Monleone, Domenico
Monleone, Domenico
Monleone, Domenico, Italian opera composer; b. Genoa, Jan. 4, 1875; d. there, Jan. 15, 1942. He studied at the Milan Cons. From 1895 to 1901 he was active as a theater conductor in Amsterdam and in Vienna. He attracted attention by producing in Amsterdam (Feb. 5, 1907) an opera, Cavalleria rusticana, to a libretto by his brother Giovanni, on the same subject as Mascagni’s celebrated work; after its first Italian performance (Turin, July 10, 1907), Mascagni’s publisher, Sonzogno, brought a lawsuit against Monleone for infringement of copyright. Monleone was forced to change the title; his brother rewrote the libretto, and the opera was produced as La Giostra dei falchi (Florence, Feb. 18, 1914). Other operas were Una novella di Boccaccio (Genoa, May 26, 1909), Alba eroica (Genoa, May 5, 1910), Arabesca (Rome, March 11, 1913; won 1st prize at the competition of the City of Rome), Suona la ritrata (Milan, May 23, 1916), II mistero (Venice, May 7, 1921), Fauvette (Genoa, March 2, 1926), and La ronda di notte (Genoa, March 6, 1933); also an opera in Genovese dialect, Scheuggio Campann-a (Genoa, March 12, 1928). For some of his works he used the pseudonym W. di Stolzing.
—Nicolas Slonimsky/Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire