October 31, 2009: 'Le Villi' by Giacomo Puccini

Opera-ballo in two acts by Giacomo Puccini to a libretto by Ferdinando Fontana after Alphonse Karr's short story Les Willis; premiered in Milan, Teatro Dal Verme, May 31, 1884 (revised version premiered in Turin, Teatro Regio, December 26, 1884.

Cast:
Roberto, a village lad (tenor) -- Albert Montserrat
Anna, daughter of the head forester and Roberto's betrothed (soprano) -- Halla Margret
Guglielmo, the head forester, Anna's father (baritone) -- Andrea Rola

Villagers of the Black Forest (chorus)
The Willis, ghosts of jilted maidens (dancers)

From Grove Music Online:

In the Black Forest villagers are celebrating the engagement of Roberto (tenor) and Anna (soprano), daughter of the head forester, Guglielmo (baritone). Roberto is about to leave for Mainz to collect an inheritance. Anna brings him a posy of forget-me-nots to keep him mindful of their vows (‘Se come voi piccina’). In their duet ‘Tu dall’infanzia mia’ he tells her to doubt the existence of God himself rather than his own constancy. All join in a prayer (‘Angiol di Dio’) to speed him on his way.

At the beginning of Act 2 a verse of poetry describes how Roberto has fallen into the clutches of a siren and forgotten Anna, who died of grief. During an intermezzo (‘L’abbandono’) her body is borne across the stage behind a gauze curtain to an unseen chorus of mourners. A second intermezzo (‘La tregenda’), preceded by more poetry, depicts the dance of the Willis, ghosts of jilted maidens. Outside his cottage Guglielmo grieves for his daughter and inveighs against her faithless lover (‘Anima santa della figlia mia’). Roberto returns penniless and devoured by remorse, recalling his love for Anna (‘Torna ai felici dì’). The Willis appear, among them Anna, who taunts him with his treachery. They dance until Roberto falls dead at her feet.

Le villi, Puccini’s first stage work, was originally entered for a competition for a one-act opera announced in 1883 by the publisher Sonzogno in his periodical Il teatro illustrato; but it failed to achieve even an honourable mention. However, friends and well-wishers, among them Boito, subscribed to a performance which took place under the baton of Achille Panizza with Rosina Caponetti (Anna), Antonio D’Andrade (Roberto), and Erminio Pelz (Guglielmo), and an orchestra that included Pietro Mascagni among the double basses. The reception was sufficiently encouraging for Ricordi to purchase the score. He persuaded Puccini and Fontana to enlarge the opera (originally described as a ‘leggenda in due quadri’) into its present form, adding Anna’s cavatina in Act 1 and a dramatic scena for Roberto in Act 2, inserting the invisible chorus into the first intermezzo and converting what had originally been an aria finale for the soprano into a duet for her and the tenor. The final addition was the tenor romanza ‘Torna ai felici dì’, composed during the course of a revival at La Scala, Milan in January 1885 under Franco Faccio with Romilda Pantaleoni (who later created Verdi’s Desdemona) as the heroine. Further modifications followed in the editions of 1888 and 1892, the latter being the one in general use today.

Like many a beginner’s work, Le villi shows a number of influences, from Ponchielli and Catalani (notably in the tenor romanza) to Gounod and Bizet in the dance movements, Massenet in the solos, and even the Weber of Der Freischütz in the final scene. At the same time Puccini’s individual voice can be heard in the atmospheric prelude whose opening theme, a motif that will connote Roberto’s vow of fidelity, is taken from a romanza, Melanconia (1881), since lost; in Anna’s cavatina and subsequent duet with Roberto – in the variety of phrase-structure and flexible articulation of the verbal text; in the preghiera, based on an earlier song, Salve del ciel regina; in the first intermezzo, with its languishing melodies that incline towards the subdominant, its prolonged suspensions and yearning insistence on variants of the dominant 9th; and in the abundance of thematic reminiscence towards the end of the work. The second intermezzo, a miniature ‘Walkürenritt’, is the only instrumental piece in a Puccini opera that will bear transplantation from its original context. But for all its vitality Le villi is not so much a drama as a story. There is no interplay of character, no one to react to Guglielmo’s grief or Roberto’s remorse; hence the opera’s virtual exclusion from the Puccini canon. On the rare occasions when it is performed the snatches of poetry are declaimed by a narrator; but it would seem that they were intended merely to be read by the audience.

Budden, Julian. "Villi, Le." The New Grove Dictionary of Opera. Ed. Stanley Sadie. Grove Music Online. Oxford Music Online. 31 October 2009 .