Rossini: Semiramide Overture (Score)

This is the Overture to Rossini’s Semiramide

Performed by: Chamber Orchestra of Europe

Conducted by: Claudio Abbado

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 Assyria. The opera was first performed at La Fenice in Venice on 3 February 1823. Semiramide was Rossini's final Italian opera and was based on a Voltaire tragedy titled Tancredi. The music took the form of a return to vocal traditions of Rossini's youth, and was 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. Musicologist Rodolfo Celletti sums up the importance of Semiramide by stating that it "was the last opera of the great Baroque tradition: the most beautiful, the most imaginative, possibly the most complete; but also, irremediably, the last.". I hope you enjoy Rossini’s overture to Semiramide.

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The score in this video is in the public domain, and was downloaded from imslp.org

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