This is one of the most important operas of the 17th century and a 3-act opera blending tragic and comic aspects in a most entertaining way. This is also music never heard before on record: the world premiere recording of a milestone in operatic history, captured live at the Innsbruck Early Music festival. Here is lively and varied music incorporating short arias, turbulent ensembles and traditional dances.

Alessandro De Marchi’s new performance version juxtaposes a richly-scored baroque orchestra with a period folk music ensemble that accompanies the buffo servant Giampetro who sings in a fake Calabrese dialect. A great vocal cast accompany authoritative playing from de Marchi’s own Italian ensemble, the Academia Montis Regalis.

Francesco Provenzale (1624–1704) was the first composer to bring Venetian operatic models to his hometown. He bridges the schools of Francesco Cavalli and Alessandro Scarlatti.

Italian conductor Alessandro De Marchi is one of today's leading specialists in the field of historic performing practice, on both original and modern instruments. His opera repertoire ranges from Monteverdi, Cavalli, Vivaldi and Handel through Keiser, Pergolesi and Hasse to works by Haydn, Mozart and Cimarosa. De Marchi also performs operas by Bellini, Rossini and Donizetti on original instruments, and sees these in a historic context between Baroque and Classical opera.

Alessandro De Marchi has been principal conductor of the Academia Montis Regalis since 1998. In 2009 he was appointed artistic director of the Innsbruck Early Music Festival as successor to René Jacobs with effect from the 2010 season. The Academia Montis Regalis (orchestra and chorus) is a Piemontese institution that has been actively promoting Early Music for many years. It started life in 1994 as a Baroque and Classical orchestra with the goal of presenting 17th and 18th century repertoire on original instruments, with attention to historic performing practice.