The Journal of Seventeenth-Century Music

Volume 30 (2024) No. 1

Alessandro Melani, L’empio punito. Edited by Luca Della Libera. Recent Researches in the Music of the Baroque Era 228. Middleton, WI: A-R Editions, 2022. [cii, 361 pp. ISBN 978-1-9872-0812-2.]

Reviewed by Nastasia Heckendorff*

1.1 L’empio punito is the first opera based on the Don Giovanni story. The libretto, by Filippo Acciaiuoli and Giovanni Filippo Apolloni, was set to music by Alessandro Melani, the youngest brother of the castrato singer Atto Melani, and performed in Rome during Carnival 1669 in the Teatro Colonna, under the patronage of Christina of Sweden.^[1] In accordance with its historical significance, L’empio punito has recently attracted considerable interest: the first modern performance took place in Leipzig in 2003, and three further productions occurred in 2019 and 2020.^[2] Now Luca Della Libera has published the critical edition reviewed here.

1.2 In his introduction, Della Libera places particular emphasis on the literary sources and their impact on L’empio punito. Evidence of the spread of the Don Giovanni story by commedia dell’arte troupes in Italy dates back to the early 1620s. Around the same time, the theme circulated in writings such as the Spanish El burlador de Sevilla by Tirso de Molina (ca. 1616–30) and an undated, unattributed Italian version, Il convitato di pietra. According to Della Libera, the Florentine reception of the Don Giovanni story was pivotal for its selection for the libretto, as the opera’s authors had close connections to that city. However, L’empio punito deviates in many respects from the original myth: for example, the plot takes place in the pseudo-classical city of Pella and not in the Spanish/Italian environs. Also, Acrimante (the Don Giovanni character), cousin of the king of Corinth, does not engage in any trickery by changing clothes. These particularities, among others, render the opera an unusual example of the myth, and they prompt the editor to ask what other elements may have influenced the libretto.

1.3 In his analysis of the opera’s dramaturgy, Della Libera displays an impressive panorama of references, supplemented by an appendix. He suggests that the libretto of L’empio punito mirrors trends of the time: the opera includes several topoi such as sleep and dream scenes, a prison scene, and such supernatural elements as enchanted statues, the last already a central part of the Don Giovanni story. Furthermore, the libretto is characterized by numerous quotations and textual borrowings. These include quotes from earlier librettos by Apolloni, borrowings from Giacinto Andrea Cicognini and Sebastiano Baldini, as well as references to the works of important literary figures such as Ovid, Ariosto, Tasso, and Caldéron de la Barca.

1.4 Della Libera also discusses the choice to set the opera in the ancient Macedonian kingdom. He believes this to be indicative of trends in Roman librettos because Venetian librettists tended to favor plots set in Roman antiquity. This claim seems surprising in light of  the examples of Venetian operas with plots set in Greece and the Middle East. Among the most important of these was the so-called “Persian Cycle” consisting of Xerse, Artemisia, and Antioco by Nicolò Minato and Francesco Cavalli—performed in Venice between 1655 and 1659—which was inspired by Graeco-Persian antiquity and recalls episodes from Persian history and the Middle East.

1.5 While Della Libera explicitly mentions the role of Minato’s cycle in L’empio punito, the influences he identifies are essentially limited to dramaturgy. As Della Libera points out, this cycle introduced the structure of the Spanish comedy with three couples, which was then adopted in L’empio punito. Could the cycle have influenced Acciaiuoli and Apolloni not just in their choice of dramaturgy, but also in their choice of setting? Della Libera does not address this question.

1.6 Indeed, there may be good reasons for viewing L’empio punito as indicative of Venetian operatic trends. In fact, Acciaiuoli and Apolloni played a pivotal role in the reception of Venetian opera in the papal city: encouraged by the patronage of Christina of Sweden, the two librettists adapted a series of Venetian operas for the Roman Teatro di Tordinona, among them Giasone and Scipione Affricano, which were given two years after L’empio punito.^[3] Della Libera does discuss certain respects in which L’empio punito was influenced by contemporary operatic topoi and by Venetian librettists other than Minato. For example, he notes that Cicognini’s comedy L’Adamira (published 1657) may have served as the source for the name of Acrimante’s abandoned wife, Atamira. Nonetheless, a more thorough engagement with Venetian libretto trends and their influence on L’empio punito—perhaps instead of what sometimes seems to be a disproportionate focus on conceiving of the opera primarily as an adaptation of Don Giovanni—could have made Della Libera’s introductory remarks even more well-rounded.

1.7 The introduction is followed by editions of the libretto and the music. The musical text makes use of two main sources: a manuscript score copied by Giovanni Antelli and a second copyist, probably Bernardo Terenzi or Tarquinio Lanciani, that is preserved in the Vatican Library,^[4] and another score copied solely by Antelli that is housed in the Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. Both scores are addressed equally in the edition, as their deviations are minimal. Two important characteristics of the manuscripts—the dating, based on the watermarks in the Chigi manuscript, as well as the fact that both scores largely include the same cuts and variants—lead Della Libera to the hypothesis that both sources are connected to the first performance. The musical dramaturgy is characterized by a high density of contrasting musical forms: arias, duets, and arioso passages are especially rich and vary in length, form, and style, as Della Libera states in his introduction. The orchestra includes two obbligato treble instruments and basso continuo. The edition presents a well-edited musical text, pleasant to the eye.

1.8 Della Libera’s invaluable edition marks a milestone in the study of Roman opera. It raises questions that will inspire further investigation into L’empio punito as well as related operas from the latter half of the seventeenth century.