Penny Smith's Missing Link
Can you work out the missing link from these clues?
Last updated 20th Aug 2020
Every weekday morning from 11:00 Penny Smith plays 3 pieces that each have something in common, can you figure out the connection?
This morning’s clues were:
The Barber of Seville - Philharmonia Orchestra
Elgar: Cello Concerto in E Minor - Featuring Alisa Weilerstein
La Traviata - Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra
Scroll down to reveal the answer.
Missing Link: All pieces that flopped at their premieres
The composer Giovanni Paisiello accused Rossini of ripping him off, and a group of his fans booed and hissed throughout the premiere of The Barber of Seville. (Also, one singer tripped on a trapdoor and had to carry on the performance with a bloodied nose, and a cat decided to jump on stage … and then refused to leave).
The conductor of the rest of the programme at the premiere of Elgar's Cello Concerto over-ran his rehearsal schedule, which didn’t allow enough time for Elgar to prepare the orchestra. It led one critic to write “Never has so great an orchestra made so lamentable an exhibition of itself.”
And at the premiere of La Traviata, audience members mocked the fact that the soprano singing the role of Violetta was an unrealistic choice as a desired courtesan. Verdi himself described the opening as a fiasco.