The composer Umberto Giordano (1867–1948) was not the only Italian who in the early 20th century took an interest in plots that were set in exotic countries. At the same time as Giordano, in 1903, Giacomo Puccini wrote the opera Madama Butterfly based on a Japanese plot, and one year later came Franco Alfano's opera Risurrezione after Tolstoy. Possibly the idea for Siberia came to Giordano from his Russian wife Olga Spatz. The score was to include the Russian national anthem God Save the Tsar, dances to balalaika accompaniment and the Song of the Volga Boatmen which the composer, it is true, used as a convicts' song.
Luigi Illica, who in addition to Madama Butterfly also wrote the libretti for Puccini's operas Manon Lescaut and Tosca, confirmed that the basis of the plot came from Tolstoy's novel Resurrection, but he could also have referred to works by Leskov and Dostoevsky. The text includes numerous "Russian" motifs – hard labour, Siberia, a duel, Easter with bell-ringing, the characters singing serenades and in the finale the beautiful and self-sacrificing courtesan Stephana dies in the arms of her beloved, the soldier Vassili. It is a truly verist opera – Umberto Giordano was a representative of the Giovane scuola (Young School), which followed this movement.
At the premiere of Siberia at the Teatro alla Scala in 1903 it was sung by the finest singers, and for the rehearsals of Giordano's work preparations for another opus – Madama Butterfly – were stopped. The second production, in Venice, was not a success. The situation was rectified by a production in Genoa and performances of the opera soon afterwards in America and Paris. Among the admirers of this verist drama was the French composer Gabriel Fauré, who predicted that the opera would enjoy a long stage life.
Anastasia Spiridonova
