Gaetano Donizetti: la Romanzesca (Opera Rara Audio CD)

Opera Rara Donizetti CD

Elisabeth Scano; Bruno Praticò; Alfonso Antoniozzi; Pietro Spagnoli; Bruce Ford; Paul Austin; Academy of St Martin in the Fields; David Parry - conductor


Donizetti's rarest one-act farce, written for Naples, concerns the antics of Antonia. To the exasperation of her father and various suitors, she spruns marriage in favour of her obsession with the new fad for 'romanticism'.

Donizettis La Romanzesca 'e luomo nero' dates from the same period as 'Anna Bolena' and 'Lelisir damore' when the composers genius was in full flood. The plot satirises the 1830s obsession in Italy with the Gothic and centres on Antonia and her fantasies about the mysterious Man in Black.

'A real discovery and a wholly enjoyable disc' - Richard Law, Opera