Composer of the Week - Verismo - Episode 2

The last decade of the nineteenth century produced a work that's been cited as a watershed of verismo. Mascagni's Cavalleria rusticana is a tale of rivalry and infidelity, set in a village in Sicily. Its unprecedented popularity generated a rush of composers interested in producing their own takes on this new style of musical drama. Two years later that included Leoncavallo who produced "I Pagliacci", an opera that's forever linked with Cavalleria rusticana as part of the double bill popularly known as Cav and Pag With Donald Macleod and Roger Parker.