About the work
La secchia rapita is a dramma eroicomico in three acts by Antonio Salieri, set to a libretto by Giovanni Gastone Boccherini. It is based on Alessandro Tassoni's mock-heroic poem of the same name about the legendary 1325 "bucket war" between Bologna and Modena. The opera was first performed on 21 October 1772 in Vienna.
Plot
Modenese soldiers have carried off a wooden bucket from a Bolognese well; when Bologna demands its return, it also demands two brides in compensation. Amid mock-military posturing and the romantic troubles of the mayor's daughter Renoppia, the opera parodies grand war-themed opera seria until the quarrel is settled by a wedding.
Cultural significance
Salieri is credited as the first composer to score three timpani instead of the usual two, each tuned to a different pitch — an unusually rich sound for a comic opera. The work received 21 performances in its first season and later travelled to Mannheim, Dresden and Modena before disappearing from the stage for two centuries.