Lots of women in the 2022 Opera Season of the Verona Philharmonic
One thing immediately catches the eye, scrolling through the billboard of the 2022 Opera Season of Verona Philharmonic Theater: the rich presence of female figures, called to be protagonists not on the stage, but also on the podium of the orchestra, and engaged in direction, sets and costumes.
There are six operatic productions scheduled for the year, one of which brings together two single acts; and four of them in the city of Verona.
The bill will open on January 30 with an unreleased show, initially scheduled for 2020, which sees two one-act acts juxtaposed with a great protagonist at the center: Susanna’s Secret by Wolf-Ferrari e Sister Angelica by Puccini. In the first, Susanna will be Lavinia Bini, his consort Count Gil Vittorio Prato. Sister Angelica returns to Verona after twenty years, with an obviously all-female cast as the protagonist Donata D’Annunzio Lombardi.
This completes the Puccini Triptych launched in 2019 with Gianni Schicchi, and continued in 2021 with The cloak streamed. The first panel of the evening will be directed by the composer’s descendant Federica Zagatti Wolf-Ferrari, the second that of Giorgia Guerra. The scenes are in any case curated by Serena Rocco, the costumes from Lorena Marina. The management will be in the hands of Gianna Fratta.
Verdi tragic and Rossini comedian
The great operatic repertoire will be present at the Filarmonico with Rigoletto by Verdi, on stage from February 27, again making use of the successful production that the director Arnaud Bernard he made for Lausanne in 2005, shot here in Verona in 2011 and again in 2016, with the beautiful wooden scenes of Alessandro Camera. The protagonist will be Luca Micheletti, alongside Ruth Iniesta and Ivan Magrì, Gianluca Buratto and Anastasia Boldyreva; all will be under the direction of Francesco Ommassini.
Rossini’s youth farce has never been performed before in Verona The silk stair (first March 27) will be concerted and directed by Nikolas Nägele, and directed by Stefania Bonfadelli – the well-known soprano from Verona – with the sets by Serena Rocco and costumes by Valeria Donata Betella.
Alongside an established interpreter of the funny repertoire, Carlo Lepore, the young voices of Manuel Amati, Eleonora Bellocci, Matteo Roma, Caterina Piva, Emmanuel Franco will perform.
A baroque masterpiece returns after 43 years
The first representation in modern times of theOrlando furious by Vivaldi, in the 1978 and 1979 seasons of the Filarmonico, was a memorable event – also for the caliber of the performers – which gave a decisive impulse to the gradual rediscovery of the melodramas of the Red Priest.
After 43 years this work returns with the recent staging co-produced with the Fenice di Venezia and the Festival della Valle d’Itria; and then directed by Fabio Ceresa, the scene of Massimo Checchetto and the costumes of Giuseppe Palella.
The poster shines the names of Clémentine Margaine, Francesca Aspromonte, Chiara Tirotta, Laura Polverelli, Lucia Cirillo, Federico Fiorio and Christian Senn; the management will be entrusted to Giulio Prandi.
The gloomy Venice of the Mona Lisa, the snowy Paris of Mimi
After the summer break, which will see the workers of the Arena Foundation involved in the 99th Opera Festival, the Philharmonic’s Opera Season will resume in the autumn with The Gioconda by Ponchielli, a title that inaugurated the Arena festival in 2005, signed by Pier Luigi Pizzi.
This time enjoy a new staging and the Slovenian National Theater of Maribor – curated by Filippo Tono in the direction, while the sets and costumes are designed by Carla Galleri. Orchestra and Chorus will be under the baton from Giampaolo Bisanti; In the main role will sing Maria José Siri, alternating with the very young Monica Conesa. The cast is completed by Samuele Simoncini, Annalisa Stroppa, Sebastian Catana, Simon Lim.
In the vicinity of the Christmas holidays it returns, on 11 December on stage La Boheme by Puccini, this time in an unpublished production signed by the director Stefano Trespidi and by the set designer Michele Olcesi.
The musical part will be in the hands of emerging talents, largely on their debut at the Philharmonic: the Russian conductor Alevtina Ioffe will go up on the podium, while Karen Gardeazabal, Galeano Salas, Giulia Gianfaldoni, Gabriel Bermúdez, Jan Antem, Francesco will perform on stage. Leone and Nicolò Ceriani.