Open AccessL’EDIZIONE CRITICA DEI «PURITANI» DI VINCENZO BELLINI: ALCUNI ASPETTI DI METODO
Author(s) -
Fabrizio Della Seta
Publication year - 2014
Publication title -
rendiconti. classe di lettere e scienze morali e storiche
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 2384-9150
pISSN - 1124-1667
DOI - 10.4081/let.2014.220
Subject(s) - opera , musical , premise , point (geometry) , event (particle physics) , art , flexibility (engineering) , philosophy , literature , humanities , linguistics , physics , mathematics , geometry , quantum mechanics , statistics
The critical edition of I Puritani, published in 2013, provides an opportunity for some reflections on the nature of the operatic score compared with that of the literary text. Unlike the latter, the written dramatic-musical text does not coincide with the artwork; rather, it is the premise to the creation of a complex event, the theatrical performance. Bellini’s opera excellently exemplifies the point: the author’s thought is transmitted by multiple sources, each of which contains variants that are not in conflict with each other; they embody a compositional thought that contains within itself the flexibility of the performance. A case in point is offered by metronome markings: Bellini wrote up to four different indications for the same passage in different manuscripts. None of these should be considered to represent the author’s final idea; rather, they delimit the spectrum of options within which the interpreter is called to choose.