page_title: Petite messe solennelle
section_title: Performances
hierarchical_section_title: Petite messe solennelle / History / Performances
caption_attribution_description: English: Italian opera singer Marietta Alboni (1826-1894) by Charles Vogt (18??-18??)
context_page_description: Gioachino Rossini's Petite messe solennelle was written in 1863, possibly at the request of Count Alexis Pillet-Will for his wife Louise to whom it is dedicated. The composer, who had retired from composing operas more than 30 years before, described it as "the last of my péchés de vieillesse".
  The extended work is a missa solemnis, but Rossini labeled it, not without irony, petite. He scored it originally for twelve singers, four of them soloists, two pianos and harmonium. The mass was first performed on 14 March 1864 at the couple's new home in Paris. Rossini later produced an orchestral version, including an additional movement, a setting of the hymn "O salutaris hostia" as a soprano aria. This version of the mass was not performed during his lifetime because he could not obtain permission to perform it with female singers in a church. It was first performed three months after his death, at the Salle Ventadour in Paris by the company of the Théâtre-Italien on 24 February 1869.
  While publications began that year, the first critical edition appeared only in 1980, followed by more editions in 1992, the bicentenary of the composer's birth.
context_section_description: The mass was first performed on 14 March 1864 at the couple's new residence in Paris, the hôtel of Louise, comtesse de Pillet-Will. The countess is the dedicatee of this refined and elegant piece, which avoids the sentimental opulence of most contemporary liturgical works, such as those by Charles Gounod. Albert Lavignac, aged eighteen, conducted from the harmonium. The soloists were the sisters Carlotta and Barbara Marchisio, Italo Gardoni and Luigi Agnesi. The sisters Marchisio had performed together in Rossini's works before, such as the leading parts of the lovers in his opera Semiramide. Rossini, who had helped prepare for the performance, turned pages for the first pianist, Georges Mathias, and marked tempos by nodding his head. Among the first listeners were Giacomo Meyerbeer, Daniel Auber and Ambroise Thomas. The performance was repeated the following day, for a larger audience which included members of the press.
  In 1867, three years after the first performance, Rossini discreetly orchestrated the Petite messe solennelle, partly for fear that others would do it anyway after his death. As he disliked the sound of cathedral boys' choirs, he requested permission from the pope to perform the work with female voices at a church. When his request was rejected, he demanded that the orchestral version would only be performed after his death. The composer preferred the chamber music version anyway.
  The first performance of the orchestral version, which was also the first public performance of the work, took place on 24 February 1869, close to what would have been Rossini's seventy-seventh birthday. It was performed at the Salle Ventadour in Paris by the company of the Théâtre-Italien, with soloists Gabrielle Krauss, Marietta Alboni, Ernest Nicolas and Luigi Agnesi.
caption: Marietta Alboni, the contralto
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