Giacomo Puccini's La fanciulla del West is based on the play, The Girl of the Golden West, by the American author David Belasco. If you were to see a production still of La fanciulla del West without any context, you might think you were looking at a photo from a production of Oklahoma! by Rodgers and Hammerstein. Puccini's story is set in a gold-mining frontier town, where a poker-playing, pistol-wielding saloon owner finds herself in a love triangle with a handsome outlaw and the sheriff who is in pursuit of the outlaw.
Given its Wild West setting and its Italian composer, one could say that La fanciulla del West is a precursor to cinema's "Spaghetti Western," a subgenre of Western films that emerged in the 1960s that were produced and directed by Italians. (Visit the Classical Notes blog to learn more about Giacomo Puccini.)
Listen to Classical MPR on Wednesday, March 9, at 8 p.m., to hear a broadcast of the Minnesota Opera's 2014 production of Puccini's La fanciulla del West. Until then, have a look at the opera's chorus, as well as a video from the Minnesota Opera that summarizes the story of La fanciulla del West.
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