I Pagliaci - Opera Mini Guide Series.pdf - Opera Music Ebook Collection (Art Ebooks) - Babooshka

I Pagliacci Page 1

I Pagliacci

“The Clowns”

Italian music drama

with a prologue and two acts

Ruggiero Leoncavallo

Libretto by Ruggiero Leoncavallo.

Premiere:

Teatro Dal Verme, Milan, May 1892.

Adapted from the

Opera Journeys Lecture Series

Burton D. Fisher

Story Synopsis

Page 2

Principal Characters in the Opera

Page 3

Story Narrative with Music Highlights

Page 3

Leoncavallo and I Pagliacci

Page 15

Opera Journeys Mini Guide Series

Published / © Copywritten by Opera Journeys

www.operajourneys.com

I Pagliacci Page 2

Story Synopsis

A traveling troupe of acting-clowns arrives

at a small village in Calabria, Italy, to perform a

commedia dell’arte play: it is the holiday

celebrating the Feast of the Assumption.

In a prologue, Tonio, a hunchbacked actor

in the troupe, appears before the curtain to advise

the audience that the play they are about to see

may appear to be theatrical illusion, but they

should not be deluded: the play will portray

reality and profound human conflict, performed

by people who will reveal their inner souls; in

the play, life and art, and illusion and reality, will

become fused.

Canio, leader of the troupe, advises the

villagers that their play begins that evening at

2300 hours. Canio and another player, Beppe,

accept the villagers’ invitation and join them at

a tavern. Tonio remains behind and confronts

Canio’s wife, Nedda, pleading vainly for her love.

She rejects him and lashes him with a whip: Tonio

swears revenge.

Nedda rendezvous with her secret lover,

Silvio, a local villager. While they are engrossed

in romantic passions, Tonio spies on them: he

rushes to find Canio so he can behold his wife’s

infidelity. Canio surprises the lovers, and Silvio

escapes. Canio dresses for the performance that

evening, broken-hearted and despairing.

In the second act, the troupe’s commedia

dell’arte play is performed, its scenario, a mirror

of the exact real-life events which took place

earlier: Beppe (Harlequin) romances Nedda

(Columbine) and is caught unexpectedly by the

returning Canio (Pagliaccio). The play breaks

down as illusion quickly transforms into reality:

Canio, insane with jealousy, murders Nedda, and

then her lover, Silvio.

I Pagliacci Page 3

Principal Characters in the Opera

Canio, leader of a traveling

company of players

Tenor

Nedda, Canio’s wife

Soprano

Tonio, a hunchbacked player

in the company

Baritone

Silvio, a local villager and

secret lover of Nedda

Baritone

Beppe, a player in the company

Tenor

TIME and PLACE:

Late 19 th century. Calabria, Italy,

the Holiday of the Feast of the Assumption.

Story Narrative with Music Highlights

The opening music presages the drama and

presents the opera’s principal themes. An off-

pitch trumpet, accompanied by punctuated drum

beats introduces the motive of the clown-actors.

Opening Theme of the clown-actors:

A second theme, plaintive and despairing,

is the music from the opera’s signature aria, Vesti

la giubba, “Dressed as a clown”: it is Canio’s

despairing lament about his failure as Nedda’s

loving husband.

Canio’s lament:

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A final theme represents the clandestine,

adulterous love affair between Canio’s wife,

Nedda, and the local villager, Silvio.

Stolen love:

The play curtain parts, and the actor Tonio,

crippled, deformed, and hunchbacked, begs the

audience’s permission to introduce their play:

Si puo?, “Please allow me a word.” Tonio is the

“prologue”: he introduces and prepares the

audience for the evening’s theatrical event.

Tonio explains that their play may seem to

be illusion, but on the contrary, its author has

presented uno squarcio di vita, a realistic “slice

of life.” Beneath the actors’ makeup and

costumes, there are real human souls; creatures

like the audience themselves who possess

ambivalence and paradox, possess virtue and

vice, good and evil, noble passions of love, but

also bitter hatred, cynicism, grief, and rage.

Tonio admonishes his audience not to

separate art from life: they will witness actors’

emotions, sighs and tears, and grief and sorrow;

real human passions, not make-believe illusion.

He begs the audience to feel the actors’ pain,

because it reflects the anguish of all humanity:

he begs the audience to suffer with them and

not consider their costumes, but only their souls.

Tonio concludes, satisfied that he has prepared

his audience for an evening of realism rather than

illusion: E voi. Incominciamo! “So let’s go on

with the show!”

Tonio: The Prologue

I Pagliacci Page 5

Act I: A village in Calabria, Italy, on the

holiday of the Feast of Assumption. It is 3

o’clock on a bright, sunlit afternoon. A

makeshift stage has been erected. Villagers,

dressed for the holiday, congregate excitedly

around the arriving troupe of actor-clowns.

Local villagers welcome the paglicacci , the

traveling troupe of clown-actors who have come

to entertain them: Canio, the leader of the troupe,

his wife Nedda, Beppe, the drum playing clown,

and the hunchback, Tonio.

Canio, standing in front of the small

makeshift outdoor theater, urges the villagers

to attend their performance that evening,

announcing that it will begin at 2300 hours.

The villagers are in cheerful holiday spirits,

and invite the pagliacci to drink with them at a

local tavern. Canio bids Tonio join them, but he

excuses himself, explaining that he must remain

behind to rubdown their donkey. With presumed

jest, a villager suggests that Tonio is being

deceptive, preferring to remain behind so he can

make love to Canio’s beautiful wife, Nedda.

Canio’s jovial mood suddenly turns

anxious, menacing, and sinister. He responds to

the villager’s innuendo with feigned respect,

delivering a candid lecture about marital

infidelity: his words - and the underlying music

– become profoundly grave: un tal gioco,

credetimi, “Such jokes, believe me, should not

be made.”

Canio explains that a play is illusion, but

life is reality: in the comedy of their commedia

dell’arte stage, when a husband surprises his

adulterous wife, he thrashes her lover, and the

audience laughs. But life is not art, nor is it

comedy: if anyone should covet his wife, Nedda,

he had better beware because he will become

the victim of his vicious retribution. Canio

concludes his sermon, kisses Nedda, and as he

departs to join the villagers at the tavern, he and

I Pagliaci - Opera Mini Guide Series.pdf

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