Olivo e Pasquale is a melodramma

Melodramma

Melodramma is an Italian term for opera, used in a much narrower sense by English writers to discuss developments in the early 19th century Italian libretto...

 giocoso, a romantic comedy 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...

, in two acts by Gaetano Donizetti

Gaetano Donizetti

Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...

. Jacopo Ferretti

Jacopo Ferretti

Jacopo Ferretti was an Italian writer, poet and opera librettist.He is most famous for having supplied the libretti for two operas by Rossiniand for five operas by Donizetti....

 wrote the Italian

Italian language

Italian is a Romance language spoken mainly in Europe: Italy, Switzerland, San Marino, Vatican City, by minorities in Malta, Monaco, Croatia, Slovenia, France, Libya, Eritrea, and Somalia, and by immigrant communities in the Americas and Australia...

 libretto

Libretto

A libretto is the text used in an extended musical work such as an opera, operetta, masque, oratorio, cantata, or musical. The term "libretto" is also sometimes used to refer to the text of major liturgical works, such as mass, requiem, and sacred cantata, or even the story line of a...

 after Simeone Antonio Sografi's play.

Roles

Role	Voice type	Premiere Cast, 7 January 1827 (Conductor: - )
Olivo	baritone Baritone Baritone is a type of male singing voice that lies between the bass and tenor voices. It is the most common male voice. Originally from the Greek , meaning deep sounding, music for this voice is typically written in the range from the second F below middle C to the F above middle C Baritone (or...	Domenico Cosselli Domenico Cosselli Domenico Cosselli was an Italian operatic bass-baritone, particularly associated with Rossini operas.He began his vocal studies in his native city in 1814 and made his stage debut there in 1821...
Pasquale	bass	Giuseppe Frezzolini Giuseppe Frezzolini Giuseppe Frezzolini was an Italian operatic bass. Born in Orvieto, he studied singing in his native city with G. Pedoto. He began his career in 1819 and was active in Italy's leading opera houses up into the 1840s...
Isabella, daughter of Olivo	soprano Soprano A soprano is a voice type with a vocal range from approximately middle C to "high A" in choral music, or to "soprano C" or higher in operatic music. In four-part chorale style harmony, the soprano takes the highest part, which usually encompasses the melody...	Emilia Bonini
Camillo	contralto Contralto Contralto is the deepest female classical singing voice, with the lowest tessitura, falling between tenor and mezzo-soprano. It typically ranges between the F below middle C to the second G above middle C , although at the extremes some voices can reach the E below middle C or the second B above...	Anna Scudellari Cosselli
Matilde, Isabella's maid	mezzo-soprano Mezzo-soprano A mezzo-soprano is a type of classical female singing voice whose range lies between the soprano and the contralto singing voices, usually extending from the A below middle C to the A two octaves above...	Agnese Loyselet
Monsieur le Bross, merchant of Cadice	tenor Tenor The tenor is a type of male singing voice and is the highest male voice within the modal register. The typical tenor voice lies between C3, the C one octave below middle C, to the A above middle C in choral music, and up to high C in solo work. The low extreme for tenors is roughly B2...	Giovanni Battista Verger Giovanni Battista Verger Giovanni Battista Verger was an Italian operatic tenor and impresario. He particularly excelled in the operas of Gioachino Rossini and Gaetano Donizetti.-Biography:...
Columella, a poor traveller	buffo	Luigi Garofalo
Diego, servant in the house of two siblings	baritone	Stanislao Prò
Waiters, servants, young people

Synopsis

Time: The eighteenth century

Place: Lisbon

Olivo and Pasquale are two brothers, both merchants from Lisbon: the first is hot-blooded and brutal, the other is sweet and shy. Olivo's daughter, Isabella, loves a young apprentice, Camillo, but her father wants her to marry a wealthy merchant fro Cadiz, Le Bross. Isabella tells Le Bross that she loves another. At first he is led to believe that it is Columella, an old conceited and ridiculous man but shortly after he understand the it is Camillo. Olivo, realizuing that his daughter dares to oppose his will, is furious and Le Bross, shocked by his disproportionate reaction, becomes Isabella and Camillo's ally and promises to help them get married. The lovers threaten to commit suicide at five o'clock if Olivo doesn't agree to let them get married, but he does not believe them and refuses to be blackmailed. At five, however, shots of a firearm echo: Pasquale faints and Olivo says that now he would have preferred Isabella to be Camillo's wife rather than dead. Fortunately, the threat of suicide was not true and the two appear at the door, Olivo embraces and blesses their union.

Recordings

Year	Cast (Olivo, Pasquale, Isabella, Camillo)	Conductor, Opera House and Orchestra	Label
1980	John Del Carlo, Gastone Sarti, Estelle Maria Gibbs, Sabrina Bizzo	Bruno Rigacci, Orchestra Giovanile International di Opera Barga (Recording of a performance in the Teatro Dei Differenti, Barga, 27 July)	Audio CD: Bongiovanni Cat: GB 2005/6-2