page_title: Cristina, regina di Svezia
section_title: Background and performance history
hierarchical_section_title: Cristina, regina di Svezia / Background and performance history
caption_attribution_description: Svenska: Mindre teatern, Östra trädgårdsgatan, Stockholm. Omkring 1850
context_page_description: Cristina, regina di Svezia is an opera in five parts and three acts composed by Jacopo Foroni. The Italian libretto by Giovanni Carlo Casanova is loosely based on the events surrounding the abdication of Christina, Queen of Sweden in 1654. The opera premiered on 22 May 1849 at the Mindre Theatre in Stockholm.
context_section_description: Cristina, regina di Svezia was Jacopo Foroni's second opera. His first, Margherita, had premiered in Milan in 1848. However, his involvement with the Five Days of Milan uprising had made life dangerous in the city and led him to seek work abroad. He became the conductor of Vincenzo Galli's Italian opera company which by the autumn of 1848 had taken up residence in Stockholm's Mindre Theatre. Foroni composed Cristina to introduce himself to Swedish audiences. The librettist, Giovanni Carlo Casanova, was also a basso cantante singer in Galli's company. The opera premiered at the Mindre Theatre on 22 May 1849 and was dedicated to Oscar I of Sweden, the reigning monarch at the time. Hans Christian Andersen was at the premiere and wrote enthusiastically about it. The success of the opera led to Foroni being appointed as the chief conductor at the Royal Swedish Opera later that year.  
  In the autumn of 1850 the opera was given its Italian premiere when Foroni himself conducted its performance at the Gran Teatro Civico in Trieste. Over the next 8 years he continued in his post at the Royal Swedish Opera and composed music for royal occasions and concerts. Foroni wrote only two more operas before his death from cholera at the age of 33. Although the overture to Cristina was heard occasionally in 19th century concerts, both the composer and the work itself fell into obscurity. 
  However, it was revived at the 2007 Vadstena Summer Opera Festival, and in 2010 it was recorded for the first time with a performance by the Göteborg Opera conducted by Tobias Ringborg.
   
  It was performed again at Wexford Festival Opera in October and November 2013 with Helena Dix in the title role. The Wexford production, directed by Stephen Medcalf, updated the action to the 1930s and drew explicit parallels to the abdication of Edward VIII in 1936. The UK premiere of the work was performed in concert version by Chelsea Opera Group at London's Cadogan Hall on 8 November 2014.
caption: Mindre Theatre in Stockholm where Cristina, regina di Svezia premiered in 1849
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