Ricerche di S/Confine (Dec 2019)
Dall'opera al ballo e ritorno: Cesare in Egitto nell'Italia napoleonica
Abstract
For a ball in Naples in honor of Giuseppe Bonaparte Gaetano Gioia resumed the ancient operatic subject of Caesar in Egypt, back in vogue and referred in encomiastic terms to Napoleon since 1796. Gioia wrote his choreography inspired by the opera of Francesco Ballani and Giuseppe Maria Curci of that year. Later he draws a new version for a performance in Milan in front of Napoleon himself. The success of this second version suggested to Luigi Andrioli and Ercole Paganini another opera setting for the Teatro Imperiale in Turin in 1814. It is a rare case of translation from an opera to a ball and viceversa, from a ball to an opera. Due to the choice of Gioia's ball as a direct source, Adrioli and Paganini recover the dramaturgy of the reformed Italian opera that called for terrible situations; but they introduce it in an opera that, in regard to the dramatic plan and the lyrical numbers, is substantially marked by French poetic, where the classicism of Napoleonic era had reaffirmed the separation between melodic and dramatic value.
