An indispensable departure point for anybody who wishes to deal with the forgotten genre of opera buffa during the 1830s and 40s or who wishes to take up the challenge of projecting it onto the wider European and world of its own day, in accordance with a widespread tendency in today's musicology. [Izzo's efforts help] reveal to us a piece ... Read moreof our history, with the richness and subtlety that our history (opera history, but not only that) deserves.
BOLLETTINO DI STUDI BELLINIANI
The first substantial assessment of Italian comic operas composed during the central years of the Risorgimento
the period during which upheavals, revolutions, and wars ultimately led to the liberation and unification of Italy. Francesco Izzo's pathbreaking study argues that in the 'realm of seriousness' of mid-nineteenth-century Italy, comedy was not an anachronistic intruder, but a significant and vital cultural presence . . . [and] offers new insights into opera history and theories of comedy in the arts. It will be of interest to opera lovers everywhere and to students in music, philosophy, comparative literature, and Italian cultural studies.
SARASOTA OPERA
Shed[s] light on some of the possible implications of such works within the larger political context. A refreshingly multifaceted picture of post-Rossinian opera buffa . . . that emerges as complex and tension-imbued as it could be. [Historical accounts need to consider] the lively, anti-defeatist voices and vital operatic tradition [that] Izzo has recovered and delivered to us.
Frances Vella
MUSIC & LETTERS
Izzo provides an enlightening, often entertaining corrective to the common notion that the music of the early Romantic period in Italy was exclusively dour, serious, and grim, with exceedingly few new works of brilliant light comedy. At the same time, he provides an informative overview of the nuanced changes in style and structure of the comic genre and of the broader political and social context.
Gabriele Dotto, co-general editor, Le Opere di Gaetano Donizetti
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Thanks to its use of multiple perspectives and methodologies, Izzo's study is not only destined to become a reference work but also to restore a missing piece (and a fundamental one) to the history of nineteenth-century Italian opera. Crystal-clear prose.
IL SAGGIATORE MUSICALE
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