Gioacchino Rossini Opera & Music Education Posters & Prints
for the music studio, arts and social studies classrooms, home schoolers, decor for office or home.

“The Barber of Seville” by Rossini is an opera buffa in two acts with a libretto by Cesare Sterbini. It was first performed in 1816.

The opera follows the first of the plays from the Figaro trilogy by French playwright Pierre Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais.

In The Barber of Seville it is Figaro, the barber of Seville and former servant to Count Almaviva, who “negotiates” the marriage of the Count and Rosina under the nose of Dr. Bartolo, who wished to wed her for her inheritance.

Henriette Sontag
b. 1-3-1806; Koblenz, Germany
d. 6-17-1854; Mexico, cholera while on North American tour.

Henriette Sontag, who made her debut at age 15, was an internationally known operatic soprano. She sang the part of Rosina, Dr. Bartolo's ward, in The Barber of Seville.

• more opera singers

Rossini's La Cenerentola, ossia La bontà in trionfo, translated as Cinderella, Goodness Triumphant, is an opera based on the fairy tale of Cinderella.

It was first performed in 1817.

• Warwick Goble, illustrator

Rossini's opera “William Tell” is based on Friedrich Schiller's play Wilhelm Tell about the thirteenth century Swiss patriot who rallied his country against the Austrians.

The William Tell Overture is one of the most famous and frequently recorded works - think the “The Lone Ranger”.

The first part of this 1914 recording by Cesare Sodero's band is the pastoral Ranz des vaches (from the high pastures in the Alps) that you will recognized from its use in cartoons to signify “dawn”, the “galop” is the rousing Finale ...

“Semiramide” by Rossini is about the legendary Queen Semiramis of Babylon and is based on Voltaire's tragedy 'Semiramis'.