Le faccio un inchino (Cimarosa)
Le faccio un inchino (К графине прелестной), is the trio from the opera Il matrimonio segreto by Domenico Cimarosa, which Tchaikovsky arranged for orchestra (TH 179 ; ČW 410) by January 1871.
Instrumentation
Tchaikovsky's arrangement is scored for three female soloists: Carolina (soprano), Lisetta (mezzo-soprano), and Fidalma (mezzo-soprano), and an orchestra consisting of 2 flutes, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets (in A), 2 bassoons + 2 horns (in G), 2 trumpets (in G) + violins I, violins II, violas, cellos, and double basses.
Movements and Duration
There is one movement: Andante grazioso (196 bars, G major), lasting around 4 minutes in performance.
Text
The Italian libretto for the opera was written by Giovanni Bertati (1735–1815), based on the English play The Clandestine Marriage (1766) by George Colman (1732–1794) and David Garrick (1717–1779). The words are omitted from Tchaikovsky's manuscript arrangement [1].
History
No information survives on the origins of this arrangement. It was probably made in January 1871 at the request of Nikolay Rubinstein to be performed at a Russian Musical Society concert, in the absence of the full score of Cimarosa's opera.
Performances
The first performance took place in Moscow, at a special RMS symphony concert on 29 January/10 February 1871, with soloists Désirée Artôt (soprano), Ilma Di Murska (mezzo-soprano), and Zelia Trebelli (contralto), conducted by Nikolay Rubinstein.
Publication
Tchaikovsky's arrangement was published for the first time in 1970 in volume 59 of Tchaikovsky's Complete Collected Works, edited by Irina Iordan, with the original Italian words and a Russian translation.
Autographs
Tchaikovsky's autograph manuscript is now preserved in the Russian National Museum of Music in Moscow (ф. 88, No. 161) [view].
Related Works
The opera Il matrimonio segreto by the Italian composer Domenico Cimarosa (1749–1801) was first produced in Vienna in 1792. The trio "Le faccio un inchino" comes from Act I (No. 4) of the opera
