Pimmalione is an 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 one act by Luigi Cherubini

Luigi Cherubini

Luigi Cherubini was an Italian composer who spent most of his working life in France. His most significant compositions are operas and sacred music. Beethoven regarded Cherubini as the greatest of his contemporaries....

, first performed at the Théâtre des Tuileries, Paris

Paris

Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...

 on 30 November 1809. The 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...

 is an adaptation by Stefano Vestris of Antonio Simone Sografi's Italian translation of the text Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Jean-Jacques Rousseau was a Genevan philosopher, writer, and composer of 18th-century Romanticism. His political philosophy influenced the French Revolution as well as the overall development of modern political, sociological and educational thought.His novel Émile: or, On Education is a treatise...

 wrote for his scène lyrique Pygmalion (1770). It is based on the Classical legend of the sculptor Pygmalion

Pygmalion (mythology)

Pygmalion is a legendary figure of Cyprus. Though Pygmalion is the Greek version of the Phoenician royal name Pumayyaton, he is most familiar from Ovid's Metamorphoses, X, in which Pygmalion was a sculptor who fell in love with a statue he had carved.-In Ovid:In Ovid's narrative, Pygmalion was a...

.

Pimmalione was specially commissioned by the Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte

Napoleon I of France

Napoleon Bonaparte was a French military and political leader during the latter stages of the French Revolution.As Napoleon I, he was Emperor of the French from 1804 to 1815...

 to show off the talents of two of his favourite singers, the famous castrato

Castrato

A castrato is a man with a singing voice equivalent to that of a soprano, mezzo-soprano, or contralto voice produced either by castration of the singer before puberty or one who, because of an endocrinological condition, never reaches sexual maturity.Castration before puberty prevents a boy's...

 Girolamo Crescentini

Girolamo Crescentini

Girolamo Crescentini was a noted Italian singer castrato , a singing teacher and a composer.-Biography:He studied in Bologna with the noted teacher Lorenzo Gibelli and made his debut in 1783, quite advanced in years as a castrato...

 and the contralto

Contralto

Contralto is the deepest female classical singing voice, with the lowest tessitura, falling between tenor and mezzo-soprano. It typically ranges between the F below middle C to the second G above middle C , although at the extremes some voices can reach the E below middle C or the second B above...

 Giuseppina Grassini

Giuseppina Grassini

Giuseppina Maria Camilla Grassini was a noted Italian contralto, and a singing teacher...

 (who had been Napoleon's lover). It was first given in a private performance at the emperor's palace, Les Tuileries

Tuileries Palace

The Tuileries Palace was a royal palace in Paris which stood on the right bank of the River Seine until 1871, when it was destroyed in the upheaval during the suppression of the Paris Commune...

. Napoleon was delighted with the work and offered Cherubini a large reward and a commission for another piece.

Roles

Role	Voice type	Premiere cast, 1 September 1810
Pimmalione (Pygmalion)	castrato Castrato A castrato is a man with a singing voice equivalent to that of a soprano, mezzo-soprano, or contralto voice produced either by castration of the singer before puberty or one who, because of an endocrinological condition, never reaches sexual maturity.Castration before puberty prevents a boy's...  (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... )	Girolamo Crescentini
Galatea	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...	Luise Augustine Hymm
Venere (Venus)	contralto Contralto Contralto is the deepest female classical singing voice, with the lowest tessitura, falling between tenor and mezzo-soprano. It typically ranges between the F below middle C to the second G above middle C , although at the extremes some voices can reach the E below middle C or the second B above...	Giuseppina Grassini
Amore (Cupid Cupid In Roman mythology, Cupid is the god of desire, affection and erotic love. He is the son of the goddess Venus and the god Mars. His Greek counterpart is Eros... )	castrato (soprano)	Carlo Vestris

Synopsis

The sculptor Pygmalion falls in love with his own work, a statue of Galatea. He prays to the gods of love Venus and Cupid to release him from his passion. While he sleeps, Galatea's statue comes to life, dances and falls in love with Pygmalion. Pygmalion and Galatea celebrate their wedding in the palace of Venus.

Sources

• Del Teatro (in Italian)
• Amadeus Online (in Italian)
• Basil Deane Cherubini (Oxford University Press, 1965)