“Especially notable: Sgura’s thrilling Scarpia, who made evil sound so perniciously quotidian, and the playing of an orchestra that lives and breathes this music.” (Operatraveller.com) In the unique atmosphere of the Sferisterio, a huge neoclassical arena erected in the 1820s, Argentinean director Valentina Carrasco stages her Tosca in a 1950s film set, thus corresponding to Puccini’s cinematographic compositional style. The cinematic realization of this recording underlines the cinematic character of the production. “Valentina Carrasco set up a real fictional machine, with all the bolts put in the right place, aided by an impeccable set design by Samal Blak, which would have been half as good without Peter van Praet’s essential lighting play” (Vivere fermo). Claudio Sgura’s Scarpia is “incredibly well sung” (Operatraveller.com). Long applause also for maestro Donato Renzetti, the festival’s new musical director.
Don Giovanni
When it comes to Mozartian perfection on the opera stage, one needn’t always seek it in Milan, Vienna, Salzburg or New York! At the Sferisterio Opera Festival in the central Italian city of Macerata, a rapt audience was treated to a production of Don Giovanni “that will enter the annals of opera” (ForumOpera.com). This magnificent reading of Mozart’s timeless masterpiece sweeps the viewer into a libertine, 18th- century society dominated by sensuality and erotic impulses. They are acted out on the stage’s main prop, a large, unmade bed, not only by Don Giovanni, but also by just about everyone else in the “nearly faultless cast” (ForumOpera.com). In his role debut as the title hero, Ildebrando D’Arcangelo is “incandescent” (Gazzetta die Parma) and “doesn’t do Don Giovanni; he is the Don. Unsurpassable”(24 Ore).
Don Giovanni
When it comes to Mozartian perfection on the opera stage, one needn’t always seek it in Milan, Vienna, Salzburg or New York! At the Sferisterio Opera Festival in the central Italian city of Macerata, a rapt audience was treated to a production of Don Giovanni “that will enter the annals of opera” (ForumOpera.com). This magnificent reading of Mozart’s timeless masterpiece sweeps the viewer into a libertine, 18th- century society dominated by sensuality and erotic impulses. They are acted out on the stage’s main prop, a large, unmade bed, not only by Don Giovanni, but also by just about everyone else in the “nearly faultless cast” (ForumOpera.com). In his role debut as the title hero, Ildebrando D’Arcangelo is “incandescent” (Gazzetta die Parma) and “doesn’t do Don Giovanni; he is the Don. Unsurpassable”(24 Ore).