Performing Fascism: Opera, Politics, and Masculinities in Fascist Italy, 1935-1941

Home , Adriano Lualdi, Alessandro Pavolini, Apollo Granforte, Aureliano Pertile, Barbara Giuranna, CasaPound

Elizabeth Crisenbery

Department of Music Duke University

Date:______Approved:

______Bryan Gilliam, Advisor

______Benjamin Earle

______Philip Rupprecht

______Louise Meintjes

______Roseen Giles

Dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Department of Music in the Graduate School of Duke University

2020

ABSTRACT

Performing Fascism: Opera, Politics, and Masculinities in Fascist Italy, 1935-1941

Elizabeth Crisenbery

Department of Music Duke University

Date:______Approved:

______Bryan Gilliam, Advisor

______Benjamin Earle

______Philip Rupprecht

______Louise Meintjes

______Roseen Giles

An abstract of a dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Department of Music in the Graduate School of Duke University

2020

Abstract

Roger Griffin notes that “there can be no term in the political lexicon which has

generated more conflicting theories about its basic definition than ‘fascism’.” The

difficulty articulating a singular definition of fascism is indicative of its complexities

and ideological changes over time. This dissertation offers fascist performativity as a

theoretical lens to better understand how Italian composers interacted with fascism

through sustained, performative acts while leaving space to account for the

slipperiness of fascist identities.

Although opera thrived in fascist Italy (1922-1943), extant scholarship on this

period of music history remains scant, promoting a misleading narrative of operatic

decline in the twentieth century. This dissertation examines the positions of four

Italian opera composers within fascist culture by focusing on the premieres of four

operas during the Italian fascist period: Pietro Mascagni’s Nerone (1935), Gian

Francesco Malipiero’s Giulio Cesare (1936), Ottorino Respighi’s Lucrezia (1937), and

Ennio Porrino’s Gli Orazi (1941). These musical settings of romanità (Roman-ness)

were part of Mussolini’s efforts to glorify ancient Rome, a central tenet of fascist

ideology.

In fascist Italy, a political society that extolled masculinity and musical

composition, experiences of difference were often hidden beneath a guise of

hypermasculine rhetoric. Opera composers associated with the fascist regime were

almost exclusively men and in a patriarchal society with prescribed gender norms,

they performed gender. I situate each composer through an investigation of their

relationship with the regime, through musical analysis, and an account of the reception of their operas. While not all the composers included in this dissertation were outspoken fascists, or even confirmed members of the National Fascist Party,

iv they nevertheless performed fascism to obtain favor with Mussolini and the fascist regime.

Dedication

To my parents, my partner, and my puppo.

Contents

Abstract ...... iv

Dedication ...... vi

List of Tables...... x

List of Examples ...... xi

Acknowledgements ...... xiii

Introduction. Fascist Operas and Fascist Masculinities ...... 1

The Death of Opera in Twentieth Century Italy? ...... 6

State of Research ...... 9

Theoretical Background ...... 17

Chapter Overview ...... 20

Chapter One. Fascist Italy’s Operatic Patriarch: Pietro Mascagni and his Nerone ...... 24

Fascist Performativity ...... 28

Promotional Media for Nerone and Mascagni ...... 35

Romanità in Nerone: The Limits of “Roman Musical Language” and Greek Representation ...... 39

“Long live the Artist!”: An Unconventional Nerone ...... 51

“The Battle is Won:” Nerone Reception ...... 56

Conclusion: An Icon in the Fascist Mechanism ...... 60

Chapter Two. For Il Duce: Gian Francesco Malipiero’s Giulio Cesare ...... 63

Julius Caesar and romanità in Fascist Culture ...... 67

L’uomo nuovo as Unattainable Paradigm ...... 71

Overlooked by Fascist Musical Bureaucracy ...... 76

Malipiero’s Libretto and the Theatrical Censorship Office ...... 82

Giulio Cesare Signals an Operatic Parenthesis...... 87

Giulio Cesare Reception ...... 96

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Conclusion: Failure to be Favored ...... 99

Chapter Three. Musical Memoriam and the Politics of ‘Apoliticism’: Ottorino Respighi’s Lucrezia ...... 101

Preserving Ottorino’s Legacy Through Curated Apoliticism ...... 105

The Reception of Lucrezia: “Homage to the art of the distinguished Maestro 114

Traditionalism and Historicism in Lucrezia ...... 119

Antifeminism in Lucrezia and Fascist Italy ...... 131

Elsa Completed the Incomplete Lucrezia: She Knew the Opera by Heart ...... 139

Conclusion: The Respighis’ Fascist Entanglements ...... 143

Chapter Four. The Young Defender of ‘Italian’ Music: Ennio Porrino and his Gli Orazi...... 146

Antisemitism in Fascist Italy and its Musical Community ...... 150

Jewish in the Eyes of the State: Guastalla’s Erasure from Gli Orazi...... 158

Traditionalism and Romanità in Gli Orazi ...... 164

Youth, Power, and the Theater of the Masses ...... 184

Conclusion: Glorifying Outspoken Antisemitism ...... 192

Conclusion. (Epilogue). Encore: Neo-Fascism in the Twenty-First Century ...... 194

Appendix A. Opera Synopses ...... 204

Nerone by Pietro Mascagni ...... 204

Giulio Cesare by Gian Francesco Malipiero ...... 204

Lucrezia by Ottorino Respighi ...... 205

Gli Orazi by Ennio Porrino ...... 205

Appendix B. Fascist Timeline ...... 207

Appendix C. Analytical Tables ...... 209

Bibliography ...... 220

Scores ...... 231

Libretti ...... 231

viii

Newspaper Articles ...... 232

Recordings and Other Media ...... 233

Biography ...... 234

List of Tables

Table 1: Nerone Analysis, Act I ...... 210

Table 2: Nerone Analysis Act II ...... 211

Table 3: Nerone Analysis, Act III ...... 212

Table 4: Giulio Cesare Analysis, Act I ...... 213

Table 5: Giulio Cesare Analysis, Act II ...... 213

Table 6: Giulio Cesare Analysis, Act III ...... 214

Table 7: Lucrezia Analysis, Moment I ...... 215

Table 8: Lucrezia Analysis, Moment II ...... 216

Table 9: Lucrezia Analysis, Moment III ...... 217

Table 10: Gli Orazi Analysis, First Half ...... 218

Table 11: Gli Orazi Analysis, Second Half ...... 219

List of Examples

Example 1: Roman Chorus, Nerone: Act I, scene vii (pg. 50) ...... 45

Example 2: Roman Chorus, Nerone: Act II, scene vii (pg. 108) ...... 46

Example 3: Drunken Chorus, Nerone: Act III, scene I (pg. 117) ...... 47

Example 4: Egloge’s Chromaticism, Nerone: Act II, scene iii (pg. 69-70) ...... 48

Example 5: Greek Chorus, Nerone: Act II, scene iv (pg. 83) ...... 49

Example 6: Love Duet Motive, Nerone: Act II, scene iii (pg. 75) ...... 50

Example 7: Nerone sings Oedipus Rex, Nerone: Act II, scene i (pg. 53) ...... 54

Example 8: Nerone’s arioso, Nerone: Act III, scene i (pg. 136) ...... 56

Example 9: Parlato Indications, Giulio Cesare, Act I (pg. 13) ...... 89

Example 10: Calpurnia warns Cesare, Giulio Cesare, Act II (pg. 65) ...... 90

Example 11: Antonio and Chorus, Giulio Cesare, Act III (pg. 113) ...... 92

Example 12: Hymn to Rome Finale, Giulio Cesare, Act III (pg. 164) ...... 94

Example 13: La Voce Recitative in G, Lucrezia, First Moment (pg. 29) ...... 125

Example 14: Hyperchromatic Passage in Lucrezia, Second Moment (pg. 54) ...... 127

Example 15: Tonal Schema of Lucrezia ...... 128

Example 16: Desdemona and Lucrezia: Otello, Act IV; Lucrezia, Second Moment (pg. 41) ...... 130

Example 17: Vocal Climax in the Rape Scene, Lucrezia, Second Moment (pg. 83) ..... 133

Example 18: Lucrezia Vocal Score Misspelling ...... 142

Example 19: Measures for the Defense of the Italian Race Cartoon, L. 15.11.38, Biblioteca Nazionale Braidense ...... 153

Example 20: Roman Chorus in Bb Major, Gli Orazi (pg. 63) ...... 173

Example 21: Tonal Centers Before and During Duel, Gli Orazi (pg. 59-121) ...... 174

Example 22: Roman and Alban Choruses Cheer, Gli Orazi (pg. 68) ...... 175

Example 23: The First Orazio Falls, Gli Orazi (pg. 79) ...... 177

Example 24: Camilla Cries for Atte, Gli Orazi (pg. 116) ...... 179

Example 25: Cries of Sororicide, Gli Orazi (pg. 141) ...... 180

Example 26: Il Vecchio’s Cadenza, Gli Orazi (pg. 170) ...... 182

Example 27: Choral Finale in C, Gli Orazi (pg.193) ...... 183

Example 28: Square Colosseum in the EUR. Photo by dissertation author ...... 196

Example 29: Commemorative Inscription, Teatro dell'Opera di Roma. Photo by dissertation author...... 198

xii

Acknowledgements

This dissertation would not have been possible without the generous support of

several amazing individuals. My project evolved from focusing exclusively on the

operas of Pietro Mascagni to encompass a wider breadth of opera composers and

their operas in fascist Italy. I owe thanks to my advisor, Bryan Gilliam, for all of his

guidance, advice, and networking skills. Without Bryan’s thoughtful feedback and

support, this project might have looked very different. Early in my graduate career, he suggested that I attend the 2016 Bard Music Festival, which presented music by

Giacomo Puccini and his contemporaries. It was at the Bard Music Festival that I first met Emanuele Senici and Ben Earle. I thank Emanuele for his kindness, hospitality during my research fellowship in Rome, and help navigating Italian archives. I also thank Ben for serving on my committee, sharing elusive sources, and for his keen insight on our shared subject area. Thanks to the other members of my committee,

Philip Rupprecht, Roseen Giles, and Louise Meintjes, for shaping and strengthening my work. This work would not have been possible without the support of a James B.

Duke International Research Travel Fellowship, which funded my Italian archival

research in 2017-18.

I also want to acknowledge the mentors who have supported me during my

graduate career and encouraged my exploration of various career paths without

judgement. To this end, I thank Liz Milewicz, Maria LaMonaca Wisdom, Laura

Williams, Andrew Janiak, Charles McGuire, Cisco Ramos, and Carlus Walters. Over

the course of my graduate career, I have been fortunate to work with these mentors

and learn from their experiences as Project Manager for Project Vox, Technical

Assistant in the Duke Music Library, and Administrative Intern for the Dean’s Office

at The Graduate School.

xiii

I owe the sincerest thanks to my partner, my family, my dog, and my friends for being by my side throughout this entire process. To my partner, Curtis Presley, for his unwavering support and much needed reminders to take breaks. I would not have been able to complete this journey without you. To my parents, Mike and Cathy

Crisenbery, and my sister, Julia Crisenbery, for their unrivaled encouragement. To my doggo, Shinji, for his constant companionship. To my colleagues turned coven, Imani

Mosley and Paul Sommerfeld, for always having my back, reading my drafts, and understanding. To my friends and bandmates, Jen Fuh, Jenna Horgan, Olivia

Kretschmer, Victoria Nelson, and Alex Treyz, who kept me sane and reignited my passion for playing music.

xiv

Introduction Fascist Operas and Fascist Masculinities

Opera thrived in fascist Italy. State-sponsored Italian opera houses (enti autonomi lirici) were required to stage new works each season, resulting in an assortment of new productions during the fascist period (1922-1943).1 Yet, a clear definition of what constitutes fascism, let alone fascist opera, remains elusive.2 As Roger Griffin notes,

“there can be no term in the political lexicon which has generated more conflicting theories about its basic definition than ‘fascism’.”3 Pamela M. Potter has convincingly illustrated the limitations of the term “Nazi music,” which she described as “an amorphous concept” that is often defined “by what it was not” rather than by any unifying cultural ideology.4 Similarly, an attempt to formulate a coherent definition of fascist opera in the Italian context reveals an absence of prescribed musical doctrine.

Rather than attempting to create a monolithic definition, I explore the idiosyncrasies and complexities of opera in fascist Italy. I focus on operas created to appease

Mussolini and the National Fascist Party through the glorification of ancient Roman narratives by composers associated with the Duce and regime. In fascist Italy, opera

1 Harvey Sachs contextualizes the regime’s emphasis on the performance of new operas, particularly in the late 1930s: “In the spring of 1938, the MinCulPop decreed that as of the following season, the enti autonomi were to devote half or more of their repertoire to twentieth-century works, at least half of which had to have had their first performances not more than twenty years earlier.” Harvey Sachs, Music in Fascist Italy (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1988), 69. For more on the shifting bureaucratic relationship between the regime and the enti autonomi and its propagandistic nature, see Luca Lévi Sala, “Propaganda, Negotiations, and Antisemitism at the Teatro La Fenice, 1937-43: Proscription Lists and Other Unpublished Documents,” Journal of Musicological Research 33, no. 4 (2014): 271–314. 2 Throughout this dissertation, fascism refers specifically to fascist Italy rather than a generic concept. 3 Roger Griffin, “Staging the Nation’s Rebirth: The Politics and Aesthetics of Performance in the Context of Fascist Studies,” in Fascism and Theatre: Comparative Studies on the Aesthetics and Politics of Performance in Europe, 1925-1945, ed. Günter Berghaus (Providence, RI: Berghahn Books, 1996), 11. 4 Pamela M. Potter, “What Is ‘Nazi Music’?,” The Musical Quarterly 88, no. 3 (2005): 429, 439..

was not restricted to any one musical style, as a variety of musical styles were accepted without any prohibitive intervention from the government. The operas considered in this dissertation staged well-known tales from ancient Rome; these musical settings of romanità (Roman-ness) were part of Mussolini’s efforts to build a third Rome, which combined the legacy of the Roman Empire with fascist visions of the future.5 This study analyses four operas created in fascist Italy and their composers, contextualizing their positions within fascist culture while highlighting the performative nature of their masculine identities in a hypermasculine regime.

The subjects of inquiry include Pietro Mascagni's Nerone (1935), Gian

Francesco Malipiero's Giulio Cesare (1936), Ottorino Respighi's Lucrezia (1937), and

Ennio Porrino's Gli Orazi (1941). Mascagni, the beloved composer of the people and creator of verismo opera, chose playwright Pietro Cossa's Nerone as the subject for

his final opera. Nero seems an unconventional choice for the glorification of romanità,

but it would appear to be a result of political ignorance or indifference rather than a

direct challenge to Mussolini.6 On the opposite end of the spectrum is Malipiero's

Shakespearian Giulio Cesare, an overt attempt to gain favor with Mussolini after the disastrous reception of his previous opera. Respighi also looked to Shakespeare and the ancient Roman historian, Livy, for his for his Lucrezia, a rare example of a titular

female protagonist. Porrino embraced the historical periodicity of romanità, also

turning to Livy's The History of Rome for the subject of Gli Orazi. Romanità can be

5 Romanità was a core tenet of fascist culture and was realized in a variety of media. See Aristotle Kallis, The Third Rome, 1922-1943: The Making of the Fascist Capital (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014). 6 Alan Mallach details Mascagni's involvement with the fascist regime, underscoring his compliance with Mussolini, but also his general lack of political beliefs: "his choice was a psychological rather than a political statement, his way of reminding the powerful that he answered to the higher authority of art." Alan Mallach, Pietro Mascagni and His Operas (Boston: Northeastern University Press, 2002), 271.

loosely defined as drawing upon the culture, myth, and power of the Roman Empire, whether by evoking ancient Rome in name or in approximated aesthetics. From the beginning of the fascist regime, romanità was positioned as an essential part of fascist identity. As a cultural and mythical phenomenon, romanità functioned as an aesthetic lens for fascist masculinities. In his 1922 speech, Passato e avvenire,

Mussolini declared; "Rome is our point of departure and reference; it is our symbol or,

if you wish, our myth. We dream of a Roman Italy, that is wise and strong, disciplined and imperial. Much of what was the immortal spirit of Rome, resurges in Fascism:

Roman is the Lictor, Roman is our organization of combat, Roman is our pride and courage: Civis Romanus sum."7 Rome was the capital of fascist Italy and Mussolini capitalized on the legacy of the ancient Roman Empire to legitimize the regime. The power of this legacy is evident in what Emilio Gentile describes as “fascist religion.”8

The sacredness of romanità permeated fascist culture and aesthetics, influencing architecture, visual art, spectacle, symbols, and music.9

Three layers of performativity anchor the analytical framework for this dissertation: opera, gender, and fascism. The performance of opera is a nuanced spectacle of highly trained performers; ephemeral moments preserved and articulated through sound recordings, written reviews, and a variety of other media. The media and discourse created as a result of operatic performances offers a mediated window into specific performances and specific points in time; the discourse of fascist opera

7 Translated by Jan Nelis, “Constructing Fascist Identity: Benito Mussolini and the Myth of Romanità,” Classical World 100, no. 4 (September 11, 2007): 403. 8 Emilio Gentile, “Fascism as Political Religion,” Journal of Contemporary History; London 25, no. 2 (May 1, 1990): 245. 9 This movement involved many institutions and resulted in a spectacular fascist infrastructure, much of which still exists today. See Joshua Arthurs, Excavating Modernity: The Roman Past in Fascist Italy (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2012), Aristotle Kallis, "‘Framing’ Romanita`: The Celebrations for the Bimillenario Augusteo and the Augusteo–Ara Pacis Project," Journal of Contemporary History, Vol. 46, Iss. 4 (2011): 809-831, and Kallis, The Third Rome.

premieres during the ventennio (twenty years of fascism) provides valuable insight into the composers who created those works and their places within fascist musical culture.10

Opera composers associated with the fascist regime were almost exclusively men and in a patriarchal society with prescribed gender norms, they performed gender. The performance of gender is the repetition of specific actions and presentations, as theorized by Judith Butler in Gender Trouble. In the book’s second edition, Butler responded to the discourse generated by the first edition and reflected upon her initial theoretical aims: “The view that gender is performative sought to show that what we take to be an internal essence of gender is manufactured through a sustained set of acts, posited through the gendered stylization of the body.”11 This suggests the potential for a plurality of gendered expressions, e.g. a variety of masculinities, femininities, and non-binary expressions. However, in fascist Italy, the gender binary of male and female was deeply engrained in societal norms and men embodied a variety of masculinities. Although multiple masculinities seem antithetical to the fascist paradigm of masculinity, the uomo nuovo (new man), this unattainable masculine paradigm did not suggest one type of fascist new man.12

10 Ventennio refers to the period of fascist rule under Mussolini (1922-1943). In September 1943, Germany occupied Italy, effectively controlling Mussolini and the government until V-day in May 1945. 11 Judith Butler, Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity, 2nd ed. (New York: Routledge, 1999), xv. The first edition of Butler’s book was published in 1990. 12 Emilio Gentile names multiple realizations of the uomo nuovo: “Fascism—unlike Nazism—did not have one single ‘new man’ model. Perfect fascist prototypes were the soldier in the Great War, the fascist action squad member, and later the citizen-soldier, citizen-producer, colonizer, and so forth.” This is one of Gentile’s concepts from Fascismo: Storia e interpretazione (2002) explored by Luca La Rovere, “Totalitarian Pedagogy and the Italian Youth,” inThe “New Man” in Radical Right Ideology and Practice, 1919-45, ed. Jorge Dagnino, Matthew Feldman, and Paul Stocker (London: Bloomsbury, 2018), 19.

The performance of fascism is the repetition of highly ritualistic, political actions as prescribed by Mussolini and the National Fascist Party in public and private settings that may shift over time. Performance was also essential to maintaining fascism as an ideology, as Simonetta Falasca-Zamponi illustrates: “More than mere means of political legitimation, rituals, myths, cults, and speeches were fundamental to the construction of fascist power, its specific physiognomy, its political vision.”13 While not all of the composers included in this dissertation were outspoken fascists, or even confirmed members of the National Fascist Party, they nevertheless performed fascism to obtain favor with Mussolini and the fascist regime.

Men were in control of the National Fascist Party and they also dominated the ranks of the fascist Italian musical community. Fascist Italy was a patriarchy, continuing the legacy of male rule established in ancient Rome. Men were expected to contribute to the regime, whether through military service, production of goods, or most importantly, fatherhood.14 Stringent social norms for men and women in fascist

Italy predate Mussolini’s rise and can be traced to Italian Unification in 1870 and the rise of the Italian bourgeoise, though the patriarchal hierarchy can be traced back thousands of years to ancient Rome.15 In fascist Italy, men were expected to be virile, active, heterosexual, and maschio (manly).16 These traits were markers of their

13 Simonetta Falasca-Zamponi, Fascist Spectacle: The Aesthetics of Power in Mussolini’s Italy (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1997), 4. 14 Between wounds and disease, Italy suffered an estimated loss of 600,000 men as casualties of World War I. These numbers were first reported in Giorgio Mortara, La salute pubblica in Italia durante e dopo la Guerra (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1925), 28-29. 15 The Italian bourgeoise is a very slippery concept without a single, fixed meaning. For more on this concept and how it was represented in post-unification literature see Stefania Lucamante, Italy and the Bourgeoisie: The Re-Thinking of a Class (Madison, NJ: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 2009). 16 Masculinity and femininity were diametrically opposed in the writings of futurist Giovanni Papini: “In this day and age when I speak of the masculine I mean force, energy, hardness, pride; when I speak of the feminine I mean softness, delicate sensuality, less volume, prone to tears, gossipy spirit, a fading and draining musicality.” “Quando parlo di maschio intendo, ora, la forza, l'energia,

masculinity, which operated as the antithesis of femininity.17 Although both men and women were actively working and providing for their families in fascist Italy, women did not have the same rights as men; women were considered fundamentally different from and lesser than men.18 Male relationships were at the forefront of fascist Italian musical culture, where new music was overwhelmingly written by men.19 Although this imbalance is not unique or restricted to the fascist period, or to the Italian nation, it is noteworthy for its structural pervasiveness and is the reason why this dissertation is restricted to critical examinations of operas by men in fascist Italy.

The Death of Opera in Twentieth Century Italy?

The decline of Italian opera in the early twentieth century is a familiar narrative in musicological, academic, and popular discourse, a misleading trope that has been

la durezza, la fierezza; quando parlo di femmina la mollezza, la dolcezza, la voluttuosità blanda, il tono minore, le lacrime facili, il pettegolio spiritosetto e la musicalità svaniente ed estenuante.” Giovanni Papini, Maschilità, 3rd ed. (Florence: Vallecchi Editore, 1921), 95. Translations by myself unless otherwise indicated. 17 Barbara Spackman traces this duality to the works of Filippo Tommaso Marinetti and Gabriele D’Annunzio: “In fascist discourse, gender and sex are not to be mixed and matched: virility is the property of man, and femininity the property of woman. Any attempt to redistribute those properties—and in particular, to allow women to enter the public, political area, and hence “masculinize” them—was to be squelched. The adjectives “masculine” and “virile” as applied to women were exclusively terms of abuse meant to deride the intellectual, “feminist,” and hence sterile woman not properly devoted to her reproductive mission.” Barbara Spackman, Fascist Virilities: Rhetoric, Ideology, and Social Fantasy in Italy (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1996), 17. 18 “Fascism took as axiomatic that women and men were different by nature. The government politicized this difference to the advantage of males and made it the cornerstone of an especially repressive, comprehensive new system for defining female citizenship, for governing women’s sexuality, wage labor, and social participation. Every aspect of being female was thus held up to the measure of the state’s interest and interpreted in light of the dictatorship’s strategies of state building.” Victoria De Grazia, How Fascism Ruled Women: Italy, 1922-1945 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1992), 7. 19 While it would be inaccurate to say that women were not involved in this process at any level, their participation was always secondary to their male colleagues. This imbalanced power dynamic should not come a surprise, as it is representative of the gendered hierarchy of men over women in place before fascism, during fascism, and after fascism. In the few instances when fascist female composers were successful, they were prevented from fully enjoying the same benefits as male composers.

repeated and confirmed by the operatic performance canon, which rarely features works from the twentieth or twenty-first centuries. This trope frequently cites the death of Giuseppe Verdi (1901) as the beginning of the end for Italian opera, an ending confirmed with the death of Giacomo Puccini (1924) and the rise of cinema in the early twentieth century. Alan Mallach dedicates an entire monograph to the decline, The Autumn of Italian Opera: from Verismo to Modernism, 1890-1915, where he ties the end of an era to the beginning of the twentieth century:

During the decade from 1905 to 1915, all the premises of Italian operatic life would come under sustained attack, while the beleaguered tradition would find few active defenders. […] Although operas continued to be composed and performed, the process by which a body of cultural practices that had maintained their vitality for hundreds of years would be transformed from a living organism into a museum artifact had begun.20

Mallach himself admits that operas continued to be composed and performed during and after this period of rapid change, yet for him, they are different than the works of the ‘great’ opera composers of the nineteenth century. In their book, A History of

Opera, Carolyn Abbate and Roger Parker locate the “death” of Italian opera precisely during the height of the fascist regime:

According to some accounts, Italy’s operatic convulsions continued long past Turandot. But perhaps it’s better to see those now-forgotten operas by Mascagni and others in the 1930s, with their grandiose, state-sponsored premieres and dictator-rich audiences, as already dead: inert presences whose inflated torsos and rouged cheeks lent them no more than a simulacrum of vitality.21

For Abbate and Parker, the political residue of fascism is palpable for the forgotten operas of 1930s Italy. These operas are unnamed and thus unworthy of critical inquiry; they are “dead.” The narrative of death continues for psychoanalytical philosophers

20 Alan Mallach, The Autumn of Italian Opera: From Verismo to Modernism, 1890-1915 (Boston: Northeastern University Press, 2007), 339. 21 Carolyn Abbate and Roger Parker, A History of Opera (New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 2012),528.

Slavoj Žižek and Mladen Dolar, who in the introduction to their book, Opera’s Second

Death, state:

The very historical connection between opera and psychoanalysis is thought- provoking; the moment of the birth of psychoanalysis (the beginning of the twentieth-century) is also generally perceived as the moment of opera’s death—as if, after psychoanalysis, opera, at least in its traditional form, was no longer possible. No wonder, then, that Freudian resonances abound in most of the pretenders to the title of the last opera (say, Berg’s Lulu).22

Without any deeper explanation, Lulu is named as the end of the operatic genre.

Though this metaphorical statement is flatly inaccurate, it is a reflection of how

twentieth-century opera is perceived by some scholars who write about opera outside of the musicological field. Similarly, Jeremy Tambling associates Kurt Weill and

Bertolt Brecht with the end of opera: “These Brecht/Weill operas may be contextualized by seeing how the practice of music shifts in the 1920s, with competing ideological values being ascribed to it in this, almost the last, decade of European opera; the moment after which, it may be argued, the form ceased to matter politically.”23 Such hyperbolic statements devalue and distort the state of opera in the twentieth century.

Today, the operatic canon is dominated by few operas and fewer composers; when major opera houses include a twentieth or twenty-first century work in their season, it is the exception to the rule. Paul Griffiths explains how the limits of the canon affect our perception of twentieth-century opera: “perhaps because new works have become increasingly marginal to operatic activity during the [twentieth] century, their history has a certain weightlessness, in that no appeal can be made to generally recognized standards: those standards have been drawn around a repertory of

22 Slavoj Žižek and Mladen Dolar, Opera’s Second Death (New York: Routledge, 2002), vii. 23 Jeremy Tambling, Opera and the Culture of Fascism (New York: Clarendon Press, 1996), 231.

classics from which twentieth-century works are largely excluded.”24 The exclusion of

twentieth-century operas from the canon reinforces the narrative of operatic decline, resulting in a skewed perspective that contributes to a prejudicial assumption of mediocrity for twentieth-century works.

In a scathing review of Harvey Sachs’ Music in Fascist Italy, Richard Taruskin

states his position on the matter: “while Italy in the 20th century is obvious a good place to observe fascism, Italy in the 20th century is rather a poor place to observe

music. With the death of Puccini in 1924 (in an archer mood I might have said, with the

death of Verdi in 1901), the nation that had once enjoyed a virtual musical hegemony

[…] became a musical backwater.”25 Indeed, the tacit acceptance of this position

voiced by Taruskin is reflected in the scarcity of literature on Italian music in the early

twentieth century. These factors, paired with the rise of fascism in 1922, create an

inaccurate narrative for early twentieth-century Italian opera within the Italian fascist

regime. My dissertation disarticulates this narrative of the end of opera,

demonstrating a wealth of operatic creation and performance in the early twentieth

century.

State of Research

Though there is an extensive body of scholarship about music in fascist regimes, much of the musicological discourse has focused on Nazi Germany rather than fascist Italy. Within the literature on music in fascist Italy, few studies focus specifically on opera, and little work has been done on music and gender or the

24 Paul Griffiths, “The Twentieth Century: To 1945,” in The Oxford Illustrated History of Opera, ed. Roger Parker (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994), 279-280. 25 Richard Taruskin, “The Dark Side of Modern Music,” The New Republic 199, no. 10 (1988): 29.

reception of operatic premieres in this fascist context. Fiamma Nicolodi's seminal text, Musica e musicisti nel ventennio fascista, presents a detailed overview of musical life during Mussolini's regime and remains an invaluable resource for research on this subject.26 Nicolodi situates prominent Italian composers within fascist Italy, exploring generations of Italian composers, their works, and their relationships with fascism;

Nicolodi also includes more than 150 pages of primary source documents, testimonials, and correspondence between the fascist regime and the numerous composers she discusses. Following Nicolodi’s lead, Harvey Sachs’ Music in Fascist

Italy is the first English monograph on the subject.27 Sachs approaches his study very differently than Nicolodi, combining personal interviews with discussions about musical institutions, composers, and performers in the fascist regime.28

Nearly twenty years separate Sachs' study from Roberto Illiano's edited collection of twenty essays in four different languages on music in fascist Italy: Italian

Music During the Fascist Period.29 Other studies on the complicated relationship between music and Italian fascism have been published since Illiano's, but they are few.30 For Illiano rightly demonstrates: "As the poverty of the musicological

26 Fiamma Nicolodi, Musica e musicisti nel ventennio fascista (Fiesole: Discanto Edizioni, 1984). 27 Sachs, Music in Fascist Italy. 28 He interviews leading Italian musical figures who lived in fascist Italy including musicologist Massimo Mila, composer Goffredo Petrassi, and the performer-conductor Gianandrea Gavazzeni. These three interviews offer a glimpse of what musical life what like during Mussolini's Italy—a valuable source of firsthand information from a generation of musicians who are now all deceased. Sachs was fortunate to conduct his interviews for his 1987 book when he did. Mila died in 1988, Gavazzeni in 1996, and Petrassi in 2003. 29 Illiano's edition corresponded with the centenary of composer Luigi Dallapiccola's birth, and he is prominently featured in one section of the volume. The other sections are categorized under three distinct topic areas: the reception of Italian music during the fascist period, Italian music during the fascist period, and Italian composers during the fascist period. Roberto Illiano, ed., Italian Music During the Fascist Period (Turnhout: Brepols, 2004). 30 Since 2004, a few studies about music and Italian fascism have been published, but they are often specific to one composer, such as Ben Earle's Luigi Dallapiccola and Musical Modernism in Fascist Italy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013). Or they may be specific to an individual work: Justine Comtois, "Alfredo Casella's Il deserto tentato (1937): An Opera Dedicated to Benito Mussolini," in Composing for the State: Music in Twentieth-Century Dictatorships, ed. Buch et al.

bibliography testifies, the topic is still a very controversial one."31 Curiously, the controversial nature of oppressive fascist regimes in the early twentieth century has not inhibited musicological discourse on studies of Nazi Germany. It is undeniable that Italy and Germany responded to Axis defeat differently; several monuments to

Mussolini still stand in Rome today, while German legislation banning Nazi symbols and rhetoric does not allow room to romanticize Hitler publicly in the same manner.32

Perhaps it is the Germanic roots of musicology, the very term an attempt at translating

Musikwissenschaft, paired with the devaluation of early twentieth-century Italian opera that has led some opera scholars to repeat narratives which either deny the existence of opera in this time period, or deem it unworthy of study.

Nevertheless, a cursory search for sources related to music in Nazi Germany produces an overwhelming number of results, especially in comparison to the number of studies on music in fascist Italy. Studies on music in Nazi Germany take a variety of forms, not limited to essay collections originating from conferences33, monographs, and historiographies.34 The subjects found within these studies are both diverse and

(Abingdon: Ashgate Publishing, 2016), 83-95. Or they may be specific to one genre: Anna Harwell Celenza, Jazz Italian Style: From Its Origins in New Orleans to Fascist Italy and Sinatra (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2017). 31 Illiano (ed.), Italian Music During the Fascist Period, xi. 32 Today, article 86a of the German criminal code bans the use of a variety of Nazi symbols including the swastika and Roman salute. There is no comparable legislation in Italy. For more information about anti-discrimination laws in Germany and Europe after World War II, see Erik Bleich, “The Rise of Hate Speech and Hate Crime Laws in Liberal Democracies,” Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies 37, no. 6 (July 2011): 917–934. 33 See Music and Nazism: Art under Tyranny, 1933-1945, ed. Michael H. Kater and Albrecht Rietmüller (Laaber: Laaber-Verlag, 2003) and more recently, The Impact of Nazism on Twentieth- Century Music, ed. Erik Levi (Wien: Böhlau-Verlag, 2014). 34 Historiographies on music in Nazi Germany are particularly numerous, including Fred K. Prieberg, Musik im NS-Staat, (Frankfurt am Main: Fischer Taschenbuch Verlag, 1982), Michael Meyer, The Politics of Music in the Third Reich (New York: Peter Lang, 1991), Erik Levi, Music in the Third Reich (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1994), and Pamela Potter, Art of Suppression: Confronting the Nazi Past in Histories of the Visual and Performing Arts (Oakland: University of California Press, 2016).

abundant. Topics range from music and Nazi nationalism35 to Jewish music in the

Reich,36 and many other subjects that could only be properly explored in an entirely separate project. Clearly, Hitler's Third Reich has established itself as a popular object of critical inquiry in musicological discussions. It is less clear why studies on music in Mussolini's Third Rome have not emerged at the same rate. Perhaps this gap in musicological discourse is a reflection of the imbalance of power in the relationship between Nazi Germany and fascist Italy; a dynamic that always put Nazi Germany in an authoritative role, diminishing fascist Italy’s role in their axis partnership.

Overshadowing both of these subjects is a wealth of studies on émigré composers who escaped Europe for the United States, with a demonstrable focus on two figures:

Arnold Schoenberg and Igor Stravinsky.37

Though there are several ideological similarities between fascist Italy and Nazi

Germany, there are also key differences. Both Mussolini and Hitler wanted to promote their individual cultures as a form of nationalism, embracing their respective nationalities. However, Hitler's Nazi Germany was founded upon antisemitic rhetoric and in the musical realm this greatly affected German musical culture, as prominent

Jewish musicians and composers were forced out of their positions or immigrated to safer countries. According to Pamela Potter, "In the first few months of Hitler's chancellorship, high-level purges did not spare the arts professions, an area where

35 See Brian Currid, A National Acoustics: Music and Mass Publicity in Weimar and Nazi Germany (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2006) for a nuanced discussion of national sound and music of mass culture. 36 For an examination of the Berlin Jewish Culture League during the Third Reich, see Lily Hirsch, A Jewish Orchestra in Nazi Germany: Musical Politics and the Berlin Jewish Culture League (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2010). 37 Both composers are central to the 20th century musicological canon and have been written about extensively. For a sampling of the literature on Schoenberg and Stravinsky, see the bibliography sections in their Grove articles: O. W. Neighbour, "Schoenberg [Schönberg], Arnold," Grove Music Online. 2001; accessed 1 Apr. 2020; Stephen Walsh, "Stravinsky, Igor," Grove Music Online. 2001; accessed 1 Apr. 2020.

German nationalists and racists had argued for decades that Jews had held far too much influence for far too long."38 In contrast, Mussolini's fascist Italy began with

Jewish support and did not take an official stance on the matter until November 1938, when Royal Decree n.1728, a set of antisemitic racial laws, was signed into law by King

Victor Emmanuel with the endorsement of Mussolini.39 With this Royal Decree, latent antisemitism was brought to the fore of fascist Italian society, echoing the antisemitic ideology of Nazi Germany.40

A second ideological difference between the musical culture of fascist Italy and Nazi Germany relates to the promotion and suppression of specific stylistic idioms. In fascist Italy, a wide variety of musical styles and forms were embraced as

Italian music, from romanticism to futurism and everything in between. Mussolini encouraged composers to write new works and spark public interest. In a speech from

1926 Il Duce said:

The interest of the public needs to be awakened around new music; already it is not loved more than vertical music: I mean that which is played in the streets, with slow cranks. It is necessary that the public appreciate and also learn to love music that they do not know by heart. But seeing as that relates to popularization, concert music does not reach large crowds, and that of the theater does, it is music of the theater that needs to be reborn most of all. […] They continue to perform and repeat old works; which I also like, be careful; but hear and repeat the new! If in a season fifty new works were given, and forty-eight vanish, the effort and the money would be well spent for the two that survived.41

38 Potter, Art of Suppression, 31. 39 For a thorough discussion of the creation of the racial laws and their influences, see chapter 2 of Michael A. Livingston, The Fascists and the Jews of Italy: Mussolini’s Race Laws, 1938-1943 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014), 22-74. 40 Prior to the antisemitic laws adopted by Mussolini, racist policies emerged with regard to Italy's African colonies including Libya and Ethiopia. Colonies and their inhabitants were viewed as inferior to their Italian colonizers, as discussed by E.M. Robertson, "Italian Fascism and Racism," in The Fascism Reader, ed. Aristotle Kallis (London; New York: Routledge, 2003), 359-366. 41 “Bisogna risvegliare l'interesse del pubblico intorno alla musica nuova; esso, ormai, non ama più che la musica verticale: intendo quella che si suona nelle strade, coi piani a manovella. È necessario che il pubblico apprezzi ed impari ad amare anche la musica che non sa a memoria. Ma siccome, per ciò che riguarda la divulgazione, la musica da concerto non arriva alle grandi folle, e quella da teatro sì, è la musica da teatro che bisogna far rinascere prima da tutto. […] Si continuano ad

Mussolini wanted new operas to be written and performed; he did not place stylistic restrictions upon the composers, refusing to voice overwhelming support for any one musical style. This climate led to a plurality of musical styles in fascist Italy. Though music was at the center of Hitler’s political imagination, a Germanic musical ideal was predicated on the exclusion of certain individuals and musical styles.42 In contrast to fascist Italy, Nazi Germany reviled modernism, atonality, jazz, and works by non-

Aryans;43 an exhibit on ‘degenerate’ music was curated by the Nazis in 1938 in

Stuttgart, showcasing these genres.44 As Potter explains, the musical and artistic culture of Nazi Germany is more easily defined by what it is not than by any sort of unifying parameters. Indeed, no coherent definition of Nazi opera was produced and according to Michael Meyer, "not one such explicit Nazi work was staged during the

Third Reich."45

Similarly, a comprehensive theory of fascist opera was never formulated in

Italy, though several composers turned to romanità for inspiration in the mid-1930s

eseguire e a ripetere opera vecchie; piacciono anche a me, badate; ma sentiamo e ripetiamo le nuove! Se in una stagione si dessero cinquanta opere nuove, e quarantotto cadessero, sarebbero bene spesi la fatica e il denaro per le due sopravvissute.” As quoted in Fiamma Nicolodi's essay "Aspetti di politica culturale nel ventennio fascista," in Italian Music During the Fascist Period, ed. Roberto Illiano (2004), 97. Nicolodi quoted from Per la dichiarazione di Mussolini, cfr. Adriano Lualdi, Viaggio musicale in Italia, Milano, Alpes, 1927, pp. 206-207 and Raffaello De Rensis, 'Mussolini musicista', in Mussolinia, V/25 (August 1927), pp. 29-30. Translations are my own unless otherwise specified. 42 For more on the role of music in Hitler’s political imagination, see Bryan Gilliam, “The Annexation of Anton Bruckner: Nazi Revisionism and the Politics of Appropriation,” The Musical Quarterly 78, no. 3 (1994): 584–604. 43 While these musical styles were publicly denounced, they were also used by Nazi composers in practice. See Celia Applegate and Pamela Potter, eds., Music and German National Identity (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2002), 26-27. 44 For a catalogue of the exhibition see Albrecht Dümling and Peter Girth, ed. Entartete Musik - Katalog zur Düsseldorfer Ausstellung von 1938 - Eine kommentierte Rekonstruktion (Düsseldorf: Landeshauptstadt, 1988). 45 Meyer, The Politics of Music, 309.

and early 1940s.46 Using Roman themes for opera libretti was increasingly fashionable

during this time period, as composers sought to secure personal success with their

operas by appealing to Mussolini’s aesthetics of ancient Roman grandeur. Though

there is a well-established literature on romanità and culture in fascist Italy, music has often been overlooked as a site of inquiry.47 Likewise, while there is an established literature on fascist masculinities, few discussions explore gender in the context of fascist operas or their composers.48 In the hypermasculine society of fascist Italy, the ideal masculine paradigm was, as suggested earlier, the uomo nuovo. Simonetta

Falasca-Zamponi describes the Italian new man as “serious, intrepid, tenacious,”49 while Gigliola Gori positions Mussolini as the ideal realization of the uomo nuovo.50

Though this ideal normative masculinity was unattainable for anyone but the Duce, it

shaped gender performance and played a formative role in determining the quotidian

practices of Italians. Women were also implicated in the patriarchal systems of fascist

Italy; Victoria de Grazia, Robin Pickering-Iazzi, and Perry Wilson provide feminist

perspectives on how women functioned and lived in this male-centric totalitarian

46 For an extended discussion on romanità in Italian fascist theater see Jane Dunnett, "The Rhetoric of Romanità: Representations of Caesar in Fascist Theater," in Julius Caesar in Western Culture, ed. Maria Wyke (Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2006), 252-261. 47 See Arthurs, Excavating Modernity and Kallis, The Third Rome, on the importance of romanità in Mussolini’s regime. 48 On fascist masculinities, see George L. Mosse, The Image of Man: The Creation of Modern Masculinity (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996), Lorenzo Benadusi and Giorgio Caravale, George L. Mosse’s Italy: Interpretation, Reception, and Intellectual Heritage (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014), Lorenzo Benadusi, The Enemy of the New Man: Homosexuality in Fascist Italy, trans. Suzanne Dingee, and Jennifer Pudney (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 2012), John Champagne, Aesthetic Modernism and Masculinity in Fascist Italy (New York: Routledge, 2013). 49 Falasca-Zamponi, Fascist Spectacle, 26. 50 Gigliola Gori, “Model of Masculinity: Mussolini, the ‘New Italian’ of the Fascist Era,” in Superman Supreme: Fascist Body as Political Icon—Global Fascism, ed. J.A. Mangan (London: Frank Cass, 2000), 33-38.

society.51 This feminist literature has set the stage for further discussions about normative masculinity in Italian fascist culture and opera.

While studies on music and gender have been around since the late 1980s, only recently have musicologists begun to interrogate the gender binary, shifting the discourse to develop more nuanced readings beyond gender difference.52 Within the realm of gender studies, this shift is characterized as moving from difference to discourse. Ian Biddle and Kirsten Gibson link identity, voice, and discourse as a theoretical framework for exploring music and masculinities. Focusing on the sonic rather than the visual disrupts the ocularcentric tendencies of gender studies, leading to new ways of thinking about masculinity through sound and music. Through this framework, Biddle and Gibson bring identity, gender, and the sonic to the fore, examining “the ways in which men are construed as acousmêtres or beings in sound.”53 Michel Chion’s acousmêtre evokes the slippery concept of voice, which lends itself to a variety of meanings.54 Critically, voice in Biddle and Gibson’s formulation necessitates a discussion of sound or music, whether it be in discourse

51 See Victoria de Grazia, How Fascism Ruled Women: Italy, 1922-1945 (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1992), Robin Pickering-Iazzi, ed., Mothers of Invention: Women, Italian Fascism, and Culture (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1995), and Perry Willson, “Italy,” in Women, Gender and Fascism in Europe, 1919-45, ed. Kevin Passmore (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2003). 52 In early opera and gender studies, difference is foregrounded, following the work of feminist musicologists: Catherine Clément, Opera, or, The Undoing of Women, trans. Betsy Wing (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1988), Susan McClary, Feminine Endings : Music, Gender, and Sexuality (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1991), Musicology and Difference: Gender and Sexuality in Music Scholarship, ed. Ruth Solie (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993), and En travesti: Women, Gender Subversion, Opera, ed. Corinne E. Blackmer and Patricia Juliana Smith (New York: Columbia University Press, 1995). 53 Masculinity and Western Musical Practice, ed. Ian Biddle and Kirsten Gibson (Farnham: Ashgate, 2009), 227. 54 Michel Chion, The Voice in Cinema, ed. and trans. Claudia Gorbman (New York: Columbia University Press, 1999), 17-30. The voice in opera also has a substantive psychoanalytical literature: Mladen Dolar, A Voice and Nothing More (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2006), Michel Poizat, The Angel’s Cry: Beyond the Pleasure Principle in Opera, trans. Arthur Denner (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1992), Kaja Silverman, The Acoustic Mirror: The Female Voice in Psychoanalysis and Cinema (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1988).

or performance: “In particular, what thinking about voice in this context does is to enable the recasting of identities and discourses around notions of making and intervening in cultural meanings through and in sound.”55 Voice is both the instance

of identity formation and that which remains after identity formation--identity is

further explored in discourse. If we problematize the narrative of totalitarian

repression and look more closely at how the fascist regime shaped musical culture, a

complicated system of unbridled creation for a select few emerges. The identity of a

composer, their popularity, and their devotion to the regime factored into their ability

to thrive in fascist Italian musical society.

Theoretical Background

Rooted in historical musicology, the theoretical frameworks that underpin this

dissertation draw upon a variety of disciplines and interdisciplinary perspectives,

including feminist studies, masculinities studies, cultural studies, history, and

political studies. Work-based analyses of operatic scores are accompanied by

reception histories, allowing for a sociopolitical contextualization for both operas and

composers. I rely upon the texts of Fiamma Nicolodi and Harvey Sachs, whose works

have provided foundational musical, political, cultural, and ideological context on

music in fascist Italy.56 My work also draws upon texts that focus on a single

composer, including Alan Mallach’s Pietro Mascagni and His Operas, John C.G.

Waterhouse’s Gian Francesco Malipiero 1882-1973: The Life, Times and Music of a

55 Biddle and Gibson, ed. Masculinity and Western Musical Practice, 227. 56 Nicolodi, Musica e musicisti, Sachs, Music in Fascist Italy.

Wayward Genius, Elsa Respighi’s Ottorino Respighi, and Myriam Quaquero’s Ennio

Porrino.57

My work is also informed by writings on fascist culture including Günter

Berghaus’ collected edition of Fascism and Theater: Comparative Studies on the

Aesthetics and Politics of Performance in Europe, 1925-1945 and Simonetta Falasca-

Zamponi’s Fascist Spectacle: The Aesthetics of Power in Mussolini’s Italy.58 While musical 'texts' and composers are at the forefront of this work, I ground both within the political and cultural context they were created and performed in. As Roger Griffin illustrates: “To study fascist theatre is to bring together the definitional, the methodological, the political, the social-psychological and the cultural-historical in a comparative perspective, and thus leads to an unusually sophisticated perspective on the fascist era as a whole.”59 Part of this perspective is informed by the gendered

power structures embedded within fascist Italian society; in turn, opera reflected

these power structures, reinforcing patriarchal norms with on-stage performances.

Without such socio-political context, a nuanced analysis and understanding of

the operas and their composers’ masculinities would not be possible. Here my work

draws upon the concept of gender performativity as articulated by Judith Butler.60 I am also dependent upon the work of Ian Biddle, Kirsten Gibson, and Philip Purvis on

57 Alan Mallach, Pietro Mascagni and His Operas (Boston: Northeastern University Press, 2002), John C. G. Waterhouse, Gian Francesco Malipiero 1882-1973: The Life, Times, and Music of a Wayward Genius (Amsterdam: Harwood Academic Publishers, 1999), Elsa Respighi, Ottorino Respighi, trans. Gwyn Morris (London: Ricordi, 1962), Myriam Quaquero, Ennio Porrino (Sassari: Carlo Delfino editore, 2010). 58 Günter Berghaus, ed. Fascism and Theatre: Comparative Studies on the Aesthetics and Politics of Performance in Europe, 1925-1945 (Providence, RI: Berghahn Books, 1996), Falasca-Zamponi, Fascist Spectacle. 59 Roger Griffin, “Staging the Nation’s Rebirth: The Politics and Aesthetics of Performance in the Context of Fascist Studies,” in Fascism and Theatre: Comparative Studies on the Aesthetics and Politics of Performance in Europe, 1925-1945, ed. Günter Berghaus (Providence, RI: Berghahn Books, 1996), 27. 60 Judith Butler, Gender Trouble.

masculinities and music.61 I echo the sentiments of Suzanne Cusick, who explains:

"many feminist critics have found formal and tonal analysis by themselves seem not to reveal anything much about the gender of composers, or their experience of difference."62 In this case, analysis needs to go beyond the score; because both

western art music and its composers are coded as masculine, they share a position of

privilege. Cusick elaborates: "The composer is masculine not because so many

individuals who live in the category are biologically male, but because the composer

has come to be understood to be mind—mind that creates patterns of sounds to

which other minds assign meanings."63 The gendered association connected to the mind/body dualism in western art music reinforces patriarchal power while running the risk of erasing its corporeality. This dualism is strengthened when composers are lauded as geniuses and creators, privileging the mind and maintaining compositional masculinity. In fascist Italy, a political society that extoled masculinity and musical composition, experiences of difference are often hidden beneath a guise of hypermasculine rhetoric.

My dissertation is dependent upon primary sources in the form of printed reviews, newspaper articles, periodicals, magazine articles, and correspondence.

These sources provide the necessary historical, social, and political context to allow nuanced interpretations of the operas and their composers. Here I draw upon the theoretical framework of Leon Botstein, who extolls the value of reception history in musicological studies: “There is a vast body of unexamined material surrounding

61 Biddle and Gibson, eds. Masculinity and Western Musical Practice, Philip Purvis, ed. Masculinity in Opera: Gender, History, and New Musicology (New York: Routledge, 2013). 62 Suzanne Cusick, "Feminist theory, music theory, and the mind/body problem," Perspectives of New Music 32.1 (Winter 1994): 13. 63 Ibid., 16.

musical life that can alter, when integrated with the musical text and its performance history, our notions of the past.”64 By examining musical scores and the historical

contexts in which they were created, we develop better understandings of the music,

the composers, and their roles in society. Reception history is an important lens

through which to conduct such analyses and as such, this methodology is dependent

upon a variety of source materials.65 Botstein elaborates: “Reception history demands a far deeper foray into the archival riches, historical parallels surrounding musical culture, and the secondary historical literature well outside of music.”66 Archival

materials, primary sources, secondary literature from history, cultural history,

musicology, gender studies, political theory, philosophy, and musical scores inform

my understanding of opera in fascist Italy as articulated in this dissertation.

Chapter Overview

This project is comprised of four chapters and is organized chronologically by date of operatic premieres. Chapters are constructed around one composer and one opera, yet organic connections emerge between the composers, resulting in a better understanding of the musical climate in fascist Italy. Chapter one focuses on Pietro

Mascagni and his opera, Nerone (1935), examining his position as fascist Italy’s

operatic patriarch. Once a great innovator of verismo opera, by the 1930s, Mascagni

64 Leon Botstein, “Music in History: The Perils of Method in Reception History,” The Musical Quarterly Vol. 89, No. 1 (Spring 2006): 5. 65 Reception theory was pioneered by philologist Hans Robert Jauss in the 1970s, when he outlined an aesthetics of reception in a number of key texts. These individual texts were collected and translated from German to English: Hans Robert Jauss, Toward an Aesthetic of Reception, trans. Timothy Bahti, intro by Paul de Man (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1982). Drawing upon linguistic discourse, Paul de Man describes Jauss’ historical reception model as, “a syntagmatic displacement within a synchronic structure becomes, in its reception, a paradigmatic condensation within a diachrony.” (Jauss, xiv). In other words, a surface level displacement within a certain moment in time becomes, through reception, a paradigm over time. 66 Botstein, “Music in History,” 12.

was a musical traditionalist, and this is evident in his final opera, Nerone. As the preeminent living opera composer in fascist Italy, Mascagni enjoyed the favor of the

National Fascist Party, and in turn, the PNF capitalized on Mascagni’s image and music. In this chapter, I consider how Mascagni was portrayed in the media, how his identity was constructed and appropriated by the fascist regime, and how he performed fascism as a beloved composer and wavering member of the National

Fascist Party.

Chapter two explores Gian Francesco Malipiero and his Giulio Cesare (1936), which he dedicated to Mussolini with the hope of regaining the Duce’s favor.

Malipiero’s previous opera, La favola del figlio cambiato (1934), gained notoriety after its disastrous Roman premiere, where Mussolini was so offended by the libretto that he banned subsequent performances of the work. Giulio Cesare was a calculated response to Malipiero’s public failure, as the Duce’s admiration for Julius Caesar was well-documented. Malipiero was a prolific musical modernist, and Giulio Cesare

marked the beginning of a stylistic shift, resulting in a tempered modernism.

Tempered modernism refers to a prominent lyricism set to more conventional libretti

rather than the use of unconventional texts as libretti for disconnected, self-contained musical miniatures that characterized his earlier style. Despite Malipiero’s best efforts, he was unable to gain Mussolini’s favor with Giulio Cesare, and did not enjoy

the same bureaucratic benefits as some of his colleagues, such as Ottorino Respighi.

In this chapter, I examine the aftermath of Malipiero’s failure with La favola del figlio cambiato as the impetus for creating Giulio Cesare, exploring Caesar’s place in fascist culture, the power of fascist bureaucracy and the censorial process, as well as an analysis of the opera and its critical reception.

Chapter three considers Ottorino Respighi’s Lucrezia (1937) as the final piece of his musical legacy; a legacy which was deeply entwined with the fascist regime.

The rape of Lucrezia as portrayed in Respighi’s opera is an act of sexual violence that belies an imbalanced power dynamic between men and women; this narrative is reflective of fascist Italy’s gendered power imbalance in which the opera was created.

In his position as a celebrated Italian composer, Ottorino Respighi, along with his wife Elsa, was deeply embedded within Italian musical life and they enjoyed the benefits of the National Fascist Party’s favor, including personal meetings with

Mussolini, Ottorino’s membership in the prestigious fascist Accademia d’Italia, and

financial gains. Despite his associations with the fascist regime, Respighi has been

positioned as an ‘apolitical’ bystander in an effort to distance him from Mussolini and

the National Fascist Party. In this chapter, my examination of Respighi’s Lucrezia

underscores the patriarchal society of fascist Italy, limitations placed upon women

within that society, the performative nature of participating in fascism, and Elsa’s

sustained effort to distance her husband from the fascist regime.

Chapter four assesses Ennio Porrino and his Gli Orazi (1941), the work of a

young, antisemitic composer who sought to defend the tradition of “Italian” music.

Porrino, a student of Ottorino Respighi, was a staunch traditionalist who openly

attacked his modernist colleagues, such as Alfredo Casella, and wrote about the

dangers of foreign influence in Italian music. After the antisemitic racial laws of 1938

were enacted in Italy, Jews lost their ability to participate fully in Italian society, and

this is reflected in the creation of Gli Orazi. Porrino positioned himself as a fervent

nationalist, a xenophobe, and an antisemite, yet he also collaborated with an

ethnically Jewish librettist to create Gli Orazi. In this chapter, I argue that Porrino was

a young defender of traditional Italian music, using antisemitic rhetoric to denounce

his rivals and erase the work of his librettist, Claudio Guastalla, despite his use of modernist musical techniques and his collaboration with a Jew.

Chapter One Fascist Italy’s Operatic Patriarch: Pietro Mascagni and his Nerone

Pietro Mascagni (1863-1945) was the most powerful and famous Italian opera

composer of the ventennio (fascist period).1 On January 16, 1935, Pietro Mascagni’s

long-anticipated operatic swan song, Nerone, premiered at the Teatro alla Scala in

Milan, Italy. Years in the making, Nerone was heavily advertised by Mascagni and the press. The seventy-one-year-old composer was a competent self-promoter who proudly flaunted his egoism, positioning his final opera thusly: “It will be a battle. I have always fought and still fight to defend the glorious Italian opera tradition.” “Sarà una battaglia. Io ho sempre combattuto e combatto ancora per difendere la gloriosa tradizione italiana del melodramma.”2 Mascagni’s unshakable confidence paired with his immense popularity and personal longevity afforded him an unquestionable position of power in Mussolini’s fascist regime.3 At the fin de siècle, Mascagni was

poised to become Italian opera’s next leading figure, disrupting the traditional

schema of Italian opera while ensuring its future success. He is perhaps best known

for creating the operatic verismo genre with the debut of Cavalleria Rusticana in 1890.

After the success of Cavalleria, Mascagni composed fifteen operas, enjoyed an

1 Ventennio literally means a period of twenty years, but it is commonly used to describe the roughly twenty years of Italian fascism. Mussolini controlled the Partito Nazionale Fascista (National Fascist Party) from 1922 until 1943, when Nazi Germany occupied Italy and the party became the Partito Fascista Repubblicano (Republican Fascist Party) until the axis defeat in 1945. 2 Mario Morini, Pietro Mascagni (Milano, Casa Musicale Sonzogno di Piero Ostali: 1964), 424. Translation by dissertation author unless otherwise indicated. 3 Giacomo Puccini, Mascagni’s main operatic rival, died in 1924, whereas Mascagni lived to see the fall of Mussolini’s regime, dying in August 1945, a few months after Mussolini’s April execution in Milan.

international conducting career, and was intimately connected with the leading Italian composers of multiple generations, including Verdi and Puccini.

Mascagni participated in the Partito Nazionale Fascista, reaping the rewards of his musical prowess by playing his part in the fascist propaganda machine despite his general uninterest in politics.4 Indeed, the beginning of Mascagni’s relationship with

the fascist regime was a calculated demonstration of the regime’s power. Known for

his tricks and jokes, Mascagni had crossed a line while working in Prague:

At the dawn of Mussolini’s rule, [Mascagni], finding himself abroad, in Prague, I believe, had spoken to a few journalists and had amused himself tossing off some jokes about the new regime; when he returned to Italy, it happened that blackmail was ready for him too: either surrender to Fascism, or be treated worse than a village bandmaster.5

As a result of this exchange, Mascagni submitted to the PNF in November of 1925, and the regime benefitted from the composer’s cultural renown.6 Like many Italians,

he embraced the cult of il Duce and according to Mario Morini: “Mascagni was more a

follower of Mussolini than a fascist.” “Mascagni più che fascista fu mussoliniano” 7

Although his interests were more self-serving than overtly political, Mascagni

participated in the fascist regime as a composer, conductor, and a member of the

Accademia d'Italia, a fascist reimagining of the Académie française.8

Mascagni’s Nerone was part of a regime-directed revival of ancient Roman

subjects in music, art, architecture, archaeology, and other aesthetic realizations

4 For a nuanced discussion of the Italian musical climate before and during fascism, see Ben Earle. Luigi Dallapiccola and Musical Modernism in Fascist Italy. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013). 5 Reflection by playwright Sem Benelli cited in Alan Mallach, Pietro Mascagni and His Operas (Boston: Northeastern University Press, 2002), 256. 6 Ibid., 257. It is unclear if Mascagni actually joined the party in 1925, though he certainly capitulated to Mussolini this early and enjoyed the benefits of the PNF’s favor. 7 Morini, Pietro Mascagni, 344. 8 For more information about the Accademia d’Italia and Ottorino Respighi’s membership, see chapter 3.

which resulted in an explosion of romanità (Roman-ness). The revival of romanità had

gendered implications, and underscored the patriarchal power structure of both

ancient Rome and fascist Italy; ancient Roman narratives about men dominated the

operatic stage in 1930s Italy.9 Nerone provided Mascagni the outlet to continue his fight for the glory of Italian opera, serving as the final work in a long and illustrious career. Although romanità had aesthetic and narrative implications for opera, such as

what ancient Roman tale would be the subject for the libretto, music was

unencumbered by stylistic restrictions. In fact, during Mussolini's tenure as Prime

Minister cultural variety in new music was accepted, and opera was seen as an important means of cultural dissemination. In a speech from 1926, il Duce said:

Bisogna risvegliare l'interesse del pubblico intorno alla musica nuova; esso, ormai, non ama più che la musica verticale: intendo quella che si suona nelle strade, coi piani a manovella. È necessario che il pubblico apprezzi ed impari ad amare anche la musica che non sa a memoria. Ma siccome, per ciò che riguarda la divulgazione, la musica da concerto non arriva alle grandi folle, e quella da teatro sì, è la musica da teatro che bisogna far rinascere prima da tutto. […] Si continuano ad eseguire e a ripetere opere vecchie; piacciono anche a me, badate; ma sentiamo e ripetiamo le nuove! Se in una stagione si dessero cinquanta opere nuove, e quarantotto cadessero, sarebbero bene spesi la fatica e il denaro per le due sopravvissute.10

9 This is apparent in Mascagni’s Nerone, Gian Francesco Malipiero’s Giulio Cesare, and Ennio Porrino’s Gli Orazi. Ottorino Respighi’s Lucrezia is the exception to this norm, as explored in this dissertation, yet the titular female protagonist is brutally raped and commits suicide to regain her ‘purity,’ a horrible narrative that upholds the patriarchal order. 10 Per la dichiarazione di Mussolini, cfr. Adriano Lualdi, Viaggio musicale in Italia, Milano, Alpes, 1927, pp. 206-207 and Raffaello De Rensis, 'Mussolini musicista', in Mussolinia, V/25 (August 1927), pp. 29-30. As cited in Fiamma Nicolodi, "Aspetti di politica culturale nel ventennio fascista," in Italian Music During the Fascist Period, ed. Roberto Illiano (Turnhout: Brepols, 2004), 97.

Here, we have an interesting glimpse of the inclusive musical landscape in fascist

Italy, where Mussolini, himself, advocates for musical innovation, valuing the creation of new works over the popular success of those works.

In this chapter, I argue Mascagni functioned as fascist Italy’s operatic patriarch, acting as the embodiment of the Italian opera tradition which granted him immense political and artistic power. I am interested in the social and political conditions of creating opera during the Italian fascist era and the impact of these works upon Italian musical identity. Specifically, I explore how Mascagni performed fascism, his portrayal in the media, his use of romanità in Nerone, and the reception of

Nerone. By the mid-1930s, almost every professional Italian composer who remained

in Italy benefited from the financial support of the regime.11 Mascagni received more money in subsidies from the Ministry of Popular Culture than any other composer:

1,290,000 lire, roughly equivalent to $700,000 in today’s money.12 According to Fiamma

Nicolodi, Mascagni’s operas were performed more than any other living composer in

fascist Italy.13 After Puccini’s death in 1924, Mascagni established himself as Italy’s preeminent opera composer; he was the living embodiment of a connection to the

‘great’ Italian opera composers of the late nineteenth century, and he was incredibly popular with his fellow Italians. These credentials gave Mascagni cultural and political clout, and the aged composer wanted to create a final opera to glorify his

11 The Union of Fascist Musicians was created in 1924, advocating for the establishment of a national opera house to ensure steady, state-funded employment, establishing a national aid fund to support members in times of need, as well as a pension fund. In 1935, the Ministry of Popular Culture was formed by the regime, which kept a payroll of well-known musicians, composers, and artists. Mascagni received the highest payments of anyone, totaling 1,290,000 lire. Harvey Sachs, Music in Fascist Italy (New York: W.W. Norton Co., 1988), 27-32, 119. 12 Ibid., 119. 13 Detailed performance tables for both living and dead Italian opera/ballet composers from the 1935-6 to 1942-3 seasons tally the number of productions put on by enti autonomi (autonomous institutions, a.k.a. opera houses), with Mascagni at 42 performances, Giordano at 33, and Respighi at 27. Fiamma Nicolodi, Musica e musicisti nel ventennio fascista (Fiesole, Discanto: 1984), 22-24.

beloved Italy with a nod to the aesthetic interests of the fascist regime. Capitalizing on his unique standing within the regime, Mascagni chose an unlikely subject to glorify fascist Italy: the notorious emperor Nerone.

Fascist Performativity

What constitutes participation in fascism? Over the course of Mussolini’s rule, 1922-

1943, membership and individual political engagement with the regime fluctuated.

Enthusiastic fascists could become disenchanted with the party, those uninterested

in fascism could become fervent supporters, and individuals uninterested in politics

hoping to gain benefits from the party could engage with the regime in a variety of

ways. These types of engagement with the National Fascist Party underscore the

slipperiness of fascist participation, particularly as the political climate evolved over

the course of more than twenty years. One theoretical framework to account for these shifting perspectives and modes of engagement is to conceptualize fascism as a set of sustained performative acts. In the context of fascist Italy, one did not have be a member of the National Fascist Party to perform fascism, and this framework of performativity provides a theoretical lens that allows for a deeper understanding of fascism beyond party membership.

Although the PNF was the only political party in Italy during the ventennio, membership was not always extended to everyone at all times. Membership was particularly exclusive during the first decade of Mussolini’s rule; early adopters of fascism earned distinguished places in the party, while latecomers had to wait to join.

The party accepted new members in waves, opening and closing its application window over the years. According to Dante L. Germino:

The party ranks were open to new recruits for several months after the March on Rome, but only a fraction of those requesting membership were satisfied at that time, and on April 24, 1923, the newly created Grand Council decreed a halt to the acceptance of new members. […] The PNF, which had come to power with fewer than five hundred thousand names on its rolls, numbered almost one million men in the fall of 1926. […] Accordingly, from November 1926 until November 1932, the gates were again barred to new adult members. […] Beginning on November 5, 1932, the PNF received applications for membership until August 1, 1933, when the lists were closed again. […] The 1933 invitation to join the party was not extended to the general population; it was addressed only to certain categories of people, and the persons who received it had no option but to accept if they wished to remain in public life.14

As a result of the short application periods, party membership could be difficult to

obtain. In spite of these obstacles, the PNF methodically indoctrinated the Italian

people in an attempt to convert them into enthusiastic fascists. To facilitate this

conversion, the party created groups specific to different social populations. Germino

elaborates:

A set of lectures designed especially for women was given at regular intervals under the auspices of the Fasci Feminili, the women’s group affiliated with the PNF. For the working classes, the party sponsored through the Dopolavoro, the dictatorship’s ‘leisure-time’ organization, an annual course on the Revolution, party organization, the Fascist syndicates, and the youth organizations.15

Participation in groups associated with the party did not necessarily equate to party membership, and this relationship underscores that membership in the PNF was not needed to perform fascism.

Guided by a nebulous ideology with specific rituals, spectacles, mundane bureaucratic processes, and many other facets, individuals performed fascism through the repetition of acts. The repetition of certain acts, such as the fascist salute, cheering for the Duce, or wearing the uniform of the squadristi (Blackshirts) were some of the many ways individuals performed fascism. This performative

14 Dante L. Germino, The Italian Fascist Party in Power: A Study in Totalitarian Rule (Minneapolis: University. of Minnesota Press, 1959), 53-54. 15 Ibid., 22.

conceptualization of fascism draws upon Judith Butler’s theory of gender performativity. In her groundbreaking book Gender Trouble, Butler explains her theoretical framework: “Consider gender, for instance, as a corporeal style, an ‘act,’ as it were, which is both intentional and performative, where ‘performative’ suggests a dramatic and contingent construction of meaning.”16 For Butler, the construction of meaning and identity through performative acts provides the tool for a nuanced understanding of gender. When this performative framework is applied to fascism, it provides a theoretical lens that reveals the complexities of fascist engagement, particularly as participation, policies, and viewpoints evolved over time.

Elaborate public spectacles were fundamental to fascism, and these spectacles were highly performative, combining rituals, symbols, and fervent nationalism in a conscripted display of fascist propaganda. Simonetta Falasca-

Zamponi contextualizes such displays:

The proliferation of fascist images and sounds and the regime’s monopolization of public spaces occurred in an era of new consumption trends and commercialization, an age of a developing market economy and emerging means of technological reproduction. […] Through festivals and images, rituals, and speeches, Mussolini narrated fascism’s story and naturalized the regime’s history.17

Film was a powerful tool for disseminating fascist images and sounds, and such films provide a mediated entry into fascist spectacle. As a recognizable and culturally significant figure, Mascagni participated in filmed spectacles, performing fascism for public audiences.

Mascagni’s performative fascism was captured in a propagandistic film reel, as he conducted a public performance of Va pensiero from Giuseppe Verdi’s Nabucco at

16 Judith Butler, Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity, 2nd ed. (New York: Routledge, 1999), 177. 17 Simonetta Falasca-Zamponi, Fascist Spectacle: The Aesthetics of Power in Mussolini’s Italy, (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997), 185, 191.

the Stadio del Partito Nazionale Fascista in Rome. Thousands of participants from the Opera Nazionale Dopolavoro (OND) played and sang in this massive display of

Verdian musical grandeur, which took place on May 26, 1935.18 In the black and white

five minute and twenty-five second film, Mascagni and Mussolini are prominently

featured, the only two recognizable individuals in a crowd of thousands of fascist

workers. The title card reads: “In the presence of the Duce, 7000 members of the workers’ club directed by his excellency Pietro Mascagni perform the chorus from

Nabucco.”19 Va pensiero, or The Chorus of the Hebrew Slaves, is laden with

nationalistic associations, which developed during the mid-nineteenth century as Italy moved towards unification in 1861.20 Verdi’s chorus remains an enduring example of music intersecting with politics, foregrounding an interconnectedness of national identity and opera in Italian life. This performance of Verdi’s music and fascist grandeur is an example of what Mabel Berezin calls “public political ritual.” For

Berezin, “Public political ritual is performance; and performance, whether it occurs in the tightly bounded world of the theater or the more permeable social space of a public piazza, is a highly elusive entity because its effects are experiential.”21 The

ritual captured in this film reel offers a sort of curated spectatorship, giving viewers

mediated access to this public performance of fascism. Mascagni, Mussolini, and the

18 Ivano Di Lillo, “Opera and Nationalism in Fascist Italy” (PhD diss., University of Cambridge, 2011), 134. 19 Alla presenza del Duce 7000 dopolavoristi diretti da S.E. Pietro Mascagni eseguiscono il coro del Nabucco. 20 The precise year when Verdi’s chorus became a symbol of nationalistic pride has been hotly debated by musicologists. For a sampling of these viewpoints, see Roger Parker, Arpa d’or dei fatidici vati: The Verdian patriotic chorus in the 1840s (Parma: Istituto Nazionale di Studi Verdiani, 1997), Philip Gossett, ““Edizioni distrutte" and the significance of operatic choruses during the Risorgimento” in Opera and Society in Italy and France from Monteverdi to Bourdieu, ed. Victoria Johnson, et al. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 181-189, and George Whitney Martin. “Verdi, Politics, and ‘Va, Pensiero’: The Scholars Squabble,” The Opera Quarterly 21, no. 1 (June 7, 2005): 109–32. 21 Mabel Berezin, Making the Fascist Self: The Political Culture of Interwar Italy (Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 1997),30-31.

crowd perpetuate the nationalistic legacy of Va pensiero by performing and listening to Verdi’s music, moving it into the arena of fascist spectacle.

The sound of trumpets cue the title to cut to footage of the stadium, full of thousands of Italian workers. Mussolini is also found in the stadium, standing on a balcony above the crowd while dressed in a suit and tie, accompanied by an unnamed man who waves to the people. Mascagni is shown in the middle of the stadium, standing on top of a tall podium and wearing the black shirt of Mussolini’s squadristi,

visually signifying his connection to the fascist regime through his clothing. Falasca-

Zamponi explains the significance of the black shirt: “The black shirt constituted the

basic piece of party members’ uniforms and a constant of fascist attire spanning more

than twenty years of variations in fashion.”22 Mussolini felt strongly about the black

shirt and the mindset of those who wore it, as evidenced by his words to the fascist

congress in 1925: “The black shirt is not the everyday shirt, and is not a uniform either.

It is a combat outfit and can only be worn by those who harbor a pure soul in their

heart.”23 Mascagni’s attire is a clear act of fascist performance, signaling his fascist

participation with the black shirt. The vociferous crowd chants “Duce, Duce,” and

instruments are waved in the air as Mussolini smiles. A noticeable hush falls over the

stadium as Mascagni raises his baton and begins to conduct the musicians. The

camera pans to reveal the scale of the chorus and brass orchestra, whose ranks blend

into the crowd of spectators, creating a sense of community and mass participation.

Opera provided an ideal space and platform for fascist performativity. High-

ranking members of the fascist party would often attend important musical premieres,

22 Falasca-Zamponi, Fascist Spectacle, 101. 23 Ibid. Translation by Falasca-Zamponi, cited from Benito Mussolini, Scritti e discorsi, vol. VIII, (Milan: Hoepli, 1934), 21.

giving an official fascist presence in the theater itself. Accompanying this presence was a fascist musical acknowledgement from the orchestra, which would play

Giovinezza, the official hymn of the National Fascist Party.24 As a recognizable piece

of fascist music, Giovinezza merged fascist performativity with musical performance and it was performed at a variety of public events including concerts, exhibit openings, sporting events, and even the coronation of Pope Pius XII.25 From the

founding of the state-sponsored Radiotelevsione Italiana (RAI) in 1924, Giovinezza was played at the conclusion of each radio program.26 During the fascist period, this hymn was ubiquitous in Italian life; it functioned as a musical sign of fascism. Indeed, any resistance to the performance of Giovinezza was met with hostility and aggression. After repeatedly refusing to play the fascist hymn, conductor Arturo

Toscanini was physically assaulted by a group of fascist men before a performance at

Bologna’s Teatro Comunale. Harvey Sachs recounts the episode:

The maestro, on emerging from his car, found himself surrounded by a group of about twenty Fascist youths. One of them—Leo Longanesi […] asked Toscanini whether he would play “Giovinezza.” “No, no anthems, Toscanini replied. The Fascists began to imprecate against him; Toscanini told them to go to hell; and Longanesi hit him in the face and neck and shouted insults, including “A morte!” (Kill!), that were echoed by others in the crowd.27

The violent reaction to Toscanini’s act of resistance is a reflection of the power and importance of Giovinezza as the PNF’s official hymn. By not conducting this hymn, he refused to perform fascism, and the public outcry both for and against his refusal

24 An instrumental period recording of Giovinezza sold by Columbia Records in 1927 has been digitized and is available for listening on the Internet Archive. https://archive.org/details/78_fascisti-hymn-giovinezza_italian-military-band-g- blanc_gbia0120201b/Fascisti+Hymn+(Giovinezza)!+-+Italian+Military+Band.flac 25 For an account of Pope Pius XII’s coronation, see Herbert L. Matthews, “Pope Takes Over St. John Lateran in Pageant Last Held 93 Years Ago: 20,000 in Streets Join with the Hierarchy and Italian Aristocracy in Paying Homage to Bishop of Rome” New York Times, May 19, 1939. 26 Elio Matarazzo, La RAI che non vedrai: idee e progetti sul servizio pubblico radiotelevisivo (Milan: Franco Angeli, 2007), 26. 27 Harvey Sachs, Toscanini: Musician of Conscience (New York: Liveright Publishing Corporation, 2017), 507.

eventually led to Toscanini seeking refuge from the fascist regime in the United

States, where he lived until his death in 1957.

In addition to playing Giovinezza, before the premiere of a new work,

composers frequently presented a copy of their score to Mussolini. This ceremonial

act demonstrated the connectedness of opera and the regime, an act that Mascagni

performed when he presented Mussolini with a copy of Nerone as a way of paying

respect to the Duce. In an ingratiating letter to Mussolini following the premiere of

Nerone, Mascagni emphasized this offering:

Think and remember that Nerone, an expression of the Roman environment, was inspired by the grand endeavor to return to the light of that Imperial Rome, which was the capital of the world, and that by virtue of His Excellency is about to repeat the miracle. I offer my work, in humility, to the country and its Duce.

Si pensi e si ricordi che il Nerone, espressione di ambiente romano, è stato inspirato dall’opera grandiosa del ritorno alla luce di quella Roma Imperiale che fu la Capitale del Mondo e che per virtù dell’E.V. è in procinto di ripetere il miracolo. Di questa opera mia, in umiltà, faccio offerta alla Patria ed al suo Duce. 28

Such offerings were important displays of obedience to the regime and its leader, regardless of genuine sincerity. Particularly in Mascagni’s case, this letter to

Mussolini came after a conference promoting his Nerone, where the composer incited public outrage with a few bombastic comments. One especially revealing statement made by the composer during this conference was in reference to the change in management at the Teatro dell’Opera di Roma, where Mascagni wanted to premiere

Nerone. At the direction of Mussolini, the management was dismissed, and Mascagni commented: “What is the use of power if not to abuse it?” “Per cosa servirebbe il potere se non ad abusarne?” as if to suggest the composer had a hand in the firing of

28 Letter from Mascagni to Mussolini from Milan, 27 January 1935, cited in Nicolodi, Musica e musicista, 403.

the Teatro dell’Opera’s management, which prompted a string of comments and murmurs in the crowd.29 Mascagni walked a fine line with such outrageous public comments, but in spite of his cantankerous nature, he remained in favor with the regime, demonstrating his power and renown. Mascagni performed fascism to ensure the success of his opera and to maintain his standing in the regime as fascist Italy’s operatic patriarch.

Promotional Media for Nerone and Mascagni

Mascagni’s final opera was widely promoted in Italian print and film media, which

continually updated the public on the work’s progress and praised the composer.

Indeed, Mascagni first started thinking about writing a Nerone as early as 1891, only a

year after his success with Cavalleria Rusticana. However, he quickly paused the project out of respect for Arrigo Boito, waiting for the older composer to finish his own Nerone. As a result, Mascagni turned to a different Roman narrative and began

setting Rocco de Zerbi’s La Vistilia to music. While Vistilia would never be

completed, Mascagni took inspiration from this incomplete opera to create his

Nerone.30 Unfortunately for Mascagni, Boito continued to work on his Nerone for decades, dying in 1918 before completing the score.31 In later years, Mascagni was

quite candid, almost cantankerous, in his dismissal of Boito’s opera, lamenting that

"The libretto exists but the music is lacking."32 Boito's compositional process was

29 Rapporto informativo from Milan, 16 January 1935, cited in Nicolodi, Musica e musicista, 401. 30 For more on the relationship between Vistilia and Nerone, see Roberto Bianchini, "Pietro Mascagni tra Vistilia e Nerone," Rassegna Musicale Curci vol. 51, no. 1 (1998): 18-21. 31 In 1924, Boito's Nerone enjoyed a lavish and successful premiere at La Scala; yet it quickly was retired from the repertoire, giving Mascagni the opportunity to create his Nerone. 32 Pietro Mascagni and David Stivender, Mascagni: An Autobiography (White Plains, NY: Kahn & Averill, Ltd., 1988), 242.

notoriously slow, and he received encouragement from his famous collaborator,

Giuseppe Verdi, who wrote to Boito, "Try to work, to go ahead; don't grow lazy; throw yourself rashly into this work. I tell you this in your own interests, because that prankster Mascagni is capable of beating you to it."33 Mascagni began to work on

Nerone in December 1932, and as early as February 1933, newspapers were reporting about the maestro’s latest opera.34 Press publicity continued for the next two years, building anticipation for the eventual January 1935 premiere. Mascagni’s wry sense of humor was captured in an interview on his progress with the opera: “’How is Nerone?’

asked the journalist. ‘Well’ responded the maestro, ‘actually poorly: he has a dagger

at the throat.’” “‘Come sta il Nerone?’ domanda il giornalista. ‘Bene’ risponde il

Maestro, ‘anzi male: ha il pugnale alla gola.’”35 As Mascagni continued to compose his opera, this work was documented and presented to the Italian public through print and film; in the age of newsreels, promotional media gained the added elements of images and sound.

Nerone offers a unique case of film promotion for new opera in fascist Italy, something modern and unheard of in Nazi Germany. While many film reels about opera and the arts were produced by the fascist Instituto L’Unione Cinetographica

Educativa (LUCE), the footage for Nerone appears to be the only material promoting

the new work of a living composer. This footage also shows aspects of Mascagni’s

masculine identity as a caring grandfather and as a contributor to the regime,

produced and constructed for public consumption. Two black and white sound reels

feature Mascagni ‘composing’ at the piano. The shorter of the two reels from

December 1932 is two minutes and twenty-three seconds, and uses movietone

33 Ibid., 243. 34 “Le nuove opera di Mascagni, Respighi, Mule e Robbiani,” La Stampa, February 24, 1933. 35 Alberto Savinio, “Il ‘povero’ Nerone,” La Stampa, September 23, 1933.

technology to sync sound with the picture. It opens with an intertitle: “Rome: His

Excellency Mascagni begins his seventieth year working on his new opera,” the text framed on either side by Roman fasces.36 This text highlights Mascagni’s admirable

work ethic, giving his age but never portraying him as elderly or feeble in any way.

We hear a piano being played while the intertitle is still on screen—it changes

to reveal a smartly dressed Mascagni at an upright piano. He plays music from Nerone

and Egloge’s Act II love duet, using sweeping arpeggios to take advantage of the

piano’s full register. After a cadence, the camera shifts to a close-up of Mascagni’s

face; he puts a cigar in his mouth and then plays the same passage from the Act II

love duet. Mascagni stops playing, takes a pen and transcribes notes onto staff paper

at the piano. We can see him in the act of notating, but the picture is not clear enough

to see what he is writing. While the shot is focused on the maestro’s hand on the

paper, a fly comes into the frame, resting upon the notated music before departing.

After Mascagni finishes notating, he plays the same passage from the Act II duet, but

this time he is interrupted by his young grandson. Mascagni is delighted by the

appearance of the little boy, embracing him while giving a big smile. The reel

concludes, changing to the fine title. Over the course of this short film reel, viewers are given access to a staged intimacy, offering a glimpse of the great maestro at work on his newest opera. Setting this reel in what appears to be one of Mascagni’s lavish apartments, the private sphere is used as a workplace. Mascagni is portrayed as a serious composer, working studiously at his craft with pen in hand and cigar in mouth. But, his depth of character is fully demonstrated when he is shown as a jovial

nonno who adores his grandson. It is these final few seconds of the reel that

36 Roma: S.E. Mascagni inizia il settantesimo anno di vita lavorando per una sua nuova opera lirica. This footage has been digitized and can be viewed at the Archivio Storico Istituto LUCE website. https://www.archivioluce.com/

strengthen Mascagni’s role as fascist operatic patriarch, humanizing the composer and thereby rendering him more relatable to his Italian viewers.

The longer of the two reels appears to be a rough cut of the first with additional footage, totaling four minutes and twenty-two seconds.37 Again, the reel is

black and white with sound, but this rough version of the polished reel lacks

intertitles. The footage begins in the exact same setting with Mascagni playing music

from the Act II love duet at the piano, pausing to notate on his staff paper, resuming

his playing, and finally being happily interrupted by his grandchildren. Paired with the

almost identical visual and sonic narrative and the erroneous creation year (1931), this

reel was most likely never shown in theaters.38 The only noteworthy difference in the

longer reel is that Mascagni’s compositional work at the piano is interrupted by two

grandchildren, a boy and girl. In retrospect, these reels can be read as promotional

material for Nerone; but if we attempt to avoid an anachronistic interpretation,

Mascagni, not his new opera, is the true focus of the reels. The intertitle for the

shorter reel does not reveal the title or subject of the opera, and without intimate

knowledge of the music being played at the piano, it is impossible to really associate

with Nerone. These two reels stage Mascagni the composer at work, portraying a

serious artist who transforms into an affable family man; representations which are at

the core of his identity as fascist operatic patriarch.

37 This footage has been digitized and can be viewed at the Archivio Storico Istituto LUCE website. https://www.archivioluce.com/ 38 Mascagni began working on Nerone in December 1932, and the shorter reel is credited with a December 1932 creation, so a promotional reel in 1931 is extremely unlikely.

Romanità in Nerone: The Limits of “Roman Musical Language” and Greek Representation

Mascagni wanted a glorious premiere for his Nerone and, in his opinion, Rome was the ideal city to present the opera. Initially, Mascagni tasked an impresario, Ottavio

Scotto, with securing the performance venue. Scotto, as Ivano Di Lillo illustrates, wanted to premiere Nerone in the Coliseum on the twelfth anniversary of the March on

Rome to commemorate the beginnings of fascism.39 While the Coliseum would have

been a spectacular physical link to the romanità of Mascagni’s Nerone, this request

did not come to fruition. Nevertheless, Mascagni was determined to have a Roman

premiere for his final opera, so he set his sights on the Teatro Reale dell’Opera di

Roma. This choice of venue was supported by the fascist regime and the Teatro

Reale, as evidenced in this correspondence between bureaucratic officials from 1933,

referring to Mascagni’s Nerone as “the opera,” and Mascagni as the “eminent musician:”

In Rome the Regime wanted and has been able to create the biggest lyrical theatre that exists. [ ... ]Traditions,[ ... ] those of the reconsecrated theatre, that none other ever had. [ ... ]The Corporazione expresses the very fervent wish that the opera [written] by the eminent musician will be performed, as it deserves, in the biggest theatre of the Capital.

In Roma il Regime ha voluto ed ha saputo creare il più grande Teatro lirico che esista. [...] Tradizioni [...] quelle del riconsacrato Teatro romano, quale niun altro ebbe mai. […] La Corporazione formula il voto vivissimo che l 'opera dell'illustre musicista venga eseguita, come si merita, nel massimo teatro della Capitale. 40

Despite the interest of all relevant parties, the plans to stage Nerone at the Teatro

Reale never materialized. Mascagni’s Roman opera would not receive a Roman

39 Di Lillo, “Opera and Nationalism in Fascist Italy”, 79-81. 40 Letter sent by the president of the Corporazione dello Spettacolo to the Presidenza del Consiglio dei Ministri on 5 October 1933. ACS, PCM, a. 1931-33, fasc . 3.2.12.10068, Rome. As cited and translated in Di Lillo, “Opera and Nationalism in Fascist Italy”, 84.

premiere. In a letter to his friend, Armando Tanzini, Mascagni revealed his extreme disappointment in failing to secure the Roman theater for his premiere:

Nerone will not be given at the Teatro Reale di Roma and no other theater wants it. This is the great compensation for an old artist, who asks nothing from nobody, and who worked with care to make a thing for Art and for the nation! […] I, for my seventieth birthday, composed Nerone; and in Italy I am regarded as a delinquent! This is why I suffer more for my country than for myself.

Il Nerone non si darà al teatro Reale di Roma e nessun altro teatro lo desidera. Ecco la grande soddisfazione di un artista vecchio, che non chiede nulla a nessuno, e che ha lavorato col pensiero di fare una cosa per l’Arte e per la Patria! […] Io, per il mio settantesimo compleanno, ho composto il Nerone; ed in Italia mi si tratta come un delinquente! Ecco perché ne soffro più per la Patria mia che per me. 41

Mascagni had a penchant for the melodramatic both on and off stage—despite the feelings articulated in his letter above, the Teatro Reale dell’Opera did not reject him out of spite. Rather, Mascagni’s inability to complete the opera in time for the 1934 season is one concrete factor that prevented a Roman premiere.42 Despite this political and institutional support, the deadline for setting the 1934 opera season did not wait for Mascagni to finish Nerone. As a result, Mascagni set his sights on La

Scala, premiering his Roman opera in Milan.43

Nerone is an opera in three acts and four scenes with libretto by Arturo

Rossato and Giovanni Targioni-Tozzetti.44 The narrative is based on the rise and fall

41 Morini, Pietro Mascagni, 423. 42 Di Lillo provides a thorough account of the difficulties securing a Roman performance venue for Nerone with archival documents from the Archivio Centrale dello Stato. Di Lillo, “Opera and Nationalism in Fascist Italy”, 79-87. 43 Operas with themes of romanità frequently premiered at La Scala during the fascist period. In addition to Mascagni’s Nerone, Ottorino Respighi’s Lucrezia, and Ennio Porrino’s Gli Orazi premiered at La Scala. Rome may have been the inspiration, but it did not have to be the site of performance. 44 Although Giovanni Targioni-Tozzetti is credited with writing the libretto in the printed score and in the publicity surrounding Nerone, much of it was written by librettist Arturo Rossato. For unspecified reasons, Mascagni replaced Rossato with his old friend Targioni-Tozzetti during the compositional process and refused to credit Rossato's involvement with the opera. Mascagni and Targioni-Tozzetti were loyal to each other, drawing upon a friendship that began in 1890 with their

of the notorious Roman Emperor Nero Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus, who ruled over the Roman Empire from 54 to 68 C.E.45 Mascagni’s opera takes place in ancient Rome towards the end of the emperor’s reign46. Rossato and Targioni-

Tozzetti’s libretto features named roles for fifteen characters: thirteen men and two women. As the title might suggest, the narrative is constructed completely around

Nerone--all other characters are secondary to the emperor. Both female characters,

Atte and Egloge, are Nerone’s former and current love interests. In addition to the named characters, there are choruses of Greek girls, patricians, senators, praetorians, freed people, and the people of Rome. By focusing on Nerone as an artist, the narrative calls attention to the disparity between the emperor and the people of Rome, rendering him as a disconnected, unpopular drunken despot who would rather recite

Oedipus Rex than engage with politics or society outside of his gilded palace.

Romanità was a key ideological and aesthetic concept that drew upon the

legacy of ancient Rome, positioning the fascist regime as a modern iteration of its

Roman predecessors. Capitalizing on this historical legacy, romanità glorified ancient

Rome through a variety of historical exhibits, art, architecture, and music. Mussolini forged a deep connection between fascism and ancient Rome, and this connection

collaboration on Cavalleria Rusticana. Nearly all Targioni-Tozzetti's libretti were written for Mascagni's operas. The pair collaborated on seven operas over more than forty years, until Targioni-Tozzetti's death in 1934. 45 For an intensive account of Nero’s life, see Anthony A. Barrett, Elaine Fantham, and John C. Yardley, eds.,The Emperor Nero, A Guide to the Ancient Sources (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2016). 46 See appendix for an analytical table of Nerone, detailing Acts and scenes, narrative action, incipits, tonal centers, characters, form, pages, and corresponding tracks for listening. Pages correspond to the only publicly accessible vocal score of the opera. Pietro Mascagni, Nerone (Firenze: Stabilimento Mignani, 1934). Tracks correspond to the Bongiovanni recording. Pietro Mascagni, Nerone, Radio Symphony Orchestra di Hilversum, conducted by Kees Bakels, recorded November 16, 1986, Bongiovanni (1994), CD.

manifested in a plurality of creations. Marla Stone articulates the significance of

romanità in the fascist regime:

Fascist culture and ideology depended heavily upon Roman imperial motifs, from Roman military and economic might to the primacy of classical aesthetic forms to the Roman ‘civilising mission’. Imperial Rome, especially the age of Augustus, was a useable past which played a number of roles between 1922 and 1943. Through fascist eyes, romanità, the elusive quality of Romanness, was flexible enough to meet Fascism’s changing politics. […] In the arts, romanità was translated as both a call to modern classicism and a demand for copies of Roman monuments. Under Italian Fascism, Rome was an idea, and aesthetic and a location with infinite possibilities and identities.47

Though visual media such as sculpture or architecture had ancient Roman models that they could replicate or reference, this did not exist in music. Composers could not easily replicate the sounds of ancient Rome, nor did they aim to. Rather, in the case of opera, romanità came from the libretti and the ancient Roman narratives set to music. Nevertheless, Mascagni attempted to articulate romanità musically:

One cannot put Nero on the stage and deny him his Roman-ness. Nero was very Roman and this opera needed to be Roman. By 'Roman' one can mean many things, but one of these is fundamental when dealing with a musical work; I mean to say the Roman-ness of the musical language. For me the Roman musical language is a diatonic language, everything precise and unwavering intervals. For this reason the opera proceeds in blocks of diatonicism from beginning to end. The character of Egloge is the exception; she is Greek and a chromatic language suits her.48

While Mascagni is not claiming the historical accuracy of tonal music in ancient

Rome, he positions tonality as a way of understanding musical romanità in Nerone.

However, we risk falling into an essentialist trap if we take Mascagni’s musical-

nationalistic associations at face value.

Mascagni musically signifies the exotic other through chromaticism, constructing an aural binary between Roman and Greek. This simple binary provides

47 Marla Stone, “A flexible Rome: Fascism and the cult of romanità,” in Roman Presences: Receptions of Rome in European Culture, 1789-1945, ed. Catharine Edwards (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), 220. 48 Stivender, Mascagni, 246-247.

what appears to be a straightforward analytical lens through which to categorize

Roman and Greek music from the composer who wrote it. Yet, when this binary is applied to the music of Nerone it does not account for all moments of Greekness or

Romanness. Roman superiority is implied throughout the opera; Greeks are

represented as slaves and former slaves, subservient to the emperor Nerone. This

construction highlights colonialism in the ancient Roman Empire and points to a

reimagining of Greco-Roman representation in fascist culture where Rome was

master and Greece servant. Mascagni’s musical formulation of Romaness and

Greekness speaks to the limits of the self/other binary in musical discourse, which

has been explored by Jonathan D. Bellman in his discussion of the pitfalls of Edward

Said’s legacy of orientalism in musicology:

[…] works that use musical gestures to suggest specific people, places, or cultures are often put in a separate, problematic critical category: separate because of the unstated, unproven, yet (seemingly) widely held assumption that there exists some kind of standard, definable, more normative style that does not evoke identity or place so specifically, and problematic because of the longstanding tradition […] that local color automatically implies cheapness, ephemerality, and compositional weakness.49

Mascagni’s choice to name diatonicism as Roman and chromaticism as Greek underscores the importance of romanità with an ill-conceived attempt to articulate the concept musically, particularly since chromaticism is not reserved only for Egloge nor diatonicism for Nerone. There is nothing inherently Roman about diatonicism, nor

Greek about chromaticism. Egloge’s narrative, rather than her music marks her otherness as a Greek slave in Rome. In reality, Mascagni’s tidy harmonic explanation of his opera does not sufficiently articulate the complexity of the harmonic language, which pushes the limits of diatonicism. Lack of strong key centers and clear cadential

49 Jonathan D. Bellman, “Musical Voyages and Their Baggage: Orientalism in Music and Critical Musicology,” The Musical Quarterly 94, no. 3 (2011): 420.

motion paired with shifting accidentals make it difficult to discern tonal areas for long stretches of the opera. In the scenes where key signatures are used, key areas are usually easier to distinguish, but this convention is really a marker of older material composed for Vistilia.50 Because the opera was constructed from previously composed material and new material with obvious stylistic and harmonic differences, key areas are not as significant to the characters’ identities as Mascagni suggests.

Although Mascagni’s binary of Roman diatonicism and Greek chromaticism does not account for the musical complexity of the entire opera, there are clear moments that align with this framework. In particular, the chorus amplifies moments of romanità with bombastic diatonicism in Act I, scene vii and Act II, scene vii. In Act

I, scene vii, the chorus of Praetorians and the people sing a martial hymn to Nerone and Rome, firmly in the key of A major (example 1). This diatonic chorus paired with the overtly Roman text creates a conspicuous moment of romanità.

Chorus: Act I, scene vii Gloria a Nerone! Glory to Nerone! Al divo Imperatore! To the divine Emperor! Cesare Augusto, veglia su Roma! Augustus Ceasar, watch over Rome! Vittorie e Gloria per l’alma Roma! Victory and glory for the spirit of Rome! Gli Dei proteggano Nerone e Roma! May the Gods protect Nerone and Rome! Roma! Roma! Roma! Rome! Rome! Rome!

50 For more on specific scenes originally composed for Vistilia, see Bianchini, "Pietro Mascagni tra Vistilia e Nerone," 18-21.

Example 1: Roman Chorus, Nerone: Act I, scene vii (pg. 50)

For some critics, this stylistic choice approached the point of parody; this viewpoint is articulated in a review from the newspaper Il regime fascista:

The composer Mascagni has repeated and let others repeat that in Nerone he wanted to express the Roman spirit. Excellent intention. [...] Mascagni has always known how to evoke with his music the "local colour", an atmosphere. [...] Not here. [...] On the contrary, there is a point, the conclusion of the first act, which seems a ferocious caricature of the Roman spirit. [...] We do not rule out that the composer Mascagni does not have a noble idea of the Roman spirit. But perhaps next time, instead of expressing it diatonically, as he has, will try to articulate it chromatically, he will not time the Hymn of Imperial Rome to the belches of a drunkard.

Il maestro Mascagni ha ripetuto e fatto ripetere che nel Nerone intendeva esprimere la romanità. Eccellente intenzione. [...] Mascagni [...] ha sempre saputo evocare con la sua musica il "colore locale", una atmosfera. [...] Qui no. [...] Anzi, vi è un punto, il finale del primo atto, che sembra una feroce caricatura della romanità. [...]Non si esclude con ciò che il maestro Mascagni non abbia una sua elevata idea della romanità. Ma forse la prossima volta, se invece di sentirla diatonicamente, come egli insegna, proverà sentirla cromaticamente, non gli accadrà di ritmare l’Inno di Roma Imperiale sui rutti di un ubriaco.51

51 S. P., "La 'prima' del 'Nerone' alla Scala", II regime fascista (17 January 1936), 3. Translation as cited in Di Lillo, “Opera and Nationalism in Fascist Italy”, 91-92.

Caricature or no, the chorus which ends Act I presents one operatic version of

romanità due to narrative context rather than explicit musical signifiers. This diatonic

trope is repeated in Act II, scene vii, when Nerone is visited by the chorus of

Praetorians and Senators, who sing similarly obsequious text to the emperor

(example 2). Here the chorus oscillates between the distant keys of Ab major and B

major, reinforcing Mascagni’s description of Roman as diatonic while pushing the

limits of diatonicism by featuring chromatically related tonic areas in quick

succession.

Chorus: Act II, scene vii

Salve, Nerone! Hello, Nerone! Per te fioriscono del Campidoglio For you the laurels bloom everlasting in perenni i lauri! the Capital! La tua Gloria si spande per Your glory spreads throughout l’Orbe intiero, o Cesare! the entire globe, o Caesar! Tutte le genti romane esultano! All the Roman people rejoice! Dai sette colli te, Nume, invocano! They evoke you from the seven hills, idol!

Example 2: Roman Chorus, Nerone: Act II, scene vii (pg. 108)

In Act III, scene i, the chorus breaks with Roman diatonicism during a drunken orgy (example 3). In this scene, no key signature is given, and the chorus inhabits a space of harmonic liminality, which is representative of Mascagni’s harmonic style for

most of the opera. Heavy accidentals and a lack of clear cadential motion thwart any hint of clear cut diatonicism. Here Mascagni’s binary of Roman diatonicism and Greek chromaticism truly breaks down. Although the musical style shifts noticeably, the character of the chorus’ text continues to aggrandize Nerone. In addition to praising the emperor, the chorus evokes Bacchus, the Roman God of wine.

Chorus: Act III, scene i Gloria a Nerone, gloria! Glory to Nerone, glory! Io Bacche! Io Bacche! Evohè! Io Bacche! Io Bacche! Evohè! La candida mensa scintilla The snow-white table shines Ricca di fiori, brilla Full of flowers, sparkles Di luce eterea! With heavenly light! La coppa ricolma spumeggi! The overflowing cup brims over! A te noi beviamo, Nerone! We drink to you, Nerone! Io Bacche! Io Bacche! Evohè! Io Bacche! Io Bacche! Evohè! Gloria a Nerone, gloria! Glory to Nerone, glory!

Example 3: Drunken Chorus, Nerone: Act III, scene I (pg. 117)

In practice, Mascagni’s association between diatonicism and romanità is not

an absolute; Roman choruses sing both diatonic and chromatic music. Nevertheless,

The ‘Greek’ chromaticism as described by Mascagni pertains to Nerone’s love

interest, Egloge, and a group of female Greek dancers. In Act II, scene iii, Egloge

sings about dancing and how happy she is in an extended solo passage. Though the

Greek aspect of her identity is brought to the forefront with the numerous references

to her being a Greek slave, the ‘Greekness’ of this scene pales in comparison to the

unabashed romanità of the choruses outlined above. The chromaticism is present, but the Greek text is not; instead Egloge’s identity as a Greek woman is the inspiration for this stylistic choice (example 4).

Example 4: Egloge’s Chromaticism, Nerone: Act II, scene iii (pg. 69-70)

The chorus of Greek women also provide Greekness in Act II, scene iv. Here, Egloge

and the female Greek chorus overlap long legato lines. Despite the narrative

‘Greekness,’ this chorus is in the key of E major. Chromatic inflections are present,

but they do not challenge the primacy of E major (example 5). Again, the stylistic binary between Roman and Greek is contradicted by the music.

Example 5: Greek Chorus, Nerone: Act II, scene iv (pg. 83)

In Act II, scene iii, Nerone demonstrates the extent of his love for Egloge. After she sings about how much she enjoys dancing, Nerone grants the young Greek slave her freedom. Rather than leaving the palace as a free woman, Egloge stays with

Nerone, and the two begin a fantastical romantic relationship; Egloge will be Nerone’s empress. This series of events leads to one of the musical highlights of the opera:

Nerone and Egloge’s love duet. Nerone begins the duet, praising Egloge’s beauty with long flowing melodic lines in the key of Db major. Here a memorable motive is

introduced, sung first by Nerone. This motive, featuring super-triplet groupings paired with a descending thirty-second note figure is repeated twice by the emperor, showcasing the upper tenor register (example 6).

Example 6: Love Duet Motive, Nerone: Act II, scene iii (pg. 75)

Even more striking than this beautiful motive is how each character utilizes it.

After Nerone finishes singing the first half of the duet, Egloge sings the second half, declaring her love for the man who until very recently was also her owner. As the duet continues, she begins to sing exactly the same notes (an octave higher), with a few rhythmic discrepancies, as Nerone sang in the beginning of the duet. This musical mimicry could be interpreted as a symbol of their love, or as an aural manifestation of

Egloge’s desire to appease the powerful man who granted her status as a free woman and the next empress. After Egloge repeats Nerone’s music and sings the afformentioned motive twice, Nerone sings once more, and the two conclude the duet singing together, proclaiming a fortissimo “amore! amor!” with Egloge singing the

highest note in the opera, Db6. This motive is evocative of Egloge and Nerone’s

relationship, yet it also reinforces Nerone’s centrality as emperor and main

protagonist. When the motive is reprised by Egloge at the end of act II and during her

death in Act III, scene I, she speaks directly to Nerone: increasingly her character can

only be defined in relationship to him.

“Long live the Artist!”: An Unconventional Nerone

Curiously, Mascagni chose to portray Nerone as a sympathetic artist rather than a matricidal tyrant, glossing over the more unsavory episodes in Nerone’s life. In an interview published before the premiere Mascagni describes his protagonist: "I believe that few musicians have set a Nerone to music because they have always

considered him an emperor and a political man, while instead he was never a

politician nor an emperor. His life was that of an artist, failed if we wanted, but an

artist." “Io ritengo che pochi musicisti si siano accinti a musicare un Nerone, perché

l’hanno sempre considerato un imperatore e un uomo politico, mentre invece egli non

è mai stato né un politico né un imperatore. La sua vita fu quella di un artista, mal

riuscito se vogliamo, ma un artista.”52 Nerone was no doubt an emperor, politician, and an artist, but by focusing solely on the artistic, Mascagni sought to distance his

52 La Scala programma di sala per Nerone, 1935.

opera’s main character from being an overtly political figure. 53 By foregrounding

Nerone the artist and ignoring Nerone the emperor, Mascagni demonstrates his own

political naivete, failing to make any connection between the subject of his opera and

the political regime in which he was living. Nevertheless, Mascagni's general

disregard for politics did not prevent others from making comparisons between

Nerone and Mussolini. According to Alan Mallach, Mussolini confronted Mascagni

saying, "I am not at all happy with you—did you have to pick Nero in particular for a

subject?"54 However, Ivano Di Lillo cites a complete lack of evidence for this exchange, positioning it “among the many romantic legends told about the composer.”55 The character of Nerone is a far cry from the powerful, matricidal

emperor as we remember him historically. According to Mascagni:

We give the people an interpretation of Nerone a bit less traditional, a little less of the tyrant and marionette. Finally, in this marvelous rebirth of romanità, we empty history of its surly figures, we give them again, even with their defects and vices—since this is the legacy of every man, every age, a ballast necessity—a prestige, a halo, a significance; none other is worthy of Ancient Roman greatness.

Diamo al popolo un’interpretazione un po’ meno tradizionale, un po’ meno da tiranno da marionette, di Nerone. Infine, in questa meravigliosa rinascita di romanità, spopoliamo la storia dalle torve figure, doniamo ad esse, sia pure con I loro difetti e I loro vizi—giacché questo è un retaggio d’ogni uomo, d’ogni epoca, una zavorra necessaria—un prestigio, un alone, un significato, se non altro degno dell’antica grandezza romana.56

53 The artist trope is more prominent in German operas from the early twentieth century, known as Künstleropern, including Hans Pfitzner’s Palestrina (1915), Ernst Krenek’s Jonny spielt auf (1926), Paul Hindemith’s Mathis der Maler (1935). See Claire Taylor-Jay, The Artist-Operas of Pfitzner, Krenek, and Hindemith: Politics and the Ideology of the Artist (Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2004). 54 Mallach, Pietro Mascagni and His Operas, 271. 55 Di Lillo, “Opera and Nationalism,” 86. 56 La Scala programma di sala per Nerone, 1935.

In other words, Nerone is cast as more sympathetic version of his historical character, whose vulnerabilities are displayed for all to see. This portrayal shows a powerful, yet susceptible man, whose artistic narcissism eventually leads to his ruin and death.

In Act II, Nerone demonstrates his artistic aspirations while reinforcing his apathy for the political duties of his office as he recites from Sophocles' Oedipus

Rex.57 This reference to the Greek tragedian complicates how Greekness is represented in the opera, elevating at least one Greek far beyond the lowly status of slave or former slave. The inclusion of Sophocles points to a more complicated reading of Greeks in Nerone’s narrative, reifying the words of the tragedian and presenting this Greekness through the Roman emperor. Nerone sings from Oedipus

Rex (example 7):

Oedipus Rex: Act II, scene i

Possa la morte cogliere il pastore Death can surprise the shepherd che mi tolse dal monte from the mountain who leaves me e sciolse i nodi and loosens the bonds che mi tenano i piedi imprigionati that keep my feet imprisoned!

57 While it is highly unlikely that Mascagni or his librettists, Rossato and Targioni-Tozzetti would have considered any psychoanalytic allusions to Freud or his Oedipus complex, we can make a comparison between Nerone and Oedipus on the basis of the two protagonists being male rulers who kill their mothers and suffer for it.

Example 7: Nerone sings Oedipus Rex, Nerone: Act II, scene i (pg. 53)

This phrase from Oedipus Rex signals the beginning of Act II, and Nerone is

supported by soft open octaves in the orchestra. The light orchestration paired with

the vocal indication, cantando a voce spiegata (clear voice singing), emphasizes

Nerone’s text and allows it to be heard. The prominence of whole-tone relationships in both Nerone’s line and in the orchestra are a musical departure from much of what we hear in Act I, marking this phrase as a moment of diegetic singing. Nerone’s diegetic performance is interrupted and confirmed by Menecrate’s obsequious praise:

“Praises and crowns to you, the greatest singer… incomparable artist!”58

Following the interruption, Nerone returns to Oedipus Rex, continuing to sing

Sophocles’ text.

Oedipus Rex: Act II, scene i

Chi mi serbò alla vita Who will save me from life e all'ire atroci delle Furie? And from the terrible ire of the Furies? Per quale ignota colpa I have all of the gods as enemies mi son nemici, ahimè, tutti gli Dei? For this unknown crime of mine, alas!

58 Plausi e corone a te, sommo cantore… l’artista incomparabile!

The soft accompanimental octaves return, supporting Nerone’s whole tone line, which is sung in full voice, with a crescendo until the final word of the recitation.

Upon finishing his second recitation from Oedipus Rex, Nerone sympathizes with

Oedipus, embracing the tragedy of the ancient story. He breaks from the whole tones

of the oration to softly exclaim, “What tragedy grew on Oedipus’ head!”59 Nerone and

Oedipus are connected through these orations, foreshadowing Nerone’s eventual

demise.

The emperor’s artistry is featured again in act III, during an imperial banquet

given in his honor. The chorus of guests shower him with praises: “Long live the

father of the fatherland! Long live our God, Nerone!”60 Nerone responds to his obsequious guests, “Better to say: long live the artist!”, choosing to be seen as an artist rather than a God.61 Yet, this response is anything but humble, Nerone merely

wants to showcase his talents, seizing the opportunity to perform for his guests.

Nerone’s Act III performance is one of the few self-contained solo passages in the opera, allowing the emperor a moment of artistic indulgence, featuring his tenor register (example 8).

59 Quale tragedia s’addensò sul capo d’Edipo! 60 Evviva il padre della Patria! Evviva il nostro Dio, Nerone! 61 Dite meglio: viva l’artista!

Example 8: Nerone’s arioso, Nerone: Act III, scene i (pg. 136)

The arioso performance begins in a 6/8 meter with arpeggiated accompaniment supporting Nerone’s long legato lines before shifting to 2/4 meter for a largely unaccompanied solo finale. Throughout this passage, the emperor sings in the key of

D major, building towards the vocal climax on the tenor’s high A. Nerone holds fast to his artistic identity until the very end—in the final scene of the opera his death is facilitated by a slave and Nerone exclaims, “What a great artist dies!” in an ultimate moment of narcissism. Nerone may have lost his imperial power, but his identity as a

‘great’ artist remains intact.62

“The Battle is Won:” Nerone Reception

Mascagni conducted the premiere of Nerone, directing a star-studded cast featuring

Aureliano Pertile as Nerone, Lina Bruna Rasa as Atte, Margherita Carosio as Egloge,

Apollo Granforte as Menecrate, and Tancredi Pasero as Babilio. Pertile was noteworthy not only for his dramatic tenor voice, but also because he originated the

62 Che grande artista muore!

same titular role in Arrigo Boito’s Nerone. Printed reviews of the premiere were overwhelmingly positive, celebrating Mascagni and the opera alike. Mascagni’s popularity and the significance of his final opera were embraced by the public. A special publication by the Sindacato Interprovinciale Fascista dei Giornalisti

commemorated the event, full of biographical articles singing the composer’s praises

and providing further information about Nerone.63 At the premiere, the atmosphere

was charged; opera goers anticipated a spectacular performance. The Milanese

Corriere della Sera newspaper printed a detailed account of the unforgettable

evening:

At eight fifteen the theater was full to the brim: three thousand spectators and 273,250 lire in takings. An audience so impressive and marvelous hasn’t been seen for many years. You need to go back to the great premieres of Boito’s Nerone and the Puccinian Turandot to find a point of comparison.

Alle venti e quarantacinque la sala era colma: tremila spettatori e un incasso di 273,250 lire. Da molti anni non si era mai visto un pubblico così imponente e meraviglioso. Bisogna risalire alle grandi prime del Nerone di Boito e della Turandot pucciniana per trovare un termine di paragone.64

By evoking a comparison to Puccini and Boito’s posthumous premieres, Mascagni’s premiere was elevated to the highest level of successful reception, reserved for the

‘great’ composers of fascist Italy.65

In the same review, Mascagni is touted for his dexterity; the corporeal limits of

his advanced age are erased, and he is made to sound like a younger version of

himself:

Pietro Mascagni nimbly climbed onto the podium: there, with his back to the orchestra, his manly [maschio] face smiling in front of the great theater, bowed and responded to the thunderous greeting with a cordial hand gesture.

63 Nerone di P. Mascagni: Numero Speciale (Milano: Sindicato interprovinciale fascista dei giornatlisti, 1935). 64 “L’indimenticabile serata,” Corriere della Sera, January 17, 1935, 3. 65 Puccini’s Turandot and Boito’s Nerone both premiered in 1924, shortly after Mussolini came into power.

Pietro Mascagni è salito, agilmente, sul podio: è lì, con la schiena all’orchestra, il maschio viso sorridente davanti alla grande sala: e si inchina e risponde allo scrosciante salute con un gesto cordiale della mano.66

The use of maschio is a rare occurrence of explicitly gendered language in press

reception, underscoring Mascagni’s masculinity and augmenting it. In the context of

the Nerone premiere, most critics do not use explicitly gendered language whatsoever, marking the Corriere della Sera review for its use of a masculine descriptor in a society where male power was so pervasive, it didn’t need to be named.

Mascagni’s masculinity was also reinforced by militaristic language, as he proudly displayed his decades-long campaign fighting for Italian opera.67 Many published reviews refer to Nerone as a battle, a curious analogy provided by Mascagni himself during a public lecture a few days before the premiere. Ever eager to present himself as a promoter and defender of Italian music, Nerone became Mascagni’s

entrée into the discourse of combat. The results of Mascagni’s battle were somewhat

mixed, despite the overall positive nature of the press. According to La Stampa,

Mascagni did not quite make the mark:

We would have really liked to hear an authentic battle opera today, in which the combatant had shown refinement of himself, of the ideal, of technique, of the experience, for example, as Verdi did with Falstaff, and the continuity of his development.

Molto ci sarebbe piaciuto di ascoltar oggi una autentica opera di battaglia, nella quale il combattente avesse mostrato il raffinamento di se stesso, dell’ideale, della tecnica, dell’esperienza, così come, per esempio, fece Verdi col Falstaff, e la continuità del suo svolgimento.68

66 “L’indimenticabilie serata,” Corriere della Sera, January 17, 1935, 3. 67 Before fascism, Mascagni championed italianità (Italian-ness) while conducting his operas internationally—most notably on his extended South American tours in 1911 and 1922. See chapter 11 and 14 in Mallach’s Pietro Mascagni and His Operas for further discussion. 68 Andrea Della Corte, “L’eccezionale serata alla Scala,” La Stampa, January 17, 1935, 3.

Associating Mascagni’s Nerone with Verdi’s Falstaff is a loaded comparison, but one that nevertheless placed Mascagni in the company of the preeminent Italian opera composer of the nineteenth century. The Corriere della Sera disagreed with La

Stampa, declaring an overwhelming victory for Mascagni’s battle:

The government representative congratulates Mascagni with heartfelt remarks and communicates to him that the Duce has already inquired from Rome by telephone two times about the result of the noble and beautiful art battle, immediately after the first act and immediately after the second. And he wanted to know the number of curtain calls. […] The battle is won, and the victory is beautiful.

Il rappresentante del Governo si felicita con fervida parola con Mascagni e gli comunica che il Duce ha già due volte domandato da Roma, per telefono, dell’esito della nobile e bellissima battaglia d’arte: subito dopo il primo atto e subito dopo il secondo: e ha voluto sapere il numero delle chiamate e degli applausi a scena aperta. […] La battaglia è vinta: e la vittoria è bellissima.69

Not only did Mussolini want to show his support for Mascagni and Nerone, he wanted

the public to know about his support. Though the Duce didn’t attend the Milanese

premiere, he sent his son-in law, Galeazzo Ciano, undersecretary for Press and

Propaganda to represent the government.70 Mascagni took note of this attention, and wrote a letter to Mussolini, first complaining about some of the press reviews Nerone

received, and then thanking il Duce for his interest and support:

But no gesture could appear dearer to me than the interest expressed so spontaneously from your excellency: official interest, with the presence of the undersecretary for Press and Propaganda, representing the government, at the first performance; intimate and affectionate interest, with the telephone request for news during the opera performance. With a heart full of emotion, I express to your excellency a feeling of profound gratitude for the great comfort that your kindness has brought to my soul. And I will be very grateful to your excellency if you would kindly accept copies of the Nerone libretto and score, which I devoutly present to you.

Ma nessun atto poteva riuscirmi più caro dell'interessamento spiegato così spontaneamente dalla Eccellenza Vostra: interessamento ufficiale, con la presenza alla prima rappresentazione di S.E. il sottosegretario di Stato per la

69 “L’indimenticabile serata,” Corriere della Sera, January 17, 1935, 3. 70 “S.E. Galeazzo Ciano rappresenterà il Governo fascista alla prima del ‘Nerone’,” La Stampa della Sera, January 15, 1935, 5.

Stampa e la Propaganda, in rappresentanza del Governo; interessamento intimo ed affettuoso, con la richiesta telefonica di notizie durante I'esecuzione dell'opera. Col cuore pieno di commozione, esprimo alla E.V. il sentimento di profonda riconoscenza per il grande conforto che la Sua bontà ha recato all'anima mia. E sarò maggiormente grato all'E.V. se vorrà benevolmente accettare Ie copie del libretto e dello spartito del Nerone, che devotamente Le faccio presentare.71

A few weeks after the premiere, Mascagni had a congratulatory audience with

Mussolini in Rome, where he presented il Duce with the libretto and score to his final opera.72 Mascagni had achieved both musical and political success with Nerone, securing the favor of Mussolini and ensuring his continued support, winning his battle for the glorious tradition of Italian opera.

Conclusion: An Icon in the Fascist Mechanism

Pietro Mascagni leveraged his popularity and status to promote Nerone, presenting himself as the defender of Italian musical tradition. Mascagni’s iconicity served both himself and the regime, positioning the elderly composer as an integral part of fascist musical culture while securing his fame and fortune. Capitalizing on previous international efforts to promote Italian opera, Mascagni demonstrated his masculinity and patriotism through the use of battle rhetoric, creating a narrative of personal, political, and musical victory. Mussolini’s public praise inflated his already oversized ego, assuring Mascagni his operatic battle was successful. His power and desire to write a Roman opera resulted in Nerone; the tale of a failed artist and failed emperor

who betrayed his country, resulting in his death, as well as the death of his lover

Egloge, displaying the cultural power of the patriarchy on stage. Nerone’s

71 “Lettera di P. Mascagni a Mussolini, da Milano, 27 gennaio 1935,” in Fiamma Nicolodi, Musica e musicisti nel ventennio fascista (Fiesole, Firenze: Discanto, 1984), 402. 72 “Le udienze del Duce,” La Stampa, February 27, 1935, 1.

characterization is nuanced, and his recitations from Oedipus Rex provide fascinating

intertextual connections, complicating his relationship with Egloge and the Greeks.

Ultimately, Nerone’s artistic failure is bound by his political failure—he lost his

imperial power when he ceased to care about his political duties and the Roman

people. Mascagni’s success with Nerone affirmed his place as a musical icon in the fascist mechanism, presenting the composer as fascist Italy’s operatic patriarch.

Mascagni continued with a full conducting schedule until 1940; thereafter his health began to decline and his public performances dwindled. After Mussolini was deposed and Germany took over Rome in 1943, Mascagni lived a sedentary existence in the Roman hotel he called home. As fascism crumbled and the allies advanced,

Mascagni became disenchanted with the regime and Mussolini, celebrating the end of fascism in a letter dated July 26, 1943 to his lover, Anna Lolli: “Fascism is over! The sun of liberty shines upon us!”73 This position shift in the final years of his life by no means negates his previous support of or involvement in fascism, nor is it a redemption narrative, but it does point to the complexities of Italian politics and public support. Nevertheless, Mascagni’s celebrity allowed him tangible comforts in an unstable setting. When the allied French Resistance arrived in 1944, Mascagni and his wife were the sole occupants of the Roman hotel permitted to remain in their lodgings.74 As his health failed, he became a more devout Catholic and was granted several audiences with Pope Pius the XII. Mascagni died at age 81 in August 1945, outliving the regime and Mussolini by only a few months. Despite his power and status during the height of the regime, the importance of Mascagni’s role as fascist

73 Pietro Mascagni, Epistolario, Vol. II, ed. Mario Morini, Roberto Iovino, and Alberto Paloscia (Lucca: Libreria Musicale Italiana Editrice, 1997), 339. Original text: Il fascismo è finito! Torna su di noi il sole della libertà! 74 Mallach, Pietro Mascagni and His Operas, 284.

operatic patriarch faded in the post-war era, overshadowed by the success of his youth and Cavalleria Rusticana. Nevertheless, Mascagni embraced fascism and played his part in the machine, underscoring the importance of musical culture in fascist Italy and the complexities of masculine representation in fascist ideology.

Chapter Two For Il Duce: Gian Francesco Malipiero’s Giulio Cesare

A prolific musical modernist and musicologist known mainly for his orchestral works and critical edition of Monteverdi’s complete works, Gian Francesco Malipiero (1882-

1973) was also the principal modernist opera composer of his generation, though few of these operas are performed today.1 On February 8, 1936, Malipiero’s Giulio Cesare premiered at the Teatro Carlo Felice in Genoa. This Shakespearian adaptation was a complete narrative departure from his previous opera, La favola del figlio cambiato, with libretto by Luigi Pirandello. The Roman premiere of La favola in 1934, attended by

Mussolini, gained notoriety after the Duce voiced his strong disapproval for the work and banned subsequent performances of it. Despite successful German productions in Braunschweig and Darmstadt, Mussolini and the Roman audience took issue with the text of Pirandello’s libretto.2 Music critic Fedele D’Amico recounts Mussolini’s outrage: “[he] prohibited further performances, declaring that if he had been in the gallery, he would have thrown the chairs down on to the stage; and a little time afterwards he publicly described the text of the opera […] as the libretto of a cretin.”3

1 Malipiero belongs to a group of Italian composers deemed the generazione dell’ottanta (generation of the ‘80s) including Alfredo Casella, Ottorino Respighi, Ildebrando Pizzetti, and Franco Alfano. Casella and Malipiero were more modernist than their counterparts, Respighi and Alfano were more traditional, and Pizzetti was ‘progressive’. For the distinction between modern and progressive, see Ben Earle, Luigi Dallapiccola and Musical Modernism in Fascist Italy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013), 57-58. 2 The opera premiered in Braunschweig on January 13, 1934 to great acclaim. The Roman premiere of La favola del figlio cambiato occurred on March 24, 1934. Mussolini’s reaction to La favola was international news. For an American perspective, see Raymond Hall, “Malipiero’s New Opera: ’La Favola del Figlio Cambiato’ Banned by Mussolini as Immoral,” New York Times, May 13, 1934. 3 As cited in John C. G. Waterhouse, Gian Francesco Malipiero 1882-1973: The Life, Times, and Music of a Wayward Genius (Amsterdam: Harwood Academic Publishers, 1999), 46. For an account of the disastrous premiere see Fedele D’Amico, “La storia del favola” in the programma di sala del Teatro dell’Opera di Roma, February 24, 1982, 587-607.

Though the libretto was the cause of Mussolini’s ire, Pirandello himself was protected as an internationally recognized Italian intellectual, winning the 1934 Nobel Prize in

Literature.4 Naturally, Pirandello was offended by Mussolini’s reaction to La favola del figlio cambiato and distanced himself from the Duce and fascism, though he remained in Rome until his death in 1936.

Though this call for censorship was far from the norm, Malipiero was keen to regain Mussolini’s favor, choosing one of the Duce’s favorite subjects for his next opera: Giulio Cesare. Mussolini’s admiration for and identification with Caesar is

well-documented and led to an influx of Italian translations and adaptations of

Shakespeare’s play shortly after he came into power in 1922.5 His identification with

Caesar was accentuated by Italy’s colonization of Ethiopia, sparked by an unprovoked

Italian attack in October 1935, which lasted for seven months before the country was officially annexed by Italy in May 1936. Following the capture of the Ethiopian capital,

Addis Ababa, Mussolini addressed the masses and proclaimed victory: “Italy has its

Empire at last, a Fascist Empire, with the indelible mark of the will and the power of the

Roman Littorio. For fourteen years, this has been the focus of the ardent and disciplined energies of this generation of young and mighty Italians.”6 Although

Italy’s imperial expansion was short-lived, it was a demonstration of Mussolini’s

4 For more on Pirandello’s reaction to the banning of La favola del figlio cambiato, see Guido Bonsaver, Mussolini censore: storie di letteratura, dissenso e ipocrisia (Roma: Laterza, 2013), 89-90. 5 According to Elisa Fortunato, there were thirteen Italian translations of Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar between 1924-25 alone, with more than forty editions circulating in print by the end of the fascist era. Elisa Fortunato, “‘But Men May Construe Things After Their Fashion’: Julius Caesar and Fascism,” Studia Litteraria Universitatis Iagellonicae Cracoviensis 13, no. 3 (2018): 197. 6 Marla Stone, The Fascist Revolution in Italy: A Brief History with Documents (Boston: Bedford/St Martin’s, 2013), 142. Italian original cited in Ezio Maria Gray, Lecturae Ducis: Tre Commenti (Rome: Edizioni Latium, 1942); Il Popolo d’Italia, May 10, 1936.

desire to create a new fascist empire, paying homage to the greatness of the ancient

Roman empire with a modicum of its imperial success.

Giulio Cesare is an opera in three Acts and seven quadri, with libretto

translated and adapted from Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar by Malipiero. In this opera,

Malipiero cut several scenes from Shakespeare’s play, focusing the narrative upon

three moments: the conspiracy to kill and remove Cesare; the stabbing of Cesare; and

the victory of Cesare’s successors. As such, the opera focuses on Cesare and the

many male characters who conspire to depose him. Giulio Cesare presented a tempered modernism that marked the beginning of a stylistic shift in Malipiero’s compositional output. Here tempered modernism refers to a prominent lyricism set to more conventional libretti rather than the use of unconventional texts as libretti for disconnected, self-contained musical miniatures that characterized his earlier style in works such as Pantea (1919) and Sette canzoni (1918-19).7 Malipiero dedicated Giulio

Cesare to Mussolini and ceremonially presented him with a copy of the score before

the opera’s premiere.8 He wanted to curry favor with the regime, and he sent frequent

updates about the progress of Giulio Cesare to various high-ranking bureaucrats,

including a telegram to Mussolini about the performance the night before its

premiere.9 The success of the opera’s premiere was acknowledged by Il Duce in the

form of a brief, congratulatory telegram to Malipiero dated February 9, 1936. On the

surface, Malipiero had achieved what he set out to do with Giulio Cesare, to appease

Mussolini and to move beyond the public failure of La favola del figlio cambiato.

7 For a thorough discussion of the evolution of Malipiero’s musical style leading up to Giulio Cesare, see Waterhouse, Gian Francesco Malipiero 1882-1973, 125-203. 8 This practice was not uncommon amongst Italian opera composers of this era; many composers presented copies of their operas to Mussolini, including Pietro Mascagni’s Nerone and Ottorino Respighi’s Lucrezia. 9 All letters and telegrams to and from Malipiero can be found in Fiamma Nicolodi, Musica e musicisti nel ventennio fascista (Fiesole, Firenze: Discanto, 1984), 361-363.

However, the success of Giulio Cesare did not award Malipiero the prestige and status that he desired.

In this chapter, I examine the aftermath of Malipiero’s failure with La favola del figlio cambiato as the impetus for creating Giulio Cesare, exploring Caesar’s place in

fascist culture, the power of fascist bureaucracy and the censorial process, as well as

an analysis of the opera and its critical reception. I argue that Malipiero was not as

successful as some of his peers who obtained leadership positions in fascist musical

organizations or membership in the Accademia d’Italia, despite frequent direct

appeals to Mussolini. Malpiero’s inability to attain the level of success he desired as

an Italian, male composer working in fascist Italy belies a precarious and murky

political hierarchy that grandstanded Mussolini as its ultimate authority. The Duce

was the paradigm for the ideal fascist masculinity: l’uomo nuovo (new man). As such, very few, if any were able to realize the masculine paradigm of the uomo nuovo

because it was unattainable for anyone other than Mussolini himself. Malipiero did

not embody this masculine paradigm, nor did he truly gain the Duce’s favor with

Giulio Cesare. Although this failure to be favored cannot be tied to any one reason or instance, it is crucial to note his failures were never a direct result of his modernist musical style. Mussolini accepted a variety of musical styles from Italian composers, and the rare instances of operatic censorship were always concerned with libretti and text, not music. Malipiero performed fascism through his dedication to the regime and its leader, yet his fascist legacy is a mixture of failure and success.

Julius Caesar and romanità in Fascist Culture

From the very beginnings of the Italian fascist regime, spectacle and allusion to the

greatness of ancient Rome were integral to fascist culture. Mussolini’s role as Italian

Prime Minister commenced with the March on Rome in October 1922, as 30,000 troops

converged upon the capital. This march was more of an orchestrated demonstration of power than a violent coup, modeled after Julius Caesar’s March on Rome in 49 BC, to underscore Mussolini’s identification with Caesar. Direct comparisons between the two dictators were frequently made in the press, and as early as 1923, Tito Vezio’s Le due marce su Roma: Giulio Cesare e Benito Mussolini made these comparisons explicit.10 Mussolini openly forged the Caesarian connection in an article published in

Il popolo d’Italia on July 6, 1933: “This, this too, is an epoch that can call itself

Caesarian, dominated as it is by exceptional personalities who reassume in

themselves the powers of the State, for the well-being of the people, against the

parliamentarians, just as Caesar marched against the senatorial oligarchy of Rome.”11

During the early years of Mussolini’s regime, parallels were drawn between the

beginnings of Mussolini and Caesar’s respective rises to power rather than Caesar’s

betrayal and demise.

Exemplified by romanità, allusions to Caesar were part of the larger fascist

cultural ideology. Romanità, or Roman-ness, was a central facet of fascist culture, selectively drawing upon the myths, aesthetics, and culture of ancient Rome. The link between fascism and ancient Rome was fundamental, positioning Mussolini’s regime

10 Tito Vezio, Le due marce su Roma: Giulio Cesare e Benito Mussolini (Mantova: Edizioni Paladino, 1923). 11 Translation as cited in Maria Wyke, “Sawdust Caesar: Mussolini, Julius Caesar, and the drama of dictatorship,” in The Uses and Abuses of Antiquity, ed. Michael Biddiss and Maria Wyke (Bern: Peter Lang, 1999), 170.

as a reimagined, reinvigorated Roman Empire. This link was bolstered by the visibility of ancient Roman ruins throughout the capital, where countless archeological ruins and iconic spaces, such as the Colosseo, remain for all to see and visit. Simonetta

Falasca-Zamponi describes the importance of this link and its mythical power: “In

general the myth of Rome reconnected the country to a common past, a shared

rootedness. The invention of historical memory spurred collective identity. […]

Furthermore, the recourse to the Roman tradition legitimated fascism’s leadership

role by asserting a continuity between fascism and Italian history.”12 Because

Mussolini and the fascist regime were geographically linked to the successes and innovations of the ancient Roman Empire, they were able to use those historical connections to legitimize the National Fascist Party. In this context, the myth of ancient Rome provided aesthetic inspiration for a variety of new culture, including opera, under the fascist regime. The production of this new culture that took inspiration from identifiable ancient Roman subjects perpetuated the myth of ancient

Rome, strengthening the connection between ancient Rome and fascist Italy.

Another Roman figure favored by Mussolini was Augustus, the first emperor

of Rome and chosen heir of his great-uncle Julius Caesar, whose reign increased the size of the Roman empire and marked an age of relative peace. Following the Italian invasion and colonization of Ethiopia, which officially became a subsidiary of Italy in

May 1936 after a brutal war, it appeared that Mussolini had the beginnings of a new

Italian empire. As the fascist regime entered its second decade, Augustus was vaunted and celebrated with a year of extravagant exhibits, initiatives, and excavations, celebrating the emperor’s bimillenary. The Mostra Augusteo della

12 Simonetta Falasca-Zamponi, Fascist Spectacle: The Aesthetics of Power in Mussolini’s Italy (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997), 94.

Romanità (Augustan Exhibition of Roman-ness), displayed the grandeur of ancient

Rome to the Italian public, showcasing a recreation of a Roman villa, a miniature model of Augustinian Rome, and various archeological artifacts; portraying the fascist regime as deeply connected to this legacy, fulfilling the regime’s ideological goal of fascist rebirth.13 Falasca-Zamponi elaborates, “Mussolini’s words—‘Italians, you must ensure that the glories of the past are surpassed by the glories of the future’—dominated the entrance to the exhibit, and a special section entitled

‘Fascismo e Romanità’ concluded the revisitation of Augustus’s Rome.”14 In the age of the new Italian empire, comparisons between Mussolini and Caesar shifted to comparisons between Mussolini and Augustus.

Though comparisons between Mussolini and Caesar and Italian translations of Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar were numerous during the fascist regime, only one

Italian version of Shakespeare’s play was produced. In the summer of 1935, the Italian

Julius Caesar was staged in the restored Basilica of Maxentius, setting Shakespeare

in the ruins of ancient Rome. The logic behind the lack of Shakespearian productions

is grounded in the potential subversiveness of the text; measures were taken by the

theatrical censorship office to quell any dissident actions or words that appeared on

stage. This adaptation of Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar was shaped by the head of

13 For more information about the Mostra Augusteo della Romanità and the various architectural initiatives that accompanied it, see Joshua Arthurs, “Bathing in the Spirit of Eternal Rome: The Mostra Augustea della Romanità,” Brill’s Companion to the Classics, Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany, ed. Helen Roche and Kyriakos N. Demetriou, (Leiden: Brill, 2017), 157–177 and Aristotle Kallis, “‘Framing’ Romanità: The Celebrations for the Bimillenario Augusteo and the Augusteo— Ara Pacis Project,” Journal of Contemporary History 46, no. 4 (2011): 809–31. Film reels and photographs of the Mostra Augusteo della Romanità are digitized on the archivio LUCE website: https://patrimonio.archivioluce.com/luce- web/search/result.html?startPage=0&query=*%3A*&jsonVal=%7B%22jsonVal%22%3A%7B%22qu ery%22%3A%5B%22*%3A*%22%5D%2C%22fieldDate%22%3A%22dataNormal%22%2C%22_perPag e%22%3A20%2C%22temi%22%3A%5B%22%5C%22Mostra+Augustea+della+Romanit%C3%A0%5C %22%22%5D%7D%7D&orderBy=&orderType=asc&activeFilter=temi&perPage=20 14 Falasca-Zamponi, Fascist Spectacle, 93.

fascist theatrical censorship, Leopoldo Zurlo, to remove any portion of the narrative that might suggest anti-establishment sentiments.15 Obvious measures were taken to

feature parallels between Caesar and Mussolini, whereby an actor who resembled the

Duce was cast in the leading role. Nancy Isenberg describes this non-traditional casting: “The actor’s physical appearance contrasted disturbingly with that of the

Roman leader’s, as one could easily see by observing the statue on display only metres away on the Avenue of the Empire. The actor was ‘not lean, muscular and wiry, but rather a paunchy fellow with a thick neck’.”16 The portrayal of ‘Mussolini’ as

Caesar in the Basilica of Maxentius production was a literal depiction of the Duce as

his imperial predecessor, though Shakespeare’s play lacked the italianità found in

Giovacchino Forzano’s play, Cesare.

Shakespeare was abandoned altogether in Forzano’s Cesare, which premiered at the Teatro Argentina in Rome in April 1939. In Forzano’s play, Cesare was truly a fascist reimagining of the historical figure, created in collaboration with Mussolini to appease the Duce and reclaim the ancient Roman dictator for Italy.17 Umberto

Giordano, a contemporary of Pietro Mascagni and fellow member of the Giovane

scuola, composed incidental music for Cesare.18 Whether Shakespearian or a modern

15 Leopoldo Zurlo, Memorie inutili: La censura teatrale nel ventennio (Roma: Edizioni dell’Ateneo, 1952) 178-180. 16 Nancy Isenberg, “‘Caesar’s word against the world’: Caesarism and the Discourses of Empire,” in Shakespeare and the Second World War: Memory, Culture, Identity, ed. Irena R. Makaryk and Marissa McHugh (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2012), 94. Description of the actor who portrayed Caesar appears is translated by Isenberg and originally appears in Ermanno Contini, ‘“Giulio Cesare” di Shakespeare.’ Rev. of Giulio Cesare directed by Ferdinando Tamberlani. Il Messaggero, 2 Aug. 1935: 4. 17 For a synopsis of Forzano’s Cesare, see Wyke, “Sawdust Caesar,” 173-175. The original play can be found in Giovacchino Forzano and Benito Mussolini, Mussolini: autore drammatico con facsimili di autografi inediti (Florence: G. Barbèra Editore, 1954). 18 Fiamma Nicolodi, “Aspects of Italian Musical Theater under the Fascist Dictatorship,” in Musikwissenschaftliches Institut, Musiktheater im Exil der NS-Zeit: Bericht über die internationale Konferenz am Musikwissenschaftlichen Institut der Universität Hamburg, 3. bis 5. Februar 2005, ed. Peter Petersen and Claudia Maurer Zenck (Hamburg: Von Bockel, 2007), 71.

reimagining of Julius Caesar, the figure of Caesar was ubiquitous in fascist Italian culture: a paradigm of romanità. This paradigm paired with Mussolini’s fondness for

Caesar led to an abundance of Caesar-centric, fascist culture, to which Malipiero’s opera belonged. Indeed, Malipiero’s Giulio Cesare was the only operatic adaptation of

the tale to be performed in fascist Italy, created to appeal to an audience of one in the

hopes of regaining Mussolini’s favor and advancing his career.

L’uomo nuovo as Unattainable Paradigm

The fascist uomo nuovo (new man) was an ideal model of masculinity, a man who served the fascist regime who exemplified youth, virility, and strength. An amalgamation of hyper-masculine, anti-feminist, anti-bourgeois, pro-natalist, and anti-intellectualism, the uomo nuovo drew inspiration from the writings of Filippo

Tommaso Marinetti, Giovanni Papini, Gabriele D’Annunzio, and Friedrich Nietzsche.

Mussolini’s identification with the uomo nuovo was just as pronounced as his connection to Julius Caesar. Fascist propaganda portrayed the Duce as the embodiment of the uomo nuovo: an active, virile man who put the needs of the regime above all else.19 This masculine model was integral to fascist culture and it was necessary to ensure the success of the regime, yet few men fully embodied it as fully as the Duce. Given this exceptionally high standard, the uomo nuovo ideal was unattainable for most men, Malipiero included. Few men could hope to match the version of masculinity exuded by Mussolini’s public image; this paradigm was more aspirational than realistic, an ideal type, according to Lorenzo Benadusi, “The concept of hegemonic masculinity […] or rather a connotation of man that is hyper-

19 Gigliola Gori, “Model of Masculinity: Mussolini, the ‘New Italian’ of the Fascist Era,” The International Journal of the History of Sport 16, no. 4 (December 1, 1999): 27–61.

virile, traditional, misogynist, homophobic, and aggressive, that stigmatizes any different form of self-expression, refers to an ideal type that is valid more as an ideal model than as a realistic example.”20 This understanding of the uomo nuovo as an

ideal type was influenced by Max Weber’s conceptualization of the ideal type as

“utopia [that] cannot be found empirically anywhere in reality.”21 As such, the fascist

uomo nuovo was not representative of Italian men in general; rather it was an idealized representation of masculinity in a society of multiple masculinities.22 This pluralistic understanding of masculinities in fascist Italy underscores the nuances of gender performance and points towards a pluralistic understanding of performing fascism.

Masculinity has many meanings, and during the fascist period, masculinity was frequently written about in diametric opposition to femininity. The power of the gender binary is clear in the writings of futurist Giovanni Papini in his work on masculinity, Maschilità:

In this day and age when I speak of the masculine I mean force, energy, hardness, pride; when I speak of the feminine I mean softness, delicate sensuality, less volume, prone to tears, gossipy spirit, a fading and draining musicality. Quando parlo di maschio intendo, ora, la forza, l'energia, la durezza, la fierezza; quando parlo di femmina la mollezza, la dolcezza, la voluttuosità blanda, il tono minore, le lacrime facili, il pettegolio spiritosetto e la musicalità svaniente ed estenuante. 23

20 Lorenzo Benadusi, “Masculinity,” in The Politics of Everyday Life in Fascist Italy: Outside the State?, ed. Joshua Arthurs, Michael Ebner, and Kate Ferris (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017), 52. 21 Max Weber, “Objectivity in Social Science and Social Policy,” in The Methodology of the Social Sciences, ed. and trans. E. A. Shils and H. A. Finch, (New York: Free Press, 1949), 90 as cited in Sung Ho Kim, “Max Weber,” in The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, ed. Edward N. Zalta, Winter 2019 (Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University, 2019), https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win2019/entries/weber/. 22 The new man as an ideal type is explored in multiple European contexts by George L. Mosse, “Fascism and the French Revolution,” Journal of Contemporary History 24, no. 1 (January 1, 1989): 5–26. 23 Giovanni Papini, Maschilità, third edition (Florence: Vallecchi Editore, 1921), 95.

In this context, the traits assigned to masculinity were meant to be performed by men and those assigned to femininity performed by women. In fascist Italy, men were expected to be virile, active, heterosexual, and maschio (manly). These were markers of their masculinity, which operated as the antithesis of femininity. Barbara Spackman links this duality to the works of futurist Filippo Tommaso Marinetti and poet Gabriele

D’Annunzio:

In fascist discourse, gender and sex are not to be mixed and matched: virility is the property of man, and femininity the property of woman. Any attempt to redistribute those properties—and in particular, to allow women to enter the public, political area, and hence “masculinize” them—was to be squelched. The adjectives “masculine” and “virile” as applied to women were exclusively terms of abuse meant to deride the intellectual, “feminist,” and hence sterile woman not properly devoted to her reproductive mission.24

In this sense, men were expected to perform simultaneously masculinity and fascism

in a highly prescriptive framework. To operate beyond this framework and the socially

constructed gender norms of fascist Italy risked alienation and public derision; such

is the power of hegemonic masculinity and the uomo nuovo.

Female subordination is a core component of hegemonic masculinity; a

concept coined by Raewyn Connell in which an idealized masculinity is constructed

and operates in a position of ultimate power.25 Hegemonic masculinity takes Antonio

Gramsci’s theory of hegemony, “that man is not ruled by force alone but, also ideas,”

and applies it to gender, demonstrating the power of masculinity as an ideology.26

24 Barbara Spackman, Fascist Virilities: Rhetoric, Ideology, and Social Fantasy in Italy (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1996), 17. 25 Raewyn Connell, Gender and Power: Society, the Person and Sexual Politics (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1987). 26 A concise description of the concept of hegemony from Thomas R. Bates, “Gramsci and the Theory of Hegemony,” Journal of the History of Ideas 36, no. 2 (1975): 351.

Gramsci’s conceptualization of hegemony was a response to Benedetto Croce’s treatment of orthodox Marxism, as he stated in a letter from May 1932:

It happened that in the very period which Croce elaborated this so-called club of his, the philosophy of praxis was elaborated by its greatest modern theorists in the same sense, and the moment of “hegemony” or of cultural leadership was systematically upgraded precisely in opposition to the mechanistic and fatalistic concepts of economism. It is possible to affirm that the essential feature of the most modern philosophy of praxis consists precisely in the historico-political concept of hegemony.27

Nevertheless, Connell’s concept of hegemonic masculinity has raised valid critiques by numerous scholars: including its almost exclusive focus on male subjects as a feminist theoretical tool, the limitations of the oppression/domination power structure, and its disconnect with actual masculinities in a social order.28 Much like

the uomo nuovo, hegemonic masculinity is an idealized fantasy that is never realized

in its entirety.

To take an ideal masculinity as the only acceptable masculine expression

oversimplifies gendered expression in fascist Italy, overlooking individual expression

and ignoring a complex system of male relationships. For the state to function, each

fascist citizen had to perform different roles for the good of the whole. Emilio Gentile

explains the fascist uomo nuovo cannot be confined to a single paradigm: “Fascism— unlike Nazism—did not have one single ‘new man’ model. Perfect fascist prototypes were the soldier in the Great War, the fascist action squad member, and later the

27 Letter to Tatiana, 2 May 1932, Benedetto Croce, Lettere dal carcere, ed. Elsa Fubini (Turin: Einaudi, 1965), 616. As translated and cited in Bates, “Gramsci and the Theory of Hegemony,” 352. 28 These critiques can be found in Toby L. Ditz, “The New Men’s History and the Peculiar Absence of Gendered Power: Some Remedies from Early American Gender History,” Gender & History 16, no. 1 (May 12, 2004): 1–35; Michael Moller, “Exploiting Patterns: A Critique of Hegemonic Masculinity,” Journal of Gender Studies 16, no. 3 (November 1, 2007): 263-276.

citizen-soldier, citizen-producer, colonizer, and so forth.”29 These prototypes bely a complex system of gender and fascist performance that ultimately reinforce patriarchal gender norms that were already ingrained in Italian culture. According to

Luca La Rovere, “The fascist ‘new man’ was not a new model of masculinity, given its traditional image of man and the relationships between men and women. Fascism promoted instead a new type of citizen, who completely identified with fascist values and was keen to subordinate his individuality to collective interests and the nation’s political-military goals.”30 The ideal fascist man lived to serve the regime, who worked to further the aims of the regime, and who conformed to its standards of paradigmatic masculinity. Producers of fascist culture, such as opera composers, were also part of this system of fascist production, merging music and politics in a spectacle of operatic performance. Politics and art were ideologically linked in fascist Italy, and

Mussolini made this connection in a 1926 speech: “There is no doubt that politics is an art. Certainly it is not a science. […] ‘Political’ creation, like artistic [creation], requires a slow elaboration and a sudden divination. The artist creates with inspiration, the politician with decision. […] The dull happiness of the successful man is as unknown to the artist as it is to the politician.”31 The parallels between art and

politics emphasize the importance of culture in fascist society, as well as the power

afforded to the men who created both.

29 One of Gentile’s concepts from Fascismo: Storia e interpretazione (Bari: Editori Laterza, 2002) explored by Luca La Rovere, “Totalitarian Pedagogy and the Italian Youth,” in The “New Man” in Radical Right Ideology and Practice, 1919-45, ed. Jorge Dagnino, Matthew Feldman, and Paul Stocker (London: Bloomsbury 2018), 19. 30 Ibid., 21. 31 Stone, The Fascist Revolution in Italy, 129. Italian original cited in Benito Mussolini, “Il Novecento, February 15, 1926,” in Scritti e discorsi di Benito Mussolini (Milan: Ulrico Hoepli, 1934), 5:279-82. Translated by Staisey Divorski and Marla Stone.

Overlooked by Fascist Musical Bureaucracy

By the time Mussolini came into power in 1922, Malipiero had lain the groundwork for

an illustrious compositional career in which he was known for his innovative,

modernist music. After attending the 1913 Parisian premiere of Stravisnky’s Le sacre du printemps, with fellow Italian musical modernist, Alfredo Casella, Malipiero was inspired to write inventive works of his own.32 In the years after, he created some of his most enduring works, such as the seven symphonic expressions of Pause del silenzio

(1917), the collection of seven distinct miniature music dramas of Sette canzoni (1918-

19), and the symphonic monodrama for mute dancer and offstage chorus, Pantea

(1919). Waterhouse described Pantea thusly: “its bold juxtapositions of hectically piled-up dissonances in the fiercer passages with the luminous yet searingly poignant

cantabilità of the more lyrical sections create a total world of sound that is like no

other.”33 Malipiero was on the forefront of progressive, contemporary music,

collaborating with Casella to create the Corporazione delle Nuove Musiche

(Corporation of New Music) in 1923, which was subsequently incorporated into the

International Society for Contemporary Music—these organizations brought a variety

of foreign and Italian works to Italian audiences, promoting modern music writ large.

In addition to his compositional activities, Malipiero was also devoted to

reconstructing the music of Claudio Monteverdi in meticulous, historically informed

detail. The first of seventeen volumes was published in 1926 by the Universal Edition; additional works were published over the decades that followed, concluding with the

32 John C.G. Waterhouse, “G.F. Malipiero’s Crisis Years (1913-19),” Proceedings of the Royal Musical Association, Vol. 108, Iss. 1 (1981): 129. 33 Ibid., 136.

publication of a supplemental volume in 1968.34 Malipiero’s dedication to the

enormous task of creating an edition of Monteverdi’s complete works branded him a

musicologist, which John C. G. Waterhouse flags as “a term that he always refused to

accept as a valid description of himself.”35 Nevertheless, Malipiero made significant

contributions to musicology by making original sources accessible to scholars and

wider audiences for the first time with his editions of Monteverdi’s works, his

publication of Monteverdi’s letters, and his writings on the history of Italian music.36

Malipiero’s dedication to the music of Monteverdi greatly informed his own compositions; he viewed Monteverdi as the ultimate “modern” composer in an article from 1932:

We live in the century of noise, and noise is the negation of music. Noise is not necessary; but we cannot do without music. Everybody screams, hoping to be heard above the noise and believing that if noise is progress the most progressive will be those who dominate by making more noise; and in the general disorder we hear only the words “modern,” “new art,” and other even more ridiculous expressions, while a throng of deformed creatures struggles in the dust and the public criers exalt the marvels of their damaged goods. If we mount toward the sources of antique musical art we shall be able to project ourselves with greater strength into the future, avoiding the abyss of the chaotic present. Monteverdi, that prodigious alchemist, offers us the elixir of long life distilled in his marvelous alembics. And the infallibility of his potions has been demonstrated by his compositions: they remain eternally “modern.”37

This linking of Monteverdi to modernism in 1930s Italy underscores the connection

between neoclassicism and musical modernism, exemplified in the work of Malipiero

and Casella. Casella detailed the return to tonality in an 1924 article: “after audacious

34 Claudio Monteverdi, Tutte le opere di Claudio Monteverdi, ed. Gian Francesco Malipiero (Vienna: Universal Edition, 1926-1942, 1968). 35 Waterhouse, Gian Francesco Malipiero 1882-1973, 37. 36 Monteverdi’s letters were published in Gian Francesco Malipiero, Claudio Monteverdi (Milano: Fratelli Treves, 1929). 37 G. Francesco Malipiero, “Claudio Monteverdi of Cremona,” trans. Berta Gerster-Gardini,The Musical Quarterly 18, no. 3 (1932): 395–96.

polytonal and atonal experiments, young Italians have recognized – in conformity with the healthy down-to-earth shrewdness that is a Latin prerogative – the necessity of maintaining tonal centres; consequently they have returned to tradition.”38 This return

to “tradition” as neoclassicism also corresponded with the rise of the fascist regime,

to which Casella maintained strong ties.39

Though the fascist regime and the public supported Malipiero’s music, not

everyone was a fan of his modernist style. In 1932 Malipiero and his friend Casella

were unnamed targets of an anti-modernist manifesto published in La stampa, Il corriere della sera, and Il popolo d’Italia, signed by ten composers of varying

importance, including Ildebrando Pizzetti, Ottorino Respighi, and Riccardo

Zandonai.40 This “Manifesto of Italian Musicians in Support of the Nineteenth-

Century Tradition of Romantic Art”, incited a short-lived outrage, which ultimately made no impact upon Italian musical culture or taste.41 Alceo Toni, music critic for Il popolo d’Italia, was behind the manifesto, which read in part:

For twenty years the most diverse tendencies have been fighting one another in a continuous chaotic revolution. We are still at the stage of ‘tendencies’ and ‘experiments’, and nobody knows what definite affirmations and to what sure ways they may lead. The public, troubled by the clamour of so many amazing apologias, intimidated by so many profound and erudite programmes of aesthetic reform, no longer knows which voice to listen to. […] there has infiltrated into the spirt of young musicians a sense of convenient rebellion against the time-honoured canons and foundations of art. […] The future of Italian music is not sure except to the tail of foreign styles. At the most, here to

38 Alfredo Casella, “Contributo ad un nuovo stile musicale nostro,” La prora, 1/2 (1924): 37. Cited in Francesco Parrino, “Between the Avant-Garde and Fascist Modernism: Alfredo Casella’s Aesthetics and Politics” (PhD diss., Royal Holloway, University of London, 2007), 227. 39 Ben Earle describes Casella’s neoclassicism and his connection with the fascist regime in Earle, Luigi Dallapiccola and Musical Modernism in Fascist Italy, 93-110. 40 In addition to Pizzetti, Respighi, and Zandonai, the other seven signatories included Giuseppe Mulè, Alberto Gasco, Alceo Toni, Riccardo Pick-Mangiagalli, Guido Guerrini, Gennaro Napoli, and Guido Zuffellato. 41 Ben Earle points out the erroneous narrative of this manifesto as an example of regime sponsored antimodernism in post-war literature. Earle, Luigi Dallapiccola and Musical Modernism in Fascist Italy, 67.

following foreign fashions, […] some think of chewing the cud of our distant musical past. Above all […] they struggle and fight against the Romanticism of the last century: for them that is the great adversary. […] The public must free itself from its state of intellectual subjection, which paralyses its free emotional impulses. […] An imaginary chain ties the past to the future. For this reason we feel no need to repudiate, and do not repudiate, any of our past. […] Yes sirs! we like to believe ourselves, and wish to be, direct descendants of Verdi and Puccini too.42

The manifesto was not representative of the National Fascist Party nor of any state- sponsored viewpoint, but rather of a small group of anti-modernist composers who felt compelled to defend their version of traditionalism. Nevertheless, this targeted yet unnamed attack against Malipiero is colored by palpable xenophobia: a reaction against “foreign fashions” and those who drew upon them. Malipiero, like many of his peers, did travel and study abroad in his youth, attending a few classes with Max

Bruch at the Hochschule für Musik in 1908 before traveling to Paris and attending the

1913 Le Sacre premiere with Casella.43 Like Malipiero, Ottorino Respighi briefly studied with Max Bruch (1902) and Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov (1900-1, 1902-3) before returning to Italy, where his international fame continued to grow until his death in

1936.44 Though international study and travel were commonplace for European composers by the 1930s, the xenophobic position adopted by the signatories of the manifesto marked Malipiero as an outsider. The double standard applied to these two internationally trained and recognized composers cannot be more blatant: Respighi was favored while Malipiero was not.

42 English translation cited from John C. G. Waterhouse, “The Emergence of Modern Italian Music up to 1940” (PhD diss., University of Oxford, 1968), 239. Text from the Manifesto in the original Italian can be found in Nicolodi, Musica e musicisti nel ventennio fascista, 141-143. 43 Waterhouse, Gian Francesco Malipiero 1882-1973, 16-19. 44 See Chapter 3 for more information about the regime’s approval of Respighi and his music.

While his contemporaries were appointed to fascist bureaucratic positions with varying degrees of power, Malipiero was continually overlooked, underscoring his attempts and failures to rise to the upper echelons of fascist musical bureaucracy.

This positionality is most apparent as he was not appointed a member of the

Accademia d’Italia, where his compositional contemporaries and elders, Pietro

Mascagni, Umberto Giordano, Francesco Cilea, Ottorino Respighi, and Ildebrando

Pizzetti enjoyed its privileges. Modeled after the Académie française, the Accademia

d’Italia was created during the fascist period as an organization to promote the very best of Italian intellectualism, which excluded women from membership. Membership in the Accademia was by invitation only, with few inductees admitted every year who gained access to financial and political resources.45 Even with the support of Gabriele

D’Anunnzio, Malipiero was denied an invitation to join the Accademia.46 Rather, his

career in fascist musical bureaucracy included roles as the Fascist Union of

Musicians’ interprovincial secretary for its Venetian branch and a member of the

union’s national board.47 The lack of clear success in fascist musical bureaucracy combined with the manifesto and the public failure of La favola del figlio cambiato

furthered Malipiero’s position as an outsider and he increasingly believed he was the

target of a coordinated effort to stymie his career.

Indeed, Malipiero sent a letter on the matter directly to Mussolini, asking for

personal favors and demonstrating a general lack of awareness about his importance

in relation to larger political matters. In a particularly tactless letter dated March 25,

1936, Malipiero adopts a paranoid tone in his request to fill Respighi’s vacancy at the

45 See chapter three for more information about the Accademia d’Italia and Ottorino Respighi’s membership. 46 Waterhouse, Gian Francesco Malipiero 1882-1973, 44. 47 Harvey Sachs, Music in Fascist Italy (New York: W.W. Norton Co., 1988), 134.

Accademia di Santa Cecilia in Rome, portraying himself as a victim of unnamed parties:

Excellency, I think that my ‘enemies’ have once again tried to put me in a bad light by denouncing me to Your Excellency. More I do not know. I think it has to do with the Royal University of Padua, where I am giving a music history course in a very pleasant atmosphere. […] My moral, artistic [life] is absolutely in order, but I do not want to have to count on posterity. My adversaries are trying to block every one of my activities within the fascist cultural institutions. Why? If, with a few hisses, they manage to bury my works—even those that have been alive for twenty years on the world’s stages—would it not be easier [still] to liquidate me forever? […] To talk to the Duce of my personal situation at this moment [i.e. during the Ethiopian war] is perhaps a mistake, but since Your Excellency has read what my adversaries have written, I hope you will [also] read these lines […] I would like to live in Rome. Could I not be transferred from my post in Venice (advanced courses for composers) to Rome, to Santa Cecilia? A word would be sufficient. I wouldn’t look bad next to my friend Ottorino Respighi. […] Should Your Excellency like to do something for me, it would suffice to arrange for me to meet with His Excellency Count De Vecchi di Valcismon [Minister of Education].48

Malipiero’s letter to Mussolini demonstrated the precariousness of his career while reinforcing his position as a musical outsider, at least to his ‘enemies’, with deep connections to the fascist regime. Though there is is no singular reason for

Malipiero’s outsider status, his relationship with the regime did not manifest in the same honors or positions of power as Respighi. Though both men were famously reclusive, they occupied very different spaces within the fascist musical bureaucracy:

Respighi was publicly lauded while Malipiero was kept at a distance. This complex

dynamic underscores Malipiero’s failure to rise to the elite ranks of fascist musical

bureaucracy, but not for lack of effort. In his words it did appear to be a mistake to

48 Ibid., 133-134.

write to the Duce about his personal matters, or perhaps more realistically, it did not warrant Mussolini’s attention, as Italy was in the process of forcefully invading and colonizing Ethiopia. Needless to say, Malipiero did not receive a response from

Mussolini and his request to take over Respighi’s post at Santa Cecilia was not granted. Instead, Malipiero remained a semi-recluse at his Asolo home in the

northern region of Veneto. In 1939, he was appointed director of the Venice Liceo

Musicale, where he taught until 1952.49

Malipiero’s Libretto and the Theatrical Censorship Office

Before any theatrical or operatic work could be performed in fascist Italy, the text of

the play or libretto had to be submitted to the theatrical censorship office of the

Ministry of Popular Culture for approval. This practice began in 1931 and was

overseen by head censor, Leopoldo Zurlo, until the collapse of the regime in 1943.

Though Zurlo was a censor for the fascist government, he was not a member of the fascist party; according to George Talbot, Zurlo, “had a genuine passion for the theater and he was zealous to a fault.”50 Zurlo read each text that was submitted,

providing editorial changes as he deemed them appropriate. If a text needed changes,

Zurlo would provide cuts or substitute text, which the author needed to incorporate to

receive the Ministry of Popular Culture’s official stamp of approval. Each text

submitted to the theatrical censorship office was documented and filed by Zurlo—the

specific file number and date which it was viewed by the censor is usually included in

the first few pages of print publications, frequently on the copyright page.51 Malipiero

49 Waterhouse, Gian Francesco Malipiero 1882-1973, 47. 50 George Talbot, Censorship in Fascist Italy, 1922-43 (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007), 150. 51 The relevant information about when the text was viewed by the theatrical censorship office almost always appears in libretti—sometimes it also appears in published opera scores, though not always.

submitted the libretto for his Giulio Cesare to the theatrical censorship office in

October 1935 in the shadow of his public failure with La favola del figlio cambiato. In the wake of this fiasco, any work attached to Malipiero was under scrutiny. Nancy

Isenberg explains Zurlo’s tact in approaching Malipiero’s Giulio Cesare libretto:

In a press report dated 6 October, shortly after he received Malipiero’s libretto, Zurlo takes care to mention that, before proceeding, he had consulted with His Excellency Dino Alfieri, Undersecretary of State in the neo-Ministry of Press and Propaganda (which had just taken over the Censorship office from the Ministry of the Interior and was headed by Mussolini’s son-in-law). Zurlo notes that he had shown Alfieri the report drawn up the preceding summer in regard to the Maxentius proposal and that ‘His Excellency agreed it would not be possible to prohibit the libretto’.”52

While the potential reasons for prohibiting a performance of Malipiero’s Giulio

Cesare were not given by Zurlo, there were two main factors at play: the first was the

residual baggage of Mussolini banning La favola del figlio cambiato; the second was

the start of Italy’s Ethiopian invasion. Italy invaded Ethiopia on October 3, 1935,

eventually naming the country as an Italian colony in May 1936. In November 1935, the

Ministry of Popular Culture instituted a ban on works by foreign authors whose

countries of origin were under sanctions, including England, though exceptions were

made for Shakespeare and select foreign playwrights.53

Malipiero took Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar as the inspiration for his opera,

Giulio Cesare, translating and abridging the play into his libretto. In a letter from

Malipiero’s second wife, Anna Wright Malipiero, to American patroness Elizabeth

Sprague Coolidge, she explains his process and names his textual sources:

52 Isenberg, “‘Caesar’s word against the world’: Caesarism and the Discourses of Empire,” 96. Isenberg cites Zurlo’s quote from the Archivio, Presidenza, 3/2-12.5855. 53 Patrizia Ferrara, Censura teatrale e fascismo (1931-1944): la storia, l’archivio, l’inventario (Roma: Ministero per i beni e le attività culturali, Direzione generale per gli archivi, 2004), 85-86.

I am simply brimming over with desire to tell you what he [Malipiero] is working at now, he is rather secretive about it, but I feel to you I can reveal everything: the theatre is always a lure, he always hearkens back to opera, but this time he goes back to being the author of his own libretti and the person responsible for the words, but actually he is not absolutely responsible for he is adapting a play of a great departed dramatist, will you ever guess that he has turned to Shakespeare, […] , following the Shakespearean text as closely as possible, he works on the French translation of François Hugo, but he has his English text at his side and I translate it out to him as he wants to be even closer to the English than the French translation, although it is the libretto that has occupied and preoccupied him yet at the same time of working it he is constantly thinking of the music of it. I know you will be mightily thrilled at this news.54

Coolidge commissioned numerous works, used her philanthropic resources to support the creation of new music in America and abroad, and donated countless pieces to the Library of Congress, where her legacy continues to support the creation of new music through the Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge Foundation.55 By the time

Malipiero was working on Giulio Cesare, Malipiero and Coolidge had a long-

established relationship—in 1920 Malipiero received the Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge

prize for his string quartet, Rispetti e strambotti.56

Malipiero’s libretto for Giulio Cesare was approved by Zurlo with minimal changes. The libretto submitted to the theatrical censorship office by Malipiero is riddled with small errors and appears to be typed in haste or unrevised by the author.

The copy of Malipiero’s libretto with Zurlo’s annotations is preserved in the theatrical

54 Alessandro Turba, “Il mito di Giulio Cesare e il culto della romanità nel teatro musicale dell'Era Fascista: i casi di Gian Francesco e Riccardo Malipiero” (PhD diss., Università degli Studi di Milano, 2016), 20-21. The letter originates from Cfr. l. di A. Wright a E. Sprague Coolidge (Asolo, 1° settembre 1934) cit. 55 Coolidge’s influence over and support of new music, particularly chamber music in the early 20th century cannot be overstated. She also supported Ottorino Respighi’s music, and frequently corresponded with Elsa Respighi. Her life and patronage are detailed in Cyrilla Barr, Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge: American Patron of Music (New York: Schirmer Books; London: Prentice Hall International, 1998). 56 Waterhouse, Gian Francesco Malipiero 1882-1973, 36.

censorship office archive at the Archivio Centrale dello Stato in Rome. The first of

two textual changes given by Zurlo is on page 2 of the libretto, during a long passage by il Tribuno. Here the original text by Malipiero read, “colui che cammina trionfante

nel sangue di Pompeo!” (he who walks triumphantly in the blood of Pompeo). Zurlo

crossed out this text with a red pencil, changing it to, “colui che cammina esultante

nel trionfo su Pompeo!” (he who walks exultantly in the triumph over Pompeo).57 The

second censorial change is even shorter than the first; on page 4 of Malipiero’s

libretto, Zurlo changed a single word during an exchange between Cesare and

Antonio. As they discuss Cassio’s mistrust, Malipiero’s text originally read, “Odia

troppo” (He hates too much). Zurlo changed this to “Pensa troppo” (He thinks too

much), marking through the typed text with a red pencil and indicating the new text

with graphite pencil. Neither of these censorial changes erased overt, anti-fascist or

anti-authoritarian sentiments; indeed the second change made by Zurlo was a restoration of Shakespeare’s original sentiment (He thinks too much). Curiously, the first text change suggested by Zurlo was made in the printed libretto, but the second was not—neither of the censorial changes were made in the vocal score, which was published by Ricordi as a manuscript facsimile rather than the usual, type-set score.

Similarly, Malipiero’s dedication to Mussolini was not included in the published scores.58 Following the scandal and embarrassment of his short-lived collaboration with Pirandello, La favola del figlio cambiato, Malipiero elected to write

his own libretto with the beloved ancient Roman dictator as its protagonist. Although

57 Images of Zurlo’s censorial changes to Malipiero’s Giulio Cesare can be found in Turba, “Il mito di Giulio Cesare”, 35. These images come from Malipiero’s Giulio Cesare file with the theatrical censorship office and is held in the theatrical censorship office archive at the Archivio Centrale dello Stato. 58 This dedication is named in an appointment document for Mussolini from the Archivio Centrale dello Stato, printed in Nicolodi, Musica e musicisti nel ventennio fascista, 361-362.

Malipiero wanted to appease Mussolini with Giulio Cesare, he also wanted to write a

thoroughly Italian opera that exuded romanità. Shortly before the premiere of Giulio

Cesare, Malipiero explained the impetus for creating this work:

[…] I chose Giulio Cesare [Malpiero confided in an interview with L. Colacicchi] because there was something in the air that led me towards a Latin hero. And even if Shakespeare wasn’t Latin […], he nevertheless belongs to the multitude of those artists that most closely resemble us spiritually. From that moment on I liked, in his Julius Caesar, the humanity of the emperor with all of his weaknesses and the celebration that ignites that spirit of the Romans, friends and enemies, after his death, as this accomplished his purification. […] ho scelto il Giulio Cesare [confiderà Malipiero in un’intervista a L. Colacicchi] perché nell’aria c’era qualche cosa che mi spingeva verso un eroe latino. E ancorché Shakespeare non sia latino […], egli appartiene tuttavia alla schiera di quegli artisti che più si avvicinano a noi spiritualmente. E poi mi piace, nel suo Giulio Cesare, l’umanità dell’imperatore con tutte le sue debolezze e l’esaltazione che accende gli animi dei romani, amici e nemici, dopo la sua morte, quanto questa ha compiuto la sua opera di purificazione.59

Capitalizing on Mussolini’s affinity for Julius Caesar and the regime’s penchant for

romanità, Malipiero’s work was the only operatic setting of Shakespeare’s play to

emerge from the fascist era. While the text to his opera had to be read and approved

by the theatrical censorship office, there was no equivalent process for written music.

Indeed, we recall that Malipiero’s music was never the source of Mussolini’s distain

for La favola del figlio cambiato—the regime accepted a plurality of musical styles and the Duce openly advocated for variety in new music.60 Malipiero’s wife, Anna Wright,

confirms the libretto was the root of the public censorship and corresponding

humiliation: “This opera [by] Pirandello [and] Malipiero met with the Duce’s

59 L. Colacicchi, “Confidenze di Malipiero sul <>,” Il popolo di Roma, February 4, 1936, as cited in Nicolodi, Musica e musicisti nel ventennio fascista, 229-230. English translations by dissertation author unless otherwise indicated. 60 See Fiamma Nicolodi's essay "Aspetti di politica culturale nel ventennio fascista," in Italian Music During the Fascist Period, ed. Roberto Illiano (2004), 97. Nicolodi quoted from Per la dichiarazione di Mussolini, cfr. Adriano Lualdi, Viaggio musicale in Italia, Milano, Alpes, 1927, pp. 206-207 and Raffaello De Rensis, 'Mussolini musicista', in Mussolinia, V/25 (August 1927), pp. 29-30.

disapproval as he considered the words of the libretto were anti-fascisti, he had no quarrel with the music but the text offended him and he forbade it to be performed.

This was great grief to my husband, and it was after this that he turned to

Shakespeare for his text and wrote Julius Caesar.”61 With the text firmly in his control,

Malipiero was free to redeem himself with Giulio Cesare.

Giulio Cesare Signals an Operatic Parenthesis

Malipiero’s Giulio Cesare was a conspicuous stylistic departure from his previous

stage works, which altogether lacked recitative and were rather experimental.

Malipiero recognized the deliberate choice to avoid recitative in Pantea (1919) and

Sette canzoni (1918-19) in an interview with his pupil, Mario Labroca: “I adored opera; but I loathed recitative. Therefore I had the idea of choosing a series of subjects which could be portrayed without any need of recitative.”62 Indeed, Malipiero completely reversed his position on recitative with Giulio Cesare; this break in

operatic style is retrospectively marked by the composer himself, in his writings from

1952:

Giulio Cesare, and the works that followed it, Antonio e Cleopatra, Ecuba, and La vita è sogno, despite the framework that is made of recitative, must be considered as an operatic parenthesis. La favola del figlio cambiato has broken the fascination with “my” theater, but not that of the theater; therefore, this parenthesis does not cause me a negative reaction, nor do I reject it. Quite the contrary. Il Giulio Cesare, e le opere che lo seguirono, Antonio e Cleopatra, Ecuba e La vita è sogno, nonostante l’economia che vi si fa del recitativo, vanno considerate una parentesi lirica. La favola del figlio cambiato aveva rotto l’incanto del “mio” teatro, ma non quello del teatro; perciò questa parentesi non provoca in me reazioni negative, né la ripudio. Tutt’altro.63

61 Turba, “Il mito di Giulio Cesare,” 129. 62 Waterhouse, “G.F. Malipiero’s Crisis Years (1913-19),” 138. Waterhouse’s translation of an interview broadcast by Radiotelevisione Italiana on March 2, 1973. 63 L’Opera di Gian Francesco Malipiero, ed. Guido M. Gatti (Bologna: Edizioni di Treviso, 1952), 201.

Here Malipiero acknowledges a stylistic shift in his operas beginning with Giulio

Cesare, obliquely naming La favola del figlio cambiato as the catalyst for this change.

Far from the experimental works of Malipiero’s early career, Giulio Cesare is calmer and more lyrical, though still quite modern, especially in comparison to his more traditional contemporaries.

The musical style of Malipiero’s Giulio Cesare is a tempered modernism, with

an overall emphasis on text and instrumental preludes.64 Harmonically, there are no

obvious tonal centers or key areas that drive the opera. This lack of clear harmonic

direction is underscored by a dearth of cadence, resolution, and key signatures. In place of straightforward harmonic resolution there are points of musical climax, anti- climax, and moments of abrupt conclusion. Published by Ricordi in 1935, the opera has twenty-three named roles of varying importance, including two female roles for soprano and twenty-one male roles for tenor, baritone, and bass. Also included are choruses of citizens, people, and soldiers. Male characters and voices dominate the opera; the two named female characters are not central to the narrative and therefore are given less music. Giulio Cesare is not an opera of melodies, but rather one of recitative, brief choruses, and orchestral preludes. Indeed, Numerous parlato

indications are given to the singers, and their lines are syllabic rather than melismatic,

allowing the text to be articulated and heard. Giulio Cesare is, as Malipiero noted,

“framed by recitative,” and there is little to musically distinguish each character,

leading to a homogenous sound that can be difficult to follow without looking at the

64 See appendix for an analytical table of Giulio Cesare, detailing acts, narrative action, form, incipits, characters, pages in the vocal score, and corresponding tracks for listening. Gian Francesco Malipiero, Giulio Cesare (Milan: Ricordi, 1935). Tracks correspond to this recording of the opera: Gian Francesco Malipiero, Giulio Cesare, Orchestra Sinfonica e Coro di Milano della RAI, conducted by Nino Sanzogno, recorded July 8, 1956, Great Opera Performances (2006), CD.

score. Malipiero gives precise stylistic indications to each character, frequently indicating parlato by their vocal entrances. During Cesare’s entrance in Act I, he,

Calpurnia, and Antonio are all given parlato indications, which then becomes sempre parlato for Cesare’s second line (Example 9).

Example 9: Parlato Indications, Giulio Cesare, Act I (pg. 13)

While parlato recitative is the dominant vocal style throughout the opera, there are a few passages where this stylistic indication is omitted. It is here that the singers embrace a more traditional legato, providing an audible contrast with the syllabic

parlato scenes. This lyrical contrast first occurs in Act I, when Bruto’s wife, Porzia pleads with him to reconsider his plan of murdering Cesare. Here Porzia and Bruto sing a quasi-duet, with Porzia singing legato and Bruto switching between parlato

and legato styles. Their brief quasi-duet is Porzia’s only appearance in the entire opera and her soprano voice is the first instance of sustained legato singing. In this scene Bruto’s legato singing is disrupted by the reintroduction of parlato recitative as

he instructs Porzia to leave him. When the only other soprano character, Calpurnia, enters in Act II, she begins singing parlato, but this quickly gives way to legato

singing, as she tells Cesare of a fatal premonition (Example 10).

Example 10: Calpurnia warns Cesare, Giulio Cesare, Act II (pg. 65)

Like Bruto and Porzia, Calpurnia and Cesare also sing a quasi-duet, with Calpurnia

singing legato for a majority of the scene and Cesare switching between parlato and

legato styles. Although the only two female roles in Giulio Cesare, Porzia and

Calpurnia, have limited music and time on stage, their respective quasi-duets provide

a welcome contrast to the monotony of pure, parlato recitative favored by the male characters. While Porzia and Calpurnia sing mostly legato, legato singing is not limited to female characters; Bruto, Cesare, and Antonio all sing sustained legato

passages, which all correspond to crucial moments in the opera’s narrative. Bruto in

Act I as Porzia tries and fails to convince him not to betray Cesare; Cesare in Act II

when Calpurnia warns him of his impending betrayal, and Antonio in Act III as he mourns Cesare’s death. Antonio’s speech in Act III features a male chorus of citizens, who respond to Antonio’s words (Example 11).

Example 11: Antonio and Chorus, Giulio Cesare, Act III (pg. 113)

The chorus of citizens who respond to Antonio during his Act III speech voice the will of the Roman people as they mourn for the loss of Cesare. Later in Act III, after Ottaviano avenges Cesare and Bruto impales himself, the full chorus sings a hymn to Rome. The hymn to Rome concludes the opera and is comprised of a four- part, soprano, alto, tenor, bass chorus. Malipiero describes this hymn as true

melodramma in a brief writing titled “Memorie utili” (useful memories) on the creation of the opera, dated February 1938:

1934 Giulio Cesare. Shakespeare. I gave in to the temptation. I was able to follow the Shakespearean tragedy, summarizing the most dramatic and non- anti-musical scenes. Only the last part of the last act was the most difficult to translate musically; but with music, there is a unity of time and place that perhaps is missing in the tragedy. The ending is really melodramma; the victorious heroes intone the Carmen Saeculare of Horace. 1934 Giulio Cesare. Shakespeare. Ho ceduto alla tentazione. Ho potuto seguire la tragedia shakespeariana, riassumendo le scene piú drammatiche e non antimusicali. Solo l’ultima parte dell’ultimo atto è stata la piú difficile a tradurre musicalmente; però con la musica, c’è un’unità di tempo e di luogo che forse manca nella tragedia. Il finale è veramente melodramma; gli eroi vittoriosi intonano il Carme Secolare di Orazio.65

The lyricism of the chorus in the finale, “Alme sol,” contrasts with the majority of the opera, which is dominated by long stretches of parlato, recitative singing (Example

12). Malipiero retains the Latin text for the hymn, sung in three and four parts by the chorus, with occasional rhythmic displacement between the basses and upper parts.

By the end of the hymn, the chorus is no longer rhythmically displaced, singing triumphantly together in octaves before concluding on a high Ab. The orchestra continues after the chorus concludes, playing a collection of descending and

65 Gian Francesco Malipiero, L’armonioso labirinto: teatro da musica, 1913-1970, ed. Marzio Pieri (Venezia: Marsilio, 1992), 533.

ascending sixteenth notes before abruptly ending without a semblance of cadential motion; Malipiero ends his score with the silence of an eighth and quarter note rest.

Example 12: Hymn to Rome Finale, Giulio Cesare, Act III (pg. 164)

The explicit romanità of this final chorus using Latin text from Horace is an unlikely addition to a Shakespearian opera; nevertheless, it is a clear reflection of the political and artistic context in which Malipiero wrote Giulio Cesare. This final chorus is certainly a tribute to the fascist regime and its preoccupation with the glorification of ancient Rome. Waterhouse underscores this connection, naming this chorus as, “the nearest thing to an overt obeisance to the regime that Malipiero ever perpetrated in the actual substance of his works: in 1935 there would have been nothing very novel or far-fetched about identifying victorious Octavius with the Duce and expecting an

Italian audience to do likewise.”66 Giulio Cesare was, in sum, an obvious vehicle for

glorifying the fascist regime; Malipiero featured one of Mussolini’s favorite historical

Roman figures and he adapted the narrative to foreground a parallel between the

Duce and the emperor who assumed power after Cesare’s murder.

It appeared that Malipiero’s Giulio Cesare was pro-fascist, pro-regime, pro-

Mussolini propaganda, serving as an operatic realization of romanità for the Duce.

Curiously, the same Shakespearian narrative would be the basis of a decidedly anti- fascist production of Julius Caesar given in New York City by Orson Welles in 1937.

Welles’ version of Julius Caesar portrayed Caesar as Mussolini, dressing the actor in an instantly recognizable costume favored by the Duce and featuring sets modeled after newsreels of Nazi Germany’s Nuremberg rallies.67 Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar

was effectively adapted by fascists and anti-fascists, though their productions were

66 Waterhouse, Gian Francesco Malipiero 1882-1973, 192. 67 Welles’ adaptation removed the character of Octavius completely, focusing instead on the destructive potential of Caesar the tyrant and foregrounding the dangers of fascism. For more context about the anti-fascist characteristics of his production, see Richard France, “Orson Welles’s Anti-Fascist Production of ‘Julius Caesar,’” Forum Modernes Theater; Tübingen 15, no. 2 (January 1, 2000): 145–161. For more on Orson Welles’ plays with the Mercury Theater and annotated scripts of the plays, see Orson Welles, Orson Welles on Shakespeare: The W.P.A. and Mercury Theatre Playscripts, ed. Richard France (New York: Greenwood Press, 1990).

entirely dependent upon the politics of the countries in which they were staged.

Context and audience are essential for determining the propagandistic potential of a theatrical work; in the case of Malipiero’s Giulio Cesare, he aimed to please the Duce

with his operatic realization of romanità, though with mixed results.

Giulio Cesare Reception

Malipiero took measures to ensure Giulio Cesare had pre-approval from the

necessary bureaucratic powers to avoid any negative criticism from the fascist regime

or its leader. In addition to the standard process of sending his libretto to the

theatrical censorship office in the Ministry of Popular Culture, Malipiero appealed

directly to Mussolini, obtaining his approval for the opera. This extra precaution

eliminated the possibility of any public outrage from the Duce or the regime. Malipiero

acknowledged these precautionary measures in the month before the premiere of

Giulio Cesare:

With his hopeful prophecies regarding Giulio Cesare, the Duce has definitively removed any lingering doubts about this work. The 'manuscript' has been observed, evaluated and analyzed, and one cannot forget that he accepted this effort with great willingness. II Duce ha definitivamente cancellato tutti i dubbi con le sue ottimistiche profezie sul Giulio Cesare. Il “manoscritto" è stato scrutato, pesato, sondato e non si può dimenticare la convinzione con la quale Egli ha accettato l'offerta di questa fatica senza peso.68

While it is doubtful that Mussolini scrutinized the manuscript to Giulio Cesare, he

supported the opera, sending congratulations to Malipiero after its Genoa premiere.

68 Gian Francesco Malipiero. Sul Giulio Cesare, in L'Italia letteraria, 26 January 1936, 175. As cited in Nicolodi, “Aspects of Italian Musical Theater under the Fascist Dictatorship,” 79.

Mussolini did not attend the premiere, instead the government was represented by Undersecretary of State, Dino Alfieri.69 Since Mussolini was unable to attend the opera, Malipiero sent a telegram to him:

On the eve of Giulio Cesare I express my gratitude to His Excellency and inform him that the Teatro Carlo Felice has prepared a most beautiful performance. Alla vigilia del Giulio Cesare invio a V.E. il mio pensiero riconoscente et Le annunzio che il Teatro Carlo Felice ha preparato una bellissima rappresentazione.70

Two days later, Mussolini’s secretary, Osvaldo Sebastiani, replied to Malipiero’s telegram: “The Duce thanks him for the sentiment and warmly congratulates him.”

“Duce ringrazia sentimenti espressiGli et si congratula vivamente.”71 Malipiero secured Mussolini’s approval with this generic, congratulatory telegram, though the critics gave his Giulio Cesare mixed reviews. The review in the Roman newspaper, Il

Giornale d’Italia made it clear that their expectations of great Roman glory were not

met:

A subject such as Julius Caesar, in times of such heartfelt and happy commemoration of the greatness of the Roman Empire, must bring to the theater all the characters of the melodrama proper, moreover the work must possess a high level of artistic and creative sentiments worthy of our tradition, and an immediacy of language and musicality such as to become popular. It does not seem, at first glance, that the maestro Malipiero has succeeded in this. Music reduced to the task of comment, has […] qualities which, perhaps better and more fittingly, could stand out in a non-theatrical work; [...] if they were not so scattered and detached during the course of the work, they could, joined together, become an interesting symphonic work. [...]. But we can say that his new conception, since it is new and truly his, did not fit Julius Caesar, who, we repeat, in this time of a proud return to Roman greatness must possess the elements to speak, persuade, move, and attract the masses.

69 Various officials frequently represented the fascist regime in an official capacity at opera premieres, which were not always high on Mussolini’s list of priorities. 70 Nicolodi, Musica e musicisti nel ventennio fascista, 363. 71 Ibid.

Un soggetto come il Giulio Cesare, in tempi di così sentita e felice rievocazione della grandezza dell’Impero Romano, doveva, portato in teatro, avere tutti i caratteri del melodramma propriamente detto, dell’opera che possiede in alto grado, oltreché sentimenti artistici e inventivi degni della nostra tradizione, immediatezza di linguaggio e musicalità tali da divenire popolare. Non pare, ad un primo esame, che il maestro Malipiero sia riuscito a tanto. La musica, ridotta a compito di commento, ha […] pregi che, forse meglio e più giustamente, potevano risaltare in un lavoro non teatrale; […] se non fossero così sparsi e staccati nel corso dell’opera potrebbero, fusi in blocco, divenire un interessante lavoro sinfonico. […]. Ma possiamo dire che questa sua nuova concezione, dato che sia nuova e sia veramente sua, non si adattava al Giulio Cesare, che, ripetiamo, in questo tempo di giusto orgoglioso ritorno alla grandezza romana deve possedere gli elementi per parlare, persuadere, commuovere, trascinare le masse.72

While Il Giornale d’Italia proclaimed Giulio Cesare was not good enough to represent

the glory of the ancient Roman Empire, Aldo Belloni of La Sera came close to writing a personal attack upon Malipiero, questioning his position as an Italian:

Gian Francesco Malipiero said he had never been supported in Italy. We have seen whether this was also true for his Giulio Cesare. This time, on the contrary, [Malipiero] had the most official and the most generous of support: the most official and the most generous because it must not be forgotten that for many, many years, Malipiero has done nothing but conspire abroad against triumphant Italian opera, behind the compensation of some interested and certainly not dangerous foreign sympathy, which in fact essentially always resulted in failures, see Sette canzoni, see Pantea. Official support be blessed! Those who believed that it only served to save the appearances of the new failure were greatly mistaken. The new failure - art, not public - has instead become definitive, unequivocal, decisive. Gian Francesco Malipiero diceva di non essere mai stato aiutato in Italia. S’è visto anche per il suo Giulio Cesare se ciò era vero. Stavolta anzi, il posatore autobiografico ha avuto il più ufficiale e il più generoso degli appoggi: il più ufficiale e il più generoso perché non bisogna dimenticare che per tanti, tantissimi anni, il Malipiero non ha fatto altro che congiurare all’estero contro il trionfante operismo italiano dietro il compenso di qualche interessata e non certo pericolosa simpatia straniera sempre risoltasi infatti, praticamente, in fior di fiaschi, vedi Sette canzoni, vedi Pantea. Sia benedetto l’appoggio ufficiale! Chi credeva che non servisse che a salvare le apparenze del nuovo fiasco, si sbagliava di grosso. Il nuovo fiasco – d’arte, non di pubblico – è invece diventato così definitivo, inequivocabile, decisivo.73

72 “Il “Giulio Cesare” di Malipiero rappresentato al Carlo Felice di Genova,” Il Giornale d’Italia, February 11, 1936. 73 Aldo Belloni, “Malipiero e la musica,” La Sera, February 10, 1936, p. 3.

Despite the negative tone of these reviews, Malipiero recounts his victories with

Giulio Cesare in 1936, including a South American tour of the opera:

1936. Genoa – success. Buenos Aires – success. In Rio de Janiero, Shakespeare caused a little misunderstanding. Poor Shakespeare. And then: La favola del successo cambiato! (The fable of the changed success!) 1936. Genova – successo. Buenos Aires – successo. A Rio de Janiero, Shakespeare ha provocato qualche malinteso. Povero Shakespeare. E poi: La favola del successo cambiato!74

Malipiero’s word play is an obvious allusion to the disastrous Roman premiere of La

favola del figlio cambiato, and it is clear from this entry that he felt Giulio Cesare was

an auspicious response to help him move beyond the failure of his collaboration with

Pirandello.

Conclusion: Failure to be Favored

Malipiero’s Giulio Cesare was an overt display of operatic romanità paired with a

tempered musical modernism, created with the hopes of professional redemption and

personal gain. He chose the famous Roman dictator as the subject of his opera,

producing the first and only operatic setting of Shakespeare’s play in fascist Italy in

an attempt to gain favor with Mussolini and move beyond the public fiasco of his

previous work. Mussolini was the embodiment of fascist masculinity and power, and

the Duce’s fondness for Julius Caesar suggested the potential for a triumphant

premiere, yet Malipiero was unable to capture the glory of ancient Rome in his opera.

Overwhelming success was unattainable for Malipiero, and he did not fruitfully merge

74 Gian Francesco Malipiero, “Memorie utili ovvero: come nasce nei musicisti il desiderio di scrivere per il teatro,” in Malipiero scrittura e critica, ed. Maria Teresa Muraro (Firenze: Leo S. Olschki Editore, 1984), 151. Emphasis mine.

art and politics in his Giulio Cesare. While Mussolini conveyed his congratulations to

Malipiero after the premiere of Giulio Cesare, this superficial message did not secure

Malipiero a position in the Duce’s favor, nor in the elite ranks of the Accademia d’Italia. Over the course of the ventennio, Malipiero’s attempts to ingratiate himself with Mussolini became fewer and after the regime collapsed, he distanced Giulio

Cesare from the fascist context in which it was created. In an unpublished letter from

September 21, 1945, Malipiero announced his position as neither for nor against the

Duce, revealing his ambivalence to directly connect Giulio Cesare to fascism: “I never wrote one note that [Giulio Cesare] had any reference to fascism, often I was worried of the fate of my homeland.” “Mai ho scritto una nota che abbia qualsiasi riferimento al fascismo, spesso invece mi preoccupai […] delle sorti della mia patria.”75 Although

Malipiero did not enjoy all the benefits the regime had to offer, he continued to compose and teach while living in his Asolo home, outliving Mussolini and fascism by nearly three decades. This failure to be favored excluded Malipiero from the top levels of fascist musical bureaucracy despite his best efforts, accentuating a complex system of power for the few men who exercised it and the nuances of musical politics in fascist Italy.

75 Malipiero, Gian Francesco, ‘Né con il duce né contro il duce.’ Unpublished TS. 21 Sept. 1945. 25 Oct. 1992. http://www.rodoni.ch/malipiero/ducegfm.html.

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Chapter Three Musical Memoriam and the Politics of ‘Apoliticism’: Ottorino Respighi’s Lucrezia

Ten months after his premature death, Ottorino Respighi’s final opera, Lucrezia, premiered on February 24, 1937 at La Scala as part of a commemorative evening for the composer. This musical memoriam was a triple bill of Respighian works featuring

Lucrezia (istoria in un atto), Maria egiziaca (mistero in un atto 1932), and Gli uccelli

(suite per piccola orchestra, 1928).1 Lucrezia was an unintended swan song for a

composer in his prime who had achieved widespread success at home and abroad. In

his position as a celebrated Italian composer, Ottorino Respighi (1879-1936), along

with his wife Elsa, was deeply embedded within Italian musical life and they enjoyed

the benefits of the National Fascist Party’s favor.2 The couple met Mussolini as early as 1923, when he attended a concert of Ottorino’s works at the Circolo del Convegno in Milan.3 This encounter with the Duce was the first of many—Mussolini was an ardent supporter of Ottorino’s music. Ottorino taught courses at the state-funded

Conservatorio di S. Cecilia from 1923 until 1935 and in 1932 became a member of the

Accademia d’Italia, a fascist organization for the Italian intellectual elite. Despite these associations, Ottorino’s political legacy is one of apoliticism and distance from the National Fascist Party (Partito Nazionale Fascista or PNF). This apolitical

1 On this occasion, Gli uccelli was performed as a ballet with choreography by Margherita Wallmann. The libretti for Maria egiziaca and Lucrezia were written by Claudio Guastalla, Respighi’s trusted collaborator. 2 The Respighis will frequently be referred to by first name only throughout this chapter so not to confuse Ottorino and Elsa. 3 Although the works performed during this concert are not named, they were likely songs for voice and piano. Elsa, an accomplished singer, describes participating in the concert of her husband’s works with the pianist Mieczyslav Horszowsky in her memoir. Elsa Respighi, Fifty Years of a Life in Music, 1905-1955, trans. Giovanni Fontecchio and Roger Johnson (Lewiston: E. Mellen Press, 1993), 95.

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positionality is inherently political and belies an intricate and murky relationship with

fascism. Indeed, one did not need to be a registered member of the PNF to perform

fascism.

Although Ottorino Respighi is chiefly associated with his most popular

orchestral compositions, Fontane di Roma (1917), Pini di Roma (1924), and Feste

Romane (1928), he also composed operas and was a passionate promoter of early

Italian music.4 Each work in Respighi’s Roman Trilogy achieved international

success, presenting programmatic interpretations of Roman landscapes and

soundscapes. Mussolini’s fondness for the Roman Trilogy placed Respighi in the

Duce’s favor and underscored the cultural power of musical romanità in the context of fascist Italy.5 Respighi included descriptions written by Claudio Guastalla to

accompany each movement of the symphonic poems, connecting the music to

specific locations in Rome and scenes of ancient Roman glory.6 This orchestral

romanità is most prominent in the final piece of the trilogy: Feste Romane, which conjures past scenes of Roman festivals. Lucrezia is a muted realization of the colorful, post-Romantic orchestration that constituted Respighi’s signature style in the Roman Trilogy; Respighi attempted to challenge the expectations for his signature orchestration. The musical traditionalism of Lucrezia glorifies Italy’s musical past,

4 Ottorino composed nine operas and orchestrated a version of Claudio Monteverdi’s Orfeo for La Scala in 1934. 5 Mussolini’s affection for these works is a common anecdote in Respighi literature. Variations of the same story appear in the following sources: Michael Webb, Ottorino Respighi: His Life and Times (Leicester: Matador, 2019), xix; John C.G. Waterhouse, Janet Waterhouse, and Potito Pedarra. "Respighi, Ottorino." Grove Music Online. 2001; Accessed 15 Nov. 2019; and Lee G. Barrow, “Guilt by Association: The Effect of Attitudes toward Fascism on the Critical Assessment of the Music of Ottorino Respighi,” International Review of the Aesthetics and Sociology of Music 42, no. 1 (2011): 82. 6 For detailed analyses of each work in the Roman Trilogy, see Christoph Flamm, Ottorino Respighi und die italienische Instrumentalmusik von der Jahrhundertwende bis zum Faschismus (Laaber: Laaber-Verlag, 2008) and Webb, Ottorino Respighi.

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emphasizing prominent historicism in Respighi’s final opera by drawing upon stylistic

conventions from the likes of Claudio Monteverdi and Giuseppe Verdi. Lucrezia was inspired by Shakespeare’s poem The Rape of Lucrece (1594), Livy’s The Rape of

Lucretia in The History of Rome, and André Obey’s play Le viol de Lucrèce (1931).7

Ottorino Respighi worked with his favored librettist, Claudio Guastalla, to write the

istoria in un atto e tre momenti (history in one act and three moments). The opera

takes place in ancient Rome and focuses on the rape of the noblewoman Lucrezia by

Sesto Tarquinio, son of the Roman King, while her husband is away on the battlefield.

Lucrezia is so distraught after her rape that she commits suicide, stabbing herself

with a dagger, causing her husband Collatino and his Roman friends to seek revenge

upon Sesto Tarquinio for his brutality. According to Livy’s account, the tragedy of

Lucrezia was the impetus for disrupting the tradition of sovereign succession,

marking the end of the Roman kingdom and the beginning of the Roman republic.8

Ottorino died at the age of fifty-five after a prolonged heart infection, leaving twenty-nine pages of the Lucrezia score unfinished. His wife Elsa, a composer in her

own right, finished the score in the style of her late husband, studying his previous

works while relying upon her intimate knowledge of his musical style.9 Following

Ottorino’s death, preserving his memory and music became the dominating focus of

Elsa’s life; her efforts secured an enduring legacy for her husband’s music, while her

7 Benjamin Britten and his librettist, Ronald Duncan, also consulted Obey’s play for their opera: The Rape of Lucretia (1946). 8 For more on the legend of Lucrezia in the early Roman republic, see Elaine Fantham et al., “Republican Rome I: From Marriage by Capture to Partnership in War—the Proud Women of Early Rome” in Women in the Classical World: Image and Text (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994), 225-227. 9 Ottorino Respighi’s student, Ennio Porrino, aided Elsa Respighi with completing the opera.

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own compositions faded into obscurity.10 Elsa’s work as chief supporter of Ottorino and his music is a reflection of patriarchal power structures which lauded the accomplishments of men and positioned women as their caretakers. These patriarchal power structures were embedded within the fabric of fascist Italy—a continuation of centuries of male-dominated society that created different roles and expectations for men and women dependent upon age, class, race, and nationality.11

In this chapter, I argue that Ottorino Respighi’s premature death established

Lucrezia as the final piece of his musical legacy; a legacy which was deeply entwined

with the fascist regime, despite his ‘apolitical’ stance. I assert that Ottorino’s

apoliticism is a political stance that does not erase his connections to Mussolini and

the National Fascist Party and that he performed fascism without being a member of

the PNF. Lucrezia is part of Respighi’s fascist musical oeuvre and its ancient Roman subject is reflective of the romanità promoted as the pinnacle of fascist culture by the regime.12 In fascist Italy, there were no stylistic restrictions or prohibitions placed

upon music, which resulted in a plurality of operatic styles. Ottorino embraced

musical traditionalism in his Lucrezia, glorifying historic Italian opera while creating a

thoroughly Roman opera. To explore Ottorino’s historicist opera, I analyze the

10 Elsa met Ottorino as a student in the composition course he was teaching at Santa Cecilia in Rome. After they married in 1919, she suspended her compositional activities and only resumed them after Ottorino’s death. Elsa’s songs are the most enduring of her compositions: Mary Lenn Buchanan, “The Songs of Elsa Respighi Olivieri Sangiacomo” (DMA diss., Louisiana State University, 1993). 11 While a discussion of the history of gendered roles in Italy from an intersectional perspective is out of the scope of this chapter, a variety of perspectives on this subject are presented in Gender, Family, and Sexuality: The Private Sphere in Italy 1860-1945, edited by Perry Willson (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004) and Perry Willson, Women in Twentieth-Century Italy, New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010). 12 Romanità was a central facet of fascist culture, selectively drawing upon the myths, aesthetics, and culture of ancient Rome. The link between fascism and ancient Rome was fundamental, positioning Mussolini’s regime as a reimagined, reinvigorated Roman Empire. See chapter 2 for more details.

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traditional musical style of Lucrezia, underscoring his proclivity for music of the

Italian past, demonstrating his version of operatic romanità in the form of tragedy.

While Ottorino’s death marked Lucrezia as his final work, it was also the

impetus for his widow, Elsa, to complete the final pages of the opera, an effort that

marked the beginning of his carefully curated legacy. Women were restricted from fully participating in the fascist Italian musical community, and the antifeminism of this male-dominated community in the context of a patriarchal country and government greatly limited opportunities for female composers.13 I examine Elsa’s role in completing the score for Lucrezia through anecdotes and correspondence, the reception of the opera, and her efforts to preserve her husband’s memory by distancing him from Mussolini and the PNF. The gendered roles performed by Elsa and Ottorino will be contextualized by literature on antifeminism and the patriarchal limitations imposed upon women in fascist Italy.

Preserving Ottorino’s Legacy Through Curated Apoliticism

Elsa was Ottorino’s chief caretaker during their marriage; she doted upon him,

handled his business affairs, and created a life for her husband where he could work

on his music unencumbered by the mundane tasks of everyday life. After his

premature death, she became the protector of his name and music, preserving his

memory while doing everything in her power to ensure its abiding success. Central to

Ottorino’s image were his politics; Elsa portrayed Ottorino as deeply apolitical and

13 Barbara Giuranna (1899-1998) is the rare exception to this rule, though she faced many obstacles as a woman in the male-dominated area of music composition. Little has been written about her, as evidenced by her two paragraph Grove Music entry. Antonio Trudu, “Giuranna, (Elena) Barbara,” Grove Music Online, 2001; Accessed 31 Jan. 2020, https://doi.org/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.article.11236.

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attempted to distance her husband posthumously from Mussolini and the PNF by

repeatedly stating that he was not a fascist. 14 In her biography of her husband, Elsa

recounts an episode from 1931 where anti-fascist demonstrators protested a

performance of Le fontane di Roma in Brussels, but due to a last-minute program

change, they mistakenly booed Berlioz’s Carneval romain. Elsa balked at the idea of

Ottorino being a fascist, yet he could not shake this association in an international

context. In a rare footnote to this anecdote Elsa elaborated: “As I have said, the

Maestro belonged to no political party, club, clique, or music society. A recluse by

nature, he always led an isolated life.”15 However, another statement from Elsa suggests a crack in Ottorino’s façade of complete political isolation: “Even when he was later offered the nomination to membership in the Italian National Academy, he accepted but added that in no way would he join the Fascist Party!”16

Though it is unclear whether or not Ottorino Respighi was a member of the

PNF at any point in his life, Elsa’s statements cannot be taken at face value: part of maintaining Ottorino’s image was dependent upon removing any perception of political ties to the fascist regime after its collapse and therefore her credibility in this circumstance is unreliable.17 Ottorino himself praised the fascist government during a radio broadcast to his “American friends,” which was transcribed and published in the magazine Radiocorriere:

This interest [in our opera] of the Italian public is always great, and the construction of vast new theaters is being studied, which will allow excellent

14 All four of the composers in this dissertation had relationships with fascism and performed fascism in different capacities: from the outspoken fascism of Porrino, to the veneration of Mussolini by Mascagni and Malipiero, to the ‘apoliticism’ of Respighi. 15 Elsa Respighi, Ottorino Respighi; His Life Story, trans. Gwyn Morris (London: Ricordi, 1962), 133. 16 Respighi, Fifty Years of a Life in Music, 1905-1955, 154. 17 For more on the suppression of fascist experience after the fall of Mussolini’s regime, see Luca La Rovere, “Interpretations of Fascism as a Political Religion in Post-Fascist Italy (1943–1948),” Politics, Religion & Ideology 15, no. 1 (January 2, 2014): 23–44.

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shows to be offered to the masses at affordable prices for everyone. Meanwhile, the fascist government subsidizes numerous theaters with several million a year, maintains singing schools to direct young people to this art, announces competitions for new works and promotes their performance. Well aware of the importance that music has in the life of the people, the fascist government has become the promoter and supporter of initiatives that will serve as an example to civilized populations. Nel pubblico italiano questo interesse è sempre grande, e si sta studiando la costruzione di nuovi vastissimi teatri che permettano di offrire alle masse ottimi spettacoli a prezzi accessibili a tutti. E intanto il Governo fascista sovvenziona con parecchi milioni all’anno numerosi teatri mantiene scuole di canto per avviare i giovani a quest’arte, bandisce concorsi per opere nuove e ne favorisce la rappresentazione. Consapevole dell’importanza che la musica ha nella vita di un popolo, il Governo fascista si è fatto promotore e sostenitore di iniziative che potranno servire d’esempio ai popoli civili.18

By commending the fascist government to a foreign audience, Ottorino clearly demonstrated his appreciation for the efforts made by the PNF to support Italian opera, positioning these efforts as something for other “civilized populations” to emulate.

In addition to this public declaration of support for the fascist government,

Ottorino’s music allowed the Respighis to interact with a number of high-ranking fascists, both Italian and German. Elsa recounted her experience in Berlin for a

German performance of Ottorino’s opera, La Fiamma (1934), conducted by Karl Böhm:

“At the premiere of the opera on June 7, I was in Goebbels’ box with our ambassadors and the tall weeds of the regime. I had to grin and bear it. I saw quickly that no one liked the opera, presented as it was.”19 It would appear that Elsa’s discomfort in this situation was founded in her disapproval of this interpretation of her late husband’s opera rather than the company of prominent Nazis. Even if Ottorino

18 Ottorino Respighi, “La musica italiana moderna,” Radiocorriere, 10-16 Febbraio 1935, 3. English translations by dissertation author unless otherwise indicated. 19 Respighi, Fifty Years of a Life in Music, 1905-1955, 208.

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was ‘uninterested’ in politics, he performed fascism by interacting with the PNF, by

inviting Mussolini to performances of his music, and by composing works that

celebrated the rebirth of romanità in a hyper-nationalist society. Daniele Spini contextualizes Ottorino’s position within fascist Italy:

Respighi […] was certainly not in disgrace with the regime, much less suspected of heresy or even of rebellion. The honours he received – among them, election to the Accademia d’Italia in 1932 – and the frequent, major productions of his operas in the most important Italian theaters, demonstrate that he was an officially recognized and consecrated artist during the early 1930s […]. If, however, the historian is asked […] to compare [Respighi’s] attitude towards fascism with those of the other protagonists of Italian music during that period, it must be said that he comes off much better than many others. Elsa [the composer’s widow] maintains that Respighi never became a member of the National Fascist Party, and she is supported by the testimony of Claudio Guastalla [Respighi’s librettist and close friend …]. This in itself does not say much, but it certainly does not show a special mania for approving [the regime].20

Hence, Respighi was not an apolitical bystander, but rather a participant in certain aspects of the fascist regime.

Apoliticism in and of itself is a political stance and Ottorino’s apoliticism was a guise constructed by Elsa to distance her husband’s legacy from his participation in fascism and association with Mussolini. According to Jacques Ellul: “to become apolitical is to make a political choice, and as a result apolitism hides some very definite political choices. The idea that one can escape politics by being nonpolitical is just as absurd as the political illusion itself.”21 True neutrality was not possible for a composer who depended upon the official recognition of the fascist regime to

20 English translation cited from Harvey Sachs, Music in Fascist Italy (New York: W.W. Norton Co., 1988), 132. Original text from Daniele Spini, “Ottorino Respighi (1879-1936). Profilo biografico,” in Ottorino Respighi, ed. Giancarlo Rostirolla (Torino: ERI, 1985) 74-75. 21 Jacques Ellul, The Political Illusion, trans. Konrad Kellen (New York: Knopf, 1967), 201.

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maintain cultural relevance and to move in the appropriate social circles; neutrality

was not possible for any high-profile figure in fascist Italy. Indeed, the Respighis

associated with a number of ardent fascists, such as conductor Bernardino Molinari,

journalist Ugo Ojetti, and composer Ennio Porrino.22

Ottorino’s appointment to the Accademia d’Italia in 1932 was an honor

bestowed upon a select few; this appointment was a reflection of his good standing

with the PNF, Mussolini, and the cultural importance of his music. The Accademia d’Italia was a fascist institution meant to promote and showcase the brightest Italian minds of the age, whether they be scientists, writers, humanists, or artists. Modeled after the long-standing Académie française, the Accademia d’Italia was inaugurated in 1929, and its membership totaled sixty members before its dissolution with the end of the regime in 1943. All members of the Accademia d’Italia were men and were well established in their respective disciplines, including, besides Respighi himself, figures such as: Giovanni Gentile, Luigi Pirandello, Pietro Mascagni, and Enrico

Fermi.23 The privileges and monetary gain for the select few who gained membership to the Accademia were substantial. According to Philip Cannistraro:

[…] academicians received a monthly stipend of 3,000 lire (it is interesting to note that in 1929 the yearly per capita income in Italy was 3,079 lire), enjoyed free first-class travel on the national railroads, and were entitled to wear an elaborate dress uniform and to be addressed as “Your Excellency”. In addition, they were eligible to compete for the four annual Mussolini prizes awarded to members of the Accademia for outstanding work in their respective fields. In return academicians swore loyalty to Italy and Fascism.24

22 For more on these relationships, see Webb, Ottorino Respighi, xxiii-xxxi. 23 For a complete list of members, membership invitations, and a guide to archival research, see Paola Cagiano de Azevedo and Elvira Gerardi, Reale Accademia d’Italia: Inventario dell’Archivio (Rome: Ministero per i beni e le attività culturali, 2005). 24 Philip V. Cannistraro, Historical Dictionary of Fascist Italy (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1982), 475.

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Theoretically, Ottorino Respighi had to pledge his loyalty to fascism in order to join

the Accademia d’Italia. Though this was not explicitly stated in the rules for members of the Accademia when Ottorino was inducted in 1932, the rules were amended in

1934: “Candidates must be registered with the National Fascist Party.” “Gli aspiranti debbono essere iscritti al Partito Nazionale Fascista.”25 Curiously his position as a

non-fascist might have been a deciding factor in his invitation to the Accademia.

Cannistraro elaborates that “Indeed the regime preferred to nominate to membership

in the academy those who were not fervent Fascists, in the expectation that they

would ‘convert,’ and non-Fascists were frequently preferred over members of the

Party, who were told they ‘could wait.’”26 This expectation of conversion for non- fascist members of the Accademia demonstrates the power of the PNF over this

group of distinguished individuals, which aimed to uphold and develop fascist

culture. Given that Ottorino was a member of the Accademia until his death, it is

logical that he was a registered member of the PNF after the amendment to the rules,

though this claim cannot be fully substantiated. Despite Elsa’s assertions that

Ottorino proclaimed he would not join the PNF, he performed his duties to fascism as

a member of the Accademia, surrounded by a group of illustrious peers who likewise performed fascism in their own capacities. By participating in the Accademia, a cultural group created by the PNF whose membership was approved by Mussolini,

Respighi performed fascism without necessarily pledging membership to the PNF.

25 Reale Accademia d’Italia, Annuario della Reale Accademia d’Italia, VI, 1933-1934-XII (Roma, 1935), 60. 26 Philip V. Cannistraro, “The Organization of Totalitarian Culture: Cultural Policy and the Mass Media in Fascist Italy, 1922-1945” (PhD diss., New York University, 1971), 49.

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Although Ottorino Respighi may not have been an ardent fascist, he met

Mussolini as early as 1923, when Il Duce attended one of his concerts at the Circolo

del Convegno in Milan. Elsa recalls Mussolini’s presence was notable, as he sat in the

front row of the audience and joked with Ottorino about his own violin playing

abilities.27 In addition to his membership in the Accademia d’Italia, Respighi also held

positions in the ever-evolving fascist cultural bureaucracy, including the Commission for Intellectual Co-operation and the Executive Council of the National Fascist Union

of Musicians.28 His activities as a member of the Executive Council led to at least one other personal meeting with Mussolini in 1928, documented by a group photograph at the Palazzo Chigi in Rome. Mussolini stands front and center in the group of representatives of the National Fascist Union of Musicians; Respighi is prominently featured to the left of Il Duce.29 As was customary for those who received honors from

the regime, Respighi wrote letters thanking Mussolini and inviting him to

performances of his music, though these letters mostly went unanswered.30 Following

Ottorino’s death, Elsa was personally received by Mussolini before the premiere of

Lucrezia:

The Duce welcomed Mrs. Elsa Respighi, widow of the great composer and academic of Italy, who presented him with the posthumous work Lucrezia, which will be given in the near future at La Scala, and reported to him on the design of the Respighi Foundation. Il Duce ha ricevuto la signora Elsa Respighi, vedova del grande compositore e accademico d’Italia, la quale gli ha fatto omaggio dell’opera postuma Lucrezia,

27 Respighi, Fifty Years of a Life in Music, 95. 28 Sachs, Music in Fascist Italy, 29-30. 29 This photograph can be viewed on the Archivio LUCE website: https://patrimonio.archivioluce.com/luce-web/detail/IL3000047808/12/mussolini-posa-nella-sala- della-vittoria-palazzo-chigi-i-rappresentanti-del-direttorio-del-sindacato- musicisti.html?startPage=0&jsonVal={%22jsonVal%22:{%22query%22:[%22ottorino%20respighi%22 ],%22fieldDate%22:%22dataNormal%22,%22_perPage%22:20,%22archiveType_string%22:[%22xDam sPhotoLuce%22]}}. 30 Ottorino Respighi’s letters to Mussolini can be found in Fiamma Nicolodi, Musica e Musicisti Nel Ventennio Fascista (Fiesole, Firenze: Discanto, 1984), 450-451.

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che sarà data prossimamente alla Scala, e gli ha riferito sul progetto della <>.31

This encounter between Elsa and Mussolini is indicative of her proximity to the upper

echelons of the fascist party and the cultural currency of Ottorino’s music.

Particularly after the fall of the fascist regime and the end of World War II, Elsa

and other devotees of Ottorino bristled at any mention of his association with

Mussolini. The translators of Elsa’s biography, Giovanni Fontecchio and Roger

Johnson, dismiss any political connection to Mussolini outright: “[…] Ottorino’s

relatively favorable reception by Mussolini […] apparently did not work in favor of the

post-World War II status of his music. To be sure, Ottorino’s ‘politics’ had more to do

with Monteverdi than Mussolini.”32 Harvey Sachs similarly portrays Ottorino:

“Respighi did not attempt to ingratiate himself with the regime because he was the one composer of his generation whom the regime backed without being asked.”33

Four years after Elsa’s death in 1996, Ottorino Respighi was profiled as the composer of the month for BBC Music Magazine. The front cover of the magazine announced

the article with the byline, “Respighi: Mussolini’s Favourite,” and the article itself

highlighted Respighi’s involvement with fascism. The passage which drew ire from

Respighi devotees is found in the middle of the article: “Among Respighi’s more

controversial acquaintances was Benito Mussolini, whom he met in 1923, and who

greatly impressed him. […] the Fascist leader was particularly fond of the Roman

trilogy. Respighi’s sympathy with Fascism was evidence of a naivety which

31 “L’omaggio al Duce di un’opera postuma di Respighi,” Roma 23 Gennaio, Corriere della Sera, 24 Gennaio, 1937, pg. 5. 32 Respighi, Fifty Years of a Life in Music, viii. 33 Sachs, Music in Fascist Italy, 132.

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characterised him throughout his life.”34 This charge of naivety risks divesting

Respighi of his political agency; his support of fascism cannot be explained away by

naivety, nor should it.35

Though Ottorino Respighi’s political beliefs remain murky, there is no doubt that he participated in fascist societies and benefitted from the favor of Mussolini, thereby performing fascism. Nevertheless, by positioning Respighi as a fascist sympathizer, Siepmann’s article threatened to undo Elsa’s work of distancing her husband from the fascist regime. Outraged fans wrote letters to the editor of BBC

Music Magazine, including the president of the now defunct Respighi Society,

Adriano. In Adriano’s letter to the editor, he wrote a list of eight reasons why he

believed Respighi was not a fascist. Unsurprisingly, Adriano revealed his biases in

the opening paragraph:

I was a close friend of Respighi's widow, Elsa, from 1977 until her death in 1996. Occasionally, we discussed the composer's attitude to Fascism when false accusations appeared in the media. I was allowed to read the composer's private correspondence and other documents, so I can therefore claim to know the true facts about Respighi and I feel obliged, in Elsa's and Ottorino's memory, to write this letter. There is much evidence to prove that Respighi was not Fascist; on the contrary, he was actually Anti-Fascist.36

There is, of course, no evidence that Ottorino Respighi was anti-fascist. Adriano’s

statements should be read with critical skepticism and contextualized as a

continuation of Elsa’s work to preserve Ottorino’s memory.37 Though Ottorino may

34 Jeremy Siepmann, “Composer of the Month,” BBC Music Magazine 8, n. 6 (2000), 44-45. 35 This is not to say that Ottorino Respighi did not curry the favor of Mussolini and the regime, but that he did not do so in such an obsequious manner as some of his contemporaries, e.g. Gian Francesco Malipiero and Pietro Mascagni. 36 Text of Adriano’s full letter to the editor of BBC Music Magazine can be found online: (http://www.musicweb-international.com/respighi/bbc.htm). 37 Similar sentiments to Adriano’s are found in an article by Lee G. Barrow, who also authored a Respighi bibliography. Barrow, “Guilt by Association” 79–95. Lee G. Barrow, Ottorino Respighi (1879-1936), an Annotated Bibliography (Lanham, MD: Scarecrow Press, 2004).

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not have been a political person, he participated in fascist societies, which in turn

politicized both Ottorino as a public figure and the music he produced. These

entanglements reveal the interconnectedness of opera, politics, and identity in fascist

Italy, entanglements that have the potential to leave an enduring mark upon those

associated with Mussolini’s regime. Lucrezia is part of Ottorino’s legacy and his final musical work will forever be linked to the fascist regime in which it was created and premiered.

The Reception of Lucrezia: “Homage to the art of the distinguished Maestro”

Though the details of the fatal illness that caused Ottorino Respighi’s death were kept

from the composer as he slowly deteriorated, his friends and the public were aware of

his precarious state.38 After a prolonged battle with an incurable illness, Ottorino died

on April 18, 1936. As the leading composer of his generation, Respighi had considerable popularity both in Italy and internationally. Consequently, his death was mourned by many important cultural figures of the day. Acclaimed poet and proto- fascist Gabriele D’Annunzio mourned Ottorino and the impossibility of their planned collaboration that never materialized. Elsa recounts this episode with D’Annunzio in her memoirs:

In September 1936 I returned to the Vittoriale where d’Annunzio, in an unforgettable conversation, told me of his infinite grief over the unfinished work, abandoned for ever because ‘only Ottorino could have expressed musically the true essence of my poem’. And he added, ‘Tell me, Elsa, what

38 Elsa refused to tell Ottorino the true extent of his illness, preferring to keep him blissfully ignorant of the lack of effective treatments and his imminent death. This façade was maintained with the cooperation of Claudio Guastalla, who regularly visited Ottorino. The press reported on Respighi’s condition and the various treatments he underwent, informing the public of his grave illness. See Respighi, Ottorino Respighi; His Life Story, 166-171.

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can I do for you to exalt and perpetuate Ottorino’s posthumous glory.’ He spoke as if he had lived with Ottorino for years, and I was astounded to learn what he knew of his soul, personality and art, of our marriage and life together.39

D’Annunzio’s condolences were accompanied by messages of support and remembrance from a variety of colleagues and the public at large. Respighi’s friend turned rival, Alfredo Casella, reminisced about Ottorino after learning of his death and described his musical style thusly:

I consider that to arrive at a proper judgement of Respighi’s artistic position we must remember that his point of departure was the same as that of our entire generation: the necessity to leave the outworn, sterile atmosphere of verismo as soon as possible, that is, to abandon the art of the preceding generation. […] there were conflicting natures in him: a sincere sensibility oriented toward modernism and especially toward novelty in sound effects, […] which could have carried him far if it had not been for his second nature, which won out over the first: the love of an easy life, a spiritual laziness that made him rest comfortably on his laurels and prevented him from going beyond the Franco-Russian impressionism with which he began and which remained always the basis of his art.40

Ottorino Respighi and Alfredo Casella began their relationship in 1916 as members of the National Music Society, which aimed to elevate and defend new Italian music. As time passed, the two composers became more distant and their comradery turned into a public rivalry—the most notorious instance being the 1932 “Manifesto of Italian

Musicians in Support of the Nineteenth-Century Tradition of Romantic Art” that bore

Respighi’s signature and attacked modernist composers, such as Casella.41

39 Ibid., 139. 40 Alfredo Casella, Music in My Time; the Memoirs of Alfredo Casella, trans. and ed. Spencer Norton (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1955), 212-213. 41 The manifesto, written by Alceo Toni was published in three leading newspapers, Il popolo d’Italia, La Stampa, and Il corriere della sera on December 17, 1932, and was signed by ten composers. Although Casella was not explicitly named in the manifesto, he and Gian Francesco Malipiero were the intended targets of its anti-modernist message. Text from the Manifesto in the original Italian can be found in Nicolodi, Musica e musicisti nel ventennio fascista, 141-143, while an

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The commemorative triple bill of Ottorino’s works at La Scala on February 24,

1937, featuring Maria egiziaca, Gli uccelli, and the premiere of Lucrezia, was one of many performances held to honor the composer’s memory after his death.42 But unlike the performances of known works, the premiere of Lucrezia was exceptional because

it presented Ottorino’s new opera for the first time, showcasing his final work to a

public still mourning his loss. Following the Milanese premiere, Lucrezia, Maria egiziaca, and Gli uccelli were staged in Bologna, Rome, and at the Maggio Musicale in

Florence.43 The celebration of Ottorino Respighi’s life and music was also evident in published reviews of Lucrezia, which was well received by the Italian critics at large.

Musicologist and critic for L’illustrazione italiana, Carlo Gatti, praised Respighi’s final

opera:

In essence, Lucrezia […] is proof of the composer's 20-year effort to revive the traditional forms of Italian melodrama, taking advantage of the abilities of modern elaboration, of which he was the absolute master. A learned harmonist with the finest taste, under his pen the most inventive combinations were arranged in logical and pleasing sequences [...] A prodigious orchestrator, even where it is lighter and more transparent, full of exquisite findings. In sostanza Lucrezia […] è la riprova dello sforzo durato vent’anni dal compositore per ravvivare le forme tradizionali del melodramma italiano, servendosi dei mezzi d’elaborazione moderni, di cui era padrone assoluto.

excerpt of the Manifesto in English translation can be found in John C. G. Waterhouse, “The Emergence of Modern Italian Music up to 1940” (PhD diss., University of Oxford, 1968), 239. The excerpt translated by Waterhouse is cited in chapter 2 of this dissertation. While this manifesto may sound like an important musico-political attack, it did not result in any substantive changes to the musical landscape of fascist Italy. For more context, see Ben Earle, Luigi Dallapiccola and Musical Modernism in Fascist Italy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013), 67. 42 Among the many concerts held to commemorate Ottorino, Elsa names Le fontane di Roma conducted by Ricardo Zandonai at the Massenzio Basilica in the Roman Forum as a particularly memorable performance. See Respighi, Fifty Years of a Life in Music, 209-212 for more on commemorative performances. 43 Ibid., 211.

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Armonista dotto e di gusto finissimo, le combinazioni più ardite sotto la sua penna si ordinavano in successioni logiche e gradevoli […] Istrumentatore prodigioso, anche dov’è più lieve e trasparente, fecondo di trovate squisite.44

Franco Abbiati of the Milanese newspaper, Corriere della Sera, described the

premiere of Lucrezia as an occasion worthy of national remembrance:

Yesterday was one of the most exciting evenings of the current season, one of the rare events of art and intellectuality on which the high level of the spiritual life, or if you like, of a nation is measured. […] Lucrezia - as well as the other two works performed, Maria Egiziaca and Gli uccelli, already known to the La Scala public - has subsequently interested and fascinated, moved and exalted, in the end achieving a complete and absolutely certain success. È stata, quella d’ieri, una della serate più emozionanti della corrente stagione, uno dei rari avvenimenti d’arte e di intellettualità sui quali si misura l’alto livello della vita spirituale, o se più vi piace, culturale di una Nazione. […]

Lucrezia – come del resto le altre due opere rappresentate, Maria Egiziaca e Gli uccelli, già note al pubblico della Scala – ha successivamente interessato e affascinato, commosso ed esaltato, ottenendo alla fine un successo completo e assolutamente convinto.45

The commemorative evening at La Scala was marked as a major event in the context of Italian music. More details about who attended the performances are found in the

Turinese newspaper, La Stampa:

The evening dedicated to Ottorino Respighi at the Teatro alla Scala assumed a cordial character of homage to the art of the distinguished maestro. [...] The brand new Lucrezia, had a refined and alert conductor in Marinuzzi, and in Maria Caniglia a superb protagonist. The dear departed musician left the last pages of the orchestration incomplete, which were completed by his widow, Mrs. Elsa Olivieri, based upon piano parts. [...] An extraordinary audience packed La Scala. His Royal Highness the Duke of Bergamo, the Minister of Press and Propaganda, His Excellency Dino Alfieri, was represented by De Pirro, the Director General of the Theater Commission, who paid the most

44 Leonardo Bragaglia, Ottorino Respighi e i suoi interpreti (Bologna: Paolo Emilio Persiani, 2012), 137-138. 45 Franco Abbiati, “Vibrante successo della ‘Lucrezia’ di Ottorino Respighi,” Corriere della Sera, February 25, 1937.

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heartfelt tribute to Elsa Respighi on behalf of the Minister who was held-up in Rome. La serata dedicata a Ottorino Respighi dal Teatro alla Scala ha assunto un cordiale carattere di omaggio all’arte dell’insigne maestro. […] La nuovissima Lucrezia, che il compianto musicista aveva lasciato incompiuta nelle ultime pagine dell’orchestrazione, e che è stata terminata dalla vedova signora Elsa Olivieri, sulla scorta degli appunti pianistici, ha avuto nel Marinuzzi un concertatore raffinato e vigile, in Maria Caniglia una superba protagonista. […] Un magnifico pubblico gremiva La Scala. Da un palco assisteva alla rappresentazione S.A.R., il Duca di Bergamo, Il Ministro alla Stampa e Propaganda, S.E. Dino Alfieri, era rappresentato dal Direttore generale del teatro comm. De Pirro, il quale a nome del Ministro, trattenuto a Roma, recó il più fervido omaggio a donna Elsa Respighi.46

Adriano Lualdi, outspoken fascist and critic for the Roman newspaper, Il giornale

d’Italia, reported that, “Lucrezia, listened to with the greatest interest, had a very

worthy performance, extremely accurate, expressive, and effective.” “Lucrezia,

ascoltata col più vivo interesse, ha avuto una esecuzione degnissima, sommamente accurata ed espressiva ed efficace.”47 Michele Lessona of the Turinese newspaper,

Gazzetta del Popolo, echoed the praise for Lucrezia stating, “the posthumous work by

Respighi, reveals itself worthy of the fame and name of the distinguished musician in every respect.” “la postuma opera respighiana, che si rivela, sotto ogni aspetto, degna della fama e del nome del musicista insigne.”48 In the wake of Respighi’s death, the

premiere of Lucrezia was a commemorative occasion for the beloved composer: a

celebration of his final opera.

46 “La serata e il successo,” La Stampa, February 25, 1937. 47 Adriano Lualdi, Il Giornale d’Italia, February 26, 1937. 48 Michele Lessona, Gazzetta del Popolo, February 25, 1937.

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Traditionalism and Historicism in Lucrezia

In fascist Italy, a plurality of musical styles was accepted by the regime and the public, ranging from nineteenth-century traditionalism to modernism. Mussolini expressed the need to produce new operas as a means of reaching Italian audiences and advocated for their creation.49 Ottorino Respighi integrated a number of musical styles into Lucrezia, mining centuries of Italian opera for its gems and composing in a traditional style unrestrained to a specific period of music history. Respighi drew upon the beginnings of Italian opera, paying homage to the great Italian composers of the past such as Claudio Monteverdi and Giuseppe Verdi by using their stylistic idioms in Lucrezia, accentuating the italianità and romanità of this opera. Although this amalgamation of Italian operatic style might seem disjunct, the opera is nevertheless compelling, though it has rarely been performed since its premiere.50

While the musical referents may be centuries apart, they complement one another in

Respighi’s work. Overall, Lucrezia is a strong realization of musical traditionalism and historicism in an early twentieth-century opera. The chamber orchestra, light

49 In a 1927 speech Mussolini stated: “The interest of the public needs to be awakened around new music; already it is not loved more than vertical music: I mean that which is played in the streets, with slow cranks. It is necessary that the public appreciate and also learn to love music that they do not know by heart. But seeing as that relates to popularization, concert music does not reach large crowds, and that of the theater does, it is music of the theater that needs to be reborn most of all. […] They continue to perform and repeat old works; which I also like, be careful; but hear and repeat the new! If in a season fifty new works were given, and forty-eight vanish, the effort and the money would be well spent for the two that survived.” As quoted in Fiamma Nicolodi's essay "Aspetti di politica culturale nel ventennio fascista," in Italian Music During the Fascist Period, ed. Roberto Illiano (Turnhout: Brepols, 2004), 97. Nicolodi quoted from Per la dichiarazione di Mussolini, cfr. Adriano Lualdi, Viaggio musicale in Italia, Milano, Alpes, 1927, pp. 206-207 and Raffaello De Rensis, 'Mussolini musicista', in Mussolinia, V/25 (August 1927), pp. 29-30. 50 The commemorative triple bill of Lucrezia, Maria egiziaca, and Gli uccelli was repeated at the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino in 1937 and at the Teatro dell’opera di Roma in 1938. There are few recordings of Lucrezia including, Ottorino Respighi, Lucrezia, Orchestra sinfonica e Coro di Milano della RAI, conducted by Oliviero De Fabritiis, recorded September 12, 1958, Golden Age of Opera (1995), LP; Ottorino Respighi, Lucrezia, Junge Philharmonie der A.M.O.R, conducted by Ettore Gracis, recorded July 24, 1981, Bongiovanni (1982), CD; Ottorino Respighi, Lucrezia, Slovak Radio Symphony Orchestra (Bratislava), conducted by Adriano, recorded June 9-16, 1994, Marco Polo (1995), CD.

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orchestration, and focus on the voices recall the beginnings of Italian opera, while

some of the vocal gestures are evocative of Verdian melodies. Lucrezia is noteworthy for the number of female roles and their vocal prominence throughout the work, despite the tragic demise of the titular protagonist. Particularly in Italian operas written during the fascist period that promote romanità, men are typically the protagonists and they take up the majority of narrative and musical space. In Lucrezia,

Respighi challenged those norms, albeit with a gruesome libretto that upheld the

unbalanced gender hierarchy and power dynamics embedded within the patriarchy of

fascist Italy and its operas. In this context, the antifeminism present in Lucrezia is a

reflection of the antifeminism of fascist Italy.

Lucrezia is a one-act opera in three moments with eleven named roles: La

Voce (mezzo soprano), Lucrezia (soprano), Servia (mezzo soprano), Venilia

(soprano), Collatino (tenor), Bruto (tenor), Tarquinio (baritone), Tito (baritone),

Arunte (baritone), Spurio Lucrezio (bass), and Valerio (baritone). There are no

choruses in this work—small ensembles and solo passages constitute the entire

opera. In the first moment, all of the men, save Spurio Lucrezio and Valerio, are away

from their Roman homes on the battlefield, drinking in Tarquinio’s tent. As they drink

and socialize, they imagine what their wives are doing in their absence, and Collatino

makes a bet that his wife, Lucrezia, is the most chaste of them all and will not be at the

banquet other wives are attending. The men wager a bet and ride to see Lucrezia is

indeed at home before returning to their encampment. The second moment takes

place in Lucrezia and Collatino’s home. While the men are away, Tarquinio

unexpectedly arrives as Lucrezia is about to retire for the evening. Lucrezia asks him

for news from the battlefront and offers to let him stay the night, of which he takes

advantage. Tarquinio is transfixed by Lucrezia; he violates her on multiple levels and

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destroys her will to live by raping her. In the third moment, Lucrezia is suffering the

effects of her rape. Her father, husband, and his friends find her devastated, and she

names her attacker before committing suicide by stabbing herself. They vow revenge

and leave to kill Tarquinio as the opera concludes.

By the 1930s, Claudio Monteverdi had been firmly positioned as the father of opera thanks to the writings of poet-philosopher Gabriele D’Annunzio in his 1900 novel, Il fuoco. For D’Annunzio, this was not a historical narrative, but rather an aesthetic reimagination of operatic history to reclaim Italian supremacy in the face of

Wagnerian dominance. Monteverdi is the ultimate figure of Italian operatic authority for D’Annunzio: “We must glorify the greatest of innovators: the divine Claudio

Monteverde […] what a heroic soul, purely Italian in its essence! […] he undertook his work in the storm, loving, suffering battling, alone with his faith, with his passion, and with his genius.”51 Ottorino, along with many of his contemporaries such as Gian

Francesco Malipiero and Luigi Dallapiccola, was particularly interested in the works

of Monteverdi and created several transcriptions of his music.52 Indeed, Respighi was embedded within the movement to revive Monteverdi in the early twentieth century, and he arranged Lamento di Arianna for orchestra in 1908. In 1934, he was

commissioned by La Scala to create an arrangement of Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo (1607)

for the 1934/35 opera season.53 Respighi was not the first or the only composer to

arrange L’Orfeo, indeed there was a L’Orfeo craze in the early twentieth century which

51 Gabriele D’Annunzio, Il fuoco (Milan: Fratelli Treves, 1900; rpt 1989), 187. Translation as cited in Andrew Dell’Antonio, “Il divino Claudio: Monteverdi and Lyric Nostalgia in Fascist Italy,” Cambridge Opera Journal 8, no. 3 (1996): 271–84. 52 For a descriptive catalogue of Respighi’s works, manuscripts, and transcriptions, see Potito Pedarra, “Catalogo delle composizioni di Ottorino Respighi” in Ottorino Respighi, ed. Giancarlo Rostirolla (Torino: ERI, 1985), 327-404. 53 Ottorino gave an interview on his arrangement of Monteverdi’s Orfeo, which can be found in Respighi, Fifty Years of a Life in Music, 189.

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included versions by Vincent d’Indy (1905), Gian Francesco Malipiero (1930), and Carl

Orff (1939).54 While Malipiero faithfully reconstructed Monteverdi’s score, Respighi

took great liberties with his arrangement, which Nigel Fortune describes as “an

opulent vulgarisation of Monteverdi’s original” and Pietro Mascagni called “truly

unseemly.”55 Thus, Respighi injected his own musical style into L’Orfeo, resulting in a

Respighian interpretation of Monteverdi. It is evident that Ottorino was influenced by

Monteverdi’s musical style as he composed Lucrezia, an opera that drew upon the traditions of the Italian operatic past in a radical departure from the bombastic orchestration synonymous with Respighi’s established, impressionist style. Musical traits evocative of this inspiration include sparse orchestration, a mezzo soprano narrator (La Voce) as a parallel of L’Orfeo’s narrator (La Musica), allusions to modality, and a palpable focus on vocal text setting.

Respighi, known for his colorful, dense, post-Romantic orchestration was determined to subvert expectations and challenge his own stylistic norms, though the result was more of an illusion to Monteverdi rather than a thorough realization of his seventeenth-century musical style.56 Respighi made an intentional choice with the

orchestration in Lucrezia, demonstrating his ability to compose in a style different

from that most associated with his music, while giving the critics something to talk

about. Guastalla recounts this choice for Lucrezia in his Notebooks:

54 Other versions of L’Orfeo were created by Vito Frazzi, Paul Hindemith, Valentino Bucchi, Bruno Maderna, and Luciano Berio. For a detailed history of these editions, see Nigel Fortune, “The Rediscovery of ‘Orfeo’,” in Claudio Monteverdi: Orfeo, ed. John Whenham (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986), 78-118. 55 Ibid., 95. 56 Respighi composed several works that can be described as sixteenth, seventeenth, or eighteenth- century pastiche, including the concerto all’antica (1908), Antiche danze ed arie (1917, 1923, 1932), and Gli uccelli (1928). For an overview of Respighi’s musical style, see John C.G. Waterhouse, Janet Waterhouse, and Potito Pedarra. "Respighi, Ottorino." Grove Music Online. 2001; Accessed 15 Nov. 2019.

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He strove for the utmost simplicity, stripping his music of all inessentials, reducing the orchestra to a minimum and showing what could be achieved with the strictest economy of means. In some passages the voice is unaccompanied. The Maestro would say with a smile, ‘They’ll talk about Respighi’s orchestra.’ For, irritated by the familiar eulogies of his prodigious skill in orchestration—praise which after all was a form of criticism, he was determined to destroy the legend.57

By challenging the expectations for his orchestration, Respighi shifts the focus from the orchestra to the singers.58 Indeed, the orchestration in Lucrezia provides space for the singers to shine and musically drive the opera. Strings and woodwinds accompany the singers during the long sections of recitative, while horns and percussion are reserved for specific scenes in the opera, including the rape of

Lucrezia. Respighi’s use of tutti orchestra during the rape of Lucrezia is reminiscent of Strauss, and stands stark in contrast to the majority of opera, comprised of recitative-like passages that focus on the singers rather than the orchestra. Though this shift is radical for Respighi, the relatively sparse orchestration, exemplified by use of the strings and woodwinds, is evocative of a chamber orchestra, which in moments of narrative importance emerges as full tutti.

From the very beginning of the opera, the importance and primacy of the voice

is evident in Lucrezia. There is no orchestral prelude or introduction, indeed there is no instrumental accompaniment at all in the first few pages of the opera. Instead, a solo baritone voice sings a drinking song before his tune is elaborated upon by a solo tenor voice, and the two voices sing a unison duet. The opening tune and duet are in

57 Respighi, Ottorino Respighi; His Life Story, 163. 58 Lucrezia is scored for strings, piccolo, 2 flutes, 2 oboes, english horn, 2 clarinets in B flat, 2 bassoons, 4 horns in F, 3 trumpets in B flat, 2 tenor trombones, bass trombone, tuba, cymbals, bass drum, and tam-tam.

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the tonal area of F.59 Only after this duet concludes does the orchestra make its first appearance with a brief interlude before the ensemble of Roman men return.

Respighi’s final opera highlights the voice; the sparse orchestration complements the vocal lines, where notes almost always align syllabically, allowing for easily discernable diction. The prevalence of the voice in Lucrezia is also underscored by the inclusion of the anthropomorphic La Voce, who narrates the action of the opera from the orchestra pit, physically separating her body from the other singers on stage.

La Voce is reminiscent of Monteverdian narrators, such as La Musica in L’Orfeo, and this character sings extended recitative and arioso passages throughout the opera, the first of which appears at the end of the first moment. This passage combines recitative and arioso, beginning with repeated G major chords that are softly

59 See appendix for an analytical table of Lucrezia, detailing moments, narrative action, incipits, tonal centers, characters, form, pages in the vocal score, and corresponding tracks for listening. Pages correspond to the Ricordi vocal score, Ottorino Respighi, Lucrezia (Milan: Ricordi, 1936). Tracks correspond to the most recent and widely available recording of the work. Ottorino Respighi, Lucrezia, Slovak Radio Symphony Orchestra (Bratislava), conducted by Adriano, recorded June 9-16, 1994, Marco Polo (1995), CD.

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sustained by strings when La Voce makes her first entrance (Example 13)

Example 13: La Voce Recitative in G, Lucrezia, First Moment (pg. 29)

The G major tonal center quickly shifts to G minor, and this modal mixture is

characteristic of the harmony during La Voce’s recitative-arioso passage before cadencing on E, which becomes the new tonal center until the end of the moment.

Throughout La Voce’s first moment recitative-arioso passage, the orchestra provides light, chordal accompaniment, with a wide range of dynamic markings, from pianissimo to fortississimo. During the sections of recitative, the chordal accompaniment by strings and woodwinds is piano, supporting La Voce without

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covering her music and text. Dynamics crescendo as she reaches the upper register, cadencing on an E5.

The harmonic range of La Voce is not limited to modal mixture; in the second moment she has a chromatic passage that is decidedly hyperchromatic. The tension between half steps, whole steps, and ever-changing accidentals is amplified by the slow ascent of the vocal and orchestral lines, mirroring the tension of Tarquinio’s unexpected arrival to Lucrezia’s home (Example 14). Throughout the opera, passages of tonal ambiguity are brief, yet strikingly effective. In La Voce’s hyperchromatic passage during the second moment, her text corresponds to the inner thoughts of

Tarquino and how he lusts after Lucrezia, positioning La Voce as a narrator who is privy to the story rather than reacting as events unfold.

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Example 14: Hyperchromatic Passage in Lucrezia, Second Moment (pg. 54)

The key signatures Respighi provides in Lucrezia do not always signal strict tonality, but they do correspond to defined tonal centers. Here, his continued usage of key signatures is a reminder of his position as a musical traditionalist and underscore the musical traditionalism of Lucrezia. Overall, the opera is quite tonal, colored by

allusions to modality with modulatory passages during sections of recitative (Example

15).

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Example 15: Tonal Schema of Lucrezia

An overt musical comparison can be drawn between Respighi and Verdi in the

second moment of the opera. During Lucrezia’s arioso, “E piangeva la misera donna,”

she recounts the tragic story of Elissa (Dido) to her two female servants, prior to

Tarquinio’s unexpended arrival.60 It is here that a triple exclamation of “Perfido!

Perfido! Perfido!” recalls a passage from Desdemona’s The Willow Song in Verdi’s

Otello (1887). Andrea Della Corte, music critic for the Turin newspaper La Stampa,

noted Lucrezia’s triple “Perfido!” as a descendent of Desdemona’s triple “Salce!” in

his review of the opera’s premiere.61 Since the premiere, critics and musicologists

have continued to comment upon this connection. Alberto Cantù contextualizes the

link between Respighi and Verdi in this scene:

[…] the great Virgilian aria of the second moment purposely follows Desdemona’s The Willow Song, and not so much in the characteristics of crying (<>) or of the general atmosphere of night parting (<< Riponi la tunica... >>), as in the triple exclamation of << Perfido! Perfido! Perfido! >> which imitates Verdi's << Salce! Salce! Salce! >> and in the overall tone of unhappy love story (Lucrezia as Desdemona, Dido as Barbara).

60 Perfido! Perfido! Perfido! Appears on page 41 of the vocal score to Lucrezia. 61 Andrea Della Corte, “La prima di Lucrezia: opera postuma di Respighi,” La Stampa, February 25, 1937.

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[…] la grande aria virgiliana del secondo momento infine ricalca volutamente la Canzone del salice di Desdemona, e non tanto nel particolare del pianto (<>) o della generica atmosfera di commiato notturno (<>), quanto nella triplice esclamazione di <> che imita il verdiano <> e nel tono complessivo di racconto di infelice storia d’amore (Lucrezia come Desdemona, Didone come Barbara).62

Desdemona’s “Salce!” and Lucrezia’s “Perfido!” share the same general contour, a descending leap of a minor third from D to B, and both place rhythmic emphasis on the first syllable of the word (Example 16). However, there are also a few key

differences between Verdi and Respighi’s syllabic settings. Because “Salce!” has two

syllables and “Perfido!” has three, Lucrezia sings three notes per exclamation

(E,D,B), while Desdemona sings two (D,B). The rhythmic duration of the

exclamations is also different, though both Desdemona and Lucrezia repeat the

shorter duration twice before augmenting the rhythm in the third exclamation. Finally,

Desdemona sings unaccompanied, while Lucrezia is accompanied by strings.

62 Alberto Cantù, Respighi Compositore (Torino: EDA, 1985), 214-215.

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Example 16: Desdemona and Lucrezia: Otello, Act IV; Lucrezia, Second Moment (pg. 41)

Lucrezia’s “Perfido! Perfido! Perfido!” occurs during the beginning of her arioso passage, “E piangeva la misera donna”—which is in the tonal area of E minor and has a hauntingly beautiful sound. Narratively, the story of Elissa (Dido) foreshadows the impending tragedy that will soon befall Lucrezia; the parallel between the two women is a bit heavy-handed, but nonetheless effective.

While the comparison of Lucrezia to Desdemona noted by Della Corte and

Cantù underscores a musical connection between Respighi’s Lucrezia and Verdi’s

Otello, these operas also share a conceptual link to Shakespeare. According to

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Guastalla, “Respighi had chosen the tragic story of Lucrezia after reading

Shakespeare’s poem The Rape of Lucrece…”63 Although Shakespeare may have been the spark that led to the creation of Lucrezia, Guastalla chose to use Livy’s account of the tragedy in The History of Rome as the source for his libretto, which he felt was more dramatically powerful than Shakespeare’s English version. By using Livy rather than Shakespeare as his primary source for the libretto, Guastalla strengthened the

romanità of Lucrezia, adapting the words of the Roman Empire’s most enduring historian rather than the Bard’s English translation.64 Romanità drew inspiration from the culture of ancient Rome and the PNF capitalized on this lineage, celebrating the glories of their ancestors through the creation of new works. Respighi also glorified the Italian musical past with his traditional style in Lucrezia, connecting his musical legacy to Monteverdi and Verdi.

Antifeminism in Lucrezia and Fascist Italy

Lucrezia was a traditional Respighian opera, traversing the centuries for musical

inspiration resulting in an interesting display of historicism rooted in an antifeminist

narrative. The libretto inspired by ancient Rome celebrates romanità through tragedy,

showcasing the demise of a woman who was brutally raped by her husband’s friend.

As previously noted, the rape of Lucrezia is significant in Roman history, as it marked

the end of Roman sovereignty and the beginning of the Roman republic. Indeed, acts

of physical and sexual violence against women are foundational to several key events

63 Respighi, Ottorino Respighi; His Life Story, 162. 64 Guastalla would also use Livy as his source for the libretto of Gli Orazi, his uncredited collaboration with Ennio Porrino. See chapter 4.

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in Roman history, such as the rape of the Sabine women led by Romulus, the founder

of Rome. When the Sabine women refused to marry Roman men, they were kidnapped

and forced into marriage with their abductors with the goal of populating Rome.65

While depictions of violence against women leading to their death are commonplace

in opera, the primacy of female characters is a rare occurrence in fascist Italian operas

from the 1930s and early 1940s, which almost exclusively feature male protagonists

and are dominated by male characters.66 Lucrezia is a tragic opera, showing a version of romanità focused on the glorification of Rome and the gendered violence of the ancient Roman patriarchy where Lucrezia is lauded for her virtue.

The heart of the opera’s narrative occurs in the second moment when

Tarquinio declares his predatory desires to Lucrezia, and despite her unwavering resistance, he rapes her. This passage is the longest continuous scene in the entire opera and cycles through multiple tonal areas, including f, eb, cs, f s, and f; a tumultuous musical representation of the horrific violence present in the narrative.

Indeed, Respighi embraced the fluidity of harmonic systems, drawing upon his old- fashioned, post-Romantic inclinations in a context where dissonance had already been emancipated.67 As the menacing duet between Tarquino and Lucrezia reaches a frenzied peak, he attacks her and she cries out in the upper register with a chromatic ascent from A5 to C6. La Voce responds with “Vile! Vile! Vile!” disgusted by

65 66 The other operas in this dissertation, Mascagni’s Nerone (1935), Malipiero’s Giulio Cesare (1936), and Porrino’s Gli Orazi (1941), all have titular male protagonists and the few female characters play smaller roles than the male characters. 67 While it is unlikely Respighi was familiar with Arnold Schoenberg’s theoretical writings on the emancipation of dissonance in his 1926 essay “Opinion or Insight,” his harmonic language was unencumbered by the restraints of tonality. Arnold Schoenberg, “Opinion or Insight?” in Style and Idea: Selected Writings of Arnold Schoenberg, ed. Leonard Stein, trans. Leo Black (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984), 258-264.For more about the state of harmonic language in fascist Italy, see Chapter 4.

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Tarquinio’s assault, she brings the horrific scene to a close (Example 17). Mercifully,

the rape itself is not depicted on stage—the second moment ends with an orchestral

interlude and the return of c#.

Example 17: Vocal Climax in the Rape Scene, Lucrezia, Second Moment (pg. 83)

Lucrezia’s vocal climax signals her rape by Tarquinio, which continues during the

orchestral interlude that follows, and her cry of “Ah!” ascends to the highest sung

note of the opera. This operatic cry is a common portrayal of violence, an audible

signifier of Lucrezia’s pain; Lucrezia’s melodic cry at the moment of her rape portends

her inconsolable grief and a violation that will result in suicide.68 The rape of Lucrezia

68 A melodic cry as opposed to a pure cry, more akin to shouting, as differentiated by Michel Poizat. The musical pleasure, pain, and emotions of jouissance as experienced in opera are discussed at great length in Michel Poizat, The Angel’s Cry: Beyond the Pleasure Principle in Opera, trans. Arthur Denner (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1992), 76 and Michel Poizat, “‘The Blue Note’ and ‘The Objectified Voice and the Vocal Object,’” Cambridge Opera Journal, no. 3 (1991): 195–211.

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is explicitly antifeminist; an act of sexual violence that destroys the titular

protagonist’s will to live, and because of this she commits suicide to uphold her

‘virtue.’69 This rape is a violent demonstration of male power and dominance over one of the few female characters in the opera. As a result of Tarquinio’s sexual violence,

Lucrezia felt she was no longer pure enough for her husband, Collatino, despite his declarations of love and assurance of his belief in her innocence. Though Tarquinio is clearly at fault, Lucrezia feels that she can only regain her purity in death, and this is the driving force behind her suicide. Lucrezia’s suicide continues the well-established practice of female opera characters dying on-stage, merging musical cultural with violence against women.70 The sexual and mortal violence Lucrezia experiences in this opera are extreme portrayals of the patriarchal order present both in ancient Rome and fascist Italy.

Women did not have the same rights, freedoms, or cultural expectations as men in fascist Italy. While class, race, age, education, nationality, and other factors were key in determining the individual and very different experiences of women, in general women were subject to the antifeminist position of Mussolini and the PNF. In

1932, Mussolini expressed this position clearly: “My notion of woman’s role in the

State is utterly opposed to feminism. Of course I do not want women to be slaves, but if here in Italy I proposed to give our women votes, they would laugh me to scorn. As

69 Several recent writings on sexual violence in opera and the historiography of the discourse are detailed in this colloquy: Suzanne G. Cusick, and Monica A. Hershberger, "Sexual Violence in Opera: Scholarship, Pedagogy, and Production as Resistance," Journal of the American Musicological Society, vol. 71, no. 1 (2018): 213-253. 70 Catherine Clément’s seminal work on the violence against women portrayed in 19th century opera laid the groundwork for decades of feminist musicology writings on opera. Catherine Clément, trans. Betsy Wing. Opera, or the Undoing of Women (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1988).

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far as political life is concerned, they do not count here.”71 Women were situated as different and less than men in the context of fascist Italy; without suffrage or a democratic government their political opinions were of no concern to the PNF.

Indeed, women in Italy did not obtain the right to vote until after the fall of fascism in

1945.72 The antifeminist viewpoint of the PNF was strengthened by its partnership with the Catholic Church following the Lateran Pacts of 1929, as neither the Vatican nor the PNF supported equity for women.73 As a result, the PNF could draw upon the power of Catholic religious doctrine to legitimize the patriarchal order.

Women were expected to support the efforts and aspirations of men, as well as to have babies and grow the Italian population to strengthen Italy’s political position in the world. This was the mission as directed by Mussolini during his 1927

Ascension Day Speech: “the most fundamental, essential element in the political, and therefore economic, and moral, influence of a nation lies in its demographic strength.

[…] Italy, if she is to count for anything in the world, must have a population of not less than 60 million inhabitants by the middle of this century up from approximately 40 million.”74 Two years prior to Mussolini’s speech, the Opera Nazionale per la

Maternità ed Infanzia (National Organization for Mother and Child, ONMI) was

founded by the fascist government, providing social welfare to mothers and young

71 Karen Offen, European Feminisms, 1700-1950: A Political History (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2000), 286. 72 For further insights, see Susanna Mancini, “From the Struggle for Suffrage to the Construction of a Fragile Gender Citizenship: Italy 1861-2009,” in The Struggle for Female Suffrage in Europe: Voting to Become Citizens, ed. Ruth Rubio-Marin and Blanca Rodriguez-Rui (Leiden: Brill, 2012), 373-388. 73 Alexander De Grand, “Women under Italian Fascism,” The Historical Journal 19, no. 4 (1976): 956- 57. 74 Lauren E. Forcucci, “Battle for Births: The Fascist Pronatalist Campaign in Italy 1925 to 1938,” Journal of the Society for the Anthropology of Europe 10, no. 1 (2010): 4.

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children to incentivize motherhood with programming and propaganda.75 Rural, peasant women were the target demographic for ONMI and Mussolini’s birth campaign. Adding to the pronatalist position of the Italian state was the fact that all forms of contraception were illegal, and abortions were considered criminal acts against the state.76 The Catholic Church and the PNF upheld this position together, the Church deeming contraception a sin and the PNF hoping to increase the population by whatever means necessary.77 Their mission to increase population and thereby reduce women to their reproductive capabilities went hand in hand with limiting their employment opportunities.

These efforts were diametrically opposed to the work opportunities Italian women had throughout World War I. During this war, Italian women worked in a variety of industries to support the war efforts, filling those jobs that men left vacant while they were participating in battle. This shift in the labor market valued women as workers because they were essential to maintaining the economy in a radical reversal of gendered roles that was both empowering and temporary. According to Daniela

Rossini, depictions of women working were used in the press in jobs at home usually reserved for men, while male soldiers were depicted doing household chores usually

reserved for women while away on the battlefield—“But this inversion of roles was

75 For more information about OMNI, see Michela Minesso, Madri, figli, welfare: istituzioni e politiche dall’Italia liberale ai giorni nostri (Bologna: Società editrice il mulino, 2015) and Elisabetta Vezzosi, “Maternalism in a Paternalist State: The National Organization for the Protection of Motherhood and Infancy in Fascist Italy,” in Maternalism Reconsidered: Motherhood, Welfare and Social Policy in the Twentieth Century, ed. Marian van der Klein, et al. (New York: Berghahn Books, 2012), 190-204. 76 Perry R. Willson, “Flowers for the Doctor: Pro-Natalism and Abortion in Fascist Milan,” Modern Italy vol.1, no. 2 (1996): 49-54. 77 Luisa Passerini, Fascism in Popular Memory: The Cultural Experience of the Turin Working Class, trans. Robert Lumley and Jude Bloomfield (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987), 159.

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consistently presented not as indicative of a lasting social evolution towards more

equal gender roles but as ‘the acme of an extreme, dramatic, pathological situation,’

that should be righted as soon as the war ended.”78 The majority of workers in Italy

during World War I were women: by 1917, 70% of the munitions industry was

comprised of female labor. After legal equity for men and women in the context of

employment was declared in the Sacchi law of 1919, women’s participation in

professional life seemed poised to continue in full force.79 Yet, the progressive

potential of equity in employment suggested by the Sacchi law did not materialize

after the war. Italian women were not given the right to vote and those who had gainful

employment during the war had extreme difficulty finding work in peacetime. As

veterans returned home, they reclaimed the jobs that were occupied by women during

their absence, resulting in mass unemployment for Italian women. The effort to

remove women from the workforce coincided with the rise of fascism in Italy.80

In fascist Italy, the types of jobs women worked were extremely dependent

upon their class and access to social capital, or lack thereof. Since middle- and upper-class families did not depend upon the income from working women to survive,

women from those classes were not as focused on working to earn a living as their

counterparts with fewer means. Indeed, women from the middle- and upper-classes

rarely participated in creative pursuits as professionals or for their primary source of

income. These class-specific social norms in the context of the fascist patriarchal

society resulted in the exclusion of women from many aspects of fascist musical

78 Daniela Rossini, “Feminism and Nationalism: The National Council of Italian Women, the World War, and the Rise of Fascism, 1911–1922,” Journal of Women’s History 26, no. 3 (September 11, 2014): 43. 79 De Grand, “Women under Italian Fascism,” 949. 80 For specifics on how the fascist state treated women working in the interwar period see Victoria de Grazia, “Working,” in How Fascism Ruled Women: Italy, 1922-1945 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1992), 166-200.

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culture. Such gendered exclusion is particularly evident in the realm of music

composition, where the majority of composers were, and continue to be, men.

Victoria de Grazia provides an illuminating anecdote about the reality for Italian

women in composition:

In 1937 the exceptionally talented composer Barbara Giuranna won the first prize of the National Fascist Syndicate of Musicians for her symphonic poem Decima legio. Recently widowed with a family to support, Giuranna was still thwarted in her attempts to win a conservatory professorship. This was in spite of the fact that her prizewinning composition had been performed sixteen times, counting its Milanese premiere at La Scala (which was ruined for her when a man in the audience shouted out, “Get a husband!”).81

Barbara Giuranna’s success challenged the status quo and she was treated poorly on

the basis of her gender. Men dominated the fascist musical scene so much so that by

1940 each of the 105 officers named in the registry of the National Fascist Union of

Musicians were men. Harvey Sachs positions the blatant antifeminism embedded

within the registry as “simply one among many examples of the contempt with which

women’s intellectual and organizational capacities were regarded by the regime.”82

Despite the participation of women in fascist musical society, particularly as

performers, they did not hold positions of power in the bureaucratic systems created

by the PNF. Nevertheless, female participation in composition and performance was

essential. For example, without the labor and talents of Elsa Respighi, Lucrezia would not have been completed nor staged.

81 Ibid., 252. 82 Sachs, Music in Fascist Italy, 30.

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Elsa Completed the Incomplete Lucrezia: She Knew the Opera by Heart

By all accounts, Elsa and Ottorino had a very supportive and intensely codependent relationship. They met when Elsa was a student in Ottorino’s composition course, and after they married in 1919, she abandoned her own compositional work to support his career. Claudio Guastalla, favored librettist and friend of the Respighis, outlined the nature of Elsa and Ottorino’s relationship at their Roman villa, I Pini:

‘Silence! The Maestro is working.’ Life there is governed by this law. The Maestro’s work is sacred. A sacred fire of which Elsa is the Vestal. […] The maternal instinct that is in every woman, Elsa uses it to protect, watch over, warm […] perhaps even spoil the Maestro a little. One by one Respighi delegated to his wife all the tiresome things and worries—money matters, even the smallest, for example. […] All routine and business correspondence with publishers and impressarios became Elsa’s exclusive province for which, as the Maestro’s secretary, she had to learn typewriting and languages. She had learnt other things too! To cut his hair, for example, as Respighi detested going to a barber, and so he was also spared this annoyance. […] So as not to worry and get annoyed, Respighi never read press notices. Elsa did and selected what she thought advisable to tell him.83

The limits of Elsa’s caretaking knew no bounds—she curated an easy life for Ottorino, catering to his wants while placing him and his work upon a pedestal. Elsa created a comfortable bubble for Ottorino to inhabit, acting as intermediary between her husband and the outside world. She put aside any personal aspirations to support the aspirations of her husband in a society where she could not have achieved the same level of success due to her gender. Although Ottorino encouraged Elsa to continue composing after they were married, her compositional activities quickly decreased and she found herself unable to continue: “it was always difficult to pull myself together and focus on my work, absorbed as I was in Respighi’s life. […] I would have

83 Respighi, Ottorino Respighi; His Life Story, 128-129.

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had to distance myself from the Maestro’s current work and his earlier

accomplishments; and this was not possible.”84 Elsa’s role as the wife of Ottorino

Respighi was deeply ingrained in her identity, even after his death—she worked tirelessly to uphold his legacy for the final six decades of her life, which ended in 1996 just shy of her hundred and second birthday.

Part of ensuring the legacy of Ottorino and his music depended on finishing the incomplete score to his final opera, Lucrezia. Elsa painstakingly completed the

score, using draft parts to compose in Ottorino’s late style for absent sections of

music. She recounts this process in her memoir:

I knew the opera by heart because in the afternoon Ottorino would always let me hear what he had composed in the morning. But I had not followed the score. In looking at it again, I realized that a few pages from the middle were missing, and, of course, the end. What I found particularly odd was that Ottorino had only indicated the names of the characters in the finished pages of the score. He had worked out the voice parts in his daily drafts but had not transfered [sic] them to the score. […] The task of tracking down each singer’s part in the daily drafts was painful. […] As far as the pages of the score were concerned, I tried to be as faithful as possible to the character that Respighi had given them.85 I was so exhausted that I asked a student of Respighi, Ennio Porrino, for help transcribing the parts for the singers, which I was deciphering little by little from the first manuscript. I assumed direct responsibility for the missing pages of the score because I wanted the instrumentation to correspond as much as possible to the last works by Respighi. I patiently researched chord sequences and passages that, in Lucrezia, seemed to be like passaged in other works by Respighi. It was a long, painful, and tiring work; but La Scala wanted to present the opera during the 1937/38 season; and the publishing house Ricordi kept urging me on, since they had to prepare all the material in time for the occasion.86

Elsa used her skills and intimate knowledge of Ottorino’s musical style to complete

Lucrezia, filling-in the missing pages with music indiscernible from that written by her

84 Respighi, Fifty Years of a Life in Music, 68. 85 Ibid., 205. 86 Ibid., 208-9.

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husband. It is undeniable that she purposely hid her own musical style in this project.

Lucrezia was Ottorino’s opera and Elsa finished the work in his style in such a convincing manner that Victor De Sabata, artistic director of La Scala, praised her abilities during the first rehearsal for the premiere: “Elsa, you know that I know

Respighi’s scores thoroughly. Yet I can tell you that I have been unable to discern which pages you composed.”87 To imitate so convincingly Ottorino’s musical style bespoke Elsa’s compositional talent; this talent also had the potential to hide her labor in the score to Lucrezia. Nevertheless, in an extraordinary celebration of female

compositional labor, Elsa was named as the completer of Lucrezia by multiple

sources. To ensure the success of the opera, Elsa curried favor with the fascist

regime by presenting Mussolini with a copy of Lucrezia, a ceremonial act that has

become routine by 1937. Elsa’s ceremonial presentation and her labor were chronicled in the Milanese newspaper Corriere della Sera:

Respighi had entirely completed the music composition and only twenty-nine pages of the score were missing, which Elsa Respighi (who was an excellent pupil of the maestro) completed, curating the edition of the musical score. Respighi aveva interamente compiuto la composizione della musica e mancavano soltanto ventinove pagine di partiturà che Elsa Respighi (che del maestro fu eccellente allieva) ha condotto a termine curando poi l’edizione dello partito.88

This echoed an interview with Elsa Respighi that appeared in the Roman newspaper

La Tribuna: “Elsa Respighi completed her husband’s score by herself.” “Elsa

Respighi ha completato, da sola, la partitura del marito.”89 Elsa’s role in completing

the score was so widely reported that it appeared in the American magazine,

87 Ibid., 209. 88 “L’omaggio al Duce di un’opera postuma di Respighi” Roma 23 Gennaio, Corriere della Sera, 24 Gennaio, 1937, pg. 5. 89 Alberto Gasco, La Tribuna, 22 Gennaio, 1937.

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Newsweek: “At the opera’s close, Signora Elsa Olivieri Respighi, the composer’s widow, accepted the resounding applause—some of which was for her part in the successful premiere. A composer in her own right, she had completed scoring the last 40 pages of ‘Lucrezia,’ the story of an early Roman heroine.”90 With all of the publicity surrounding Elsa, it was logical for her name to be included in the published score.

Ricordi acknowledged Elsa in the prefatory pages of the Lucrezia vocal score,

crediting her for completing the score while egregiously misspelling her name

(Example 18). The printed acknowledgement of ‘Elisa’ rather than Elsa would be

comical if it did not point to the lack of editorial oversight by Ricordi to represent

correctly the name of the woman with whom they were intimately acquainted.

Example 18: Lucrezia Vocal Score Misspelling

90 “OPERA: Respighi Widow Scores Final 40 Pages of His Posthumous ‘Lucrezia’,” Newsweek, March 6, 1937, 35.

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By completing Lucrezia, Elsa merged her roles as composer and supporter of her late husband’s musical legacy. Since Elsa intentionally finished the score in Ottorino’s style, it would have been easy to omit Elsa’s name from the score, hiding her labor in support of Ottorino’s success. Nevertheless, Elsa was recognized for her contributions to Ottorino’s opera—an opera that could not have been performed without her guidance or support. Such recognitions are noteworthy because they were public acknowledgements of a woman’s labor in the male-dominated space of

music composition. Unsurprisingly, women’s labor was frequently undervalued and

overlooked in fascist Italian society writ large.

Conclusion: The Respighis’ Fascist Entanglements

Ottorino Respighi’s musical legacy will always be entangled with the fascist context in which he lived and worked. His position as an apolitical bystander uninterested in politics does not erase his connections to Mussolini, fascism, or the National Fascist

Party; whether or not he was ever a member of the PNF, nevertheless Respighi performed fascism as an active participant in fascist musical societies and intellectual groups, including the revered Accademia d’Italia. Lucrezia was a product of musical culture in fascist Italy, created as an operatic version of the romanità Ottorino

captured so well in his orchestral works favored by the Duce: Fontane di Roma, Pini di

Roma, and Feste Romane. He embraced traditionalism in Lucrezia, glorifying musical

conventions of the Italian past in a fascistic combination of old and new styles.

Guastalla’s libretto was inspired by Livy’s account of the Lucrezia tragedy, a narrative

that challenged the primacy of male characters in works that took inspiration from

ancient Roman sources. The brutal violence enacted upon Lucrezia by Tarquinio and

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the patriarchal norms of her society which equated her ‘purity’ with her will to live

drove her to commit suicide. This violence is a reflection of the antifeminist society

upheld by Mussolini and the National Fascist Party. In the patriarchal society of

fascist Italy, women did not have the same opportunities as men, and many wives

curbed their ambitions to support their husbands, just as Elsa did for Ottorino. The

premiere of Ottorino Respighi’s Lucrezia not only showcased his final opera as a posthumous commemoration, it also highlighted the key role of Elsa Respighi in completing and staging the work.

Although Ottorino Respighi rarely voiced his political beliefs, he produced an opera that glorified ancient Rome and music of the Italian past, which was ceremonially presented to Mussolini, cementing the connection between Lucrezia and the fascist regime. My examination of Respighi’s Lucrezia underscores the patriarchal society of fascist Italy, limitations placed upon women within that society, the performative nature of participating in fascism, and Elsa’s sustained effort to distance her husband from the fascist regime. It is evident that Ottorino performed fascism and benefited from the National Fascist Party in a variety of ways. The financial and political support the Respighis received from Mussolini’s regime cannot be understated: both Ottorino and Elsa personally met with Mussolini on several occasions and he was a member of the fascist Accademia d’Italia. In spite of these actions, or perhaps because of them, Elsa predicated Ottorino’s legacy upon his apoliticism and fervently denied any involvement in the National Fascist Party. This curated positionality flattens the landscape of engagement with fascism and is reflective of the political baggage of fascist association in a post-World War II context. Despite the assertions of his widow, Ottorino Respighi performed fascism through his engagement with Mussolini and participation in fascist organizations as a

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favored composer of the regime, creating Lucrezia to glorify ancient Rome as a piece of musical culture in fascist Italy.

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Chapter Four The Young Defender of ‘Italian’ Music: Ennio Porrino and his Gli Orazi

In the 1930s, Ennio Porrino (1910-1959) was an up-and-coming Sardinian composer who studied in Rome at the Accademia di Santa Cecilia. He developed his compositional skills as a disciple of Ottorino Respighi and went on to work with

Respighi’s operatic collaborator, Claudio Guastalla, after Respighi’s untimely death in

1936. Respighi and Guastalla, a Jew, created the composer’s final opera, Lucrezia,

which premiered in 1937 and continued to be performed after the racial laws of 1938 by

means of a special decree.1 Guastalla (1880-1948) was an established librettist, but the

one-act Gli Orazi was Porrino’s first opera. It premiered at the Teatro alla Scala on

February 1, 1941 as part of a triple bill alongside Stravinsky’s ballet, Firebird, and

Antonio Guarnieri’s commedia lirica, Il Malato Imaginario. The narrative of Gli Orazi

glorifies Ancient Rome, contributing to the body of operatic works that center on

romanità (Roman-ness), by focusing on the fatal dispute between the Orazi and

Curiazi families as documented in Livy’s History of Rome.2 Gli Orazi is the tale of two cities who decide to settle their dispute with a small-scale fight to the death rather

1 In May 1942, the minister of popular culture, Alessandro Pavolini, circulated a decree to the enti autonomi lirici (opera houses, literally: autonomous institutions), articulating that Ottorino Respighi’s operas with texts by Jewish librettist Claudio Guastalla would be exempt from an upcoming ban on works by Jewish authors. For specific policies, government agencies, and lists of Jewish cultural figures, see Luca Lévi Sala, “Propaganda, Negotiations, and Antisemitism at the Teatro La Fenice, 1937-43: Proscription Lists and Other Unpublished Documents,” Journal of Musicological Research 33, no. 4 (2014): 271–314. 2 The legend of the Orazi and Curiazi dates to the earliest period in Ancient Rome: the Roman Kingdom (753 BCE-509 BCE) where Kings ruled before the establishment of the Roman Republic. Livy’s History of Rome provided the source material for Guastalla’s Gli Orazi libretto.

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than engaging in total war.3 The city of Alba is represented by the Curiazi brothers, while the Orazi brothers fight for Rome. During the battle, the Curiazi seem poised to win the conflict for Alba, slaying two of the three Orazi. Against all odds, the lone

Orazio brother eliminates the three Curiazi, securing the victory for Rome. This decisive victory is quickly overshadowed when the victorious Orazio kills his own sister because she was grieving for the death of her lover, the slain Curiazio. The

pater familias of the Orazi begs the King of Rome to spare his remaining son for his

act of sororicide—the daughter is stigmatized for her involvement with the enemy, the

son is forgiven, and the Roman victory over Alba is celebrated.

Ennio Porrino positioned himself as a musical traditionalist, aligning himself

with other anti-modernist, Italian composers such as Ottorino Respighi, Ildebrando

Pizzetti, Giuseppe Mulè, Riccardo Zandonai, and others.4 In this context, musical

traditionalism draws upon conventions established in the late nineteenth-century by

operatic composers such as Giuseppe Verdi and Giacomo Puccini, privileging

melody and tonality. These broad musical parameters contribute to a working

definition of musical traditionalism when it is positioned as anti-modernism.

Modernism in this context is also a slippery term that can be understood as

3 The battle between the Orazi and Curiazi brothers was well-established in Italian opera, dating back to the late 18th century with Domenico Cimarosa’s Gli Orazi e Curiazi (1796) and a 19th century version entitled Orazi e Curiazi by Saverio Mercadante (1846). 4 Respighi, Pizzetti, Mulè, and Zandonai were amongst the ten signatories of the Manifesto di musicisti italiani per la tradizione dell’arte romantica dell’ottocento (Manifesto of Italian Musicians in Support of the Nineteenth-Century Tradition of Romantic Art) which was published on December 17, 1932 in Il popolo d’Italia, La Stampa, and Il corriere della sera. Text from the Manifesto in the original Italian can be found in Fiamma Nicolodi, Musica e musicisti nel ventennio fascista (Fiesole: Discanto, 1984), 141-143, while an excerpt of the Manifesto in English translation can be found in John C. G. Waterhouse, “The Emergence of Modern Italian Music up to 1940” (PhD diss., University of Oxford, 1968), 239. The excerpt translated by Waterhouse is cited in chapter 2 of this dissertation.

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reactionary, innovative, and anti-bourgeois.5 Musically, modernism can take many forms and in fascist Italy, it included everything from neoclassicism and the rediscovery of Monteverdi to dodecaphonic tone rows. The nebulous musical definitions ascribed to traditionalism and modernism provide space for creative interpretation rather than providing a strict set of guidelines. Indeed, the divide between musical traditionalism and modernism was more ideological than practical for Porrino. Despite his positionality as a traditionalist, he paradoxically used the lack of prescriptive stylistic boundaries to blend the late nineteenth-century operatic conventions of musical traditionalism with purportedly modernist elements to create

Gli Orazi.

The politics of musical style in fascist Italy embraced both the traditional and the modern, encouraging a plurality of musical styles rather than privileging one over the other. There was no Italian fascist analogue to Nazi Germany’s Entartete Musik

(degenerate music), which overwhelmingly vilified modernist music, jazz, and music

by Jewish composers.6 In May 1938, the Nazis created a Degenerate Music Exhibit

which took place in Düsseldorf, modeled after the Degenerate Art Exhibit of 1937. 7

Nevertheless, Porrino’s traditionalist aesthetic was paired with a fervent antisemitism,

5 For a discussion of the philosophical underpinnings of musical modernism in fascist Italy, see Ben Earle, “Fascist Modernism,” in Luigi Dallapiccola and Musical Modernism in Fascist Italy (Cambridge: Cambrdige University Press, 2013), 132-193. 6 For further discussions about the Degenerate Music Exhibition and failed attempts to define German or Nazi music, see Anson Rabinbach and Sander L. Gilman eds., The Third Reich Sourcebook (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2013), Pamela M. Potter, “What Is ‘Nazi Music’?,” The Musical Quarterly 88, no. 3 (August 25, 2006): 428–55, Richard A. Etlin, ed. Art, Culture, and Media under the Third Reich (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2002). 7 The Degenerate Art Exhibition was shown in Munich by the Nazi Party in 1937, displaying numerous works of modern and avant garde art. The ideological and popular success of the Degenerate Art Exhibition set the framework for the Degenerate Music Exhibition. See Stephanie Barron, ed. Degenerate Art: The Fate of the Avant-Garde in Nazi Germany (Los Angeles: Los Angeles County Museum of Art; New York: H.N. Abrams, 1991) and Olaf Peters, ed. Degenerate Art: The Attack on Modern Art in Nazi Germany, 1937 (Munich: Prestel, 2014) for further discussions about the politics of the exhibit and reproductions of the artworks on display.

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creating an enticing false parallel with the musical policies of Nazi Germany by

showing one way of creating music for the Italian fascist state. Porrino distanced

himself from his modernist contemporaries, creating his opera, Gli Orazi, to glorify

the National Fascist Party and Italy. The combination of a nationalist rhetoric and a

willingness to attack those who held different viewpoints highlights the oppressive

potential of music and politics.

In this chapter, I argue that Porrino was a young defender of traditional Italian

music, using antisemitic rhetoric to denounce his rivals and erase the work of his

librettist, Claudio Guastalla, despite his use of modernist musical techniques and his

collaboration with a Jew. I explore the manifestations of Porrino’s traditionalist

allegiance in his writings on Italian music, in the reception of his Roman opera, Gli

Orazi, and within the opera’s stylistic musical markers. These topics are informed by

discussions about antisemitism in fascist Italy and its musical community as well as

fascist youth movements and the importance of youth in fascist culture. As a young,

fascist, male composer in a society that venerated youth and virility, Porrino had

notable power. Porrino attempted to elevate himself as a champion of traditional

Italian music by disparaging those who composed in a modernist style with racist

rhetoric, embracing the latent racism openly promoted by the fascist regime, yet he

used modernist techniques in Gli Orazi himself. This contradictory standpoint

underscores the limits of the traditional/modernism binary, revealing the space

between these two extremes as a site for more nuanced analysis.

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Antisemitism in Fascist Italy and its Musical Community

In any history of fascist Italy or Nazi Germany, antisemitism cannot be overlooked.

Antisemitism was an integral component of National Socialism in Germany; Jews

could not be Nazis because they were the chosen targets of Hitler’s racist ideology. A set of targeted antisemitic laws were enacted in Germany beginning in September

1935, including the Protection of German Blood and German Honor, the Reich

Citizenship Law, and the Reich Law Concerning the Display of the Flag. As Anson

Rabinbach and Sander Gilman note: “The Reich Citizenship Law made it impossible for anyone who did not have ‘German or kindred blood’ to be a citizen. All Jews lost the right to vote. They became, in the eyes of the Nazis, a separate people, who would no longer be permitted to share in the civil rights that had been slowly granted to them during the nineteenth century.”8 More than six million Jews were systematically

murdered by Nazis during the Holocaust. Many historical accounts position the

overtly antisemitic, Nazi ideology in contrast with fascist Italy’s general lack of interest

for racial politics—falsely stating that fascist Italy only adopted antisemitic racial

policies as a means of currying favor with Nazi Germany when they became political

allies.9

This false narrative flattens the historical landscape, failing to acknowledge

racism and antisemitism in fascist Italy absent the corrupting influence of Nazi

Germany. In this context, antisemitic, Nazi ideology is wrongly mapped onto Italian

8 Rabinbach and Gilman eds., The Third Reich Sourcebook, 338 9 For a nuanced account of this false narrative and its historiography, see Robert S.C. Gordon, “Race,” in The Oxford Handbook of Fascism, ed. R.J.B. Bosworth (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010), 296-298. Gordon traces the historical shift away from the false narrative of Nazi Germany corrupting fascist Italy to the work of Alexander De Grand, Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany, 2nd ed. (New York: Routledge, 2004), 2-3.

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fascism, particularly as Germany and Italy had a political accord, solidified in 1939 with the Pact of Steel.10 A key distinction between the axis powers is although antisemitism was certainly present in Italy, it was never a foundational component of fascist ideology. Jews could be fascists, and many were card carrying members of the

National Fascist Party.11 For sixteen years, fascist Italian Jews were treated much like any other fascist Italian citizens—Mussolini’s party embraced and encouraged Jewish participation since its beginnings in 1922.12 Italian Jews, and Roman Jews specifically were perhaps the most integrated into their society of all European Jews, establishing their place in the community nearly 2000 years earlier during the Roman Empire.13 In addition to their established places in Italian society, Italian Jews represented a small minority: in 1938 they accounted for 0.1% of the population, approximately 46,500 of

43,000,000 Italians.14

Nevertheless, Jews soon became the target of fascist Italian propaganda and racist policy. After a carefully orchestrated propaganda campaign beginning in

10 The treaty signed by Nazi Germany and fascist Italy was a declaration of their mutual support in war and peace, which was broken when Germany invaded Poland only months after the treaty was signed in September 1939. Mario Toscano’s The Origins of the Pact of Steel (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 1968) provides a diplomatic history of the treaty. 11 Margherita Grassini Sarfatti was an intellectual and a Jewish member of the National Fascist Party, until her conversion to Catholicism in 1928, perhaps most known for her intimate relationship with Mussolini as his mistress. She published a biography of the Duce which first appeared in English translation in Britain. Margherita Grassini Sarfatti, The Life of Benito Mussolini, trans. Frederic Whyte (London: T. Butterworth, ltd. 1925). Other notable fascist Jews who subsequently converted to Catholicism include Guido Jung, Minister of Finance and economist Gino Arias. Michele Sarfatti, The Jews in Mussolini’s Italy: From Equality to Persecution, trans. John and Anne C. Tedeschi (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 2006), 15-18. 12 Approximately 26.9% of Italian Jews were members of the National Fascist Party in 1938, prior to the racial laws revoking their party membership. For an in-depth discussion of the relationship between Italian Jews and the PNF, see Michele Sarfatti, “Introduction. Italy’s Fascist Jews: Insights on an Unusual Scenario,” Quest. Issues in Contemporary Jewish History, no. 11 (2017): V–XIV. 13 The Jewish community in Rome is the oldest in any European city and continues to practice to this day, centered in the Jewish Ghetto established in the sixteenth century as a result of a papal bull by Pope Paul IV require all Jews to live in a walled quarter. 14 Joshua D. Zimmerman, ed. Jews in Italy under Fascist and Nazi Rule, 1922-1945 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), 4.

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January 1938, regime sponsored antisemitism emerged in full force when the

Manifesto of the Racist ‘Scientists’ was published in the newspaper Il giornale d’Italia

on July 14, 1938. This set the tone for the racial laws the National Fascist Party

enacted later that year. The manifesto outlined ten points, including: The concept of

race is a purely biological concept; the actual population of Italy is of Aryan origin and

its culture is Aryan; a pure “Italian race” exists at this point; Jews do not belong to the

Italian race, etc.15 This manifesto was anything but scientific, functioning rather as a piece of racist propaganda targeting Jews in Italy thereby setting the stage for the racial laws. While it has been widely assumed that these laws were the result of Italy seeking the favor of Germany by adopting their stance towards Jews, the ideologies behind each set of antisemitic laws were very different. According to Renzo De Felice:

He [Mussolini] was convinced that the historical mission of Fascism was to fight the bourgeois spirit and mentality, which was responsible for the decay of the spiritual race of Judeo-Christianity, and also to fight against the Jewish spirit and therefore the Jewish race because its culture was at the root of the bourgeois mentality. This was a purely ideological conviction, giving Mussolini a political advantage that cannot be underestimated, it allowed him to single out and oppose his own spiritual racism to the biological variety represented by Nazism. The result, aside from not appearing as an imitator of Hitler, would allow him to reject the more humiliating racial implications for Italians and position himself as the advocate of a completely different racism with objectives and motivations which were spiritual, rather than materialistic.16

The ideological reasons for fascist Italy and Nazi Germany’s antisemitic laws were

fundamentally distinct and this is apparent in the language of the Italian racial laws

and the Nuremburg laws. Although the Nuremburg laws may have inspired the Italian

15 An English translation of the Manifesto of the Racist “Scientists” can be found in Renzo De Felice, The Jews in Fascist Italy: A History, trans. Robert L. Miller and Kim Englehart (New York: Enigma Books, 2001), 679-680. 16 Ibid., 228.

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racial laws, they were referential rather than prescriptive.17 The foundational Italian racial laws were given as Royal Decree n.1728 on November 17, 1938, outlining several measures for the defense of the Italian race, endorsed by King Victor Emmanuel and

Mussolini. Royal Decree n. 1728 includes three chapters and twenty-nine articles, detailing measures related to marriage, measures on those belonging to the Jewish race, and temporary and final regulations.18

Example 19: Measures for the Defense of the Italian Race Cartoon, L. 15.11.38, Biblioteca Nazionale Braidense

17 For a thorough discussion of the creation of the racial laws and their influences, see chapter 2 of Michael A. Livingston, The Fascists and the Jews of Italy: Mussolini’s Race Laws, 1938-1943 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014), 22-74. 18 An English translation of the Royal Decree n. 1728 can be found in De Felice, The Jews in Fascist Italy, 700-705.

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Visual propaganda cartoons (Example 19) depicted some of the measures from Royal

Decree n. 1728, such as “Jews cannot… serve in the military; practice as tutors; be proprietors of businesses with national defense interests; be proprietors of land or factories; have Aryan servants; Expulsion of foreign Jews—There can be no Jews… in military or civil administration; in the party; in provincial or communal institutions; in semi-public institutions; in banks; in insurance—Jews excluded from Italian schools.”

The antisemitic propaganda campaign and the racial laws of 1938 provided a local enemy for Italians, strengthening the axis pact while othering Jews. Jews were excluded from fascist culture, marked by their ‘difference’. This difference strengthened xenophobic nationalism and fueled a desire to glorify the fascist regime by evoking the past triumphs and culture of Ancient Rome. Such glorification was

ubiquitous in fascist culture during the 1930s. According to Robert S.C. Gordon, “It

was in this period that the cult of the Duce was at its strongest, the ‘Roman salute’ and the Roman version of the goosestep (passo romano) were imposed, and mass gatherings (adunate) became regular events. As most religions structure themselves,

anthropologically speaking, on the sacrifice of the impure, the scapegoat, so Fascist

Italy built its model of the fascist new man to a significant degree on the rejection of

the ‘other’.”19 By rejecting the other, rather than creating a prescriptive formulation of the fascist new man, this ideal becomes attainable. Racial laws combined with the mythos of fascist romanità established acceptable fascist participants and behaviors, prohibiting an entire group of people from such practices while naming them as other.

The racial laws of 1938 brought an underlying antisemitism to the fore of fascist Italian politics, encouraging racism through codified policy. These laws had real effects

19 Gordon, “Race,” 307-308.

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upon Jews in Italy during this period, ranging from deportation in the case of non-

Italian Jews, to expulsion from certain professions, to eventual internment in

concentration camps.

Embedded within the series of racial laws passed in 1938 were restrictions

upon Jewish people working in state-sponsored industries. Shira Klein explains:

“Since much of the entertainment and arts sector was sponsored by the state, Jews in

theater, cinema, radio, music, sculpture, and painting, stood to lose their jobs.”20 They did lose their jobs, and as the decade came to a close, the fascist regime tightened restrictions. Gradually, Jews were almost completely removed from fascist life, othered by the racist society to which they once belonged. Between 1939 and 1943, restrictions ramped up exponentially: “Theaters cancelled all plays by Jewish playwrights, radio stations stopped airing music by Jewish composers, and record companies removed Jewish musicians from their catalogs.”21 The erasure of these people from fascist Italian cultural life was a bold attempt to silence their contributions, an attempt that hid Jewish labor and creativity from its audiences while strengthening the concept of an Italian fascism without Jewish people.

Adopting the language of the Nazis, fascist Italy categorized its citizens as

Aryan or Jewish based upon a set of ambiguous guidelines as part of the 1938 racial laws. Klein explains: “Any person born to two Jewish parents automatically belonged to the ‘Jewish race,’ stated the law, and those born to two ‘Aryan’ parents were

‘Aryan.’ For people born of mixed marriages, a confusing set of rules released in mid-

November 1938 determined their ‘race.’”22 As a result of this policy, the librettist for Gli

20 Shira Klein, Italy’s Jews from Emancipation to Fascism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018), 89. 21 Ibid., 98. 22 Ibid., 87.

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Orazi, Claudio Guastalla, was categorized as belonging to the ‘Jewish race’ because

his parents were Jews. Any connection to Guastalla and thus any connection to his

Jewishness was removed from Gli Orazi’s printed libretto and musical score, both

published in 1939 by the Casa Musicale Sonzogno. This absence underscored a

debate in the fascist Italian musical community, where outspoken participants argued

for the reclamation of ‘Italian’ music as a point of national pride.

However, it is important to note that the National Fascist Party did not take an

official stance on permissible musical styles; to the contrary, Mussolini encouraged a

wide variety of musical styles, particularly in new operas.23 Ben Earle cites a strongly worded intervention by the regime in this stylistic dispute:

In an editorial with the quintessentially fascist title ‘Consegna’ (‘Orders’; the term also has the sense of a handing over of responsibility), Alessandro Pavolini, president […] of the Confederation of Professionals and Artists, the body that oversaw the Musicians’ Union (as well as twenty others), emphasized that Italian musicians were to contribute to ‘the musical life of the era of Mussolini with works – rather than with polemics’. Italian music ‘will have a single tendency’, Pavolini declared: ‘Italianness’.24

Nevertheless, proponents of musical traditionalism positioned modernism and the influence of Jewish internationalism as corrupting forces upon “Italian” music, some going so far as to equate the stylistic tendencies of modernism and futurism with

Jewishness, echoing antisemitic rhetoric present in Nazi Germany. Telesio Interlandi, creator of the antisemitic periodical, La difesa della razza, took this stance and used

his periodical to disseminate a variety of racist propaganda by likeminded authors.

23 See Fiamma Nicolodi's essay "Aspetti di politica culturale nel ventennio fascista," in Italian Music During the Fascist Period, ed. Roberto Illiano (2004), 97. Nicolodi quoted from Per la dichiarazione di Mussolini, cfr. Adriano Lualdi, Viaggio musicale in Italia, Milano, Alpes, 1927, pp. 206-207 and Raffaello De Rensis, 'Mussolini musicista', in Mussolinia, V/25 (August 1927), pp. 29-30. 24 Earle, Luigi Dallapiccola, 69, with the translated quote from Alessandro Pavolini, ‘Consegna’, Il musicista, 5/1-3 (1937), 2.

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Ennio Porrino was one of those authors, contributing an article titled “La

musica nella tradizione della nostra razza” (Music in the tradition of our race), to the

third volume of La difesa della razza, published on December 5, 1938. In this article,

Porrino positions Italian music as a fundamental component of Italian culture and national pride that has been corrupted by internationalism, here used as code for

Judaism. He expounds upon this point:

This artistic Babel corresponded to the spread of disintegrating theories of internationalism, when the main creators of humanity and religion were replaced by those corruptors of antisocial and antihuman Judaism and corruptors of atheism. Questa babele artistica corrispondeva alla diffusione delle teorie disgregatrici dell’internazionalismo, quando ai principi costruttori dell’umanità e della religione si sostituirono quelli demolitori di un ebraismo antisociale ed antiumano e quelli corruttori dell’ateismo.25

Porrino is part of the larger debate in the Italian musical community which predates the racial laws of 1938. One of his targets, modernist composer Alfredo Casella, recounts the events of the 1937 congress of the National Syndicate of Musicians, painting a stark portrait of Porrino:

A young Sardinian musician, Ennio Porrino, a disciple of the late Respighi, gave an address which was an open accusation of a whole group of Italian composers which included me. This attack by Porrino grieved me all the more because up until that day he had only encouragement and other kinds of aid from me, although his musical inclinations were not what I like to see a young man follow. The incident had great repercussions, and around Porrino, who had become suddenly the champion of the so-called “national” music, there gathered a great number of unimportant musicians: unsuccessful composers, operetta writers, bandsmen, even cinema orchestra leaders, who began a vicious campaign of defamation against me in Pèrseo and in the Tevere.26

25 Ennio Porrino, “La musica nella tradizione della nostra razza,” La difesa della razza (1938), 8. English translations by dissertation author unless otherwise indicated. 26 Alfredo Casella, Music in My Time, trans. and ed. Spencer Norton (Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 1955), 219.

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The article referenced by Casella, “Gli ebrei e la musica in Italia” (Jews and music in

Italy), appeared in the Roman newspaper Il Tevere, written by another antisemitic

composer: Francesco Santoliquido. Santoliquido aligns ‘true’ Italian music with

Catholicism, positioning it as something that has been infected by Jewish

international music.27 This rhetoric of infection reinforces the manufactured divide

between ‘true’ Italian music and ‘international’ Italian music, adding a layer of racism

to an entrenched musical debate between traditionalists and modernists. Race was

frequently used in fascist propaganda as highlighted by Roberto Illiano and

Massimiliano Sala: “For a long time the word ‘race’ was used as a synonym of ‘people’

and ‘nation’. Race thus became a new and particularly attractive discourse within

which discussions about national identity and modernity could proceed.”28 Although

Porrino entered this debate by publishing his article in La difesa della razza, he

nevertheless chose to collaborate with Guastalla on Gli Orazi, building upon a

relationship established by his mentor, Respighi.

Jewish in the Eyes of the State: Guastalla’s Erasure from Gli Orazi

While his name was removed from printed copies of the libretto and score,

Guastalla’s involvement with Gli Orazi is documented in the opera’s censorship reports, which I consulted in the theatrical censorship office collection at the Archivio

Centrale dello Stato in Rome. Beginning in 1931, text for all theatrical works to be performed on the stage or radio had to be approved by the theatrical censorship

27 Francesco Cassata, La Difesa della razza: Politica, ideologia e imagine del razzismo fascista (Turin: Giulio Einaudi, 2008), 269-270. 28 Roberto Illiano and Massimiliano Sala, “Italian music and racial discourses during the Fascist period,” in Western Music and Race, ed. Julie Brown (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 183.

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office, overseen by head censor Leopoldo Zurlo. Clive Griffiths describes the

censorial process: “Although nominally assisted by a panel, which included a

representative of the Fascist Party, emphasizing the new political aspect to the

process, in practice it was Zurlo who did the work and arrived at the decisions.”29 As this censorial process focused exclusively on text and not musical notation, operas were usually filed under the librettist’s name.

Significantly, the folder containing the censorship application for Gli Orazi

names Claudio Guastalla as the librettist and Ennio Porrino as the composer. Inside the folder are a variety of unusual documents, ranging from letters to and from Zurlo, to a pro memoria rationalizing the approval of Gli Orazi, to the libretto itself. Because this collaboration began before the racial laws of 1938 and the work was submitted after they took effect, special measures were taken to justify the publication of the work. The racial politics of fascist Italy post-1938 leave traces in this theatrical censorship folder, detailing the official rational for omitting Guastalla’s name from his work and marking these documents in a system of otherwise mundane corrections.

The pro memoria document is the most illuminating of all, which I quote at length:

The Gli Orazi libretto, which Ennio Porrino had decided to set to music in the winter of 1937-38 was accepted by the directors of Casa Musicale Sonzogno on June 13, 1938, after which the same librettist had given a reading of it in Milan. Hence the choice of libretto and most of the musical composition are prior to the beginning of the racial campaign. The subject of the libretto is one of the most orthodox one might imagine in terms of Italianess and race. Bearing in mind that the plot is completely removed (as was also stated in the newspapers) from the “History of Rome” by Titus Livius, and the guiding spirit is the glorification of the idea of Imperial Rome, of the warlike virtues and pride of the Romans. The work also has the

29 Clive Griffiths, “Theatrical Censorship in Italy During the Fascist Period,” in Culture, Censorship and the State in Twentieth-Century Italy, ed. Guido Bonsaver and Robert S.C. Gordon (London: Legenda, 2005), 78.

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merit of being the first created for the theater of the masses according to the new artistic direction wanted by the Duce. It should be noted that the artistic, moral and political responsibility for the libretto is above all with the composer, whose name is spread among the people and handed down to posterity if the work has value, while the librettist remains almost unknown to the public. Supposing that the greatest damage would come to the composer Porrino (Aryan), his fascist merits, his proven faith, and his artistic activity are noted. (Aryan Catholic since birth - Aryan Catholic father and mother - […]- For three years he has been teaching harmony and counterpoint at the S. Cecilia Conservatory - He is a graduate of S. Cecilia) - For his artistic activity he is featured in a monograph published by Ricordi. The librettist - Claudio Guastalla - has, in his favor, the following extenuating circumstances: his parents, descendants of the Jewish race, did not profess the religion, and therefore they did not want to associate their son with any ritual or concrete act, nor did they educate him in it; nor did their son EVER participate in the religion or the community. His wife is Italian, Catholic, Aryan; Catholic marriage (1912); three Catholic children since birth (1913, 1915, 1917).

Il libretto degli ORAZI, che Ennio Porrino aveva deciso di musicare sin dall’inverno 1937-38, fu accettato dai Dirigenti della Casa Musicale Sonzogno il 13 giugno 1938, dopo che lo stesso librettista ne aveva dato lettura a Milano. La scelta del libretto, dunque, e la maggior parte della musicazione sono anteriori all’inizio della campagna razziale.

L’argomento del libretto è quanto di più ortodosso si possa immaginare in fatto di italianità e di razza. Basta considerare che la trama è tolta interamente (come è stato dichiarato anche sui giornali) dalle “STORIE” di Tito Livio, e lo spirito informatore è l’esaltazione dell’idea imperiale di Roma, delle virtù guerriere e della fierezza dei Romani. L’opera ha inoltre il merito di essere la prima creata per i teatri del popolo secondo il nuovo orientamento dell’arte volute dal DUCE.

Si fa osservare che la responsabilità artistica, morale e politica del libretto è soprattutto del musicista, col nome del quale l’opera, se ha valore, viene diffusa fra il popolo e tramandata ai posteri, mentre il librettista resta quasi sconosciuto al pubblico.

Ammesso, perciò, che il maggior danno verrebbe al musicista Porrino (ariano), si fanno notare i suoi meriti fascisti, la sua provata fede, e la sua attività artistica. (Ariano cattolico sin dalla nascita – Padre e madre ariani cattolici […] - Da tre anni insegna armonia e contrappunto presso il R. Conservatorio di S. Cecilia – È Accademico di S. Cecilia) – Per l’attività artistica esibisce la monografia edità da Ricordi.

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Il librettista – Claudio Guastalla – ha, a suo favore, le seguenti discriminanti: i suoi genitori, discesi di razza ebraica, non professavano la religione, e perciò non vollero ammettervi il figlio con alcun rito o atto concreto, né ve lo educarono; né il figlio aderì poi MAI alla religione o alla comunità. La moglie è italiana, Cattolica, Ariana; matrimonio religioso cattolico (1912); tre figli cattolici fin dalla nascita (1913, 1915, 1917).

For these reasons, Guastalla’s name was omitted from the collaboration, shifting the credit to the Aryan, Catholic composer Porrino while obscuring work of the non-

Aryan, non-practicing ‘Jewish’ librettist. Although Guastalla had Jewish heritage, it is highly unlikely that he identified as a Jew, given his lack of involvement with the

Jewish community, his Catholic marriage, and Catholic children. Nevertheless, he was a Jew in the eyes of the National Fascist Party and in this context, such racial categorization led to his erasure. Also erased in this pro memoria is Porrino’s fervent antisemitism, failing to address why a composer who published in La difesa della razza would collaborate with a racially othered librettist. This question looms large,

without a satisfactory answer from archival documents alone—correspondence

between the composer and librettist reveal the complexity of their relationship.

Indeed, Guastalla himself prompted Porrino to formally remove his name from

Gli Orazi, erasing his connection with the opera to give the composer a better chance of success. Guastalla details how the work should be credited in a letter to Porrino dated May 19, 1939:

My dear Ennio, Now that all the competent authorities have approved my libretto and given the nulla osta for performance – recognizing that, if my ancestors were Jewish (not me, never!), my work is straightforwardly Latin and Italian – we could easily publish GLI ORAZI with my name. But I am still firm on the opinion that I told you six months ago: I care too much about the fate of your work to not worry about it and I want to plan for more

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serious developments of racist policy. Therefore I insist in my proposal that I formulate in this way: The GLI ORAZI libretto, which is exclusively my work, will be – for now -- published anonymously, like Puccini’s “Manon Lescaut”.

The cover will have the following wording: ENNIO PORRINO

GLI ORAZI Casa Musicale Sonzogno, Milano

And the title page will say: GLI ORAZI Istoria Un atto, da LIVIO, I, 22, 26 Musica di ENNIO PORRINO Casa Musicale Sonzogno, Milano

If the publisher deems it appropriate to modify these terms in foreign language editions, I will give him explicit consent. Given that I wish for the very long life of your work, I hope that in future editions my honest and honorable name may emerge from the shadows; since I am sure that I have written not just a great thing, but something worthy of my country that is Italy and inspired by the immense love of my city, which is Rome. For the account, an amicable letter of yours will recognize the authorship of the libretto which is entirely and exclusively mine, except for the very small modifications that you wanted. It must be presumed that, in a little time, the public would come to believe that words and music belong to Porrino, and I love my poetry too much (whatever its value!) not to reclaim it. I do not deny my fathers but I do not want to deny my children either; and this scruple of mine is a good omen, because it assumes that posterity is interested in Gli Orazi and in you. And then I would also like interest in me.

Vale et me ama. -Claudio Guastalla

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Mio caro Ennio, Ora che tutte le Autorità competenti hanno approvato il mio libretto e dato il nulla osta alla rappresentazione – riconoscendo che, se i miei antenati erano ebrei (io no, mai!), la mia opera è latina e italiana schietta – potremmo tranquillamente pubblicare GLI ORAZI con il mio nome d’autore. Ma io sono sempre fermo nell’opinione che ti dissi sei mesi fa: ho troppo a cuora la fortuna del tuo lavoro per non preoccuparmene e voglio prevedere anche più gravi sviluppi della politica razzistica. Insisto dunque nella mia proposta che formulo così: Il libretto GLI ORAZI, che è opera esclusivamente mia, verrà -- per ora -- pubblicato anonimo, come quella della “Manon Lescaut” di Puccini. La copertina avrà la seguente dicitura: ENNIO PORRINO GLI ORAZI Casa Musicale Sonzogno, Milano E il frontespizio dirà: GLI ORAZI Istoria Un atto, da LIVIO, I, 22, 26 Musica di ENNIO PORRINO Casa Musicale Sonzogno, Milano Se l’Editore stimerà conveniente modificare nelle edizioni in lingua straniera tali diciture, io gliene darò esplicito consenso. Siccome io auspico alla tua opera lunghissima vita, mi auguro che nelle future edizioni il mio nome onesto e onorevole possa uscire dall’ombra; poiché ho sicura coscienza di aver scritto non già una gran cosa, ma cosa in tutto degna della mia Patria che è l’Italia e inspirata da immenso amore della mia Città, che è Roma. Per la storia una tua lettera amichevole riconoscerà la paternità del libretto che è tutta ed esclusivamente mia, salve le piccolissime modificazioni che tu hai voluto. C’è da presumere che, fra qualche tempo, il pubblico creda che siano di Porrino parole e musica, ed io amo troppo la mia poesia (qual sia il suo valore!) per non rivendicarla. Io non rinnego i miei padri ma non voglio rinnegare nemmeno i miei figli; e questo mio scrupolo è di buon augurio, perché presuppone che I posteri s’abbiano ad interessare de GLI ORAZI e di te. E allora vorrei anche di me.

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Vale et me ama. -Claudio Guastalla30

Guastalla’s caution and wish for Porrino’s success with their work was indeed the impetus behind his exclusion from the printed score and libretto. Despite receiving the necessary “nulla osta” (without reservation, a security clearance of sorts) from the theatrical censorship office of the Ministry of Popular Culture, Guastalla elected to remove his name from his work for a temporary period of time, hoping that the racist climate in post-1938 Italy would eventually dissipate, allowing his work to be credited in the future. Unfortunately, both Guastalla and Gli Orazi fell out of public

consciousness after the collapse of Mussolini’s National Fascist Party and the

librettist is still yet to be credited in print by the Casa Musicale Sonzogno.31 That

Guastalla’s Jewishness (or rather his parents’) was hidden from the Gli Orazi

collaboration is an antisemitic erasure of work: it underscores the bureaucratic

complications embedded within racist policy changes and highlights the paradox of

an antisemitic composer collaborating with a librettist who had Jewish parents.

Traditionalism and Romanità in Gli Orazi

Traditionalism as defined in fascist Italy is inherently linked to antimodernism,

referring to a complicated, gendered ideology rather than a specific set of stylistic

parameters found in the arts. Sandro Bellassai traces the origins of this traditionalism

as a means of combatting the crisis of masculinity that emerged at the end of the

30 Epistolario Porrino, lettera di Claudio Guastalla a Ennio Porrino del 19 Maggio 1939, printed in Myriam Quaquero’s Ennio Porrino, Sassari: Carlo Delfino editore, 2010, 166-167. 31 Stage performances of Gli Orazi after World War II were exceedingly rare—the opera has been staged only three times, with the majority of performances taking place on radio or television (RAI). For an exhaustive list of performances, see Felix Karlinger and Giovanni Masala, Omaggio a Ennio Porrino (Stuttgart: Giuanne Masala Verlag, 2009), 161-162.

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nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, as women slowly gained more rights and

spaces in male-dominated societies. This crisis of masculinity required a cure:

fascism demanded a restoration of male dominated hierarchies, valuing a specific

type of masculinity. According to Bellassai, “In its totalitarian project, the fascist

regime pursued a pedagogy of virility potentially aimed at every male of every age,

proposing once again the ideal masculine model of the combatant devoted to action;

in this way it aimed to fight the negative product of modernity: the reflexive,

hypersensitive and frail man whose passive and uncertain character derived from an

excess of rationality.”32 In other words, traditionalism is inherently anti-bourgeois, anti-intellectual, and misogynist. At a glance, Porrino embraced this traditionalism, both ideologically and musically, staking his claim as a young, fascist composer trying to embody the combative masculinity promoted by the regime. However, when we examine the music of Gli Orazi, Porrino’s musical language is revealed as a

spectrum of musical traditionalism and modernism, combining both extremes in

various musical configurations. He used both modernist and traditional musical

elements in this opera, underscoring his positionality as an ideological traditionalist

rather than a strict musical traditionalist.

In the context of fascist Italy, it is crucial to understand that musical

traditionalism does not conform to a specific set of rules or components and the term

itself is not explicitly defined. Similarly, it is not possible to explicitly define modern

art, young art, nor national art. Porrino articulates this very point, speaking on behalf

of his generation in an article published in Perseo in 1937:

32 Sandro Bellassai, “The Masculine Mystique: Antimodernism and Virility in Fascist Italy,” Journal of Modern Italian Studies 10, no. 3 (2005): 320.

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We young people believe that we follow the course of action outlined by the Duce and defend our art, and we feel instead that these are not the directives, that certain themes should not be debated, that caution is needed, and other exhortations of the sort with conclusive punishment! For about thirty years now some musicians, of Italian nationality, have become criers of a so-called musical art of the future: << young art >>. Well, these distinctions do not exist: in every age an artist can produce vital works, provided that they are inspired by those eternal and indestructible values, which escape the control of the calendar and of the changing fashions. But if we want to admit that there is the art of young people as opposed to that of the old, then I am the one who claims for myself and my very young colleagues, who grew up in the climate of the Fascist Revolution, the right to speak of a young national art. Art that draws upon our tradition not for the apparent exhumation of characteristic forms of past centuries, but for an intimate, expressive content, for a sunny, fluid clarity, for an instinctive repulsion towards a multitude of international attitudes. Art that turns out to be contemporary not because of certain harmonic, rhythmic and timbre characteristics used in the actual musical language; but because of an overwhelming and compelling driving force that also draws the laziest audience to us. It is therefore necessary to clarify the misunderstandings, to establish once and for all what colors carry the flag of our art, and if this can be reserved for the honor of the black flames and glorious pennants of the Revolution.

Noi giovani crediamo di seguire le linee tracciate dal Duce e di difendere l’arte nostra, e ci sentiamo invece rispondere che non son quelle le direttive, che certi argomenti non vanno trattati, che ci vuol prudenza, ed altri fervorini del genere con punizione finale!

Da trent’anni circa a questa parte alcuni musicisti, di nazionalità italiana, si fanno banditori di una così detta arte musicale dell’avvenire: <>. Ebbene queste distinzioni non esistono: in ogni età un artista può produrre opere vitali, purché queste siano ispirate a quei valori eterni e indistruttibili, che sfuggono al controllo del calendario e delle volubili mode.

Ma se si vuole ammettere che vi sia l’arte dei giovani in contrapposto a quella dei vecchi, allora sono io che rivendico a me e ai miei giovanissimi colleghi, cresciuti nel clima della Rivoluzione del Littorio, il diritto di parlare di una giovane arte nazionale. Arte che si riallaccia alla nostra tradizione non per la riesumazione esteriore di forme caratteristiche di secoli trascorsi, ma per un intimo contenuto espressivo, per una solare chiarezza discorsiva, per un’istintiva repulsione verso atteggiamenti di marea internazionale. Arte che si rivela contemporanea non per certe caratteristiche armoniche, ritmiche e

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timbriche usate nell’attuale linguaggio musicale; ma per una irrompente forza propulsiva e irresistibile che trascina anche i pubblici più pigri verso noi.

Occorre quindi chiarire gli equivoci, stabilire una volta per sempre quali colori porta la bandiera della nostra arte, e se a questa possa essere riservato l’onore delle fiamme nere e dei gloriosi gagliardetti della Rivoluzione. 33

Porrino hits upon many themes vital to Italian musical discourse during this time:

defense of ‘their art’, the fascist dialectic between past and future, the undefinable

characteristics of a national art, and the desire to define those characteristics.

Romanità, the glorification of Ancient Rome, was a central facet of fascist culture, giving Porrino the framework to compose a nationalistic opera.

Reviews for the Gli Orazi premiere were overwhelmingly positive, touting the

success of the young composer Ennio Porrino. By 1941, the Italian press was a well-

oiled political machine, as all domestic newspapers had been placed under fascist

control more than fifteen years earlier as a result of the 1925 Consolidation Act (Testo

Unico).34 During a speech to the directors of domestic newspapers in 1928, Mussolini

evoked a musical metaphor to explain the relationship between the press and the

government:

I consider Fascist Italian journalism to be like an orchestra. You tune to a common pitch. This note is not given by the government through its Press Offices […]. It is the pitch which Fascist journalism sets for itself. It knows how to serve the regime. It does not need to await daily orders. […] But within this common pitch there is a diversity which avoids cacophony and instead produces full and divine harmony.35

33 Ennio Porrino, “Battaglie Musicali: Giovanile allarme per i sistemi sindacali,” Perseo, 15 November, 1937. 34 George Talbot, Censorship in Fascist Italy, 1922-43 (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007), 33. 35 Ibid., 78.

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Mussolini’s propagandistic press orchestra was controlled by editors sympathetic to

the regime—the Duce himself understood the importance of the press, having founded the daily newspaper Il Popolo d’Italia in 1914. Anything printed in Italian newspapers had to serve the interests of the regime, and anything could be censored, thanks to a centralized system of power. Opera reviews were part of this system, valorizing the romanità and italianità of the works to emphasize their importance as fascist culture. Language of combat was often used in fascist-era reviews, reminiscent of the rhetoric used in reviews of Mascagni’s Nerone. The Milanese newspaper Il corriere della sera used such language, declaring a straightforward success for Porrino:

Gli Orazi represents Ennio Porrino’s baptism of art in the field of opera. […] The coarse and shrill evocations of the fanfare and the martial cries disappear with observant dynamic gradations on the scenic backdrop of the work which gives us an uncompromising and combative roman-ness, but often sweetened from the laudable and pastoral songs of a simple and religious people. […] The work has met with genuine success. We counted seven curtain calls for the vocal performers, four of which also to the composer and the conductor; plus a fierce round of applause after the agonizing monologue of the old Orazio, admirably played by the bass Pasero. Gli Orazi costituiscono il battesimo d’arte del maestro Ennio Porrino nel campo della lirica teatrale. […] Le evocazioni rudi e squillanti delle fanfare e dei gridi guerreschi svaniscono con accorte gradazioni dinamiche sullo sfondo panoramico dell’opera che ci offre una romanità severa e battagliera, però raddolcita sovente dai canti tra laudari e cuocici di un popolo semplice e religioso. […] L’opera ha incentrato uno schietto successo. Abbiamo contato sette chiamate agli’interpreti vocali, di cui quattro anche all’autore e al direttore d’orchestra più un nutrito applauso a scena aperta dopo lo straziante monologo del vecchio Orazio, mirabilmente impersonato dal basso Pasero.36

Gli Orazi is steeped in romanità and the celebration of Ancient Rome; this

work stages the legend of the battle between the Orazi and Curiazi brothers originally

36 Corriere della sera, February 2, 1941.

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depicted by Livy in his History of Rome. This one-act opera includes no scenic divisions, but rather is a continuous string of vignettes, with the action peaking during the duel between rival brothers.37 There are seven named roles in Gli Orazi: Marco

Orazio il Vecchio (bass), Publio Orazio (tenor), Camilla Orazia (soprano), Atto

Curiazio (baritone), Il re Tullo Ostilio (baritone), Il feziale Marco Valerio (bass), and Il

padre patrato del popolo Albano (tenor). In addition to these roles, the other two

Orazi and Curiazi brothers are roles who do not speak or sing—though they play a

crucial narrative role. The Orazi are Romans, while the Curiazi are Albans from Alba

Longa, an ancient city neighboring Rome where none other than the founders of

Rome, Romulus and Remus, were born.

The opera begins with a prominent Bb tonal center with brass instruments sounding a fanfare during the introductory orchestral prelude. During this opening fanfare there is a brief coloristic nod to the tonal center C, before Bb resumes. The prominence of the Bb tonal center is evident throughout the opera, as it appears in nearly half of the narrative divisions I have created for analytical purposes since the opera lacks scenic divisions.38 The Bb tonal center appears in preparation for the duel, during the duel, during the Roman victory, and at the triumphant conclusion of the opera, coloring the harmonic soundscape of Gli Orazi as much as the ambiguous modulatory passages. While the protagonists of Gli Orazi drive the plot of the opera, the chorus is used extensively in various configurations and functions as a narrator to

37 See appendix for an analytical table of Gli Orazi, detailing narrative action, incipits, tonal centers, characters, form, pages in the vocal score, and corresponding tracks for listening. Pages are included due to absence of scenic division and correspond to the only publicly accessible vocal score of the opera. Ennio Porrino, Gli Orazi (Milan: Casa Musicale Sonzogno, 1939). Tracks correspond to the only recording of the work. Ennio Porrino, Gli Orazi, Orchestra Sinfonica e Coro di Milano della RAI, conducted by Ennio Porrino, recorded October 28, 1959, Premiere Opera.Net Company (2016), CD. 38 This descriptive paragraph refers to the analytical table included in the appendix.

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the onstage action. For Porrino, the chorus is an essential component of Gli Orazi

and is rarely absent from the stage, allowing for moments of bombastic musical

collectivity, particularly when celebrating Rome’s victory over Alba. Gli Orazi slowly builds to a dramatic, victorious conclusion for Publio Orazio and Rome despite the fact that he murdered his sister—an action that ultimately is forgiven and quickly forgotten by the Roman people who laud Publio for his battle prowess over his Alban enemies.

The music of Gli Orazi begs the question: how did musical traditionalism

manifest in this work? Throughout the opera, Porrino oscillates between atonality and

moments of tonality, rarely providing key signatures. While the majority of the opera

lacks a tonal center, it is decidedly not serial or dodecaphonic: Porrino sought to

reanimate tonal music, situating himself in a post-Schoenbergian world. Building upon the lush, post-romantic orchestration of Respighi, Porrino leans more towards continuous modulation, showcasing the late nineteenth-century emphasis upon melody in a harmonic system unencumbered by tonal direction. The tension of reanimated tonality in a post-tonal context is most evident in the numerous recitative- like sections of the opera. In these sections, Adorno’s commentary on Richard

Strauss’ Elektra resonates with Gli Orazi: “Adorno likened Strauss’ use of recitative to

a ‘centrifugal force’ away from tonality despite the composer’s tonal orientation.”39

The harmonic language of Gli Orazi explores the area between atonality and tonality, occasionally embracing the qualities of each end of the spectrum. Melody is

39 Bryan Gilliam, Richard Strauss’s Elektra (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991), 79. Original text in Theodor Adorno, “Richard Strauss. Born June 11, 1864”, trans. Samuel and Shierry Weber, Perspectives of New Music vol.2 (1966), 113-114.

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foregrounded throughout the opera, with recurring motives presented by the brass

instruments.

Gli Orazi retains certain elements of musical traditionalism such as melody, motives, and large choruses, yet it also pushes boundaries, challenging what constituted musical traditionalism in 1941 while highlighting the lack of a clear definition of stylistic category. In an extended review by Andrea Della Corte in La

Stampa, the critic had mixed feelings about Porrino’s first opera, noting the composer’s penchant for nineteenth-century operatic style:

This, which is the first theatrical attempt by the maestro Porrino, shows an inclination towards singability and the restoration of melodrama in the nineteenth-century sense, an inclination that was only partially realized. The characters, except for the old Orazio, who is austere and vigorous even in suffering, have very little characterization. But the points we have praised, those in which the drama concentrates and vents are therefore essential points that promise, with the in-depth analysis of artistic problems, more obvious and impressive concreteness. None of which is odd or premediated. The orchestration is plain, simple and colorful. A certain enthusiasm in taste, we repeat, nineteenth-century. We'll see. Questo, che è il primo tentativo teatrale del maestro Porrino, mostra l’inclinazione alla cantabilità e alla restaurazione del melodramma nel senso ottocentesco, inclinazione che riaiuta realizzata soltanto parzialmente. I personaggi, salvo il vecchio Orazio che è austere e vigoroso anche nel dolore, hanno in massima scarsa caratterizzazione. Ma i punti che abbiamo lodati, quelli nei quali il dramma si concentra e si sfoga, punti, dunque, essenziali, promettono, con l’approfondimento dei problemi artistici, concretezze più evidenti e convincenti. Niente di strampalato, né di premediato. L’orchestrazione è piana, semplice, colorata. Una certa foga nel gusto, ripetiamo, ottocentesco.

Stiamo a vedere. 40

40 Andrea Della Corte, “Novita alla Scala ‘Gli Orazi’ di Ennio Porrino,” La Stampa, February 2, 1941.

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One clear element of musical traditionalism in Gli Orazi is the chorus—Porrino’s

extensive use of chorus harkens to the large choruses of the late nineteenth century and early twentieth century in works by, respectively, Verdi and Puccini. The chorus serves many different narrative roles, including a chorus of pontiffs, vestal virgins, augurs, and priests; a chorus of fathers, champions, and legionnaires; a chorus of the patricians and plebeians of Rome; and a chorus of the Alban people. Before, during, and after the duel between the Orazi and Curiazi, the chorus reacts to the unheard action of battle. The duel is the most prolonged part of the opera, accounting for nearly a third of the score. Just before the battle commences, the Roman King leads the chorus in a rare tonal hymn, one of only two passages where key signatures are given, cycling through several tonal centers before the continuous modulation of the duel takes over (Example 20). Here, we have simple, almost crude, stylized battle hymn in the key of Bb major. The syllabic text setting, major key, and uncomplicated melody are evocative of a patriotic anthem. This type of choral hymn is commonly found in operas from the fascist period with ancient Roman themes; similar choral moments are found in Pietro Mascagni’s Nerone, Gian Francesco Malipiero’s Giulio Cesare, and Ottorino Respighi’s Lucrezia. The simple choral hymn is an ideal form for the

musical discourse of romanità.

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Example 20: Roman Chorus in Bb Major, Gli Orazi (pg. 63)

Other moments of tonality are found before and during the duel and are foregrounded by the choruses. Giving the choruses straightforward cadential motion in tonal key areas is perhaps the most aurally striking manifestation of musical traditionalism

Porrino includes in Gli Orazi. Nevertheless, each tonal center quickly moves to another tonal center or to murky areas of continuous modulation (Example 21).

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Example 21: Tonal Centers Before and During Duel, Gli Orazi (pg. 59-121)

Throughout the duel, the chorus is split into two factions: the Romans and the

Albans, both of whom are comprised of sopranos, altos, tenors, and basses.

Although these choruses are given different text, they sing these different texts simultaneously, often filling in chords or doubling notes, obscuring the two distinct factions and rendering the choruses into one cacophonous monolith. Each chorus cheers for their combatants before the duel begins, cadencing on an inverted seventh

chord comprised of Gb -Bb-Db-E, the enharmonic equivalent of a Fs dominant seventh chord (Example 22). This excerpt is a clear instance of the choruses in an area of ambiguous harmony and is representative of the harmonic style in use for the majority of the opera: strikingly triadic, yet not straightforwardly tonal, as tonic motion is

defamiliarized, here by a string of parallel six-four chords.

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Example 22: Roman and Alban Choruses Cheer, Gli Orazi (pg. 68)

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Perhaps the two opposing sides are better grasped when the opera is staged, but

without the visual cues it is nearly impossible to comprehend their distinctness. The

choice to give both choruses the same music is curious, particularly in a battle scene

with two sides. While we can presume the music of Gli Orazi supports the romanità of the narrative, there are no clear Alban musical markers. Any hint of Alban musical autonomy or otherness is never suggested; they are not exoticized but rather subsumed under Roman control in both musical and narrative terms. Although it is unclear what Alban music might sound like, Porrino chooses not to create different music for the Albans, instead using the same music for both the Roman and Alban choruses. This musical choice underscores the power of the Romans over the

Albans, highlighting the potency of romanità in Gli Orazi and the dominance of ancient Rome over its challengers.

The duel also features modernist musical techniques, for instance when

Porrino uses Sprechstimme in lieu of sung notes. This choice is noteworthy for its

association with the decidedly non-traditional and non-Italian composers Arnold

Schoenberg and Alban Berg, who employed the technique in a variety of pieces

including Pierrot Lunaire (1912), Wozzeck (1925), and Lulu (1937).41 However, the origins of this type of notation can be traced to Englebert Humperdink’s melodrama

Königskinder (1897), demonstrating the notation’s debt to the melodramatic tradition of oration.42 Porrino’s Sprechstimme are indicated by small crosses in place of noteheads, but beyond this notation he does not provide interpretive instructions for

41 Paul Griffiths, “Sprechgesang,” Grove Music Online, 2001; accessed July 6, 2019, http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/view/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.001.0001/omo-9781561592630-e- 0000026465. 42 On of the origins of Sprechstimme, see Joseph Smith, “Sprechstimme,” Journal of Singing Vol. 72, No. 5 (May 1, 2016): 547-562.

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the performers. The narrative role of the chorus during the battle scene is

paramount—their reactions and commentary convey the action as it unfolds,

particularly as the Orazi and Curiazi brothers remain silent for the majority of the duel.

During the first part of the duel, the Roman and Alban choruses shout their text,

cheering on their warriors or lamenting their downfall. The sopranos and altos of the

Roman chorus exclaming “No! no!” with dramatic glissandi of a minor ninth and an octave as the first Orazio is killed (Example 23).43 Immediately after the glissandi, the

sprechstimme begins as the Roman chorus begs Mars for help while exclaming that

the first of their combatants has fallen “Marte padre soccorri! Caduto!”; the Alban

chorus cheers and proclaims that they are winning “Eja! Alba vince!”.

Example 23: The First Orazio Falls, Gli Orazi (pg. 79)

43 Although choral glissandi might seem quite unusual, they are not unprecedented in Italian opera. Indeed, they are prominently featured in “Va pensiero” from Giuseppe Verdi’s Nabucco (1841), which was frequently performed throughout the fascist era and persists to the present day.

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Initially, the duel appears to favor the Curiazi, since they kill two of the Orazi in the beginning of the fight. However, after seeing his brothers slaughtered, Publio Orazio finds the strength to kill all three Curiazi, resulting in a victory for Rome over Alba.

The duel comes to a dramatic finale as Publio Orazio stabs Atte Curiazio in the throat with a sword, prompting a horrific cry from his sister, Camilla Orazia and a variety of vocal exclamations from the choruses. This cry forshadows Camilla’s own death at the hands of her brother, Publio—Porrino uses cries and glissandi in both instances

(Example 24 and 25). Here, a compelling parallel can be drawn between the masculinity on display in the duel and the idealized fascist masculinity: Publio Orazio demonstrates his power by slaying the Curiazi in armed combat and when his victory is diminished by the emotional cries of Camilla, he kills her too, emphasizing the patriarchal hiearchy of Ancient Rome. Upon seeing the lifeless body of her lover, Atto

Curiazio, Camillia Orazia is overcome with grief. Enraged by his sister’s actions,

Publio Orazio kills her on the spot, crying out: “And so, go to your husband, you who forgets your brothers and the country! And so may every Roman woman who mourns an enemy!”44

44 Original text: E vattene dunque al tuo sposo, tu che til scordi I fratelli, la patria! E così vada ogni donna romana che pianga un nemico!

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Example 24: Camilla Cries for Atte, Gli Orazi (pg. 116)

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Example 25: Cries of Sororicide, Gli Orazi (pg. 141)

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This act of sororicide calls for the immediate trial of Publio Orazio, where his actions

are defended by his father, Publio Orazio il Vecchio with a display of ultimate

patriarchal power as he invokes his patria potestas. In defense of his son, Publio

Orazio il Vecchio sings an extended arioso passage, appealing to the people and begging for his son to be spared, so as to not leave him childless. Most of this extended aria lacks a prescribed tonal center; formally it begins with recitative before moving into the arioso passage, a nod to the well-established opera form of the nineteenth century. Here, the emphasis is placed on melody—Publio Orazio il

Vecchio is given long, legato lines as he pleas for the King to spare his remaining son’s life even though the son murdered his daughter. Publio Orazio il Vecchio chooses to side with his son over his daughter, accentuating the limited power of women in Gli Orazi and more generally in Ancient Roman society. This aria allows a bass-baritone to display his virtuosity, quickly traversing vocal range of an octave and

a fifth, from Ab2 to Eb4, with a flourishing cadenza (Example 26).

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Example 26: Il Vecchio’s Cadenza, Gli Orazi (pg. 170)

Following Publio Orazio il Vecchio’s aria, the King rules that his son should be spared and celebrated for the Roman victory over Alba. The chorus returns in full force, praising the ancient god, Giove for their victory upon the battlefield, reveling in the glories of triumph. They close the opera with this sentiment while foregrounding the bombastic romanità of Gli Orazi in a C major tonal center (Example 27).

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Example 27: Choral Finale in C, Gli Orazi (pg.193)

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Gli Orazi showcases Porrino’s aptitude for combining musical traditionalism with

musical modernism despite his aggressively traditionalist stance. He builds upon the

legacies of the nineteenth century opera maestri, using some of their stylistic elements while also employing modernist techniques, demonstrating the complexities of identifying a singular music style. Only by analyzing traditional and modernist elements of the opera and problematizing the concept of musical traditionalism does it become evident Porrino was not the staunch musical traditionalist he portrayed himself to be. His extended use of suspended tonality, ambiguous harmony,

Sprechstimme, and the form of a one-act opera without scenic divisions challenge the norms of musical traditionalism in fascist Italy and challenge his positionality as a musical traditionalist.

Youth, Power, and the Theater of the Masses

Nearly every review of Gli Orazi emphasizes Porrino’s youth, setting him apart from

the older generations of composers and emphasizing his power as a vital, young man.

Youth was a central component of fascist ideology, referencing the next generation of

fascists and serving as a descriptive marker for virile men. From the early days of the

regime, Mussolini recognized the importance of indoctrinating children with fascist

culture and he used the Italian school system to do so. According to Tracy A. Koon,

“Letters from the minister to all provveditori [superintendents] in January 1923 ordered that Fascist songs and the Roman salute be included in daily flag ceremonies at the schools. Each classroom was also to be dedicated to one of the martyrs of the

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Fascist revolution.”45 Fascist education continued outside of school with the

formation of fascist youth organizations: Opera Nazionale Ballila (ONB) in 1926 which

became the Gioventù Italiana del Littorio (GIL) in 1937. These youth organizations

served a very similar function to the Hitlerjungend of Nazi Germany, shaping the

minds and bodies of children to become hardcore party members.46 Indeed, youth was

so vital to the success of the National Fascist Party (PNF) that it frequently appeared

in various forms of propaganda. The official anthem of the PNF was entitled

Giovinezza (Youth) and was played at numerous musical performances, sports, films, and other official gatherings. Giovinezza was so inextricably connected to the PNF

that when Arturo Toscanini refused to play the anthem before a concert in 1931, he

was assaulted by a group of fascist squadristi and placed under surveillance by the regime.47 Youth was a marker of power and the men who exuded it satisfied one

element of the ideal fascist masculinity. Youth was sought after and celebrated: Ennio

Porrino was young and the music critics notice, amplifying this trait in their reviews of

Gli Orazi.

The review of Gli Orazi printed in the Ricordi periodical, Musica d’oggi, hits upon two elements of the ideal fascist masculinity exemplified by Porrino, youth and war:

Two new energies were presented to the judgement of La Scala: two young men of singular value have won a great battle and who, now strong from their victory, will certainly continue their progress towards ever more arduous goals. […] Porrino’s opera was very new. Conceived for outdoor theater, the

45 Tracy H. Koon, Believe, Obey, Fight: Political Socialization of Youth in Fascist Italy, 1922-1943 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1985), 63. 46 For a comparative study, see Alessio Ponzio, Shaping the New Man: Youth Training Regimes in Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany (Madison, Wisconsin: The University of Wisconsin Press, 2015). 47 For a thorough account of the Toscanini incident, see Harvey Sachs, Music in Fascist Italy (New York: W.W. Norton Co., 1987), 207-240.

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one-act Gli Orazi is cut into blocks that summarize and express the spirit of multitudes, surroundings, and characters of great historical significance. Due energie nuove si sono presentate al giudizio scaligero: due giovani di singolare valore che hanno vinto una bella battaglia e che, forti ora della loro vittoria, continueranno certo il loro cammino volti a mete sempre più ardue. […] Nuovissima era, invece, l’opera del Porrino. Concepito per il teatro all’aperto, l’atto unico Gli Orazi è tagliato per blocchi che sintetizzano ed esprimono stati d’animo di moltitudini, ambiente e personaggi di grande respiro storico.48

The praise for Gli Orazi and the highlighting of Porrino’s youth continued in the Turin newspaper, La Stampa:

The young maestro Ennio Porrino’s Gli Orazi, conducted by maestro Antonio Guarnieri, with main performers Tancredi Pasero, Giovanni Voyer, and Iva Pacetti had been successful. The audience, who had spontaneously applauded with enthusiasm the baritone Pasero after the passionate oration, at the end of the act the performers had seven curtain calls, and the composer also appeared four times; at the address applause was particularly festive. Gli Orazi del giovane maestro Ennio Porrino, diretti dal maestro Antonio Guarnieri, con interpreti principali Tancredi Pasero, Giovanni Voyer e Iva Pacetti, hanno avuto successo. Il pubblico, che a scena aperta aveva applaudito con calore il baritono Pasero dopo la infiammata per orazione, alla chiusa dell’atto evoco gli interpreti alla ribalta sette volte, e quattro volte comparve pure l’autore, al eni indirizzo gli applausi furono particolarmente festosi.49

The favorable reviews of the premiere of Gli Orazi encapsulate Porrino’s success as a young opera composer—the critics were impressed with the work and Porrino was celebrated. Porrino’s youth was frequently referenced, highlighting the composer’s power while positioning him within the new generation of composers. Youth was an essential part of Porrino’s identity as a fascist, male composer: he was poised to be the future of Italian opera.

48 Gaspare Scuderi, Musica d’oggi, 1941. 49 La Stampa, February 2, 1941..

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As Porrino’s career progressed and the years went by, he publicly reminisced about his younger days. In a radio interview with RAI from April of 1951, Porrino recounted the circumstances surrounding the creation of Gli Orazi, reflecting upon his youth and the effects of war upon securing a performance venue to premiere the work:

At the middle school desks in Pisa, I learned to love the Latin epic by way of Julius Caesar; and this was perhaps the first cause of the sudden enthusiasm that took me that distant afternoon in 1938, when Claudio Guastalla read to me the libretto of Gli Orazi that he had faithfully drawn from Livy’s History of Rome. This work was originally written for Riccardo Zandonai, but then, the Master having given up the endeavor, I assumed the burden and honor of it. Having made the necessary changes for the realization of my musical and theatrical goals, I began with feverish enthusiasm the work of composition, which took place a little in the Dolomites, a little in Capri and finally in Rome, where, after eleven months of continuous effort ended. The orchestral score was completed (in two forms: for closed theater and for open)--the problem of promoting the work remained. I had in my favor the support of the Casa Musicale Sonzogno which, with an unusual faith in our day, had previously commissioned me to do the work; but, due to the war, the planned performances at the Teatro delle Novità in Bergamo, to the Baths of Caracalla of Rome and to the Carlo Felice of Genoa went awry. It was the Teatro alla Scala in Milan that generously opened the doors to my work in February 1941, thus breaking the loop of a sequence of unfavorable events. The welcome of the Milanese public and the critics was so flattering that the past misadventures were soon forgotten, also by virtue of other equally fortunate performances. But the war was pressing and affecting the rhythm of Italian theatrical life, and the post-war period was even more difficult for us artists. Meanwhile Tancredi Pasero had masterfully recorded the "Aria" on record where the old father, Marco Orazio, appeals to the people and intercedes in favor of his son Publius, convicted of fratricide. The complete performance that the Radio broadcasts today is therefore the first reprise of my work after years of silence, and acquires, for me and for those among the listeners who are faithful to me, a very particular meaning. Having written other and numerous works, and some larger ones, does not prevent an artist from preserving love for some favorite creation, like for Gli Orazi which is dear to me still today. It was created for the joy of becoming, in the freshness of youthful impressions, in the absolute faith of Art and in the moral values of life; it was created out of the desire to express the soul of the individual characters of the story and of the two contrasting peoples, whose

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collective passions were not different from those that have always animated and will animate humanity before the decisive turning points of history; they were created above all from my desire to create music and sing.

Sui banchi del ginnasio, a Pisa, io appresi ad amare, attraverso Giulio Cesare, l’epopea latina; e questa forse fu la prima causa dell’improvviso entusiasmo che mi prese, quel lontano pomeriggio del 1938, allorché Claudio Guastalla mi lesse il libretto de Gli Orazi che’egli aveva tratto fedelmente dalle Storie di Tito Livio. Questo lavoro era stato originariamente scritto per Riccardo Zandonai, ma poi, avendo il Maestro rinunciato all’impresa, ne assunsi io l’onere e l’onore.

Apportate le modifiche necessarie per la realizzazione dei miei obiettivi musicali e teatrali, iniziai con febbrile entusiasmo il lavoro di composizione, che si svolse un po’ sulle Dolomiti, un po’ a Capri e infine a Roma, dove, dopo undici mesi di ininterrotta fatica, ebbe termine. Completata la partitura orchestrale (stesa in duplice forma: per il teatro chiuso e per l’aperto) restava il problema de lancio del lavoro. Avevo a mio favore l’appoggio della Casa Musicale Sonzogno che, con fede inusitata ai giorni nostri, mi aveva commissionato già in precedenza l’opera; ma, a causa della guerra, andarono a monte le progettate esecuzioni al Teatro delle Novità di Bergamo, alle Terme di Caracalla di Roma e al Carlo Felice di Genova.

Fu il Teatro alla Scala di Milano che aprì generosamente le porte alla mia opera nel febbraio del 1941, rompendo così il cerchio di un seguito di eventi contrari. Le accoglienze del pubblico milanese e dalla critica furono così lusinghiere che le passate disavventure vennero in breve dimenticate, anche in virtù di altre rappresentazioni ugualmente fortunate. Ma la guerra incalzava ed incideva sul ritmo della vita teatrale italiana, e il dopoguerra fu ancor più difficile per noi artisti. Intanto Tancredi Pasero aveva magistralmente inciso su disco l’ “Aria” con la quale il vecchio padre, Marco Orazio, si appella al popolo e intercede a favore del figlio Publio, condannato per fratricidio. L’esecuzione integrale che oggi la Radio mette in onda è quindi la prima ripresa della mia opera dopo anni di silenzio, ed acquista, per me e per quelli, fra gli ascoltatori, che mi sono fedeli, un significato tutto particolare.

L’avere scritto altri e numerosi lavori, e taluni di mole più vasta, non impedisce a un artista di conservare amore per qualche creatura prediletta, come per Gli Orazi che, ancor oggi, sono a me cari. Essi nacquero per la gioia di donare, nella freschezza delle impressioni giovanili, nella fede assoluta dell’Arte e nei valori morali della vita; nacquero per il desiderio di esprimere l’animo dei singoli personaggi della vicenda e dei due popoli in contrasto, le cui passioni collettive non eran diverse da quelle che hanno sempre animato e animeranno

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l’umanità dinanzi alle svolte decisive della storia; nacquero soprattutto dal mio desiderio di costruir musica e di cantare.50

Porrino constructed a narrative valuing the pursuits and labor of his youth and

childhood, tracing his fascination with Roman subjects back to reading about Julius

Caesar in middle school and realizing his own artistic work using the libretto created by Guastalla from Livy’s History of Rome. He speaks about Gli Orazi with a sense of nostalgia, placing the opera amongst his favorite compositions.

A large performance venue where thousands of spectators could experience

Gli Orazi was essential to the success of the opera. In a short interview before La

Scala was secured as the performance venue, Porrino discusses Gli Orazi as a work for the masses, namely the Italian masses. Mussolini’s Theater of the Masses concept is referenced during the interview, foregrounding the ideal of mass spectacle while appealing to the Duce’s aesthetic sensibilities:

We asked the young maestro Ennio Porrino, composer of ardent industriousness, already familiar to our audience for various applauded works, to give us news of his recent activity, animated by the desire to offer our readers, from time to time, an informative review on our young musical forces. After the successes of Sardegna, of the Visione d’Ezechiele, and of your other symphonic works, we know that the theater has tempted you and that in a short time you have composed a one act opera titled Gli Orazi. I always thought about theater – Ennio Porrino tells us – since my early youth: but realizing an opera that had particular characteristics corresponding to the demands of modern taste, required long, hard research. Gli Orazi was conceived by me specifically for the Mussolinian “Theater of the Masses”: the instrumentation, the libretto, the composition of this opera were therefore imagined for outdoor performance in front of a large mass audience.

50 Ennio Porrino, Conversazione introduttiva per la trasmissione de ”Gli Orazi”, RAI, Terzo programma, 5 aprile 1951. A transcription of the interview appears in Quaquero, Ennio Porrino, 159- 160.

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Your Orazi was on the bill of the Teatro delle Novità of Bergamo; what reasons have prevented the performance? The Teatro delle Novità season was suspended last September as other artistic events, due to the international situation: you can imagine how I, yearning to see my creation scenically realized to draw lessons and new experiences from it, have been disillusioned. However, I think that my Orazi, due to the aforementioned peculiarities that block it, will be able to find an even more appropriate production in a great theater. During the fourth congress of the Musicians Syndicate, recently held in Catania, it was vowed that the directorates of the open-air theaters would commission authors to write works written specifically for their amphitheaters: why then do they not start to perform my opera which has been conceived for such theaters? This will also serve as an incitement and experience for other authors. We sincerely hope that your Orazi finds its worthy artistic seat as soon as possible: your ingenuity and your past production deserve the most solicitous interest on the part of the of management of the great Italian theaters.

Abbiamo chiesto al giovane maestro Ennio Porrino, compositore di ardente laboriosità, già famigliare al nostro pubblico per varie applaudite opere, di darci notizia della sua recente attività, animati dal desiderio di offrire, volta a volta, ai nostri lettori una rassegna informativa sulle nostre giovani forze musicali. Dopo i successi di Sardegna, della Visione d’Ezechiele, e di altri vostri lavori sinfonici, sappiamo che il teatro vi ha tentato e che in breve tempo avete compost un’opera in un atto dal titolo Gli Orazi. Ho sempre pensato al teatro – ci dice Ennio Porrino – fin dalla mia prima giovinezza: ma realizzare un’opera che avesse particolari caratteri rispondenti alle esigenze del gusto moderno, mi è costato una lunga, faticosa ricerca. Gli Orazi furono da me concepiti appositamente per il mussoliniano <>: lo strumentale, il libretto, la composizione di quest’opera sono stati quindi pensati per la rappresentazione all’aperto, davanti ad una grande platea popolare. I vostri Orazi figuravano del cartellone del <> di Bergamo; quali ragioni ne hanno impedito la rappresentazione? La stagione del <> fu sospesa lo scorso settembre come altre manifestazioni artistiche, a causa della situazione internazionale: potete immaginare come io, anelante di vedere realizzata scenicamente la mia creatura per trarne insegnamenti e nuove esperienze, ne abbia provato disinganno. Tuttavia penso che i miei Orazi, per le anzidette caratteristiche che rinserrano, potranno trovare in un grande teatro una realizzazione ancor più appropriate. Nel IV congresso del Sindacato Musicisti, tenutosi ultimamente a Catania, si è fatto voto che le Direzioni dei teatri all’aperto commissionino agli autori opere scritte appositamente per I loro anfiteatri: perché dunque non si

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comincia a rappresentare la mia opera che per tali teatri è stata appunto concepita? Ciò servirà anche d’incitamento e di esperienza agli altri autori. Noi vi auguriamo di cuore che i vostri Orazi trovino al più presto la loro degna sede artistica: il vostro ingegno e la vostra passata produzione meritano il più Sollecito interessamento da parte delle Direzioni dei grandi teatri italiani.51

The 1939 interview underscores the importance of Mussolini’s Theater of the Masses

as a means of cultural dissemination, mass spectacle, and fascist indoctrination.

Cultural exposure on a mass scale via the Theater of the Masses was Mussolini’s

attempt to position opera and theater as an educational platform. The desire to bring

opera to a large number of people was fueled by a 1933 speech given by Mussolini

during the fiftieth anniversary of the Italian Society of Authors and Publishers (SIAE):

I have heard reference made to a crisis of the theater. This crisis is real, but it cannot be attributed to the cinema’s success. It must be considered from a dual perspective, at once spiritual and material. The spiritual aspect concerns authors, the material aspect the number of seats. It is necessary to prepare a theater of masses, a theater able to accommodate fifteen or twenty thousand persons. La Scala was adequate when, a century ago, the population of Milan totaled eighteen thousand inhabitants. It is not today when the population has reached one million. The scarcity of seats creates the need for high prices which keep the crowds away. But theaters which, in my view, possess greater educational efficacy than do cinemas, must be designed for the people, just as dramatic works must have the breadth that the people demand. They must stir up the great collective passions, be inspired by a sense of intense and deep humanity, and bring to the stage that which truly counts in the life of the spirit and in human affairs.52

This statement from Mussolini reveals the need for physical spaces that have the ability to accommodate large crowds, to bring theater to the masses, but makes no effort to layout an actionable plan to create or construct such spaces. The fascist

51 “Breve conversazione con il Maestro Ennio Porrino”, in: Il Messagero, 14 novembre 1939, p.8. Cited in Ennio Porrino, Questioni Musicali 1932-1959 (Stuttgart: Giovanni Masala Verlag, 2010), 281- 282. 52 Jeffrey T. Schnapp, “Border Crossings: Italian/German Peregrinations of the Theater of Totality,” Critical Inquiry; Chicago 21, no. 1 (Autumn 1994): 107. Original in Mussolini, “Discorso per il cinquantenario della Società Italiana degli Autori ed Editori,” Opera Omnia di Benito Mussolini, ed. Edoardo and Duilio Susmel, 44 vols. (Rome, 1951-1978), 44:50.

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regime never built any sort of centralized national theater, yet the need for theater and

opera to reach large audiences remained a topic of constant discussion. Open-air

theaters were one type of venue that could accommodate large audiences, some of

which were ancient spaces that held and hold nationalistic significance, such as the

Roman Terme di Caracalla.53 Although a specific outdoor venue is never named, frequent references are made to Porrino’s desire for an open-air theater, which would allow him to bring Gli Orazi to the masses, thereby fulfilling Mussolini’s call for a

Theater of the Masses. Such a venue would have increased access to Gli Orazi,

allowing thousands of spectators to experience the opera and its glorification of

Ancient Rome. Nevertheless, Porrino did not secure such an outdoor venue for the premiere of Gli Orazi; despite the prestige of La Scala, it could only accommodate a

fraction of the 20,000 spectators envisioned for the theater of the masses.

Conclusion: Glorifying Outspoken Antisemitism

This examination of Ennio Porrino’s Gli Orazi underscores the paradoxical nature of his position as a young man who embraced traditionalism, a ‘traditional’ composer who used modernist musical techniques, and an antisemite who collaborated with a librettist deemed Jewish by the fascist regime. He payed homage to fascist Italy by staging a Roman libretto with a score that combined musical traditionalism and musical modernism, creating his version of theater for the masses. Porrino’s identity as a young, male composer gave him power in a society that venerated masculinity

53 The Terme di Caracalla feature a summer concert series to this day, having begun in 1937 with the Teatro dell’opera di Roma’s first summer season, featuring Lucia di Lammermoor. For more about the Teatro dell’opera di Roma’s involvement, see their website: https://www.operaroma.it/en/locations/caracalla-2/

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and youth, and his age was continually referenced both in reviews as well as in

writings by Porrino himself. In addition to this masculine power, Porrino’s overt

antisemitism was valued by the fascist society he lived and worked in, particularly

after the racial laws of 1938 were enacted.

In a time and place where those whom the regime perceived as Jews were

stripped of their rights, librettist Claudio Guastalla was unable to be credited for his

work on Gli Orazi. Although this decision came from Guastalla and not Porrino,

Porrino nevertheless went along with the erasure of Guastalla’s name from their

collaboration, pleading his case for the opera to be performed despite the true origins

of the libretto. Porrino’s ideological position as a traditionalist was also entangled

with this racist perspective, employing xenophobic rhetoric to distance his music and

himself from international styles and modernism despite his use of modernist

techniques in the music of Gli Orazi. This not-so coded language privileged Italian music uncorrupted by outside influence, using antisemitic, racist, xenophobic language to describe an ideal Italian music by Italians for Italians without describing the specific elements of such music. Porrino’s success with Gli Orazi is noteworthy for a composer’s first opera—the critics were impressed by the young composer and celebrated his victory. Gli Orazi exemplifies operatic romanità in post-1938 fascist

Italy: neither the glorification of Ancient Rome nor fascist Italy would have been possible without the hidden labor of marginalized people. Porrino fought for the music of his race by excluding and attacking those who did not prescribe to his views, valuing success over friendship and enjoying critical acclaim as a young, antisemitic, fascist composer.

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Conclusion (Epilogue) Encore: Neo-Fascism in the Twenty-First Century

Although it has been nearly a century since Mussolini’s March on Rome (1922)

marked the beginning of the fascist era, the resurgence of fascist ideology in the

twenty-first century throughout Europe and the United States underscores the need for sustained, critical inquiry to better understand the historical conditions in which fascism thrived and why neo-fascist groups currently are on the rise. To understand the gravity of this neo-fascist resurgence, we need to be aware of the history of fascism, the meaning behind fascist symbols, fascist ideology, and fascist architectural sites. Without this historical grounding, fascism can easily be repurposed, recontextualized, or most alarmingly, hidden. We should be aware of the role fascism played and continues to play in musical culture, politics, and culture writ large. Music created during the fascist era or music appropriated by the National

Fascist Party for political purposes retain this baggage, yet without knowledge of this connection, these works become distanced from their political past. Indeed, traces of fascism and the Duce’s efforts to glorify ancient Rome remain in the material sites of

Rome today, interspersed in the city’s architectural landscape. This fascist layer is more obvious in certain neighborhoods than others. Rather than demolishing or removing all physical traces of Mussolini and the National Fascist Party, spaces and buildings created under the direction of the Duce persist as another layer in Rome’s history.

For instance, to visit the Archivio Centrale dello Stato (ACS), the central state archive which houses bureaucratic documents from the National Fascist Party, one

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needs to visit a neighborhood south of Rome’s city center: the EUR (Esposizione

Universale di Roma). The EUR was intended to be the site of a spectacular fascist exhibition for the 1942 World’s Fair that was never fully realized, a fascist city partially completed during the latter half of the ventennio. Aristotle Kallis elaborates: “The spectacular consecration of Fascist universalism that the regime had intended to host on the grounds of the new city built for the EUR remained a haunting illusion, scattered amid the few incongruous building that had been completed ahead of the decision to postpone the event in 1941-2.”1 Walking through the EUR while on an archival research trip to the ACS to look at theatrical censorship reports was a surreal experience, a visceral reminder of the not so distant fascist past, one augmented by the neighborhood’s distinct architectural style and extant fascist buildings. Perhaps the most striking example of architectural fascism I encountered while in the EUR was the Palazzo della Civiltà Italiana or the Square Colosseum.

1 Aristotle Kallis, “From CAUR to EUR: Italian Fascism, the ‘Myth of Rome’ and the Pursuit of International Primacy,” Patterns of Prejudice 50, no. 4/5 (September 2016): 376.

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Example 28: Square Colosseum in the EUR. Photo by dissertation author

The building features an inscription taken from Mussolini’s October 1935 speech, broadcast via radio throughout the country in an effort to unite the Italian people.2 The

translated inscription reads, “A people of poets, of artists, of heroes, of saints, of

navigators, of transmigrators.” Initially intended to house a “permanent museum of

2 Benito Mussolini, Scritti e discorsi di Benito Mussolini, vol. IX (Milan: Ulrico Hoepli, 1934), 217-220.

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romanità,”3 the Square Colosseum, a symbol and enduring reminder of fascist

architecture, is now the headquarters of the designer fashion house Fendi, who

moved into the space in 2015.4 When fascist icons and spaces are repurposed, there is

a risk of distancing them from their origins and erasing connections to the regime.

Without historical context, the material remnants of fascism can appear

innocuous and even nondescript. Perhaps the best example of this relevant to opera

can be found in the Teatro dell’Opera di Roma, Rome’s main opera house. Above the stage, on the proscenium arch, is an inscription in stone commemorating the 1928 renovation of the theater. The inscription reads, “Vittorio Emanuele III Rege, Benito

Mussolini Duce, Lodovicus Spada Potenziani, Romae Gubernator Restituit

MCMXXVIII—VI,” naming the King, the Duce, and the governor of Rome. The Roman numerals give the Gregorian calendar year (1928) and the fascist calendar year (6), the latter being a system that considered 1922 year one, when the March on Rome marked the official beginning of the fascist era.

3 Joshua Arthurs, Excavating Modernity: The Roman Past in Fascist Italy (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2012), 133. 4 Sarah Karmali, “Fendi Relocates to a Roman Palace,” Vogue: Britain, July 18, 2013, https://www.vogue.co.uk/article/fendi-moves-headquarters-to-palazzo-della-civilta-italiano-in- rome.

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Example 29: Commemorative Inscription, Teatro dell'Opera di Roma. Photo by dissertation author.

The architectural remnants of fascism, such as the Square Colosseum and the

commemorative inscription at the Teatro dell’Opera, serve as a reminder that even though Mussolini and the National Fascist Party met a violent end, fascism was never completely eradicated in Italy. More insidious than the physical remains of fascist architecture is the residue of fascist ideology, revitalized in a variety of current, twenty-first century neo-fascist groups. One such neo-fascist group native to Rome is

CasaPound, a small, yet vocal, extreme right-wing organization named after the poet,

Ezra Pound.5 CasaPound vice president and politician Simone Di Stefano stressed

5 CasaPound was formed in part due to a lack of affordable and accessible housing for Romans. In 2003, a group of squatters took inspiration from the poetry of Ezra Pound, who decried a similar lack of housing in his Cantos. CasaPound has used Pound’s name, poetry, and connection to fascism

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the foundational importance of Mussolini’s fascist ideology to their movement in an interview from 2011: “It's [fascism] our point of reference, a vision of the state and the economy and the concept of sacrifice.”6 Much like during the era of Mussolini, fascism continues to be performed today through a set of sustained acts; the fascist symbols created by the PNF are used and adapted by neo-fascists.

The British news outlet, Channel 4 News, profiled CasaPound in 2018, highlighting the group’s use of fascist symbols, their desire to make Italy great again, actions taken as a result of their xenophobia, and clips of their official rock band,

ZetaZeroAlfa.7 While opera used to be the musical medium of choice to engage the

public during Mussolini’s era, today the music of the far-right is punk rock.8 In the case of CasaPound, music and fascism are directly connected. The neo-fascist group uses their band as a political platform, conveying fascist ideology through music;

CasaPound president, Gianluca Iannone, fronts ZetaZeroAlfa as its lead singer.9

Music is a rich medium for performing fascism and spreading political

messages to a wide audience. The propagandistic potential of music is limitless; and

music with a clear ideological message can generate discourse, thereby amplifying

to bolster their ideology. For more on CasaPound, see Elisabetta Cassina Wolff, “CasaPound Italia: ‘Back to Believing. The Struggle Continues,’” Fascism 8, no. 1 (2019): 61–88. For more on Pound, see Tim Redman, Ezra Pound and Italian Fascism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991). 6 Tom Kington, “Italy’s Fascists Stay True to Mussolini’s Ideology,” The Guardian, November 6, 2011, sec. World news, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/nov/06/italy-fascists-true- mussolini-ideology. 7 Channel 4 News, “Fascism in Italy: The Hipster Fascists Trying to Bring Mussolini Back into the Mainstream,” YouTube Video, 10:18, March 2, 2018, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I3x- ge4w46E. 8 Numerous far-right groups and ideologies have used punk as a musical outlet, including white nationalists and skinheads. For more on these movements in the United States, see Nancy S. Love, Trendy Fascism: White Power Music and the Future of Democracy (Albany, NY: SUNY Press, 2016). 9 For more on the ideology of CasaPound, see Pietro Castelli Gattinara and Caterina Froio, “Discourse and Practice of Violence in the Italian Extreme Right: Frames, Symbols, and Identity- Building in CasaPound Italia,” International Journal of Conflict and Violence 8, no. 1 (2014): 154–70.

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fascism through layered performance. During the fascist era, operas with ancient

Roman narratives contributed to the National Fascist Party’s aesthetic ideological vision of romanità, glorifying Rome with performative spectacle. As the capital city, and nexus of ancient Roman grandeur, Rome was and continues to be a sacred site for fascism. Operatic manifestations of romanità during the fascist period in works

such as the operas that comprise this dissertation, Nerone, Giulio Cesare, Lucrezia,

and Gli Orazi, glorified Rome and served the cultural demands of Mussolini’s regime.

Though opera was sometimes used by the regime for specific propagandistic aims,

like Verdi’s Va pensiero as an expression of Italian patriotism and fascist solidarity, it was by no means the only musical carrier of fascist propaganda.

Operas, such as the works explored in this study, are vehicles for political messages. These messages are strengthened when a piece of music consistently accompanies a political figure, party, or event. Indeed, political music or music used for political aims is most powerful when it provides enough ambiguity for creators, listeners, and performers to assign meaning to the music in question. Power is in the ambiguity of a work, whereby its message can be adapted to fit a variety of political contexts. Whether that message comes directly from lyrics, or is a metanarrative placed upon the work, the work in question gains a political association. The romanità

of Mascagni’s Nerone, Malipiero’s Giulio Cesare, Respighi’s Lucrezia, and Porrino’s

Gli Orazi provided space for messages in support of fascism and Mussolini.

These fascist associations have impacted the legacies of each opera and their composers. In general, all four of the operas in this study faded from the theaters shortly after their premieres, producing infrequent revivals and rare audio recordings.

Despite a grandiose premiere with favorable reviews, Mascagni’s Nerone was quickly

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retired from the repertoire. 1935 saw performances in Livorno and Bologna, while La

Scala staged a revival in 1937, and one Swiss production in Zurich in 1937 marked the final performance of the work in Mascagni’s lifetime.10 Nerone has had few modern

revivals: an audio recording was created in 1986, with Kees Bakels conducting the

Hilversum Radio Symphony Orchestra, while a 2001 performance by the Coro Lirico

Sinfonico Romano and the Orchestra Filarmonica di Roma was recorded on DVD.11

Malipiero’s Giulio Cesare was performed in Buenos Aires and Rio de Janiero following its premiere in 1936. The opera was also given in Germany in 1938 and again in 1941.12 Thereafter the opera faded from the repertoire until it was recorded by the

Italian national broadcasting company, Radiotelevisione Italiana (RAI), under the direction of Nino Sanzogno in 1956.13 Respighi’s Lucrezia was performed at the

Maggio Musicale Fiorentino and the Teatro dell’Opera di Roma in 1937, following its

La Scala premiere. A Turin performance in 1938 marked the opera’s final performance during the fascist period. However, much like Giulio Cesare, it was revived in the midcentury and recorded by RAI in 1958.14 Modern performances of Lucrezia are

limited to audio recordings from 1981 and 1994.15 After the premiere of Porrino’s Gli

Orazi, the opera was given in Florence and Turin in 1942. Following the end of the

10 Alan Mallach, Pietro Mascagni and His Operas (Boston: Northeastern University Press, 2002), 274. 11 Pietro Mascagni, Nerone, Radio Symphony Orchestra di Hilversum, conducted by Kees Bakels, recorded November 16, 1986, Bongiovanni (1994), CD. Pietro Mascagni, Nerone, Orchestra Filarmonica di Roma, conducted by Támas Pál, recorded 2001, Pan Dream (2001), DVD. 12 Tobias Reichard, “Malipiero Germanised – Traces of Cultural Usurpation in Nazi Germany,” Archival Notes, 2 (2017): 19-20. 13 Gian Francesco Malipiero, Giulio Cesare, Orchestra Sinfonica e Coro di Milano della RAI, conducted by Nino Sanzogno, recorded July 8, 1956, Great Opera Performances (2006), CD. 14 Ottorino Respighi, Lucrezia, Orchestra sinfonica e Coro di Milano della RAI, conducted by Oliviero De Fabritiis, recorded September 12, 1958, Golden Age of Opera (1995), LP. 15 Ottorino Respighi, Lucrezia, Junge Philharmonie der A.M.O.R, conducted by Ettore Gracis, recorded July 24, 1981, Bongiovanni (1982), CD; Ottorino Respighi, Lucrezia, Slovak Radio Symphony Orchestra (Bratislava), conducted by Adriano, recorded June 9-16, 1994, Marco Polo (1995), CD.

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fascist regime, Gli Orazi had a handful of revivals and radio performances.

Productions were staged in Cagliari’s Teatro Giardino in 1951 and Rome’s Terme di

Caracalla in 1952.16 The opera was recorded by RAI in 1959, conducted by Porrino.17

Though these operas are preserved by written scores and audio recordings, modern performances are exceedingly rare. Nevertheless, they were performed after the fall of

fascist Italy, creating a post-fascist legacy for these operas created during fascism.

Though Nerone, Giulio Cesare, Lucrezia, and Gli Orazi had a few revivals after their premieres, these operas have largely been forgotten by musicologists and performers alike.

How does the political baggage of fascism affect how we listen to and perform works with fascist associations today? Some music continues to be performed with great regularity in spite of documented connections to fascism or Mussolini, such as

Respighi’s Roman Trilogy, while other music with fascist connotations has faded

from the repertoire, such as the four operas examined in this dissertation. History is

necessary to understand the conditions in which musical works were created and

what purpose they served, particularly in the context of oppressive political regimes.

Without historical context, the complexities and nuances of fascism and fascist

performance are divorced from music. We should consider this history when we listen

to or perform works associated with fascism rather than considering music as a self-

contained art form. Opera, and more generally music, in fascist Italy remains an

understudied area, an area that provides insight into the mechanics of fascist

performance. With the alarming emergence of neo-fascist groups in Italy and

16 For an exhaustive list of radio performances, see Felix Karlinger and Giovanni Masala, Omaggio a Ennio Porrino (Stuttgart: Giuanne Masala Verlag, 2009), 161-162. 17 Ennio Porrino, Gli Orazi, Orchestra Sinfonica e Coro di Milano della RAI, conducted by Ennio Porrino, recorded October 28, 1959, Premiere Opera.Net Company (2016), CD.

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throughout the world, the threat of a fascist encore in the twenty-first century is real, demanding critical engagement with the fascist past to remember the lasting effects of Mussolini’s regime and the accompanying horrors of World War II.

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Appendix A

Opera Synopses

Nerone by Pietro Mascagni

Opera in three acts, premiered at the Teatro alla Scala, Milan on January 16th, 1935. Libretto by Giovanni Targioni-Tozzetti.

Act one. The opera begins in a tavern; Egloge, a female Greek dancer appears and it is clear that she is being chased by someone. The Emperor Nero and his companion, Menecrate follow Egloge, disguised as slaves. A fight ensues and Nero's true identity is revealed. Following the fight, Nero drinks heavily and becomes drunk. Atte, a freed female slave, criticizes the emperor's behavior, and Nero threatens her life. Menecrate appears and helps the emperor leave the tavern in his litter so that he can hide his drunken state. Act two. Babilio the astrologer predicts danger in Nero's future, promising that the emperor will die one hour after Babilio's death. Egloge the dancer reappears and Nero becomes enamored with the Greek girl, freeing her from slavery. Atte threatens Egloge in an attempt to make her leave, but Nero stops Atte from killing her. Nero gives his senators a brief audience. Act Three. The setting is Nero's palace; a lavish banquet and orgy with many guests is taking place. Nero compares Egloge to Venus—he is struck by her beauty. Atte is jealous and she poisons Egloge's wine, killing the Greek dancer. Following Egloge's murder, the people of Rome revolt against Nero, and he learns that those faithful to him have been killed. Nero and Atte flee Rome together and they learn that the Senate has named Nero an enemy of the state. Legionnaires pursue the couple, but Atte kills herself and Nero is killed by his friend before his enemies can capture him.

Giulio Cesare by Gian Francesco Malipiero

Opera in three acts, premiered at the Teatro Carlo Felice, Genoa on February 8, 1936. Libretto by Malipiero.

Act One. Cesare celebrates the Lupercalia festival in Rome. A fortune teller advises him to beware the Ides of March. Bruto, Cassio, and Casca are wary of Cesare's power and fear for the safety of the Roman republic. Act Two. Cesare's wife, Calpurnia has worrisome dreams and is afraid that a disaster will befall her husband. She begs him not to go out, and he complies. However, Bruto,

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Cassio, and Casca accuse Cesare of being a coward, and he eventually leaves with the three conspirators. Once the men arrive at the Senate, Casca stabs Cesare in the neck with a dagger. The other conspirators take turns stabbing Cesare—Bruto deals the final blow. Act Three. Cesare is given a funeral at the Forum and Bruto explains why he helped kill the dictator. Chaos ensues and results in a battle between Cesare's supporters and the conspirators. Cassio and Bruto are killed during the battle and Cesare is avenged. The triumphant party praises Rome.

Lucrezia by Ottorino Respighi

Opera in one act, premiered posthumously at the Teatro alla Scala, Milan on February 24, 1937. Libretto by Claudio Guastalla.

Act one. The opera begins with the soldiers Tarquinio, Collatino, Tito, Arunte, and Bruto drinking together in a tent, preparing for war. They boast about their wives, and Collatino mentions that his wife, Lucrezia is a model of virtue. Emboldened by their drunken states, the men decide to ride to Rome to check on Lucrezia. Here, Tarquinio is overcome with desire for Lucrezia, and as the soldiers ride back to their camp, he fantasizes about her. La voce (the voice) expresses Tarquinio's desires, acting as a narrator. Night falls and Lucrezia talks with her maids in her bedchamber. Tarquinio suddenly appears, and Lucrezia offers to let him stay in her home; but the maids are suspicious of him. Lucrezia goes to bed and Tarquinio enters her room uninvited, threatening to kill her if she screams for help. She resists him, saying she would rather die than love him. Nevertheless, Tarquinio rapes Lucrezia. The next day, Collatino returns home and Lucrezia tells him who raped her. Collatino vows to avenge his wife, but Lucrezia is so distraught from the rape that she commits suicide, plunging a dagger into her heart. Collatino and his friends leave for Rome to kill Tarquinio, with the intent to dethrone the Roman Kings.

Gli Orazi by Ennio Porrino

Opera in one act, premiered at the Teatro alla Scala, Milan on February 1, 1941. Libretto by Claudio Guastalla.

Act One. The opera begins with Marco Orazio the elder praying for the safety of his family and house during a time of war. His daughter, Camilla is upset by the hardships of war, as her lover Atto Curiazio and her brother Publio Orazio are destined to fight one other in battle. The Orazi are from Rome and the Curiazi are from Alba, and each family sends three sons to fight each other in an attempt to declare a victor without

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resorting to a full-scale battle. The fight between the Romans and the Albans results in a Roman victory; Publio Orazio kills Atto Curiazio, securing Roman power while emotionally scarring his sister. Camilla Orazia is distraught and mourns the loss of her husband. This enrages Publio Orazio and he kills his sister in front of a large crowd of onlookers. For this murder, Publio is brought to trial and sentenced to death. However, his father, Marco Orazio intervenes, calling for an appeal, justifying the murder of his daughter and begging forgiveness for his son. Moved by his words, the King pardons Publio Orazio, sparing his life.

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Appendix B Fascist Timeline

October 1922: March on Rome; Mussolini is appointed prime minister

January 1925: Mussolini’s dictatorship is established

February 1929: Lateran Pacts are signed, establishing Vatican City and solidifying

relations between the National Fascist Party and the Catholic Church

October 1932: Tenth anniversary of the March on Rome

January 1933: The Nazis come to power; Hitler is named German chancellor

January 1935: Pietro Mascagni’s Nerone premieres at the Teatro alla Scala in Milan

October 1935: Italy invades Ethiopia

February 1936: Gian Francesco Malipiero’s Giulio Cesare premieres at the Teatro

Carlo Felice in Genoa

May 1936: Ethiopia falls to Italy, Mussolini declares the beginning of a new Italian

Empire

February 1937: Ottorino Respighi’s Lucrezia premieres at the Teatro alla Scala in

Milan

March 1938: Germany annexes Austria

July 1938: Manifesto of the Racist ‘Scientists’ published in Il giornale d’Italia

November 1938: Royal Decree n.1728 outlines a set of antisemitic racial laws

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May 1939: Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany formalize their partnership with the Pact of

Steel

September 1939: Germany invades Poland; France and Britain declare war on

Germany

June 1940: Italy enters World War II as an axis power

October 1940: Italy invades Greece

February 1941: Ennio Porrino’s Gli Orazi premieres at the Teatro alla Scala in Milan

July 1943: Mussolini is deposed; Germany institutes a puppet state

April 1945: Mussolini is publicly executed in Milan

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Appendix C Analytical Tables

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Table 1: Nerone Analysis, Act I

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Table 2: Nerone Analysis Act II 211

Table 3: Nerone Analysis, Act III 212

Table 4: Giulio Cesare Analysis, Act I

213

Table 5: Giulio Cesare Analysis, Act II

Table 6: Giulio Cesare Analysis, Act III

214

Table 7: Lucrezia Analysis, Moment I

215

Table 8: Lucrezia Analysis, Moment II 216

Table 9: Lucrezia Analysis, Moment III

217

Table 10: Gli Orazi Analysis, First Half 218

Table 11: Gli Orazi Analysis, Second Half 219

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Scores

Malipiero, Gian Francesco. Giulio Cesare. Milan: G. Ricordi & Co., 1936. Mascagni, Pietro. Nerone. Firenze: Stabilimento Mignani, 1934.

Monteverdi, Claudio. Tutte le opere di Claudio Monteverdi. Edited by Gian Francesco Malipiero. Vienna: Universal Edition, 1926-1942, 1968. Porrino, Ennio. Gli Orazi. Milan: Casa Musicale Sonzogno, 1939. Respighi, Ottorino. Lucrezia. Milan: G. Ricordi & Co., 1936.

Libretti

Guastalla, Claudio. Lucrezia: Un atto in tre momenti. Milan: G. Ricordi & Co., 1951. Malipiero, Gian Francesco. Giulio Cesare da Shakespeare. Milan: G. Ricordi & Co., 1935. Porrino, Ennio. Gli Orazi: Istoria, Un atto da Livio, Io, 22-26. Milan: Casa Musicale Sonzogno, 1939. Targioni-Tozzetti, Giovanni. Nerone: dalla “Commedia” di Pietro Cossa: tre atti (quattro quadri). Livorno: Belforte, 1935.

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Karmali, Sarah. “Fendi Relocates to a Roman Palace.” Vogue: Britain, July 18, 2013, https://www.vogue.co.uk/article/fendi-moves-headquarters-to-palazzo-della- civilta-italiano-in-rome.

Kington, Tom. “Italy’s Fascists Stay True to Mussolini’s Ideology.” The Guardian, November 6, 2011, sec. World news, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/nov/06/italy-fascists-true-mussolini- ideology.

“Il “Giulio Cesare” di Malipiero rappresentato al Carlo Felice di Genova.” Il Giornale d’Italia, February 11, 1936.

“La serata e il successo.” La Stampa, February 25, 1937.

“Le nuove opera di Mascagni, Respighi, Mule e Robbiani.” La Stampa, February 24, 1933. Lessona, Michele. Gazzetta del Popolo, February 25, 1937. “Le udienze del Duce.” La Stampa, February 27, 1935. “L’indimenticabile serata.” Corriere della Sera, January 17, 1935. “L’omaggio al Duce di un’opera postuma di Respighi.” Roma 23 Gennaio, Corriere della Sera, 24 Gennaio, 1937. Lualdi, Adriano. Il Giornale d’Italia, February 26, 1937.

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Matthews, Herbert L. “Pope Takes Over St. John Lateran in Pageant Last Held 93 Years Ago: 20,000 in Streets Join with the Hierarchy and Italian Aristocracy in Paying Homage to Bishop of Rome” New York Times, May 19, 1939. “OPERA: Respighi Widow Scores Final 40 Pages of His Posthumous ‘Lucrezia’,” Newsweek, March 6, 1937. Porrino, Ennio. “Battaglie Musicali: Giovanile allarme per i sistemi sindacali.” Perseo, 15 November, 1937. Respighi, Ottorino. “La musica italiana moderna.” Radiocorriere, 10-16 Febbraio 1935. Savinio, Alberto. “Il ‘povero’ Nerone.” La Stampa, September 23, 1933. Scuderi, Gaspare. Musica d’oggi, 1941. “S.E. Galeazzo Ciano rappresenterà il Governo fascista alla prima del ‘Nerone’.” La Stampa della Sera, January 15, 1935. P.,S. "La 'prima' del 'Nerone' alla Scala", II regime fascista, 17 January 1936.

Recordings and Other Media

Channel 4 News. “Fascism in Italy: The Hipster Fascists Trying to Bring Mussolini Back into the Mainstream.” YouTube Video, 10:18, March 2, 2018, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I3x-ge4w46E.

Malipiero, Gian Francesco. Giulio Cesare, Orchestra Sinfonica e Coro di Milano della RAI. Conducted by Nino Sanzogno, recorded July 8, 1956. Great Opera Performances (2006), CD. Mascagni, Pietro. Nerone, Orchestra Filarmonica di Roma. Conducted by Támas Pál, recorded 2001, Pan Dream (2001), DVD.

------. Nerone, Radio Symphony Orchestra di Hilversum. Conducted by Kees Bakels, recorded November 16, 1986. Bongiovanni (1994), CD. Porrino, Ennio. Gli Orazi, Orchestra Sinfonica e Coro di Milano della RAI. Conducted by Ennio Porrino, recorded October 28, 1959. Premiere Opera.Net Company (2016), CD. Respighi, Ottorino. Lucrezia, Orchestra sinfonica e Coro di Milano della RAI. Conducted by Oliviero De Fabritiis, recorded September 12, 1958. Golden Age of Opera (1995), LP.

------. Lucrezia, Junge Philharmonie der A.M.O.R. Conducted by Ettore Gracis, recorded July 24, 1981. Bongiovanni (1982), CD.

------. Lucrezia, Slovak Radio Symphony Orchestra (Bratislava). Conducted by Adriano, recorded June 9-16, 1994. Marco Polo (1995), CD.

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Biography

Elizabeth (Liz) Crisenbery was born in Cincinnati, Ohio and raised in Lebanon, Ohio.

She graduated cum laude with a B.M. in Vocal Performance from Bowling Green

State University in 2012. She earned an M.F.A. in Musicology from Brandeis University

in 2014 with the support of a Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Scholarship. In

2016, she graduated with an M.A. in Musicology from Duke University and earned her

Ph.D. in Musicology from Duke in 2020. Liz’s book review of Tyranny and Music was

published in the December 2019 issue of Notes. Her doctoral work has been generously supported by four Summer Research Fellowships, a James B. Duke

International Research Travel Fellowship, Conference Travel Awards from The

Graduate School, and a Gender, Sexuality and Feminist Studies Travel Award.

During her doctoral studies, Liz was also a fellow in the Andrew W. Mellon

Foundation/Humanities Without Walls Pre-Doctoral Career Diversity Summer

Workshop, a fellow in the PhD Lab in Digital Knowledge at Duke, and an

Administrative Intern for the Dean’s Office in The Graduate School. She is a member of the Society of Duke Fellows.

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