Elisabetta, regina d'Inghilterra
Elisabetta, regina d'Inghilterra is a dramma per musica or opera in two acts by Gioachino Rossini to a libretto by Giovanni Schmidt, from the play Il paggio di Leicester by Carlo Federici, which itself "was derived from a novel The Recess (1785) by Sophia Lee."
Portrait of the composer
Gioachino Antonio Rossini was an Italian composer who gained fame for his 39 operas, although he also wrote many songs, some chamber music and piano pieces and some sacred music. He set new standards for both comic and serious opera before retiring from large-scale composition while still in his thirties, at the height of his popularity.
Rossini as a young man, c. 1810–1815
Giuseppe Rossini (1758–1839)
Anna Rossini (1771–1827)
The storm scene from Il barbiere in an 1830 lithograph by Alexandre Fragonard