Le Trouvère: Opera in Four Acts by Salvadore Cammarano, French Translation by Émilien Pacini

By the time Le trouv re premiered at the Paris Op ra in 1857, Giuseppe Verdi had first-hand knowledge of the unique demands of French theater. He had adapted his earlier work I Lombardi alla prima crociata (La Scala, 1843) as J rusalem in 1847, and in 1855 he composed Les V pres siciliennes, especially for the Op ra. Il trovatore, set in Spain against the backdrop of civil unrest, was especially suited to Parisian tastes, which required spectacular performances with plenty of choreography. Verdi expanded the score with a four-part ballet in the third act and rewrote the ending, where he introduced a reprise of his celebrated "Miserere," which is first heard at the start of the fourth act. By all accounts, the resulting work displayed extraordinary musical and dramatic efficacy and, after a successful premiere, Le trouv re remained in the Op ra repertory through the opening decades of the twentieth century.

There is no extant autograph manuscript for Le trouv re. This critical edition is based primarily on a manuscript full score used at the premiere and during rehearsals, preserved at the Biblioth que de l'Op ra in Paris. Editor David Lawton's introduction to this edition discusses the origins, rehearsals, and reception of Le trouv re, the numerous sources preserved in French, Belgian, Italian, and British archives, and performance issues including staging, vocal style, and orchestral considerations.