Overture: La gazza ladra (The Thieving Magpie)

Most of Rossini’s operas, including nearly all of those written before the composer abandoned Italy to take up a new career in Paris in 1824, begin with overtures that have little or nothing to do with them. Although the major exception among those composed for Italy is the very last, Semiramide, there is an earlier example in La gazza ladra, which was written for La Scala, Milan, in 1817.

What inspired Rossini to depart from his usual practice in La gazza ladra and draw on music from the opera for the overture is a matter for conjecture. It has been suggested that he had left it so late to put an overture together - the story goes that the management had to lock him in a room on the day of the first performance and keep him there until he produced something - that there was no time to invent new material. Another idea is that he so much liked the sound of the snare drums used by the soldiers in the opera that he devised a way of getting them into the overture too. Certainly, the overture begins with a roll on the side drum which then accompanies the military march that follows (Maestoso marziale). It appears again in a solo role to initiate the dramatic transition to a quicker tempo and plays a prominent part also in the two spectacular crescendos that engulf the hapless second theme of the main (Allegro) section of the piece.