Rossini: The Siege of Corinth

October 9th marks the bicentenary of the premiere at the Paris Opera of Rossini’s Siege of Corinth, his first opera written directly in French. It caused quite a stir, as the work made a barely veiled reference to the tragic siege of Greek cities by the Ottoman occupiers during the War of Independence, which was raging at the time. As was often the case, Rossini reused large sections of a previous opera (Maometto II) and skilfully adapted them to the new libretto. A highly successful opera, yet one that has fallen somewhat into obscurity and is rarely performed: the United States had to wait until 1975 to see its premiere there, thanks to the Metropolitan’s production featuring Shirley Verrett, Harry Theyard and Beverly Sills, conducted by Thomas Schippers. A few months earlier, the same team had recorded one of the finest performances of the work, in its Italian version, which is now finally available on streaming and download platforms.