Adelson e Salvini

Bellini's first opera was written as his final project at the Naples San Sebastiano Conservatory, when the composer was 23 years old. It was the custom at the Conservatory to introduce promising students to the public with a dramatic work. Bellini styled his project an opera semi-seria, and it was first performed at the Teatro del Conservatorio di San Sebastiano in Naples sometime between mid-January and mid-March 1825, although David Kimbell states 12 February 1825.[2] Herbert Weinstock attributes the uncertainty as to the exact date to a series of deaths of several prominent people (including Bourbon King Ferdinand I), which caused all public entertainment to stop during periods of mourning.[3]

"With a view to professional staging", various revisions were undertaken between 1826 and 1828, but the opera was never performed professionally.[2]

Bellini's score does not bring out much of the humour of the piece. Nevertheless, the work was so popular among the Conservatory's student audience that it was performed every Sunday for a year.

It was successful enough to generate a commission from the royal court, after it had captured the interest of the impresario Domenico Barbaja of the San Carlo Opera. Barbaja launched Bellini's career, commissioning him to write his next work, Bianca e Gernando in 1826, which was revised two years later as Bianca e Fernando.

Although much influenced by the music of Gioachino Rossini, Adelson e Salvini exhibits some of the characteristic tuneful style and delicate vocal line that Bellini achieved in his mature works. Characteristically, Bellini was to re-use some of the music from this opera in later works,[2] notably Nelly's act 1 Romanza "Dopo l'oscuro nembo" which became Giulietta's aria "O quante volte" in I Capuleti e i Montecchi. This was the only Bellini opera provided with recitativo secco.

Bellini greatly revised the opera for another production in 1829 and later revised it further. However, the first professional production[4] was not given for over 100 years at the Teatro Metropolitan, in Bellini's home town of Catania, on 6 November 1985.[2] Domenico De Meo further revised and edited the score of Adelson to prepare it for a 1992 production at the Teatro Massimo Bellini in Catania, Sicily. The following year, the Italian label Nuova Era issued Adelson e Salvini on compact discs.

Place: Ireland

Time: 17th century[6]

Lord Adelson, who is traveling, hosts in his castle his orphan girlfriend, Nelly, and his friend Salvini, an Italian painter who is secretly in love with her and is secretly loved by Fanny, a young Irishwoman to whom he gives painting lessons. Colonel Struley, Nelly's uncle, who was proscribed with his family several years ago by Adelson's father, has had Geronio engaged as a servant at the castle to try a second time to kidnap his niece in order to take revenge on the Adelson family.

• Kimbell, David (2001). "Adelson and Salvini". In Holden, Amanda (ed.). The New Penguin Opera Guide. New York: Penguin Putnam. ISBN 0-140-29312-4.
• Rosselli, John (1996). The Life of Bellini. New York: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-46781-0.
• Weinstock, Herbert (1971). Bellini: His Life and His Operas. New York: Knopf. ISBN 0394416562.

• Casa Ricordi (pub.), "Vincenzo Bellini": Outline of his life (in English) and list of critical editions of his works published by Ricordi on ricordi.it. Retrieved 13 December 2013.
• Galatopoulos, Stelios (2002), Bellini: Life, Times, Music: 1801–1835. London, Sanctuary Publishing ISBN 9781860744051
• Lippmann, Friedrich; McGuire, Simon (1998), "Bellini, Vincenzo", in Stanley Sadie, (Ed.), The New Grove Dictionary of Opera, Vol. One, pp. 389–397. London: Macmillan Publishers, Inc. ISBN 1-56159-228-5
• Maguire, Simon (1998), "Adelson and Salvini", in Stanley Sadie, (Ed.), The New Grove Dictionary of Opera, Vol. One, London: Macmillan Publishers, Inc. ISBN 0-333-73432-7, 1-56159-228-5
• Osborne, Charles (1994), The Bel Canto Operas of Rossini, Donizetti, and Bellini, Portland, Oregon: Amadeus Press. ISBN 0931340713
• Orrey, Leslie (1973), Bellini (The Master Musicians Series), London: J. M. Dent, Ltd. ISBN 0-460-02137-0
• Thiellay, Jean; Thiellay, Jean-Philippe, Bellini, Paris: Actes Sud, 2013, ISBN 978-2-330-02377-5 (in French)
• Willier, Stephen Ace, Vincenzo Bellini: A Guide to Research. Routledge, 2002. ISBN 0-8153-3805-8

• Libretto (in Italian)
• Adelson e Salvini in the "Sunday Afternoons at the Opera" Series, 22 November 1998, background notes on WWUH-fm, Hartford, Connecticut, 1998. Retrieved 10 August 2013
• Adelson e Salvini (Bellini): Scores at the International Music Score Library Project