La Vida Es Bella

Middle Ages and Renaissance

Italy is considered by many to be the early home of the marionette thanks to the influence of Roman puppetry. Xenophon and Plutarch refer to them. The Christian churchused marionettes to perform morality plays. It is believed that the term marionette' emerged around 1600. Comedy sneaked into the plays as time went by and ultimately, puppeteers responded by settingup stages outside cathedrals and became ever more ribald and slapstick. Out of this grew the Italian comedy called commedia dell'arte Puppets were used at times in this form of threate.[edit]Sicilian marionettes

Main article: Opera dei Pupi
The sides of donkey carts are decorated with intricate, painted scenes from the Frankish romantic poems, such as The Song of Roland; these same tales areenacted in traditional puppet theatres featuring hand-made marionettes of wood, this art is called L'Opera deî Pupi (Opera of the puppets) in Sicilian. The opera of the puppets and the Siciliantradition of cantastorî (singers of tales) are rooted in the Provençal troubadour tradition in Sicily during the reign of Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor, in the first half of the 13th century. A greatplace to see this marionette art is the puppet theatres of Palermo, Sicily.
[edit]Marionette operas



From a production of Mozart's The Magic Flute by the Salzburg Marionette Theatre
In theeighteenth century, operas were specifically composed for marionettes. Mozart as a child had seen marionettes. Gluck, Haydn, de Falla and Respighi all composed adult operas for marionettes. Lewis Carrollcomposed marionette operas and plays for his siblings' entertainment. Today in Salzburg in Austria, the Salzburg Marionette Theatre still continues the tradition of presenting full length opera usingmarionettes in their own purpose built theatre.
The Opera dei Pupi, Sicilian puppet theater, was relisted on the Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity in 2008....