Ermanno Wolf-Ferrari
Encyclopedia
Ermanno Wolf-Ferrari (January 12, 1876 – January 21, 1948) was an Italian
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

 composer
Composer
A composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...

 and teacher
Teacher
A teacher or schoolteacher is a person who provides education for pupils and students . The role of teacher is often formal and ongoing, carried out at a school or other place of formal education. In many countries, a person who wishes to become a teacher must first obtain specified professional...

. He is best known for his comic 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...

s such as Il segreto di Susanna
Il segreto di Susanna
Il segreto di Susanna is an intermezzo in one act by Ermanno Wolf-Ferrari to an Italian libretto by Enrico Golisciani...

(1909). A number of his works were based on plays by Carlo Goldoni
Carlo Goldoni
Carlo Osvaldo Goldoni was an Italian playwright and librettist from the Republic of Venice. His works include some of Italy's most famous and best-loved plays. Audiences have admired the plays of Goldoni for their ingenious mix of wit and honesty...

, including Le donne curiose
Le donne curiose
Le donne curiose is an opera in three acts by Ermanno Wolf-Ferrari to a text by Luigi Sugana after Carlo Goldoni's play.-Performance history:...

(1903), I quatro rusteghi (1906) and Il campiello
Il campiello
Il campiello is an opera in three acts by Ermanno Wolf-Ferrari. The Italian-language libretto was by Mario Ghisalberti, after the famous comedy of the same name written for the 1756 Venetian Carnival by the great Venetian playwright, Carlo Goldoni.Referred to as a commedia lirica, it is an...

(1936).

Life

Ermanno Wolf-Ferrari was born in Venice
Venice
Venice is a city in northern Italy which is renowned for the beauty of its setting, its architecture and its artworks. It is the capital of the Veneto region...

 in 1876, the son of an Italian mother and a German father. Ferrari was his mother's maiden-name, which he added to his own surname in 1895. Although he studied piano from an early age, music was not the primary passion of his young life. As a teenager Wolf-Ferrari wanted to be a painter like his father; he studied intensively in Venice and Rome
Rome
Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...

 and traveled abroad to study in Munich
Munich
Munich The city's motto is "" . Before 2006, it was "Weltstadt mit Herz" . Its native name, , is derived from the Old High German Munichen, meaning "by the monks' place". The city's name derives from the monks of the Benedictine order who founded the city; hence the monk depicted on the city's coat...

. It was there that he decided to concentrate instead on music
Music
Music is an art form whose medium is sound and silence. Its common elements are pitch , rhythm , dynamics, and the sonic qualities of timbre and texture...

, taking lessons from Josef Rheinberger
Josef Rheinberger
Josef Gabriel Rheinberger was a German organist and composer, born in Liechtenstein.-Short biography:...

. He enrolled at the Munich conservatory and began taking counterpoint and composition classes. These initially casual music classes eventually completely eclipsed his art studies, and music took over Wolf-Ferrari’s life. He wrote his first works in the 1890s.

At age 19, Wolf-Ferrari left the conservatory and traveled home to Venice. There he worked as a choral conductor, married, had a son called Max Winterfeld, and met both Arrigo Boito
Arrigo Boito
Arrigo Boito , aka Enrico Giuseppe Giovanni Boito, pseudonym Tobia Gorrio, was an Italian poet, journalist, novelist and composer, best known today for his libretti, especially those for Giuseppe Verdi's operas Otello and Falstaff, and his own opera Mefistofele...

 and Verdi. Just a few years later Wolf-Ferrari debuted his first opera, Cenerentola, based on the story of Cinderella. The opera was a failure in Italy, and the humiliated young composer moved back to Munich. German audiences would prove more appreciative of his work; a revised version of Cenerentola was a hit in Bremen in 1902, while the beautiful cantata La vita nuova brought the young composer international fame.

Wolf-Ferrari now began transforming the wild and witty farces of the 18th-century Venetian playwright Carlo Goldoni into comic operas. The resulting works were musically eclectic, melodic, and utterly hilarious; every single one became an international success. In fact, until the outbreak of World War I, Wolf-Ferrari’s operas were among the most performed in the world.

World War I, however, was a nightmare for Wolf-Ferrari. The young composer, who had been dividing his time between Munich and Venice, suddenly found his two countries at war with each other. He eventually moved to safety in Zurich, but the stress and sadness of the war brought him to a complete creative standstill. It was not until after the war’s end that Wolf-Ferrari moved back to Munich and began working again. A new melancholy vein appeared in his post-war work; his operas grew darker and more emotionally complex. Among these darker operas was Sly, an opera about a comic buffoon which transforms midstream into a tale of emotional torture and suicide.

In 1900, having failed to have two previous efforts published, Wolf-Ferrari saw the first performance of one of his 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...

s, Cenerentola, which was given in Venice
Venice
Venice is a city in northern Italy which is renowned for the beauty of its setting, its architecture and its artworks. It is the capital of the Veneto region...

. This was a failure at its premiere, although a later performance in Bremen was a success, setting a pattern for his later work, much of which was premiered in Germany and was received a good deal better there than it was in his native Italy. Among these works are Le donne curiose
Le donne curiose
Le donne curiose is an opera in three acts by Ermanno Wolf-Ferrari to a text by Luigi Sugana after Carlo Goldoni's play.-Performance history:...

(1903), I quatro rusteghi (1906), and Il segreto di Susanna
Il segreto di Susanna
Il segreto di Susanna is an intermezzo in one act by Ermanno Wolf-Ferrari to an Italian libretto by Enrico Golisciani...

(1909), all of them comedies, and all of them successful at their German premieres.

In 1902 he became professor of composition and director of the Liceo Benedetto Marcello
Conservatorio di Musica Benedetto Marcello di Venezia
The Conservatorio di Musica Benedetto Marcello di Venezia is a conservatory in Venice, Italy named after composer Benedetto Marcello and established in 1876.-History:...

.

With the outbreak of World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

, Wolf-Ferrari moved to Zurich
Zürich
Zurich is the largest city in Switzerland and the capital of the canton of Zurich. It is located in central Switzerland at the northwestern tip of Lake Zurich...

 and composed much less, though he still wrote another comedy, Gli amanti sposi (1916). He did not really pick up his rate of output until the 1920s, when he wrote Das Himmelskleid (1925) and Sly
Sly (opera)
Sly, ovvero La leggenda del dormiente risvegliato is an opera in three acts by Ermanno Wolf-Ferrari to an Italian libretto by Giovacchino Forzano, based on the Prologue to William Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew Sly, ovvero La leggenda del dormiente risvegliato (English: Sly, or The Legend...

(1927), the latter based on William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...

's The Taming of the Shrew
The Taming of the Shrew
The Taming of the Shrew is a comedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written between 1590 and 1591.The play begins with a framing device, often referred to as the Induction, in which a mischievous nobleman tricks a drunken tinker named Sly into believing he is actually a nobleman himself...

. In 1939 he became professor of composition at the Mozarteum in Salzburg
Salzburg
-Population development:In 1935, the population significantly increased when Salzburg absorbed adjacent municipalities. After World War II, numerous refugees found a new home in the city. New residential space was created for American soldiers of the postwar Occupation, and could be used for...

. In 1946 he moved again to Zürich before returning to his home city of Venice. He died in Venice and is buried in the Venetian cemetery Island of San Michele.

Music

As well as his operas, Wolf-Ferrari wrote a number of instrumental works, mainly at the very beginning and very end of his career. Only his violin concerto
Violin concerto
A violin concerto is a concerto for solo violin and instrumental ensemble, customarily orchestra. Such works have been written since the Baroque period, when the solo concerto form was first developed, up through the present day...

 has ever been performed with anything approaching regularity, though he also wrote Idillio-concertino (essentially a chamber symphony
Symphony
A symphony is an extended musical composition in Western classical music, scored almost always for orchestra. A symphony usually contains at least one movement or episode composed according to the sonata principle...

), various pieces of chamber music
Chamber music
Chamber music is a form of classical music, written for a small group of instruments which traditionally could be accommodated in a palace chamber. Most broadly, it includes any art music that is performed by a small number of performers with one performer to a part...

 including a piano quintet
Piano quintet
In European classical music, a piano quintet is a work of chamber music written for piano and four other instruments, most commonly piano, two violins, viola, and cello . Among the most frequently performed piano quintets are those by Robert Schumann, Johannes Brahms, César Franck, Antonín Dvořák...

 and two piano trio
Piano trio
A piano trio is a group of piano and two other instruments, usually a violin and a cello, or a piece of music written for such a group. It is one of the most common forms found in classical chamber music...

, two violin sonata
Violin sonata
A violin sonata is a musical composition for violin, which is nearly always accompanied by a piano or other keyboard instrument, or by figured bass in the Baroque period.-A:*Ella Adayevskaya**Sonata Greca for Violin or Clarinet and Piano...

s and a number of works for the organ amongst others.

Wolf-Ferrari's work is not performed very widely, although he is generally thought of probably the finest writer of Italian comic opera of his time. His works often recall the opera buffa
Opera buffa
Opera buffa is a genre of opera. It was first used as an informal description of Italian comic operas variously classified by their authors as ‘commedia in musica’, ‘commedia per musica’, ‘dramma bernesco’, ‘dramma comico’, ‘divertimento giocoso' etc...

 of the 18th century, although he also wrote more ambitious works in the manner of Pietro Mascagni
Pietro Mascagni
Pietro Antonio Stefano Mascagni was an Italian composer most noted for his operas. His 1890 masterpiece Cavalleria rusticana caused one of the greatest sensations in opera history and single-handedly ushered in the Verismo movement in Italian dramatic music...

, which are thought of less well. Much of his work has been ignored, although a performance in 1999 of Sly
Sly (opera)
Sly, ovvero La leggenda del dormiente risvegliato is an opera in three acts by Ermanno Wolf-Ferrari to an Italian libretto by Giovacchino Forzano, based on the Prologue to William Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew Sly, ovvero La leggenda del dormiente risvegliato (English: Sly, or The Legend...

by the Washington National Opera
Washington National Opera
The Washington National Opera is an opera company in Washington, D.C., USA. Formerly the Opera Society of Washington and the Washington Opera, the company received Congressional designation as the National Opera Company in 2000. Performances are now given in the Opera House of the John F...

 (the work's American premiere) marked something of a revival of interest in his works.

Chamber Music

  • Sonata No.1 for Violin & Piano in g minor, Op.1 (1895)
  • Sonata No.2 for Violin & Piano in a minor, Op.10 (1901)
  • Sonata No.3 for Violin & Piano in E Major, Op.27 (1943)
  • Sonata for Cello & Piano in G Major, Op.30 (1945)
  • String Duo in g minor for Violin & Cello, Op.33b (1946)
  • String Duo, "Introduzione e Balletto", for Violin & Cello, Op.35 (1948)
  • String Trio in b minor for Violin, Viola & Cello, WoO. (1894)
  • String Trio in a minor for Violin, Viola & Cello, Op.32 (1945)
  • String Quartet in e minor, Op.23 (1940)
  • String Quintet for 2 Violins, 2 Violas & Cello, WoO (1894)
  • String Quintet in C Major for 2 Violins, 2 Violas & Cello, Op.24 (1942)
  • Piano Trio No.1 in D Major, Op.5 (1898)
  • Piano Trio No.2 in F sharp Major, Op.7 (1900)
  • Piano Trio "Sonata" for in F Major for 2 Violins & Piano, Op.25 (1943)
  • Piano Quintet in D flat Major, Op.6 (1901)

Sources

Wolf-Ferrari, Ermanno by John C G Waterhouse, in The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, ed. Stanley Sadie
Stanley Sadie
Stanley Sadie CBE was a leading British musicologist, music critic, and editor. He was editor of the sixth edition of the Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians , which was published as the first edition of the New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians.Sadie was educated at St Paul's School,...

 (London, 1980) ISBN 0-333-23111-2

Wolf-Ferrari, Ermanno by John C G Waterhouse, in The New Grove Dictionary of Opera
New Grove Dictionary of Opera
The New Grove Dictionary of Opera is an encyclopedia of opera, considered to be one of the best general reference sources on the subject. It is the largest work on opera in English, and in its printed form, amounts to 5,448 pages in four volumes....

, ed. Stanley Sadie (London, 1992) ISBN 0-333-73432-7

External links

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