Semiramide is an opera in two acts by Gioachino Rossini. The libretto by Gaetano Rossi is based on Voltaire's tragedy Semiramis, which in turn was based on the legend of Semiramis of Babylon. The opera was first performed at La Fenice in Venice on February 3, 1823.
Semiramide (Semiramis) was Rossini's final Italian opera, and took the form of a return to vocal traditions of his youth, a melodrama in which he "recreated the baroque tradition of decorative singing with unparalleled skill". The ensemble-scenes (particularly the duos between Arsace and Semiramide) and choruses are of a high order, as is the orchestral writing, which makes full use of a large pit.
Rossini wrote the title role for his wife, Isabella Colbran. The work starts with a well-known overture, and throughout it calls for outstanding singers in the leading roles. Although the overture is one of several of Rossini's to be widely recorded, the opera is only occasionally performed.Because Rossini's overtures were sometimes shuffled from one opera to another, Rossini would have found the fact that most music lovers today identify his operas by their overture to be ironic. It is well known, for example, that The Barber of Seville, one of the greatest of comic operas, is performed all over the world with an overture that had already served Rossini twice for serious operas. Semiramide, though, has its own overture.
The overture was almost certainly composed last. Unlike many operatic overtures of the day, it borrowed musical ideas from the opera itself, thus making it unsuitable for use with another score. The range and balance of musical ideas, from the hushed, rhythmic opening through the Andantino for four horns (drawn from the opera itself) and the repetition with pizzicato countermelodies in the strings to the lively Allegro, make the overture to Semiramide one of Rossini's finest contributions to the genre and deservedly one of the most popular.Every summer, the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra holds a summer concert of music guaranteed to please the crowds at the outdoor countryside venue of Waldbühne, a few miles outside Berlin.
Based on the amphitheater in the ancient Greek city of Epidaurus, and nestled in a natural valley, the Waldbuhne theater seats 22,000 in leafy comfort and remains one of Berlin's favorite open air concert venues, with magnificent views of the stage. World class conductors lead the Berlin Philharmonic in evening concerts of popular Italian, French, Russian and American favorites.
This is a recording of the concert from 2006, conducted by Marco Armiliato..
