Vinci: La Rosmira fedele (Partenope)

The possibility of Leonardo Vinci (1690-1730) ever being counted among the world’s great composers is pretty slim; he composed almost three dozen operas—both buffe and serie—and was particularly active in Naples. Judging from La Partenope, which here gets its first recording (taken from live performances in Murcia, Spain in April and May, 2011), he was a good craftsman who composed fine arias of both the introspective and showpiece variety, some quite beautiful. The opera, composed in 1725, was a rush job—his success in 1724 in Venice with Iphigenia in Tauris led to a commission for another opera to be composed quickly. In 1722, Domenico Sarro had set a libretto by Silvio Stampiglia called Partenope; Vinci used not only the libretto but Sarro’s recitatives and a chorus or two. He cannibalized many of his own compositions for the needed arias, manipulated them, and crammed Stampiglia’s texts in to the music, eliminating much of the sense. (He also changed the opera’s name to Rosmira