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Clear filtersAfter escaping a storm at sea, the Cretan king Idomeneo remembers his vow to sacrifice the first person he meets to Neptune. That person is his son Idamante, who loves the Trojan princess Ilia. Idomeneo tries to send Idamante away with Electra, but Neptune sends a sea monster to ravage Crete. Idamante kills the monster and accepts his fate; Ilia offers her life in his place. Neptune instead orders Idomeneo to abdicate in favor of Idamante and Ilia, while Electra is consumed by despair.
On his return from Troy, Idoménée survives a shipwreck after promising Neptune to sacrifice the first person he meets on Crete. That person is his son Idamante. As Ilione and Idamante love one another and Electre schemes against them, Idoménée struggles between his vow, jealousy, and his desire to save his son; the gods’ anger ultimately drives him to kill Idamante.
Agamemnon must sacrifice his daughter Ifigenia to secure fair winds for the Greek fleet bound for Troy. Believing she is to marry Achilles, she arrives with her mother; after the truth is revealed, Ifigenia accepts her fate and approaches the altar, while the epilogue questions the perpetuation of war and prays for all its victims and perpetrators.
Leonardo Vinci’s five-act opera is based on the story of Iphigenia in Tauris. The available text does not provide the plot.
Tommaso Traetta’s three-act Italian opera draws on the story of Iphigenia in Tauris. Its roles include Oreste, Pilade, Ifigenia, Toante, and Dori.
Gian Francesco de Majo’s three-act opera, commissioned by Elector Palatine Carl Theodor, is a distinct setting of Ifigenia in Tauride. The available text does not provide a plot summary.
Italian opera seria based on Euripides’ Iphigenia in Tauris.
The opera follows Tahitian navigator and high priest Tupaia and British captain James Cook on the Endeavour’s 1769 maiden voyage. Their encounters with Tahitians and voyage to Batavia unfold amid a cultural clash between Polynesian navigation lore and Western scientific knowledge.
Bellerofonte, whose birthright to the throne of Corinth has been usurped, is separated from Argene because her father Ariobate considers him an unsuitable match for a princess without a kingdom. Bellerofonte proves his worth by killing the monster that demands a noble virgin as a yearly sacrifice. When news arrives that the usurper Clearco has been overthrown, Bellerofonte can reclaim Corinth and Ariobate agrees to his marriage with Argene. Briseide, who was to be sacrificed, also finds a husband.
Alessandro Scarlatti’s opera with a libretto by Domenico Lalli premiered at Teatro San Bartolomeo in Naples in 1719.
Two-act Italian opera based on Pierre Corneille’s play Le Cid.
For the wedding feast of Joanna von Stein and Jerzy Ignacy Lubomirski, Terra offers Juno a gemstone as a marriage pledge. Juno calls on Hymen and Cupid to bless the couple; Venus's final aria says that she alone can perfect their love.
An opera buffa centered on the young widow Giustina and her lover Flaminio, who disguises himself under the name Giulio.
The opera follows Giustino's rise from a poor farmer to emperor.
A Vivaldi setting of Nicolò Beregan’s libretto, distinct from Legrenzi’s 1683 setting and later settings by Albinoni and Handel.
Set near Rio de Janeiro in 1560, the opera centers on the love between Pery, a Guarani prince, and Cecilia, daughter of a Portuguese nobleman.
A three-act opera seria set among rulers and royal figures of Epirus, Argos, Dodone, and Larissa.
Henrique Oswald’s one-act Italian musical novelette in three tableaux adapts Alfred de Musset’s novella La mouche. The comic subject led contemporary press to describe the work as an operetta.
The magician Atlante traps Christian and pagan knights and ladies in his palace of illusions. Orlando, Ferraù, and Sacripante enter searching for Angelica. Bradamante finds Ruggiero with Angelica and threatens him, but Atlante reminds Angelica that she loves Medoro. When Astolfo arrives immune to magic, Atlante persuades the captives he is their enemy. Ruggiero breaks the spell; Atlante disguises himself as Ruggiero but loses a duel to the real knight. The palace vanishes and the captives are freed.
A five-act opera centered on the mythological abduction of Helen by Paris.
The one-act azione teatrale features Apollo, Melpomene, Erato, and Euterpe.
Pigmalione, a king and sculptor, despairs of finding his ideal woman and creates a statue. He falls in love with it and prays for it to come alive; Venus answers his prayer.
Demetrius seizes the Macedonian throne after murdering Alexander. He plans to invade Asia, but Ptolemy, Seleucus, and Lysimachus join forces against him, joined by Pyrrhus of Epirus. Pyrrhus drives Demetrius from the throne, takes his place, and is then driven away by Lysimachus.
A three-act dramma per musica by Alessandro Scarlatti using Nicolò Minato’s libretto, previously set by Francesco Cavalli in Pompeo Magno.
On a fictional Italian island in the 1950s, postman Mario becomes friends with exiled poet Pablo Neruda and asks for help writing poetry to court Beatrice. Mario and Beatrice marry. Inspired by Neruda, Mario records island sounds and writes political poetry; violence erupts at a communist demonstration, and he is shot. Neruda later receives Mario’s farewell recording.
Ruggiero, missing after defending Bulgaria, returns to Paris after being rescued by Leone, the Greek emperor. Leone loves Bradamante, who vows to marry only a man who can defeat her in combat, while Ruggiero is torn between his love for her and his debt to Leone. Leone asks Ruggiero to fight Bradamante in disguise. After Leone wins the contest, Bradamante believes she has lost Ruggiero, but Leone reveals Ruggiero’s sacrifice and confesses that he had already pledged his heart to Clotilde. Emperor Carlo blesses both couples: Ruggiero and Bradamante, and Clotilde and Leone.
Saint Alexius returns to Rome disguised as a beggar and secretly lives in poverty beneath his father’s house. He resists the Devil’s temptations with an angel’s help; after his death, a letter reveals his identity to his family.
An opera by Fernando Sor based on the story of Telemachus on the island of Calypso.
Artemisia loves her tutor Trespolo, who is too dull to notice and instead loves the servant Despina. Brothers Ciro and Nino also love Artemisia; one goes mad while the other is cured of insanity. After the farcical complications, Trespolo marries Despina and Artemisia marries Ciro.
Camilla, heir to the Volsci throne, hides as a shepherdess while plotting against the usurper Latinus. Prenesto falls in love with her after she saves him from a boar. Lavinia hides her lover Turnus, and their political conflicts unfold alongside Camilla’s effort to reclaim the throne. The opera ends with marriage between Camilla and Prenesto, reconciling their rival families.
A setting of the Vologeso story in which the Parthian king, deposed by Lucio Vero, is restored by Flavio.
This Italian dramma per musica concerns Xerxes I. Its libretto draws on Book 7 of Herodotus's Histories and is more directly based on Raffaele Tauro's comedy L'ingelosite speranze, itself adapted from Lope de Vega's Lo cierto por lo dudoso.
Comic opera based on Beaumarchais’s play Le Barbier de Séville; this entry does not supply a plot summary.
A two-act Italian intermezzo with four named characters: Fulvia, Luigi, Cilla Panarella, and Nardone.
Peter the Great works incognito as a carpenter in Saardam alongside the Russian defector Flimann, who hopes to marry the mayor’s daughter Marietta. The mayor mistakes Flimann for the Tsar. When Peter is called home to suppress a revolt, he reveals his identity and grants Flimann a title that enables him to marry Marietta.
Carlo becomes an assassin in the service of Venice to save his father's life. Ordered to kill Teodora, he recognizes his former wife, whom he once tried to kill after mistakenly believing she betrayed him. Foscari loves Teodora and later her daughter Violetta, who loves the exiled patrician Pisani. The lovers escape. Teodora kills herself in an attempt to save Carlo's father, but Carlo discovers that his father is already dead.
Ferramondo, a wealthy and bad-tempered old man, lives with his niece Angelica and nephew Giocondo. Angelica loves Valerio, but Giocondo’s wife Lucilla has spent the money needed for Angelica’s dowry. Giocondo proposes that Angelica enter a convent, while Ferramondo considers arranging her marriage to his friend Dorval. Misunderstandings about Angelica and Valerio fuel Ferramondo’s suspicions. Eventually Giocondo admits that Lucilla’s spending depleted their funds, and Ferramondo agrees to pay the dowry, let Lucilla stay in the household, and allow Angelica to marry Valerio.
On the night of his wedding, apothecary Don Annibale is repeatedly called to the door by Serafina’s cousin Enrico, disguised as a series of patients. Enrico’s interruptions keep the groom from his bride until dawn, when Annibale must leave for Rome to attend to his aunt’s will.
In a small Venetian square in the mid-eighteenth century, visiting Neapolitan gentleman Astolfi flirts with several women, provoking jealousy among their suitors. Haberdasher Anzoleto and Luçieta plan to marry, though their relationship is marked by quarrels. Gasparina’s uncle Fabrizio discovers that Astolfi is bankrupt and that he himself is a lottery winner; Astolfi asks to marry Gasparina. As Anzoleto and Luçieta’s neighbors quarrel, Astolfi invites them all to dinner and announces that he and Gasparina will marry and leave Venice.
On his wedding day, Fadinard’s horse eats a straw hat belonging to Anaide, whose jealous husband will punish her if she returns without it. Fadinard and his wedding party search across Paris, causing misunderstandings and chaotic encounters while pursuing a replacement. His deaf uncle’s wedding gift turns out to be the needed hat, and Anaide returns home reconciled with her husband as Fadinard’s marriage finally proceeds.
A two-act opera inspired by David Kertzer’s account of the kidnapping of Edgardo Mortara. Its characters include Edgardo and his parents, Salomone and Marianna Mortara, Pope Pius IX, and Inquisitor Feletti.
Queen Elizabeth plans to visit Leicester’s castle, but he hides his new bride Amelia to avoid the Queen’s anger. Amelia escapes and reveals her troubles; Leicester confesses the marriage, and the Queen dismisses him. Warney plots against Amelia, but Fanny thwarts his attempt to poison her. Elizabeth arrests Warney, pardons Leicester and Amelia, and approves their marriage.
Christian knight Tancredi and Saracen Clorinda, who are lovers, meet in battle without recognizing one another because their faces are covered by armor. Tancredi mortally wounds Clorinda and learns her identity only after removing her helmet. He baptizes her before she dies, and she sees Heaven open. A narrator recounts most of the action, while the combatants also act.
Don Giovanni is rescued from drowning and seduces the fisherwoman Elisa, then attempts to seduce Donna Anna and kills her father, the Commendatore. Later, the Commendatore’s statue appears at Don Giovanni’s supper and demands repentance; Don Giovanni refuses and is condemned to the abyss.
The corsair Corrado leaves his island to attack the Pasha Seid, leaving his lover Medora behind. After rescuing Gulnara and the harem women from a fire, Corrado is captured. Gulnara kills Seid and helps him escape. They return to the island, where Medora, believing Corrado dead, has taken poison. She dies after they reunite, and Corrado leaps from a cliff.
During the Sixth Crusade, Armando, a presumed-dead Knight of Rhodes living under an assumed name, has secretly married the Sultan’s daughter Palmide, who has borne him a son and converted to Christianity. Their identities are exposed, and Christian prisoners face death. Armando uncovers the vizier Osmino’s plot, kills him, and secures peace and reunion with Palmide.
Curious Marchese Calandrano, betrothed to Clorinda, asks Count Ripaverde to test her fidelity. Ripaverde and Clorinda fall in love; Aurelio consoles Calandrano’s niece Emilia and they fall in love, as do maid Serpina and steward Prospero. Three couples celebrate together, while Calandrano is left without a fiancée.
An opera by Gaetano Donizetti depicting the biblical story of Noah and the great flood.
The opera adapts Giovanni Ruffini’s 1855 nationalist novel Doctor Antonio.
Carlo, a carpenter in Livonia, loves Annetta. The visiting Tsar Peter and his wife Catherine discover that Carlo is Catherine’s long-lost brother. Once Carlo learns their identities, he introduces Annetta, whose father was a rebel, but Peter pardons her. Peter exposes the pretentious magistrate, and the imperial couple depart with Carlo and Annetta for St Petersburg.
Ignaz Holzbauer’s three-act opera was commissioned by Elector Carl Theodor for the opening of the Schlosstheater Schwetzingen in June 1753.
Tritemio wants his daughter Eugenia to marry the wealthy farmer Nardo, though she loves Rinaldo. To keep Nardo away, housemaid Lesbina impersonates Eugenia, and Nardo falls in love with her. When he learns who she is, he accepts her; Lesbina arranges a double wedding for herself and Nardo and for Eugenia and Rinaldo, while Tritemio marries Nardo’s niece Lena.
A two-act intermezzo for four characters, derived with modifications from Goldoni’s Il mondo della luna. Its first-act finale depicts Buonafede’s imaginary journey to the Moon.
The opera company director Lattanzio’s niece Eugenia loves cavalry lieutenant Edoardo, but his uncle refuses to let him marry an actress. Lattanzio’s wife Aurelia pretends to be a countess and deceives the colonel into approving the match. He discovers the trick but ultimately consents.
After Eleonora’s infidelity drives Cardenio to madness and exile on a Caribbean island, she is shipwrecked there and tries to reconcile with him. When Cardenio again mistakes her intentions and attempts suicide, his brother rescues him; seeing Eleonora ready to die rather than harm him, he forgives her and they reunite.
Nina and Teodoro love each other, but Nina is promised to Ernesto. Sigismondo and Camilla plot to frighten Ernesto away; he learns of their scheme and turns it against them. He finally agrees to Nina and Teodoro’s marriage, and Sigismondo renounces jealousy.
Bianca is forced to marry Count Manfredo despite secretly loving a knight. Elaisa arrives in search of her benefactor’s daughter, accompanied by Viscardo. Brunoro reveals that Viscardo is Bianca’s beloved. Manfredo suspects Bianca and locks her in the family tomb, intending to poison her, but Elaisa substitutes a strong narcotic. Believing Bianca dead, Viscardo stabs Elaisa just as Bianca wakes.
After capturing Bajazette and his daughter Asteria, Tamerlano falls in love with her and offers Andronico a kingdom if he can secure Bajazette’s consent to their marriage. Asteria feigns affection to save her father, then attempts to poison Tamerlano. Irene saves him, and Tamerlano allows Asteria and Andronico to marry; Bajazette takes the poison himself.
Riccardo Zandonai’s three-act opera adapts Charles Dickens’s The Cricket on the Hearth. Its characters include carrier John Peerybingle and his wife Dot, toymakers Caleb Plummer and Tackleton, and the Plummer family.
A one-act monodrama in which a pompous music director rehearses an orchestra, frequently imitating the instruments.
Paolino and Carolina are secretly married in the household of her father Geronimo. Paolino tries to arrange a match between Count Robinson and Carolina’s sister Elisetta, but Robinson is drawn to Carolina instead. After a series of misunderstandings, Paolino and Carolina reveal their marriage; the family forgives them, while Robinson and Elisetta agree to marry.
The three-act dramma giocoso features would-be astrologer Ecclitico, credulous Buonafede, his daughters Flaminia and Clarice, maid Lisetta, Ernesto, and Ernesto’s servant Cecco.
Opera by Pedro António Avondano using Carlo Goldoni’s libretto, originally written for Baldassare Galuppi’s 1750 setting. The source does not provide a plot synopsis.
The astrologer Ecclitico tricks the wealthy Buonafede into believing he has traveled to the Moon. There Buonafede is manipulated into consenting to marriages between his daughters and their chosen partners; once the deception is exposed, he relents and the couples celebrate.
A revised Roman version of Cavalli’s Giasone, with musical additions and changes by Alessandro Stradella and a revised libretto by Giovanni Filippo Apolloni. A distinct plot summary is not provided.
A two-part comic opera whose protagonist is Tiberio.
In Benares, Idamore, a warrior leader who is secretly a Pariah, loves Neala, daughter of Brahmin high priest Akebare. Idamore plans to marry Neala and flee, but his father Zarete arrives and demands equality for Pariahs. When Idamore reveals his origins, Akebare sentences both men to death; Neala joins them, while Akebare rejoices at the prospect of taking the empire.
In Arcadia, Amarilli is expected to marry the hunter Silvio to appease Diana, though she loves Mirtillo. Eurilla tricks the lovers into a compromising situation so Amarilli will be condemned, but Diana’s priest reveals that Mirtillo is of divine parentage. The threatened sacrifice is canceled, and Mirtillo and Amarilli, as well as Silvio and Dorinda, are joined in marriage.
A one-act comic opera pasticcio for a small cast, assembled from famous melodies by Bellini, Donizetti, Mozart, and Rossini, with new recitatives and choruses. It was written for amateur performers and presented as a benefit work.
During the French Reign of Terror, Prince Jean-Charles, disguised as the Little Marat, discovers that his mother, the Princess of Fleury, is imprisoned. He enlists Mariella and a carpenter to forge safe-conducts and arrange a boat for their escape. The Little Marat is shot while restraining the corrupt Orc, but the carpenter kills the Orc, and the Little Marat and Mariella escape to free his mother.
Shipwrecked pirate Gualtiero arrives near the castle of Ernesto, who married Gualtiero’s former beloved Imogene under threat to her father. Imogene shelters the strangers but hides her recognition of Gualtiero. The former lovers meet and declare that they still love each other, while Ernesto discovers them and challenges Gualtiero. Ernesto dies in their fight, and Gualtiero gives himself up to the knights; Imogene descends into madness as he is sentenced to death.
The gods ask Trojan prince Paris to judge which of Venus, Juno, and Pallas is fairest and should receive the Golden Apple of Discord. Paris chooses Venus. The rejected goddesses seek revenge until Jupiter ends the conflict and awards the apple to Empress Margaret Theresa.
Metalce overthrows Sostrate and seeks to marry Ericlea while promising Sostrate’s daughter Rosmene to Viridate. Jealous rivalries lead to death sentences and battle, but Sostrate regains his throne, Ericlea accepts a repentant Metalce, and Viridate learns Rosmene acted under duress.
A prisoner regains hope when his jailer suggests that revolt in Flanders may bring freedom. He escapes through the prison and emerges into a garden, where the Grand Inquisitor reveals that the apparent escape was another deception; the prisoner wonders whether true freedom awaits him at the stake.
Otto Nicolai’s opera was first performed in Italian as Il proscritto, with a German reworking titled Die Heimkehr des Verbannten premiered in 1844.
In 17th-century Scotland under Cromwell, Malvina’s Royalist husband Giorgio was believed dead after a shipwreck. Her mother and half-brother encourage her to marry the Cromwellian Arturo, and the opera opens on their planned wedding day.
Early Italian opera about the classical myth of Cephalus and Aurora. Most of the score is lost.
Gaudenzio is a spendthrift. His sister Aurora is in love with Gentilino, while Donna Ortensia has designs on her employee and her maid Dorina is attracted to Gaudenzio.
Rosalina is engaged to Colombello, but after seeing the King in his regal splendor she falls in love with him and breaks off the engagement. When she meets the King privately and sees him without his crown or clothes, her infatuation ends and she returns to Colombello.
Giovanni Paisiello’s comic opera with a libretto by Giovanni Battista Casti premiered at the Burgtheater in Vienna in 1784.
The opera features Alessandro, king of Macedonia; Aminta, a shepherd and rightful heir to Sidon; Elisa, a noble nymph; Tamiri, a fugitive princess; and Agenore, a Sidonian nobleman.
Alessandro seeks the rightful heir to Sidon and discovers that the shepherd Aminta is its king. Aminta and Elisa love one another, while Alessandro proposes political marriages that would separate them and Tamiri from Agenore; after hearing the couples plead, he relents, allows both couples to marry, and crowns Aminta.
A three-act Italian dramma giocoso by Antonio Salieri, with a libretto by Lorenzo Da Ponte after an earlier work by Giovanni Bertati.
After the Trojan War, Ulisse returns to Ithaca, where Penelope remains beset by suitors. With Minerva’s help he disguises himself, reunites with his son Telemaco, defeats the suitors, and at last convinces Penelope of his identity.
Don Calandrino, son of the podestà of Monte Secco, pretends to know everything but cannot reason well. Livietta, a wealthy peasant girl, tries to behave like a lady; Monsieur Le Blonde boasts of places he does not know; and Irene is simple and humble. After various turns, Don Calandrino pairs with Livietta, while Le Blonde pairs with Irene.
Count Gil suspects his wife Susanna is having an affair when he smells tobacco in their home. Susanna admits a secret but withholds it, and Gil searches the house. After he returns repeatedly, he catches her smoking with their servant Sante; they reconcile and smoke together.
Sofia and Florville are in love, but her guardian Gaudenzio has arranged her marriage to Bruschino junior, whom she has never met. When the young man is detained at an inn over an unpaid bill, Florville takes his place. Bruschino senior arrives, but after a series of complications he accepts Florville as his son and Sofia’s husband.
Bertolucci plans to marry his daughter Clorinda to the antiquities dealer Caramello, although she loves her music tutor Fabricio. Bertolucci’s servant Bacòlo disguises himself as the admired composer Signor Fagotto, praises Fabricio’s music and wins Bertolucci’s approval; the deception is exposed, but both Clorinda and Bacòlo find partners.
In a dream, Fortuna and Constanza offer to guide Scipio through life, but he must choose between worldly power and steadfast virtue. In the Temple of Heaven, he meets ancestral heroes and learns that he must return to Earth for a mission. He chooses Constanza, withstands Fortuna’s storm, and awakens; Licenza praises the choice and the work’s dedicatee, Archbishop Colloredo.
As stevedores unload Michele’s barge on the Seine, his wife Giorgetta grows close to Luigi, a stevedore. Michele refuses her request to bring wine to the workers and becomes increasingly estranged from her. Luigi asks to be dismissed but later admits that he and Giorgetta plan to meet after dark and escape together. Michele remembers their dead child and the days when he could shelter his wife beneath his cloak. Suspecting her infidelity, he lights his pipe; Luigi mistakes the glow for Giorgetta’s signal and returns to the barge. Michele confronts him, forces him to confess the affair, strangles him, and hides his body under his cloak. When Giorgetta returns, Michele reveals Luigi’s body.
In Scott’s Ivanhoe story, Vilfredo loves Ravena, while Rebecca falls in love with the wounded Vilfredo she nursed. The Templar Briano abducts Rebecca and she is condemned to die unless a champion defends her. Vilfredo defeats Briano, who is killed by a bolt from heaven; Rebecca confesses her love to Vilfredo, then dies when he tells her they cannot be together.
For a celebration of King João V’s name-day, this pastoral serenata tells of Nerina’s planned marriage to Adraste. The gods frustrate the arrangement because Nerina loves Arsindo more.
Riccardo Albenori, a dissolute young man, flees to Pisa with his soldier friend after trouble in Lucca, where he seduced Leonora and then pursued Doralice. Leonora and Doralice both follow him. Leonora’s brother Erminio arrives and vows revenge. Riccardo plans to elope with Doralice, but Erminio challenges him to a duel. Wounded, Riccardo repents his former life and accepts Leonora’s hand in marriage.
The opera concerns the siege of Rome by Etruscan king Porsenna, who seeks to restore the monarchy, and Roman hostage Clelia, whose intended husband is republican ambassador Orazio.
During a siege of Rome, hostage Clelia rejects Tarquinio’s advances and uncovers his treacherous attack. After escaping across the Tiber, she exposes his guilt to King Porsenna, who makes peace with Rome and frees her.
A cycle of three one-act operas by Giacomo Puccini: Il tabarro, set on a barge on the Seine; Suor Angelica, set at a convent near Siena; and Gianni Schicchi, set in Florence. The works are linked by their treatment of the concealment of a death and contrast in tone, from dark drama to religious redemption and farce.
Leonora loves the troubadour Manrico, while Count di Luna also seeks her. Manrico’s mother Azucena recounts that she abducted the Count’s infant brother to avenge her own mother’s execution but mistakenly burned her own child. The Count’s forces capture Azucena; Manrico is arrested while trying to save her. Leonora bargains with the Count for Manrico’s release but takes poison, and dies beside Manrico in prison. The Count then orders Manrico’s execution; Azucena reveals that Manrico was the Count’s brother and that she has been avenged.
The poet Prosdocimo looks for a subject for a comic drama and hears Zaida’s story: she fled a Turkish harem after being falsely accused of infidelity but still loves Prince Selim. Selim arrives in Naples, where the married Fiorilla falls for him, while her admirer Narciso pursues her. Selim offers to buy Fiorilla from her husband, Geronio, who refuses. At a masked ball, Fiorilla mistakes Narciso for Selim, while Selim mistakes Zaida for Fiorilla. Selim leaves with Zaida, and Fiorilla returns home to find that Geronio has staged a divorce. He eventually forgives her, and the two couples reunite.
A party of European travellers gathers at a spa hotel while journeying to Charles X’s coronation in Reims. A shortage of horses prevents them from continuing, but they learn the king will return to Paris and celebrations will take place there. The travellers resolve their rivalries and enjoy a banquet and musical festivities at the hotel.
Imelda Lambertazzi loves Bonifacio Geremei, whose families are feuding. When Bonifacio proposes peace through marriage, Imelda’s father and brother oppose it. Her brother stabs Bonifacio with a poisoned dagger; Imelda sucks the poison from his wound and dies beside him.
After pirates abduct Athenian maidens, Imeneo rescues the captives and asks to marry Rosmene. She loves Tirinto but feels obliged to accept Imeneo out of gratitude. Pretending to receive a judgment from the underworld, she chooses Imeneo, and the chorus endorses reason and honor over passion.
Wolfgang Fortner’s two-act German chamber opera adapts Federico García Lorca’s play Amor de don Perlimplín con Belisa en su jardín. Fortner characterized it as four images of an erotic valentine in the manner of a chamber play.
A Visitor arrives at a remote penal colony to witness an execution by a machine that inscribes a prisoner’s crimes into his flesh before killing him. The Officer, devoted to the device and its dead inventor, hopes the Visitor will endorse its supposed redemptive purpose. The Visitor opposes the procedure but refuses to intervene. The Officer releases the prisoner and takes his own place in the machine. It malfunctions, kills him quickly, and destroys itself; the Visitor leaves the island.
On Midsummer Eve, Lidunka hopes to see her beloved Vojtech reflected in the village well, following a custom said to reveal a girl’s future husband. Her mother favors the wealthy older Janek, and Lidunka consults Veruna, the village sorceress. Both suitors climb a tree to ensure their reflections appear, but Janek falls into the well just before Lidunka arrives. The confusion is eventually resolved, and Lidunka marries Vojtech.
Dante journeys through episodes drawn from the Inferno, meeting assassins, thieves, sex workers, merchants, politicians, adulterers, friars, and nuns amid storms, abysses, and other extreme landscapes. The journey culminates in an encounter with Lucifer.
Shipwrecked English trader Inkle survives with the help of Yarico, an Indigenous woman, and they fall in love. On returning to his society, he plans to sell her into slavery to recover his losses and marry Narcissa for social advancement. Narcissa marries another man, and Inkle remains with Yarico.
At a wedding in Helsinki, Tereza, a waitress and mother of a school-shooting victim, learns that groom Tuomas is the shooter’s brother. The action alternates between the wedding and the school ten years earlier, where students’ memories reveal that they bullied the shooter. Tuomas eventually discloses that he and Iris helped plan the attack but withdrew at the last moment; the shooter acted alone. Tuomas leaves Stela, while the ghost of Tereza’s daughter Markéta comforts her and asks her to move forward.
Christine, left alone while her husband Robert is away conducting, befriends a young baron. A letter about an assignation leads her to believe Robert has been unfaithful, so she demands a divorce. Their friend Stroh explains that the letter concerned him, not Robert. Once the baron confirms this, Christine dismisses him, and she and Robert reconcile.
The Crowd demands the extermination of the rats, and the Minister bargains with a mysterious Stranger to charm them away. After the Minister is re-elected, he refuses to pay, claiming the rats left freely. The Stranger departs, and the townspeople discover their children are missing; they are said to be inside the Little Hill.
Khrennikov's Russian-language opera adapts Nikolai Virta's 1935 novel Loneliness. The opera received Stalin's approval and drew criticism from Dmitri Shostakovich.
A migrant leaves a mining village to return home, but police arrest him during a peace demonstration and torture him with other prisoners. He escapes with an Algerian prisoner. In the second part, he joins a woman in opposing war and disaster; they reach a flooded river near his homeland and drown together.
Jupiter plans to woo the nymph Io disguised as shepherd Hylas, while Apollo courts her as Philemon. Io prefers Hylas but pities Philemon; when Jupiter disperses a storm, she realizes he is a god, and they declare their love. In the next scene La Folie announces that Apollo has abandoned Parnassus and she has stolen his lyre; the opera then breaks off.
Princess Iolanta has been blind since birth, but her father King René has kept this from her. Physician Ibn-Hakia says she can be cured only if she learns she is blind and wants to see. Count Vaudémont enters her garden and falls in love with her; when she cannot distinguish a red rose from a white one, he explains light and color. René threatens Vaudémont to motivate Iolanta, who agrees to treatment. It succeeds, and she rejoices in seeing the world. René releases her from her betrothal to Robert and gives her to Vaudémont.
The fairy Iolanthe was banished for marrying a mortal and secretly raised their son Strephon, an Arcadian shepherd. Strephon loves Phyllis, a ward of the Lord Chancellor, who forbids their marriage while he and other peers seek to marry her. When Iolanthe’s embrace of Strephon is mistaken for a lover’s, Phyllis rejects him. Strephon gains political power through the fairies; later, Iolanthe reveals that the Lord Chancellor is her husband and Strephon’s father. The Fairy Queen is about to punish Iolanthe for breaking fairy law again, but the peers and fairies avert the sentences by changing the law so fairies must marry mortals.
The page identifies the opera seria and its characters Danao, Ipermestra, Linceo, Elpinice, Plestene, and Adrasto, but provides no plot synopsis.
Johann Adolph Hasse’s setting of Metastasio’s libretto draws on the myth underlying Aeschylus’ Suppliants. The available text does not describe the plot.
Esperanza Spalding retells the Iphigenia myth through five manifestations of the heroine, each with a separate story. In Euripides’ account, Iphigenia’s father Agamemnon sacrifices her to secure favorable winds for the Greek fleet bound for Troy; Spalding’s version reimagines the myth.
A zarzuela by José de Nebra.
A German opera by Carl Heinrich Graun and Leopold Villati on the Iphigenia in Aulis subject. The entry provides no plot synopsis.
Agamemnon learns that he must sacrifice his daughter Iphigénie to secure winds for the Greek fleet sailing to Troy. He summons her to Aulis under the pretext of a marriage to Achilles, then tries to stop her arrival. Iphigénie and her mother Clytemnestre come despite his efforts. When the Greeks press for the sacrifice, Iphigénie accepts her fate, but Achilles intervenes and Calchas announces that Diana has relented and permits the marriage.
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