Overture to 'Il convito'

Domenico Cimarosa was the most famous and popular Italian opera composer of the second half of the 18th Century. In the course of a brilliantly successful career he composed more than 65 operas as well as a significant body of instrumental music and works for the church. His operas were performed all over Europe, both in Italian and in translation. A number of Cimarosa’s operas continued to enjoy occasional stagings during the 19th Century, and his most famous work, Il matrimonio segreto, is one of only a handful of operas of the period never to have left the repertory. Il convito (The Banquet) was Domenico Cimarosa’s 28th opera, written on commission from Teatro San Samuele in Venice for the Carnival season of 1782. There are two different overtures to Il convito. The one printed here, in three movements, is that found in the composer’s holograph score in the library of the Conservatorio di musica ‘S Pietro a Majella’ library in Naples. The second overture in one movement, apparently prepared for a performance of the opera before the court of Naples, is preserved in manuscript in The British Library. The three-movement structure is one found typically in Cimarosa’s early operas. Nonetheless, like all of Cimarosa’s overtures, the current example is remarkable for its vitality, melodic invention and assured handling of the orchestra.