Il ritorno d’Ulisse in patria

Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patria

Il ritorno d’Ulisse in patria is an opera by Claudio Monteverdi set to a libretto by Giacomo Badoaro. It was first performed at the Teatro Santi Giovanni e Paolo in Venice during the 1639–1640 carnival season. After its initial successful run in Venice the opera was performed in Bologna before returning to Venice for the 1640–41 season. Thereafter, except for a possible performance at the Imperial court in Vienna late in the 17th century, there were no further revivals until the 20th century.

About Il ritorno d’Ulisse in patria in brief

Summary Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patriaIl ritorno d’Ulisse in patria is an opera by Claudio Monteverdi set to a libretto by Giacomo Badoaro. The opera was first performed at the Teatro Santi Giovanni e Paolo in Venice during the 1639–1640 carnival season. After its initial successful run in Venice the opera was performed in Bologna before returning to Venice for the 1640–41 season. Thereafter, except for a possible performance at the Imperial court in Vienna late in the 17th century, there were no further revivals until the 20th century. The music became known in modern times through the 19th-century discovery of an incomplete manuscript score. It has since been performed in opera houses all over the world, and has been recorded many times. The work is classified as one of the first modern operas. Its music also demonstrates Montever di’s development as a composer of opera, through his use of fashionable forms such as arioso, duet and ensemble alongside the older-style recitative. By using a variety of musical styles, Montever Di is able to express the feelings and emotions of a great range of characters, divine and human, through their music. The story, taken from the second half of Homer’s Odyssey, tells how constancy and virtue are ultimately rewarded, treachery and deception overcome. In 1637 the first fully-fledged opera came to Venice with the opening of the Teatro San Cassiano.

Sponsored by the wealthy Tron family, this theatre was the first in the world specifically devoted to opera. At first three opera houses opened in the city, and by investing in the first three opened in 1637 and 1638. This work was received with great enthusiasm, as was the same pair of La Maga fulminata the following year. In rapid succession more opera houses began to open in Venice as the ruling families of the Republic sought to express their wealth and status in a new musical fashion. The first public performance of his L’Arianna was a revival of his first public contribution to Venetian opera, L’Arianna, followed by his Lèis Arianna in 1639 –40 carnival season. This remark proved to be a prescient prescient remark; it proved that the maestro might yet produce an opera for these nights too he will step onto the stage, one of these nights he will too step on the stage. The composer died in Venice in 1660. He is buried at St Mark’s Basilica in Venice. He wrote several ballets and, for the Venice carnival of 1624–25, Il combattimento di Tancredi e Clorinda, a hybrid work with some characteristics of ballet, opera and oratorio. He was an established court composer in the service of Duke Vincenzo Gonzaga in Mantua when he wrote his first operas, L’Orfeo and L’ Arianna, in the years 1606–08.