Xerse is an 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 three acts by Giovanni Battista Bononcini

Giovanni Battista Bononcini

Giovanni Battista Bononcini was an Italian Baroque composer and cellist, one of a family of string players and composers. His father, Giovanni Maria Bononcini , was a violinist and a composer.-Biography:...

. It was designated as a dramma per musica

Dramma per musica

Dramma per musica is a term which was used by dramatists in Italy and elsewhere between the late-17th and mid-19th centuries...

. The 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...

 was written by Silvio Stampiglia

Silvio Stampiglia

Silvio Stampiglia was an Italian poet, librettist, and founder member of the Accademia dell'Arcadia under the penname of Palemone Licurio.-Libretti:Operas...

 after that by Nicolò Minato

Nicolò Minato

Count Nicolò Minato was an Italian poet, librettist and impresario. His career can be divided into two parts: the years he spent at Venice, from 1650 to 1669, and the years at Vienna, from 1669 until his death....

 which had been used for the 1654 opera of the same name by Francesco Cavalli

Francesco Cavalli

Francesco Cavalli was an Italian composer of the early Baroque period. His real name was Pietro Francesco Caletti-Bruni, but he is better known by that of Cavalli, the name of his patron Federico Cavalli, a Venetian nobleman.-Life:Cavalli was born at Crema, Lombardy...

. Stampiglia's version was in turn used as the basis for Handel

George Frideric Handel

George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...

's Serse

Serse

Serse is an opera seria in three acts by George Frideric Handel. It was first performed in London on 15 April 1738. The Italian libretto was adapted by an unknown hand from that by Silvio Stampiglia for an earlier opera of the same name by Giovanni Bononcini in 1694...

.

Stampiglia's version keeps to the story used by Minato but there are major differences in the way the work as a whole is structured.

Performance history

The opera was first performed in Rome

Rome

Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...

 at the Teatro di Tor di Nona

Tor di Nona

The Tor di Nona— now a small area in Rome's Rione V called "Ponte", which lies in the heart of the city's historic center, between the via dei Coronari and the Tiber— commemorates an unregretted mediaeval tower which stood there...

 on 25 January 1694.

Main roles

Role	Voice type	Premiere Cast, 25 January 1694
Xerse	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...  castrato Castrato A castrato is a man with a singing voice equivalent to that of a soprano, mezzo-soprano, or contralto voice produced either by castration of the singer before puberty or one who, because of an endocrinological condition, never reaches sexual maturity.Castration before puberty prevents a boy's...	Nicolò Paris 'Nicolino'
Romilda	soprano castrato	Antonio Romolo Ferrini
Adelanta	soprano castrato	Rinaldo Gherardini
Arsamene	alto Alto Alto is a musical term, derived from the Latin word altus, meaning "high" in Italian, that has several possible interpretations.When designating instruments, "alto" frequently refers to a member of an instrumental family that has the second highest range, below that of the treble or soprano. Hence,...  castrato	Francesco Antonio Pistocchi
Amastre	alto castrato	Luigi Albarelli
Elviro	soprano castrato	Carlo Antonio Corno
Eumene	alto castrato	Benedetto Cini
Aristone	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...	Pietro Paolo Alberti
Clito	tenor	Giuseppe Trivelli
Ariodate	bass	Matteo de Grandis