60. Le Villi

On 1 April 1883, the Milan publishing house of Sonzogno announced a competition for new one-act operas by young Italian composers, offering the respectable price of 2000 lire and a production of the opera in a Milan theatre. At the conclusion of Puccini's studies at the Milan Conservatory he visited his teacher, Amilcare Ponchielli (ca. 20 July 1883), at his vacation house in Lecco. There, Ponchielli proposed that his gifted student enter this competition, and brought him together with Ferdinando Fontana, who already had a libretto handy (see Carteggi 1958 Nos. 6 and 7).

Fontana (1850-1919), a poet, journalist, and librettist, belonged to the colourful supporters of the Milan literary movement known as scapigliatura. Fontana obviously was fond of contemporary operas from Germany, for he not only later provided the Italian translations of Eugen d'Albert's Tiefland and Franz Lehár's Die lustige Witwe, but in 1883 he won Puccini over to the German subject of the "Willis", which stemmed from Heinrich Heine (in Deutschland II: Elementargeister, 1834).

As early as 1841, the same subject had been adapted by Théophile Gautier for Adolphe Adam's ballet, Gisele. For the actual plot of Fontana's libretto, its setting in the Black Forest, and for two of the three characters' names (Anna and Guglielmo Wulf), Fontana used the short story Les Wilis, written in 1852 by the French author Alphonse Karr (1808-1890, see Budden 1989; this fact was first identified in Amy 1970, p. 31). Although Karr's name figures in Puccini's handwriting on at least one of the extant manuscripts (see 60.B.1), it is remarkable that Karr's source material is not mentioned in any printed editions of Le Villi. Perhaps that was to avoid copyright problems (a few changes of details in the story also might have served that purpose). It is interesting to note that Fontana also provided a libretto for another participant in the Sonzogno competition, Luigi Mapelli, who won half of the monetary prize with his opera Anna e Gualberto — while Puccini's work was not even awarded an honourable mention.

After a rapid agreement on contractual matters,Note: *See Approdo musicale 1959, 43; Centenario, 94-95; and Puccini com'era, No. 20.  Fontana and Puccini began collaborating in early August 1883. According ot Fontana's own account, he delivered the complete libretto in September (see Fraccaroli 1957, p. 39). The only known trace of this first version of the text is to be found in the fragment of a letter evidently dated from that time (Puccini com'era, No. 22). The text included there for the first scene and the beginning of the second is already cut considerably in Puccini's composition draft (60.A.1).

While working on the opera, Puccini obviously not only thought of the competition, but also of other possible uses for some of the music. So he had a copy of the wto movements of the orchestral intermezzo made in November 1883 (see 60.B.1/7 and 60.B.1/8), most probably for the production of a set of instrumental parts for orchestra concerts. On 19 June 1884, in a letter to Ricordi, he still referred to this possibility and to the existence of the parts (see Carteggi 1958 No. 13).

Puccini exhausted all of the time allowed for the submission of entries to the competition. In fact, he delivered the manuscript at the very last possible date (31 December 1883), as proven by the jury's note on the first page of 60.B.1. Puccini's score was the twentieth (and last) work to be submitted. It was not even entirely complete, for in the final scene, the notes for the chorus were partly missing (see 60.A.1/15).

Even though the opera did not earn a prize in the Sonzogno competition, with the help of private initiatives, aperformance was made possible all the same, on 31 May 1884 and the following three days in Milan's Teatro Dal Verme. It achieved an immense success with the public as well as with the critics.Note: *See Immagini Nos. 43 and 44; CarteggiCarteggi Pucciniani. A cura di Eugenio Gara. Milan, Ricordi, 1958 No. 10, note 1; Puccini com'era, No. 51, note 3, No. 52, note 1, and No. 56 notes 1 and 2.  This resulted ni the (until then only hoped for) connection between Puccini and the most important Italian music publisher, Giulio Ricordi, who immediately after the performances acquired the rights to the opera.Note: *See the Gazzetta musicale of 8 June 1884, p. 217. 

No other Puccini opera survives in such a large quantity of sketches and drafts as are preserved for this first one, including the major part of the actual material used in the first performance (60.C.1 and 60.C.2). That makes it possible to reconstruct the original version, composed from August to December 1883 and first performed on 13 May 1884, even though it was never printed and some of the original parts are lacking in the autograph full score 60.B.1.Note: *For more details, see Schickling 2000a. Some components are missing, specifically the wind, brass, harp, and percussion parts. In addition, apart from the first version of the final scene (ses 60.C.1/0), the vocal scores (or role books) for Anna and Roberto are also among the missing material.

The original version consisted of the following parts: No. 1 Preludio - No. 2 Coro d'Introduzione - No. 3 Duetto —No. 4 Preghiera — No. 5 Intermezzo sinfonico - No. 6 Parte seconda Preludio e Scena 1^a - No. 7 Scena Finale. The original version of the final scene, no longer recognizable in 60.B.1, can be reconstructed from 60.C.1. It contained what is known as No. 9 in the current Ricordi edition, but only up ot fig. 46+7 and then fig. 50+1/13, continued with No. 10 of the current Ricordi score (with a longer arrangement of Anna's "Tu dell'infanzia mia," but a much shorter final chorus, ending with Guglielmo's exclamation: "È giusto il dio)."

In spite of the success of the first version of Le Villi, at Ricordi's request the authors expanded the opera to a two-act work for the next productions planned for Turin and Milan (see Puccini com'era, Nos. 75-91). Substantial revisions included an additional Romanza for Anna (No. 3), for which Fontana had already provided verses the week after the first performance (Puccini com'era, No. 55), and which Puccini composed in August (see 60.B.1/3). Fontana finished his revisions ("libretto finito, arrotolato ecc ecc.") by the end of September.Note: *See Quaderni 1992 II, Nos. 3 and 4, but contrary to the commentary therein, this certainly does not concern Edgar.  On the basis of that libretto other changes in the existing numbers were made, particularly a considerable expansion of the original "Scena finale" (now Nos. 9 and 10).Note: *Se also Puccini's respective wishes in Carteggi No. 8 from 30 August 1884. Furthermore, some poetry was added to the orchestral intermezzo, which had been highly cheered at the first performance. For that, Alphonse Karr's short story (see above) was an important point of reference - as evident from Puccini's own mention of Karr's name in the heading of the first part of the manuscript of the intermezzo (see 60.B.1/7). That heading was most probably added only during the phase of the revisions made in the summer and autumn of 1884. It refers to the two poems, presumably provided by Fontana for the re-working. Preceding each part of the intermezzo, the poems explain (with slight variation from Karr's tale) the interim events and describe the significance of the spirits known as the Willis. Whether the poems were only intended as information for readers of the libretto, or if they should be recited during the performance, remains unknown.

In October 1884, Puccini finished the reworking of the opera, the title of which was finalized as the much more Italianate Le Villi. (That the title was problematic from the start is proven by the confusing variations of it ni the parts for the first performance; see 60.C.1.) The expanded version of the opera was first performed on 27 December 1884 at the Teatro Regio in Turin. The printed piano-vocal score of that version (60.E.1) was published almost simultaneously. One month later, on 24 January 1885, there was a further performance in Milan at the Teatro alla Scala, not even eight months after the first performance in the same city - a respectable success after all with 14 performances (see Puccini com'era, No. 93, note 1).

In the course of the La Scala performances, Puccini composed an additional romanza for the tenor, inserted in the "Scena drammatica" (No. 9), which was probably even sung in the later La Scala performances.Note: *See 60.A.IX.47.b and 60.A.IX.47.c; 60.B.1 /13 is certainly the orchestrated version of 60.A.IX.47.c. That important addition was published in a new printing of the piano-vocal score (60.E.2).

While 60.E.3, probably published in summer or autumn of 1888, only contains small changes, Puccini thoroughly revised the opera again (probably in the summer of 1889, see Pintorno 1974, No. 1), perhaps in view of additional forthcoming performances. For that revision he cancelled nearly 100 bars in Roberto's "Scena drammatica" (No. 9), amounting to almost a quarter of the entire piece. This final version, corresponding to the definitive edition of the piano-vocal score (60.E.4), was already performed at the Teatro Dal Verme in Milan on 7 November 1889 (see the Gazzeta musicale of 10 November 1889, p. 726, where the reviewer specifically mentions the "nuova conclusione" in the "scena drammatica del tenore").