Catone in Utica explained

Catone in Utica (pronounced as /it/;) is an opera libretto by Metastasio, that was originally written for Leonardo Vinci's 1727 opera. Following Vinci's success, Metastasio's text was used by numerous composers of the baroque and classical eras for their own operas, including Pietro Torri (1736), Antonio Vivaldi (1737), Giovanni Battista Ferrandini (1753) and J. C. Bach (1761).

History

Before Metastasio's Catone in Utica libretto, Cato the Younger had already been the subject of following operas:

• Catone il giovane, by Bartolomeo Monari, libretto by (Bologna 1688)^[1]
• Catone Uticensi, by Carlo Francesco Pollarolo (Venice 1701)
• Cato, German opera by Reinhard Keiser, text after Matteo Noris (Hamburg 1715)^[2]

Metastasio wrote Catone in Utica in Italian, as a libretto for an opera in three acts. He changed the name of Cornelia to Emilia and that of Juba to Arbace, as better suited for music. Leonardo Vinci set the libretto to music for the first time. Vinci's opera was premiered at the Teatro delle Dame, Rome, during the carnival of 1727.

Content

The subject of the libretto is the death of Cato the Younger, set in Utica. Following characters are represented:

• Catone (Cato the Younger)
• Cesare (Julius Caesar)
• Marzia, daughter of Catone, secretly in love with Cesare
• Arbace, Prince of Numidia, friend of Catone and lover of Marzia
• Emilia, widow of Pompeo (Pompey)
• Fulvio, legate of the Roman Senate and lover of Emilia.

Operas

Metastasio's libretto was also set by:

• Geminiano Giacomelli, Vienna, 1727
• Leonardo Leo, Venice, 1729 ^[3]
• Johann Adolph Hasse, Turin, 1732
• George Frederick Handel, London, 1732, a pasticcio adapted mainly from Leo's 1729 setting, but transposing, editing or even entirely replacing its various arias to suit the skills of the singers he had at his disposal; some of the interpolated arias included pre-existing compositions by Porpora, Antonio Vivaldi, Hasse, and Leonardo Vinci. ^[4]
• Pietro Torri, Munich, 1736
• Antonio Vivaldi, Venice and Verona, 1737
• Egidio Duni, Italy, about 1738
• , Brunswick, 1743
• Carl Heinrich Graun, Berlin, 1744
• Niccolò Jommelli, Vienna, 1749
• Giovanni Battista Ferrandini, Munich, 1758
• Vincenzo Legrenzo Ciampi, Venice, 1750
• Florian Leopold Gassmann, Vienna, about 1760
• Johann Christian Bach, Naples, 1761^[5]
• Gian Francesco de Majo, Naples, 1763
• Niccolò Piccinni, Naples, 1770
• , Naples, 1777
• , Milan, 1782
• Giovanni Paisiello, Naples, 1788
• Peter Winter, Venice, 1791.

Sources

• Book: Champlin . John Denison Jr . John Denison Champlin Jr. . 1888–90 . Apthorp . William Foster . William Foster Apthorp . Cyclopedia of Music and Musicians . New York . Charles Scribner's Sons.
  • Volume I
  • Volume II
  • Volume III

Notes and References

1. Domenico Pietropaolo, Mary Ann Parker (2011). The Baroque Libretto: Italian Operas and Oratorios in the Thomas Fisher Library at the University of Toronto. University of Toronto Press., p. 109
2. http://operadata.stanford.edu/catalog/20101073 Cato, Die Liebe gegen das Vaterland, oder Der sterbende Cato
3. Web site: Catone in Utica (i). Grove Music Online. 2002. 10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.article.O901023. Shearon. Stephen. 978-1-56159-263-0.
4. Web site: Cut-and-shut Baroque: Handel's Catone in Utica. bachtrack.com.
5. Warburton . Ernest . Ernest Warburton (musicologist) . Catone in Utica ('Cato in Utica')(ii) . 10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.article.O004257 .