Il turco in Italia

Il turco in Italia
Opera buffa by Gioachino Rossini
Portrait of the composer
TranslationThe Turk in Italy
LibrettistFelice Romani
LanguageItalian
Premiere
14 August 1814 (1814-08-14)
La Scala, Milan

Il turco in Italia (English: The Turk in Italy) is an opera buffa in two acts by Gioachino Rossini. The Italian-language libretto was written by Felice Romani. It was a re-working of a libretto by Caterino Mazzolà set as an opera (with the same title) by the German composer Franz Seydelmann [de] in 1788.

An opera buffa, it was influenced by Mozart's Così fan tutte, which was performed at the same theatre shortly before Rossini's work. The strangely harmonized overture, though infrequently recorded, is one of the best examples of Rossini's characteristic style. An unusually long introduction displays an extended, melancholy horn solo with full orchestral accompaniment, before giving way to a lively, purely comic main theme.