"Luci miei traditrici"

Speranza



"LUCI MIE TRADITRICI": opera in due atti. Salvatore Sciarrino (n. 1947, Palermo).
Opera in two acts. Libretto by the composer after "Il tradimento per l’onore" by Giacinto Andrea Cicognini (1664), with an elegy by Claude Le Jeune (1608)
First performed at the Schwetzingen Festival in 1998. A co-production with the Cantiere Internazionale d’Arte di Montepulciano. Sung in Italian. Duration c. 70 ...min.

Salvatore Sciarrino’s opera begins with a bewitchly beautiful melody sung by a female voice, a quotation from an elegy by the Renaissance composer Claude Le Jeune.

Bewitchingly beautiful – but about the decline of beauty.

In Sciarrino’s composition, which he described as

"the Renaissance of music tragedy",

this melody returns but sounds more fragile each time before almost completely vanishing at the end.

The inspiration to write this opera, which was first performed in 1998, was supplied by another Renaissance composer:

Carlo Gesualdo, Prince of Venosa.

Gesualdo wrote incredibly new sounding madrigals for that time but who achieved almost mythical immortality for something quite else – the brutal, cooly premeditated murder of his wife and her lover.

ENTER CICOGNINI:

Almost 50 years after Gesualdo’s death the italian poet Giacinto Andrea Cicognini wrote a play about the events leading up to this deed, upon which Sciarrino created his libretto about the conflicts which exist within people who love.

The longing for everlasting love which collides with spontaneous passion, longing, a sense of ownership and self-torture, unrequited, one-sided desire, disappointment and the longing for revenge.

"The public", said the composer, "knows what will happen, what is inevitable."

"It discovers the magic in the performance, becomes one with the actors."

"In the middle of the audience a feeling, believed to have been long lost, becomes tangible."

The tensions that fill this piece about jealousy and murder and the tender music in the score create an intimate work of rare intensity.


Prologue:

An old song evokes the beauty of a beloved woman who seems to have died.

Scena 1:

»Come, my life« the duke calls out to the duchess.

He points out to her both the beauty and peril of a rose she wishes to pluck.

When La Malaspina begins to bleed he loses consciousness.

Scena 2:

The duke accepts the challenge of recommencing the game of love.

To love, says the duchess, is to be courageous.

The duke woos her cautiously.

As the couple pledge their undying love for each other they are watched by an envious servant.

Scena 3:

A guest has arrived. He and the duchess have a passionate encounter that deeply unsettles both of them.

Though they try their best to resist, their eyes betray their feelings.

Scena 4:

The servant witnesses the confessions of love and a secret rendezvous between duchess and guest.

Scena 5:

The servant has reported his observations to his master. The duke feels compelled to take revenge on those that have insulted his honour. The witness must die first.

Scena 6:

Duke and duchess have an agonizing conversation about the lady’s guilt.

The duke distrusts her.

She vows that she would rather die than betray him again.

He reciprocates this pledge of eternal fidelity.

The pair agree to meet again that night.

Scena 7:

The duchess is working on some embroidery that it intended to assure her fidelity.

The duke warns her that she no longer has much time.

Separately they prepare for the coming night.

Scena 8:

When the duke and duchess meet again, she finds him changed.

While he used to call her »my life«, he now sees death in her.

But, he tells her, in bed their love will become clearly visible.

He requests that she pull the curtains aside.

Before her lies the guest in his own blood.

The duches dies.

The duke lives on in perpetual torment.