Category:Berenice--music (subject)

Works of music related to Berenice

Overview

As a love story, the affair between the Emperor Titus and Berenice for almost two centuries (mid-17th to mid-19th cent.) was a favorite operatic subject and attracted the attention of major composers. No work however reached that level of celebrity as to enter the contemporary repertoire.

Berenice always appears in company of Titus, not as an independent character. Her political role is downplayed, to focus on her only as an unhappy lover.

Berenice is alluded to, but is not present in the most popular libretto, La clemenza di Titus (1734) by Pietro Metastasio, which focuses on the life of Titus after the end of his love affair with the Jewish Queen.

In 1793 Tito e Berenice revived the interest on the love affari between Titus and Berenice and a few more operas followed, based on the subject. Even some late versions of La clemenza di Tito" reintroduced Berenice as a singing character.

• [[Berenice in Roma, dramma in 2 atti (Verona, Teatro Filarmonico, 1805) by Carlo Mellara (1778-1840)

Performing Berenice (singers)

In some of the earliest operas, Berenice was played to a castrato, but already in the 18th century most of the interpreters were sopranos.

Performing Berenice (dancers)