Secret Lives Revealed
It is understandable that Cavalleria Rusticana, composed by Mascagni, and I Pagliacci, composed by Leoncavallo, are often paired and compared by students of opera. These two one-act operas were written within two years of each other and are both considered to be pioneers in the advent of the musical Verismo school (although the decision on whether they are really veristic operas is still to be determined). While Cavalleria is the story of every day villagers who experience tragedy after a revealed infidelity and Pagliacci is the story of clowns who must play the part despite their private distresses, these two operas share many similarities in both the plot and the operatic elements. Both of these operas are tales of love and betrayal which explore the themes of jealousy and infidelity among ordinary people.
Verismo is an Italian word for "realism" and was applied to a movement in Italian literature in the late 19th century that grew from a renewed......
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