About the work
Donizetti completed "L'ange de Nisida", an opera semiseria to a French libretto by Alphonse Royer and Gustave Vaëz, on 27 December 1839 for the Théâtre de la Renaissance in Paris. When the theatre went bankrupt soon after, and with its plot involving a King of Naples unstageable in Italy under censorship, the work was never performed; Donizetti reused much of its music in his opera "La favorite", and the "Ange de Nisida" score was dismembered and scattered in the process.
Plot
The exiled soldier Leone is reunited with Sylvia, the secret mistress of the King of Naples, and marries her without knowing of the affair. On learning the truth he leaves her devastated; Sylvia follows him to a monastery and dies at his feet as he calls in vain for help.
Cultural significance
Musicologist Candida Mantica spent eight years reconstructing the score from roughly 470 scattered manuscript pages held at the French National Library; Martin Fitzpatrick supplied the missing orchestration. The concert world premiere took place almost 180 years after its composition, on 18 July 2018 at the Royal Opera House in London under Mark Elder, with Joyce El-Khoury in the title role.