| Betulia liberata | |
|---|---|
| Azione sacra by W. A. Mozart | |
 Mozart in 1777, by an unknown painter | |
| Translation | The Liberation of Bethulia |
| Librettist | Pietro Metastasio |
| Language | Italian |
| Based on | Judith and Holofernes |
La Betulia liberata (The Liberation of Bethulia) is a libretto by Pietro Metastasio which was originally commissioned by Emperor Charles VI and set to music by Georg Reutter the Younger in 1734. It was subsequently set by as many as 30 composers, including Niccolò Jommelli (1743), Ignaz Holzbauer (1752), Florian Leopold Gassmann (1772),[1] Joseph Schuster (1787), and most famously Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1771).
The work of Mozart is the best known, if only because the composer's output receives more examination. Composed in March to July 1771 when Mozart was 15 years old, K. 118 (74c) is a 140-minute azione sacra on a text by Metastasio tracing the story of Judith beheading Holofernes from the biblical Book of Judith. It was commissioned in March 1771 by Giuseppe Ximenes, Prince of Aragon, while Mozart and his father Leopold were on the way home to Salzburg from their first journey to Italy. It is the only oratorio Mozart ever wrote. Its two parts comprise sixteen arias, with solo or choral parts, scored for soloists, choir and orchestra. Not performed in Mozart's lifetime, La Betulia liberata is shaped stylistically to works by Leonardo Leo and Johann Adolph Hasse.
Recent high-profile performances of Mozart's setting include one in the 2006 Salzburg Festival conducted by Christoph Poppen, as part of the M22 series, masterminded by Bernhard Fleischer to perform all Mozart's operas (and the only oratorio) in 2006 Salzburg Festival. The performance was recorded and subsequently released as DVD. (See Recordings section below.) In 2010 both the Mozart and the Jommelli settings were performed side by side at the Salzburg Whitsun and Ravenna festivals under the leadership of Riccardo Muti.
First part
Second part
(Conductor, label, catalogue number, year)
Antonio Salieri in 1820 revised Florian Leopold Gassmann's La Betulia liberata by shortening some recitatives and arias, and adding additional choirs taken from Gassmann's other compositions.[2][3]
As a student of Antonio Salieri, Franz Schubert set "Te solo adoro", Anchior's aria from the second part, as a composition exercise for four voices in November 1812.[4] The exercise was first published in 1940, and, catalogued as D. 34, again in the New Schubert Edition in 1986.[5]
