This article puts forward an alternative way of approaching Russian instrumental music, from the perspective of a different conception of musical and historical time. It has long been a truism of music criticism that nineteenth-century Russian symphonic music lacks a true sense of development when compared with a normative German model. Was Verdi or his librettist Somma aware of Isabella d’Aspeno, a big operatic hit at that time in Milano, when they started working on the dramatic plot of Un Ballo in Maschera? This paper attempts to answer this question by offering a comparative examination of the two operas, supplemented by a scrutiny of the other known prototypes of Un Ballo in Maschera, such as the works of Auber (Gustave III ou Le Bal Masquée), Gabussi (Clemenza di Valois) and Mercadante (Il Reggente). Taking into consideration that Carrer’s Isabella (composed in 1853 and first presented in Italy in 1855) is anterior to Verdi’s Ballo (1859), it would be reasonable to wonder whether the work of the young composer from Zante was one of the prototypes for one of the major operatic creations of the incontestable king of the Italian opera. ![]() Both works dramatize the assassination of a sovereign by his political and erotic rival, which takes place during an official masquerade ball. The particularity of this work lies is its obvious thematic similarity to the celebrated Italian opera Un Ballo in Maschera by Giuseppe Verdi and Antonio Somma. The opera Isabella d’Aspeno opened in April 1855 at the Milanese theatre ‘Carcano’ and was considered one of the grands succès of the year, a fact confirmed by the numerous repetitions of the production during that year and the next. This paper paper focuses on an opera forgotten today, but popular in its time: Isabella d’Aspeno, a work by the Ionian composer Paolo Carrer and the unknown Italian librettist hidden behind the initials R.G.S. His other published work includes ethnographic accounts of dance and its place in the flow of culture. His interest in Swan Lake emerges from his background as a dancer and long periods of research in the former Soviet Union during 2004–2006, when he was able to see at first hand most of the Russian productions referenced in this article. Gregory Sporton is Director of the Visualisation Research Unit in the Department of Art at Birmingham Institute of Art and Design. ![]() ![]() In this article Gregory Sporton raises questions about what motivates Siegfried and why that is important for our understanding of the ballet, offering an alternative view of Siegfried's character. As choreographer-producers have struggled in the challenge to make the ballet work dramatically, his character has been transformed from onlooker to major influence in a series of reinterpretations of this classic work. Generally seen as the ballerina's ballet, one of the greatest difficulties in presenting Swan Lake as a credible drama has been the historically marginal role played by Siegfried, the Prince. Swan Lake has a central place in the ballet repertoire.
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