






Video Credit:
 
Verdi's La Traviata: "Parigi, o cara". youtube.com, uploaded by OperaAustralia. Retrieved March 6, 2013.



Resource:

Batta, András (2000). Opera: Composers, Works, Performers. Cologne: Könemann.


(c) March 2013. Tel. Inspired Pen Web. All rights reserved. 

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