Talk:La romanziera e l'uomo nero

Roles and creators and title

There seems to be a lot of contradictory information out there on the internet. The roles and singers in the article come from Ashbrook here but these don't all agree with Casaglia's information here. Finally, the Opera Rara recording here gives conclusive proof that Carlino and Fedele are tenors, Tommaso is a buffo bass and that Tamburini probably sang the role of Filidoro! --GuillaumeTell 22:52, 5 November 2010 (UTC)

All I have is the Ashbrook and until this afternoon knew zero about this opera - I think you should weigh this up as best you can and do what you think is best, with copious footnotes if need be! almost-instinct 23:01, 5 November 2010 (UTC)

PS I agree that B Ford unlikely to be singing a role created by Tamburini.... almost-instinct 23:05, 5 November 2010 (UTC)

PPS yet further info here almost-instinct 23:10, 5 November 2010 (UTC)

Oh dear. Why does Opera Rara give it by another name? :-/ almost-instinct 11:04, 6 November 2010 (UTC)

According to Casaglia, they are alternative titles: La romanziera e l'uomo nero and La romanzesca e l'uomo nero. Voceditenore (talk) 11:33, 6 November 2010 (UTC)

Very late last night, I found this, which quotes Opera Rara as saying that "romanzesca" is correct, but the text runs out before it gives any details and I am not an American or Canadian library-user. I sort-of deduced from somewhere else that "romanzesca" means something like "a woman who is obsessed by romantic fiction" and "romanziera" means only a romantic, but wouldn't swear to it. Could the former perhaps be Neapolitan dialect?

Changing the subject slightly: at the same (slightly woozled) time, I also noticed that it is not true that the libretto is completely lost. The musical numbers and lyrics apparently survive, (and can be downloaded from Amazon!) but the recitatives (and possibly spoken dialogue?) don't. And also that Opera Rara may have concocted a new plot with new recits and/or dialogue. That may mean that some of the characters' descriptions, which I've inserted based on the image of the back of the OR box, aren't what the composer/librettist intended. There, Antonina seems to have become Antonia, and Trappolina the maid seems to have become a governess, and there may be other relationship changes. "L'uomo nero" - is he "the man in black" or "the black man"?

There is a review of the Rovigo production here and somewhere else (but I can't find it in my history files) a review (by none other than Ashbrook) of the OR recording. The plot thickens. --GuillaumeTell 18:25, 6 November 2010 (UTC)

Without looking at their arguments, as a general rule of thumb I would prefer an academic to the OR personage, at least until we know their credentials. Meanwhile, anyone got a p/copy of the MS? ;-) almost-instinct 21:18, 6 November 2010 (UTC)

The book below backs up the Opera Rara version of the title with multiple discusssion. It's in Italian. I've seen it in the book shop of the Accademia Santa Cecilia and have been coveting it for years:

• Commons, Jeremy, Le prime rappresentazioni delle opere di Donizetti nella stampa coeva, Accademia di Santa Cecilia, Libreria Musicale Italiana, 1997

By the way, Jeremy Commons is a noted Donizetti scholar and also wrote the Liner notes for the Opera Rara recording.

Note also that Casaglia also lists "Romanzesca" as the main title with "Romanziera" in parentheses. "Romanziera" means "lady novelist" while "Romanzesca" is a lady whose life is like a novel, or who is wrapped up in romanticism (not so easy to give a concise English translation. Personally, I think this article should be moved to La romanzesca e l'uomo nero with La romanziera e l'uomo nero as a redirect. One of the sources I looked at, can't remember which, said the "romanziera" may have been a transcription error (it's not Neapolitan dialect for "romanzesca").

There's a Gramophone review of the OR recording here

Their scanning technology is rather unsatisfactory - "Puma nero", "sawmill donna"! I agree about the page-move. --GuillaumeTell 17:49, 7 November 2010 (UTC)

and a lengthy one in Spanish by Santiago Salaverri (from a reputable source) here (p. 3) Voceditenore (talk) 17:18, 7 November 2010 (UTC)

• the source for the bit about the transcription error [1], a review in French of the Rovigo recording. The review is by Yonel Buldrini, who's quite sound and has written in the past for the Donizetti Society Newsletter. Voceditenore (talk) 18:06, 7 November 2010 (UTC)

• More stuff... The score with all the words to the musical numbers is intact but the libretto had fairly extensive spoken dialogue in addition to recitatives (common in operas for Neapolitan audiences). Librettos also usually list character descriptions as well as basic stage directions and settings. So I imagine a fair amount had to be reconstructed, possibly also using contemporary reviews. There's also a fairly lengthy entry for this opera (in Italian) in the online version of Dizionario dell'Opera (Piero Gelli (ed.), Milan: Baldini Castoldi Dalai, 2005. ISBN 8860731844). Voceditenore (talk) 17:29, 7 November 2010 (UTC)
• Someone using the name Caprotti uploaded (on 30 August 2011) a rather murky scan of the ms score of this opera from the Biblioteca Conservatorio San Pietro a Majella Napoli. One very interesting thing is that it contains an autograph title signed by Donizetti which I have added to the article, as well as a link to the scan at IMSLP. The autographed title reads "La romanziera e l'uomo nero", but the non autograph frontispice says "La Romanzesca; ossia L'uomo nero". Based on this additional evidence I moved this page back to the original title used by Osborne and Ashbrook. --Robert.Allen (talk) 11:05, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

Perhaps I was too bold with this and should have asked for some feedback. Apologies, if this was an error on my part. (But it should not be too difficult to fix, if it's a mistake.) --Robert.Allen (talk) 11:53, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

Smart and Budden in their list of works in the 2001 edition of New Grove retain the title La romanziera. Their bibliography cites Bini & Commons' 1997 book Le prime rappresentazioni delle opere di Donizetti, which apparently presents the argument for using the alternative title found on the 2000 CD from Opera Rara, so apparently Smart and Budden did not completely accept the argument for changing it [or they may have overlooked it; Bini & Commons is over 1600 pages long; certainly the 2000 CD would have brought this issue to their attention, but the CD may have been issued after the 2001 edition of Grove Music had gone to press]. Smith & Budden do not even mention the title La romanzesca as an alternative. (Grove Music Online does not appear to have revised their article since then, but it's not always easy to tell, since they do not date the articles found online. I searched both the main text and the works list for "romanzesca" and didn't turn up any mention of it.) --Robert.Allen (talk) 20:20, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

Rovigo recording details

Cast – Antonina: Patrizia Cigna; Fedele: Giovanni Gregnanin; Carlino: Patrizio Saudelli; Filidoro: Alessandro Calamai; Tommaso: Gian Paolo Fiocchi

Orchestra Filarmonica Veneta "G. F. Malipiero"; Coro del Teatro Sociale di Rovigo; Franco Piva (conductor)

Label: Bongiovanni GB 2287/88-2 (2 CDs).

Recorded in live performance at the Teatro Sociale di Rovigo 25 and 26 November 2000

Voceditenore (talk) 16:20, 7 November 2010 (UTC)

Filidoro's canzonetta

The performance history section mentions Filidoro's canzonetta, however there is no entry for a canzonetta in the List of musical numbers? --Francesco Malipiero (talk) 19:38, 8 November 2010 (UTC)

Well, I got the list from Amazon(!) and his solo had no description so I just inserted "aria". "Non v'e maggio dolore" certainly rings a bell, so I'll turn it into a canzonetta. --GuillaumeTell 22:26, 8 November 2010 (UTC)