Don Pasquale is a comic opera, in three acts by Gaetano Donizetti with an Italian libretto by Giovanni Ruffini.
At the time of its composition, Donizetti had just been appointed music director and composer for the imperial court of Emperor Ferdinand I of Austria, and Don Pasquale was the 64th of an eventual 66 operas he composed.
The opera, in the tradition of opera buffa, harks back to the stock characters of the commedia dell'arte. Pasquale is recognizable as the blustery Pantalone, Ernesto as the lovesick Pierrot, Malatesta as the scheming Scapino, and Norina as a wily Columbina. The false Notary echoes a long line of false officials as operatic devices. This 1979 recording stars Ewgenij Nesterenko, Francisco Araiza and Lucia Popp. Heinz Wallberg conducts.
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