Stanislao Gastaldon the music publisher Sonzogno announced a competition for one-act operas, Gastaldon decided to enter with "Mala Pasqua!", a setting of Giovanni Verga's popular short story (and later play), "Cavalleria rusticana". Another young composer, Pietro Mascagni, entered the same contest with his opera "Cavalleria rusticana", also based on Verga's story. Gastaldon withdrew his work early in the competition when he received an offer from Sonzogno's rival, Ricordi, to publish it and arrange a premiere at the Teatro Costanzi in Rome. He expanded the opera to three acts, and "Mala Pasqua!" premiered on April 9, 1890 to modest success. Mascagni's opera eventually
British National Opera Company Garden deprived the BNOC of its lucrative London seasons which had in the first years subsidised its provincial tours. The company ceased to exist in 1929 following a tax demand for £17,000 which forced it to go into voluntary liquidation. Its last performances were "Cavalleria rusticana" and "Pagliacci" at the Golders Green Hippodrome in London, on 16 April 1929, in a season in which the conductors included Beecham, Barbirolli and Eugène Goossens. The company effectively re-formed as the Covent Garden English Opera Company in September 1929, with Barbirolli as its musical director, and continued under that name until 1938. British