'',
Pietro Mascagni, flanked by his librettists,
Giovanni Targioni-Tozzetti and
Guido Menasci Libretti for operas,
oratorios and
cantatas in the 17th and 18th centuries were generally written by someone other than the composer, often a well-known poet.
Pietro Trapassi, known as Metastasio (1698–1782), was one of the most highly regarded librettists in Europe. His libretti were set many times by many different composers. Another noted 18th-century librettist was
Lorenzo Da Ponte. He wrote the libretti for three of
Mozart's greatest operas, and for many other composers as well.
Eugène Scribe was one of the most prolific librettists of the 19th century, providing the words for works by
Meyerbeer (with whom he had a lasting collaboration),
Auber,
Bellini,
Donizetti,
Rossini and
Verdi. The French writers' duo
Henri Meilhac and
Ludovic Halévy wrote many
opera and
operetta libretti for the likes of
Jacques Offenbach,
Jules Massenet and
Georges Bizet.
Arrigo Boito, who wrote libretti for, among others,
Giuseppe Verdi and
Amilcare Ponchielli, also composed two operas of his own. The libretto is not always written before the music. Some composers, such as
Mikhail Glinka,
Alexander Serov,
Rimsky-Korsakov,
Puccini and
Mascagni wrote passages of music without text and subsequently had the librettist add words to the vocal melody lines (this has often been the case with American popular song and musicals in the 20th century, as with
Richard Rodgers and
Lorenz Hart's collaboration, although with the later team of
Rodgers and Hammerstein the
lyrics were generally written first, which was Rodgers' preferred modus operandi). Some composers wrote their own libretti.
Richard Wagner is perhaps most famous in this regard, with his transformations of Germanic legends and events into epic subjects for his operas and music dramas.
Hector Berlioz, too, wrote the libretti for two of his best-known works,
La damnation de Faust and
Les Troyens.
Alban Berg adapted
Georg Büchner's play
Woyzeck for the libretto of
Wozzeck. '', with the original Italian lyrics, English translation and musical notation for one of the arias Sometimes the libretto is written in close collaboration with the composer; this can involve adaptation, as was the case with
Rimsky-Korsakov and his librettist
Vladimir Belsky, or an entirely original work. In the case of musicals, the music, the lyrics and the "book" (i.e., the spoken dialogue and the stage directions) may each have its own author. Thus, a musical such as
Fiddler on the Roof has a composer (
Jerry Bock), a lyricist (
Sheldon Harnick) and the writer of the "book" (
Joseph Stein). In rare cases, the composer writes everything except the dance arrangements – music, lyrics and libretto, as
Lionel Bart did for
Oliver!. Other matters in the process of developing a libretto parallel those of spoken
dramas for stage or screen. There are the preliminary steps of selecting or suggesting a subject and developing a sketch of the action in the form of a
scenario, as well as revisions that might come about when the work is in production, as with out-of-town tryouts for
Broadway musicals, or changes made for a specific local audience. A famous case of the latter is Wagner's 1861 revision of the original 1845
Dresden version of his opera
Tannhäuser for Paris. ==Literary characteristics==