Performances of Lorenzo Da Ponte's L’Ape Musicale (The Musical Bee) by the Teatro Lirico of the city of Cagliari L’Ape Musicale (The Musical Bee), Lorenzo Da Ponte’s final libretto and the first Italian opera conceived and staged in the United States, returns to New York 188 years after its debut

The famous Venetian man of letters, author of Mozart’s most important librettos (Le nozze di Figaro, Don Giovanni, Così fan tutte), became a remarkable example of Italian intellectual migration to America – he was the first Professor of Italian at Columbia and, indeed, at any American university – and he pioneered the production of Italian operas in the U.S. His pastiche called L’Ape Musicale (“The Musical Bee) was performed at the Park Theatre in New York on April 20, 1830.