La falena is a leggenda or 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 composer

Composer

A composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...

 Antonio Smareglia

Antonio Smareglia

Antonio Smareglia was an Austro-Hungarian opera composer of Italian ethnicity.-Life:Antonio Smareglia was born in the town of Pola , in a house on Via Nettuno which still stands and in which there is now a small museum of his life and work...

 with an Italian

Italian language

Italian is a Romance language spoken mainly in Europe: Italy, Switzerland, San Marino, Vatican City, by minorities in Malta, Monaco, Croatia, Slovenia, France, Libya, Eritrea, and Somalia, and by immigrant communities in the Americas and Australia...

 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...

 by Silvio Benco. The opera premiered at the Teatro Rossini

Teatro San Benedetto

The Teatro San Benedetto was a theatre in Venice, particularly prominent in the operatic life of the city in the 18th and early 19th centuries. It saw the premieres of over 140 operas, including Rossini's L'italiana in Algeri, and was the theatre of choice for the presentation of opera seria until...

 in Venice

Venice

Venice is a city in northern Italy which is renowned for the beauty of its setting, its architecture and its artworks. It is the capital of the Veneto region...

 on 6 September 1897.

Musical analysis

La falena is a through composed opera containing an all-pervasive symphonic movement which is only broken in between acts. The music for the extended Act 2 duet between the virtuous king and the evil protagonist is particularly thrilling. The two men move as hallucinatory figures as the music rages with nightmarish obsessive urges that heighten the opera's drama.

Roles

Role	Voice type	Premiere Cast, 6 September 1897 (Conductor: Gialdino Gialdini Gialdino Gialdini Gialdino Gialdini was an Italian composer and orchestra conductor.He studied at Florence with Teodulo Mabellini. He won a prize offered by the Pergola Theatre of that city for the best opera, with Rosmunda, which met, however, with an unfavorable reception when produced in 1868... )
Albina	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...
King Stellio	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...	Alfonso Garulli
Uberto	baritone Baritone Baritone is a type of male singing voice that lies between the bass and tenor voices. It is the most common male voice. Originally from the Greek , meaning deep sounding, music for this voice is typically written in the range from the second F below middle C to the F above middle C Baritone (or...
Falena	mezzo-soprano Mezzo-soprano A mezzo-soprano is a type of classical female singing voice whose range lies between the soprano and the contralto singing voices, usually extending from the A below middle C to the A two octaves above...