Opera Rara and Britten Sinfonia present rediscovered Mercadante opera

This June will see Opera Rara’s second collaboration with the Britten Sinfonia following the success of Donizetti’s Il Paria three years prior. The two organisations will mark the first performance of Mercadante’s Il Proscritto since its Naples premiere in 1842 with a co-production of the opera at the Barbican in London.

When Opera Rara’s artistic director, Carlo Rizzi, discovered Mercadante’s original autograph score at the start of the pandemic in March 2020, he spearheaded its full restoration. Originally found in the Naples Conservatory Library, the new performing edition is now available via Casa Ricordi.

Working together with fellow musicologist Ian Schofield, the company's artistic dramaturg Roger Parker painstakingly restored the score. He described the process: ‘There was a time when Ian Schofield and I were working obsessively on the thing: 12-hour days, 7 days a week; both of us. Under those conditions it took about three months to get to second proofs of the orchestral score.’

Il Proscritto’s original Naples audience did not receive the piece well, and so the opera was never heard again after its initial run. The 2022 revival of the work is Opera Rara’s 46th restoration project since it was founded in 1970 as an opera company, recording label and ‘operatic archaeologist’ and Il Proscritto is the fourth complete Mercadante opera which the company has restored, performed and recorded.

Parker edited the new performing edition of the opera and talked about the challenges he faced working on a piece that had fallen out of regular repertoire for so long: ‘The biggest challenge in creating a performing edition of Il Proscritto was in the fact that the opera left so few traces. Basically, there’s the composer’s autograph (not easy to read), a contemporary copy, and a few pieces in vocal score. So, there were lots of difficult decisions, in particular about matters of orchestral detail.’

Following a studio recording the week before, Opera Rara and Britten Sinfonia will give the first performance of Il Proscritto at the Barbican in London on 28 June this year. Tickets can be found here. The world premiere studio recording will be released next Spring.

This month Opera Rara also launches its Insider Series this month with an evening exploring French operetta at the Fidelio Café in London as well as its Salon Series for emerging artists on 10 May at Stone House in London.

You can find more information about Opera Rara here.