© Zani-Casadio
Autumn Trilogy: L’invisibil fa vedere Amore
Alcina
music by Georg Friedrich Händel (1685-1759)
musical drama in three acts
inspired by the opera libretto L’isola di Alcina by Antonio Fanzaglia
(first performance Londra, Covent Garden, 16 April 1735)
Edition Bärenreiter
Alcina Giuseppina Bridelli
Ruggiero Elmar Hauser
Bradamante Delphine Galou
Morgana Martina Licari
Oronte Žiga Čopi
Melisso Christian Senn
Amore Giacomo Decol
Ottavio Dantone conductor
Pier Luigi Pizzi direction, set and costume design
Accademia Bizantina
lighting design Oscar Frosio
produced by Teatro Alighieri in collaboration with Ravenna Festival
new production
Three different operas on the same stage on successive days, an ingenious and adaptable stage mechanism, an experienced technical crew ready to meet any challenge: this is the unmistakable trademark of the Autumn Trilogy, an essential part of the Festival for years now, always focusing on different periods and styles of opera. Once again, walking the tightrope stretched across the centuries, we pay homage to one of the undisputed ‘fathers’ of our music, an incomparable composer and dramatic genius, a contemporary of Bach, equally great and ‘modern’, but committed to other horizons and, above all, to the theatre. From his extraordinary catalogue, we have selected the three parts of our ‘triptych’, created through the collaboration of Pizzi’s visionary rigour and Dantone’s undoubted talent, which will evoke the ideal and timeless world of the chivalric epic.
«For what we see Love re-creates anew,/ And makes all that we dream of visible»: love and madness, courage and imagination, a tangle of passions that animate the immortal heroes of Ariosto’s famous poem Orlando Furioso, the source of Handel’s operas. Heroes portrayed in the most fragile aspect of their human nature, vulnerable to the power of love that clouds their judgement and the power of magic that confuses their intentions. Heroes who, in their madness, manage to rise above the material weight of life and transcend reality to the point of understanding it in its essence: they imagine that ideal world, which may be unattainable, but which is the driving force behind all progress. How relevant this is, almost three centuries after Orlando and Alcina were written! The same relevance of the Messiah, which, in its wonderful blend of all European styles, continues to give us a sense of hope today.
With the free app Lyri the surtitles and the plot are available on your smartphone, live in Italian and English
Running time:
first part 1h 30’ – interval 20’ – second part 50’
Running time 2h 40’
