For films, see Cavalleria rusticana (1953 film), Cavalleria Rusticana (1959

film), and Cavalleria rusticana (1982 film).

Cavalleria rusticana
Opera by Pietro Mascagni

Scene from the world premiere of the opera

Librettist
Giovanni Targioni-Tozzetti and Guido Menasci
Language
Italian
Based on
Cavalleria rusticana [it] (1880) by Giovanni Verga
Premiere
17 May 1890
Teatro Costanzi, Rome
Cavalleria rusticana (pronounced [kavalleˈriːa rustiˈkaːna]; Italian for "rustic
chivalry") is an opera in one act by Pietro Mascagni to an Italian libretto by
Giovanni Targioni-Tozzetti and Guido Menasci, adapted from an 1880 short
story of the same name [it] and subsequent play by Giovanni Verga.
Considered one of the classic verismo operas, it premiered on 17 May 1890
at the Teatro Costanzi in Rome. Since 1893, it has often been performed in a
so-called Cav/Pag double-bill with Pagliacci by Ruggero Leoncavallo.[1]

Contents
1
Composition history
2
Performance history
2.1
Premiere
2.2
Subsequent performances
3
Roles
4
Synopsis
5
Instrumentation
6
Recordings
7
Radio
8
Film
9
References
10
Bibliography
11
Further reading
12
External linksComposition history[edit]
 Mascagni (center) with his librettists, Giovanni Targioni-Tozzetti (left) and Guido
Menasci
In July 1888 the Milanese music publisher Edoardo Sonzogno announced a
competition open to all young Italian composers who had not yet had an
opera performed on stage. They were invited to submit a one-act opera which
would be judged by a jury of five prominent Italian critics and composers. The
best three would be staged in Rome at Sonzogno's expense.
Mascagni heard about the competition only two months before the closing
date and asked his friend Giovanni Targioni-Tozzetti, a poet and professor of
literature at the Italian Royal Naval Academy in Livorno, to provide a libretto.
Targioni-Tozzetti chose Cavalleria rusticana, a popular short story (and play)
by Giovanni Verga, as the basis for the opera. He and his colleague Guido
Menasci set about composing the libretto, sending it to Mascagni in
fragments, sometimes only a few verses at a time on the back of a postcard.
The opera was finally submitted on the last day that entries would be
accepted. In all, 73 operas were submitted, and on 5 March 1890, the judges
selected the final three: Niccola Spinelli's Labilia, Vincenzo Ferroni [it]'s
Rudello, and Mascagni's Cavalleria rusticana.[2]
There have been two other operas based on Verga's story. The first, Mala
Pasqua! (Bad Easter!) by Stanislao Gastaldon, was entered in the same
competition as Mascagni's. However, Gastaldon withdrew it when he received
an opportunity to have it performed at the Teatro Costanzi, where it premiered
on 9 April 1890.[3] In the 1907 Sonzogno competition, Domenico Monleone
submitted an opera based on the story, and likewise called Cavalleria
rusticana. The opera was not successful in the competition, but premiered
later that year in Amsterdam and went on to a successful tour throughout
Europe, ending in Turin. Sonzogno, wishing to protect the lucrative property
which Mascagni's version had become, took legal action and successfully
had Monleone's opera banned from performance in Italy.[4] Monleone changed
the opera ‘beyond recognition’, setting the music to a new libretto. In this form
it was presented as La giostra dei falchi in 1914.[4]
Performance history