Himmelskleid, Das (La veste di cielo)
Wolf-Ferrari, the son of a German painter and his Italian wife, was throughout his life divided between two musical cultures; the deep-felt seriousness of the German and the cheerful calmness of the Italian. He wrote thirteen operas – ten comic, and three serious. Of all thirteen, Wolf-Ferrari most loved his fairy-tale Das Himmelskleid (1927), a serious opera based on the French story The Donkey-Skin by Charles Perrault. SYNOPSIS: Das Himmelskleid is the parable of a young princess who is spolit by her wealth, greed and thoughts of power. She is deprived of all her earthly goods and of the honourable love of a prince, and her kingdom falls into ruin. She wanders through the world until finally she comes to understand her faults, and finds her prince.
Instrumentation
2+picc (picc dbl fl). 2+ca. 2+bc. 2+cbn. / 4.3.3.1. / timp / perc / hp / cel / pno / org / str Stage Music: 6 hn / 6 tpt / 3 tbn / perc (inc. thundersheet and wind machine)
Format
F/S V/S (Ger) V/S (It) Lib C/P Stage Music
Publisher
JW