To inspire his production of Handel’s Ariodante for the Salzburg Festival, director Christof Loy turned to a novel that shares a name with the opera’s source material (Ariosto’s Orlando furioso): Virginia Woolf’s Orlando. He makes no secret of this source, as quotes from Orlando (in Italian, for the sake of linguistic continuity) interrupt the overture and precede the third act. The concept is both consistent and effective. A mishmash of costume time periods from...

Cecilia Bartoli made it a habit as the artistic director of the Whitsun Festival of Salzburg: for every new edition since 2012, the mezzo-soprano incarnates a female role so that each year is the opportunity to present “a new facet of femininity”. And in order for the 2016 edition to match the 400th anniversary commemoration of William Shakespeare, Cecilia Bartoli chose  Romeo and Juliet for this lyrical event.    The author’s piece had obviously...

Cecilia Bartoli is not the type of singer modern audiences are used to hearing as Norma. La Scintilla isn’t the sort of orchestra we’re used to, either, and the Biondi/Minasi edition of the score used for this production includes surprises even for experienced Bellini aficionados. It’s daring to re-interpret the music of such a popular opera, but this project has clearly been painstakingly researched and carefully put together. In the hands of a superbly talented cast and...

In only 24 days, Maestro Gioachino Rossino created his masterpiece La Cenerentola. The date of the world premiere was fixed even before the title, the libretto or the plot of the opera was known. So once the old fairytale was decided to be the story, Rossini recycled out of former composition and created this opera buffo, including semiseria parts. The first performance was rejected by the audience but soon the work started its triumphal success worldwide, being even the first opera to be...

This year the Salzburg Whitsun Festival was dedicated to Gioacchino Rossini and his works. The festival opened with a new production of La Cenerentola. A special opportunity to meet the artistic head of the festival, Cecilia Bartoli, in one of her renowned roles on stage. The audience could feel the joy and energy she put into her appearence on stage and singing. Damiano Michieletto and his stage designer Paolo Fantin created a typical Italian ambiance. Alidoro...

Absent from Paris operas for nearly twenty years – aside from an annual recital featuring exorbitant ticket prices – the theatrical Bartoli was awaited as impatiently as if she had been Christmas Eve. The prospect was especially exciting because it was an opera by Rossini, one of her favourite composers, whom the singer had chosen to celebrate her reunion with the French public. In fact, two years after a very acclamed passage at the Zurich Opera, the Théâtre des...