Gassmann, Florian Leopold (1729-1774)

La casa di compagna (The Country House) Gassmann's last opera, was premiered at the Burgtheater on 13 February 1773. The libretto is believed to be the work of Giovanni Gastone Boccherini (1742- ca 1800), brother of the famous cellist and composer Luigi Boccherini, who signed a three-year contract with the Imperial Court as theatre poet in 1772. Boccherini wrote and revised libretti for a number of composers including Haydn whose setting of Il Ritorno di Tobia (1774-1775) was made at the invitation of the Tonknstler-Societt. The court copy of the score - upon which this edition of the overture is based - is handsomely bound in three volumes and titled La Casa di Campagna/Del Sig: Floriano Gassmann. In producing the score the copyist adhered to the usual time-saving conventions of the period: where the violins play in unison, the second part is not notated; similarly, the viola line is left blank unless it is playing independently of the basso part. As the copy was doubtless prepared under Gassmann's direct supervision it should be considered a highly reliable source. Nonetheless, there are inconsistencies, errors and the odd omissions. The style and notation of articulation and dynamic markings have been standardised throughout, and, where missing from the source,markings have been reconstructed from parallel passages. These are indicated by the use of dotted slurs or brackets. Like most eighteenth-century sources, the present manuscript is inconsistent in its notation of appoggiature; these too have been standardised to minimise confusion. Obvious wrong notes have been corrected without comment; editorial emendations with no authority from the source are placed within brackets. Allan Badley