Gioachino Rossini was only 20 years old when he wrote his fifth opera, Ciro in Babilonia, for the Teatro Comunale Ferrara in 1812. In this production from the Rossini Opera Festival of Pesaro (Italy), stage director Davide Livermore sets the action in the 1920s, with period black-and-white film inserts, lavish costumes in the Art Nouveau style, and decors highlighted by “Babylonian” elements. The production was a wildly cheered hit with the audience.
Matilde Di Shabran
“There truly is a Rossini miracle!” (Deutschlandradio). Acclaiming the mastery of tenorissimo Juan Diego Flórez and the breathtaking young soprano Olga Peretyatko in the lead roles, the press hailed the premiere of Rossini’s Matilde di Shabran at the Rossini Opera Festival in Pesaro as the “high point of the festival” (the Berlin daily Der Tagesspiegel).
Il Signor Bruschino
Rossini’s one-act opera Il Signor Bruschino was premiered at the Teatro di San Moisè in Venice in 1813. The chilly reception it was given – it was performed only once – is difficult to understand today, considering its bubbly, exhilarating music. As performed at the Rossini Opera Festival in Pesaro, the work is a gem, and the New York Times cheered the “clever production” conceived by the young Florentine theater collective Teatro Sotteraneo, one of the most innovative experimental groups in Italy.