Handel - Riccardo primo

Riccardo Primo re d’Inghilterra (or 'Richard the First, King of England') is an opera in three acts by George Frideric Handel. The Italian-language libretto was by Paolo Antonio Rolli, after Francesco Briani's Isacio tiranno, set by Antonio Lotti in 1710. Handel wrote the work for the Royal Academy's 1726-1727 opera season, and also as homage to the newly crowned George II and the nation where Handel had just received citizenship.

The opera received its premiere at the King's Theatre in London on 11 November 1727, and 11 subsequent performances. It was also performed in Hamburg and Brunswick. Handel subsequently re-used music from the opera in Scipione and Tolomeo. The opera fell into neglect after the 1728 closing of the Royal Academy.

Riccardo Primo was rediscovered and performed by the Handel Opera Society at Sadler's Wells in London on 8 July 1964. Later performances were given at Kourion Amphitheater in Cyprus at 1991, in order to mark the 800th anniversary of the historical events on which the opera is based, and also at the 1996 Göttingen Festival.

R.B. Chatwin has discussed Handel's writing of orchestral parts for the chalumeau, a forerunner of the clarinet, as part of the musicological controversy over whether or not Handel wrote music for the clarinet or its precursors.[4] Winton Dean and Richard Drakeford have commented on the weaknesses of the dramatic characterisations in the libretto.