Filippo Marchetti was an Italian

Italy

Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

 opera

Opera

Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...

 composer

Composer

A composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...

. After studying in Naples, his first opera was "successfully premiered" in Turin

Turin

Turin is a city and major business and cultural centre in northern Italy, capital of the Piedmont region, located mainly on the left bank of the Po River and surrounded by the Alpine arch. The population of the city proper is 909,193 while the population of the urban area is estimated by Eurostat...

 in 1856. With only limited success, he became a teacher of singing and composition in Rome before composing Romeo e Giulietta for a premiere in Trieste

Trieste

Trieste is a city and seaport in northeastern Italy. It is situated towards the end of a narrow strip of land lying between the Adriatic Sea and Italy's border with Slovenia, which lies almost immediately south and east of the city...

 in 1865.

Overshadowed like other Italian opera composers of his period by the genius of Verdi

Giuseppe Verdi

Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...

, Marchetti achieved one great success with his 1869 opera, Ruy Blas. It has been noted that "it was one of the first Italian operas to show the influence of French grand opera

Grand Opera

Grand opera is a genre of 19th-century opera generally in four or five acts, characterised by large-scale casts and orchestras, and lavish and spectacular design and stage effects, normally with plots based on or around dramatic historic events...

, partly, no doubt in response to its French source". The opera was performed into the 20th Century.

Major works

• Gentile da Varano, February 1856, Turin
• La demente, 27 November 1856, Turin
• Il paria, 1859
• Romeo e Giulietta, 25 October 1865, Trieste; revised 1872 and 1876. It is available on CD with Daolio, Portoghese, Coletta, Cassi, and Dolari, under Yurkevych on Dynamic CDS 501/1-2.
• Ruy Blas, 3 April 1869, Milan
  Milan
  Milan is the second-largest city in Italy and the capital city of the region of Lombardy and of the province of Milan. The city proper has a population of about 1.3 million, while its urban area, roughly coinciding with its administrative province and the bordering Province of Monza and Brianza ,...
  
  . Available on CD, but badly cut with Theodossiou, Marini, Malagnini, Gazale, Moncini, under Lipton on Bongiovanni GB 2237/38-2.
• Gustavo Wasa, 7 February 1875, Milan.
• Don Giovanni d'Austria, 11 March 1880, Turin

Recordings

• Romeo e Giulietta. With Daolio, Portoghese, Coletta, Cassi, and Dolari. Cond: Yurkevych. Audio CD: Dynamic, Cat: CDS 501/1-2.
• Ruy Blas with Theodossiou, Marini, Malagnini, Gazale, Moncini. Cond: Lipton. Audio CD: Bongiovanni, Cat: GB 2237/38-2.

External links