Volume 11 – Lyrical Operas

Opera in three acts and two scenes

In the third decade of the twentieth century the efforts of Daniele Maffeis are concentrated on establishing himself on the operatic stage.

Coming after Il Maestro Smania, The Three nights of light represents the most ambitious theatrical project of the gazzanighese composer, also inspired by the meetings with Giovanni Mari, teacher of literature for forty years at the scientific high school of Milan, to dramatise the conversion of Jacopone da Todi. It is a scenic oratorio, in which the choral part has a great prominence with a recurring motif, reworked in subsequent years in a cycle of variations (vol. II and VIII). As the author of the text states in the introduction,”the libretto contains, in three nights, a story and two sequences; the real story takes place the night before, so that the sequences are, as far as possible, supported by the music alone: a music that knows how to unite and merge symphonism and theater”. The edition includes three files for the score of each act and a file for the entire sheet music.