GIACOMO PUCCINI

In 1880, Puccini completed his studies at the Pacini Institute in Lucca, he had just finished composing a mass, Messa di Gloria the fact that he wrote this encouraged his great-uncle to help support his musical education, also a scholarship was granted from Queen Margherita. Thereby allowing the young composer to enrol at Milan's Conservatorio, Milan and its famous Teatro alla Scala was the place to be for all young up and coming composers.
For three years (1880 -1883) Giacomo continued his studies at the Conservatorio Reale under Bazzini and Ponchielli, the composer of La Gioconda, he there composed as a leaving exercise an orchestral piece, Capriccio sinfonico, this was performed by the students orchestra and achieved great success at its performance.

It foretold the gifts that were to be - of operas blending intense emotion and theatricality with tender lyricism, colourful orchestration and a rich vocal line. Meanwhile the music publishing firm of Edoardo Sonzogno announced the first of severalcompetitions for a one-act opera (Mascagni's Cavalleria Rusticana was discovered in this way in 1889) Puccini then still a pupil of the Conservatorio, decided with Ponchielli's encouragement to take part in it. Ponchielli introduced Giacomo to a young librettist and journalist named Ferninando Fontana, who suggested to the young composer that it might be an idea to compose an opera around the story Le Villi (the Witches). This a legend of brides, who have been deserted by their lovers, they then are turned into spectres, dancing the loved one to death. Subjects such as this were very popular in Italy at this time, especially after the German romantic operas of Weber, and early Wagner, at a party, the result of the competition was announced early in 1884, Puccini's name was not even mentioned, unfortunately Puccini didn't win, however the opera was produced successfully in 1884 at Milan. At the party many influential people from the world of music were present. Puccini was invited to entertain by playing the piano and singing from the opera. He was given such praise, that it was decided to stage the work at the Teatro dal Verme, where it was first given on the 31st May 1884, it achieved an immense success.The result was that the great Milanese music publisher, Giulio Ricordi, acquired the rights of Le Villi and on his advice Puccini expanded the opera into two acts. Ricordi commissioned from Puccini a new opera, again with the young Fontana as the librettist.This was the beginning a life-long association of Giacomo Puccini and Ricordi, in whom he found a fatherly friend and wise guide.

Puccini was a perfectionist. He set high standards for himself and everyone else involved in his operas. He worked tirelessly with the sopranos who play his heroines. "He went over the music step by step, phrase by phrase," recalled Maria Jeritza, Puccini's favorite Tosca. "He molded me. I was his creation."
Puccini subjected others to stern discipline. "Sometimes he would make me so angry I wanted to cry," Jeritza recalled. "Then he would get angry. 'Jeritza,' he would say, 'if ever I wake you at three in the morning and ask you to sing a high C, you will sing a high C.'"

He was no less demanding of himself. He pushed himself to excellence, aiming for quality, not quantity. He wrote just eight full-length operas, compared to Verdi's 28. He never settled for what he thought wasn't perfect, although he was often assailed by doubts about his work. The doubts forced him to always ask himself, "Will it work?" Even after some of his operas were published, he continued to ask himself whether they worked and to make changes to them.
Puccini maintained a level head about opera as both art and business. He had no use for artistic pretension. He made fun of "artists who think they have to have dandruff to be geniuses." He kept up with musical fashions, without allowing himself to be taken in by fads. His early works show German influence. Later works show the influence of Debussy, even a touch of the atonality of Schoenberg.
But he never strayed too far from his melodic Italian roots or lost his attachment to his native Tuscany. When he was financially able, he bought a villa at Torre del Lago and lived there much of his life, until driven away by the smell of a peat factory built during World War I.
Puccini took no interest in politics and thought the war a mistake from the start. His lack of enthusiasm for the war was one reason for his falling out with his fiercely patriotic friend, conductor Arturo Toscanini.
He was fond of hunting and smoking and was fascinated with the mechanical marvels of his day. He owned a wireless and a phonograph and corresponded with Thomas Edison. He also owned several automobiles and motor yachts. He barely survived one of the first car crashes in Italy.
Puccini once described himself as a "mighty hunter of wild fowl, operatic librettos and attractive women." He was a notorious lady's man, but he was innocent of the scandal that most shook his marriage.
Convinced he was having an affair with a maidservant, his wife Elvira drove the young girl from the house and publicly denounced her. The girl was so shaken she committed suicide, whereupon it was determined that she was in fact a virgin.

Near the end of his life Puccini was still striving for greatness with his last opera, "Turandot." Marek writes, "He became, not only with his librettists but above all with himself, a frightening taskmaster. He was bent on doing something new, determined to write music of much larger scope, of legendary stature and philosophic implication."
In the opinion of some critics, he nearly succeeded. Only death by throat cancer in 1924 prevented him from finishing and polishing the opera.
At the first performance of "Turandot" at Milan's La Scala in 1926, the conductor, Toscanini, ended the performance in the middle of the third act (after Liů's death), telling the audience, "At this point the Maestro died."

After the failure of 'Edgar' in 1889, young Giacomo Puccini lived, utterly destitute, in Milan. This did not influence the tendency he showed throughout his career of being very fastidious with libretto material. He had read Abbé Prévost's novel, 'Histoire du Chevalier des Grieux et de Manon Lescaut', a work that had already been made into an opera by Massenet in 1884, and fallen in love with the characters, especially Manon.
Ricordi, who feared a possible comparison with Massenet, tried to convince him to select some other material, but Puccini refused. This was actually his first try at picking an operatic subject himself. What Massenet felt 'in a French way, with powder and minuets', he wanted to translate on Italian terms, that is: 'with desperate passion'.
To achieve his goal, Puccini was to exhaust six different librettists. A first try was provided by no less than Ruggero Leoncavallo (who had yet to write his Pagliacci), a fellow student, but he did not succeed in satisfying Puccini who then turned to a young playwright, Marco Praga.
Puccini wanted the story taken from the novel, without any reference to Massenet's work. Praga called on a poet friend, Domenico Oliva, to help him with the versification. This first version, completed in the summer of 1890, pleased Puccini, who started setting it to music immediately, integrating into the score motives taken from his student years such as his 'Crisantemi' (in the last two acts), the 'Agnus Dei' from his 'Messa di Gloria' (which provided the substance of the second act madrigal), or the melody 'Mentěa l'avviso' (1883) which inspired the famous 'Donna non vidi mai'.
But as he got into his composition work, he kept on asking for modifications, and Praga dropped the matter altogether, while Oliva reworked Act III but was soon disheartened by Puccini's requirements. Ricordi then recommended Giuseppe Giacosa who in turn recommended a young playwright, Luigi Illica.

Thus started their hugely fruitful collaboration with Puccini, supervised, on this occasion, by Giulio Ricordi. The work took three years to compose, the third act being completed in October 1892. To distinguish his work from Massenet's, Puccini chose to call it 'Manon Lescaut'. As printing the names of all six authors of the libretto would have seemed somewhat ludicrous, the opera was simply presented as Manon Lescaut, music by Giacomo Puccini (nowadays, the list of librettists has been restored, though Leoncavallo's name does not appear any more).
On February 1, 1893, the work received its premiere at the Teatro Regio, in Turin, as Ricordi dreaded the reaction of the Milanese audience after Edgar's failure. Cesira Ferrani created the role of Manon, Giuseppe Cremonini sang des Grieux, and Achille Moro was Lescaut. It was an immense success both with the audience and the critics.

Puccini was still to modify some of his orchestration, and Illica some of the dialogue: Puccini had wanted so much of a chronological gap between Act I and Act II (so as to distance himself as far as possible from Massenet), that the librettists had somehow neglected to account for Manon's change from pure young girl to courtesan. Illica thus inserted new dialogue in Act I, where Lescaut evokes the fatal fascination that pleasure exerts on his sister.
Puccini had now won a choice spot on the operatic map, in Italy as well as internationally. Manon Lescaut was performed within the year in Buenos Aires, Rio de Janeiro, St. Petersburg, Madrid and Hamburg. Lisbon, Budapest, Prague, Philadelphia, Mexico City and others followed in 1894. In London (14 May 1894) it was praised by G. B. Shaw, also an influential critic. New York saw its first performances in 1898 (although the Met premiere didn't take place until 1907, with Lina Cavalieri as Manon and Caruso as des Grieux), while Paris had to wait until 1910 to see Puccini's first big success.