(Photo: MoniQue) Composer Marius Binder and librettist Robert Prosser see their new opera, “Lorit,” as a modern version of the mediaeval mystery play, in which allegorical figures embodying present-day values and behavioral traits are used to educate the audience. The plays were re-enactments of well-known religious stories containing issues that would have weighed upon the mediaeval mind, such as The {…}
Each year The Haydn Foundation schedules a short opera program consisting of three or four works, performed in theaters in the northern Italian region of Trentino-Alto Adige. What makes it stand out from the usual opera season is its commitment to staging contemporary works. This year it is performing two new works, the first of which is “Lorit – A {…}
J.M. Barrie’s “Peter Pan,” the mischievous, free-spirited child who never grows up, has exerted a hold over children and even many adults for well over 100 years. His adventures set in Neverland, with its array of comic book characters such as Captain Hook, Tinker Bell, the crocodile, the Lost Boys, and Wendy, have fascinated and entertained over the generations. Peter {…}
Photo: Andrea Macchia Situated within easy reach of the Dolomites and the Alps lies the small Tyrolean city of Bolzano. Formally part of the Austrian Empire, it was ceded to Italy at the end of World War I, and despite Mussolini’s subsequent attempt to Italianize the town, it still retains much of its Austrian heritage, with a quarter of the {…}
(Credit: Haydn Foundation official website) The Haydn Foundation Opera Festival has announced its 2022 season, which will take place in Bolzano and Trento. Here is a full slate. Anna Sowa and Martina Badiluzzi’s opera “Silenzio” features Giulia Zaniboni, Victor Andrini, Pietro Paolo Dinapoli, Margherita Berlanda, and Dorota Jasinska-Urbanska. Performance dates: March 4 – 6, 2022 Next up is Nicola Sani {…}
(Photo: Naomi Eleonora Biagi) With its commitment to producing contemporary works, The Haydn Foundation situated in Bolzano under the artistic direction of Matthias Lošek, must have one of the most ambitious opera programs in Italy, if not Europe. Over the past few years, it has consistently promoted and commissioned new pieces which it intersperses with thematically linked known works. It {…}
(Photo: Roberto Ricci) “Alice in Wonderland,” Lewis Carroll’s novel which has entertained children down the generations is a multi-layered work, which has lent itself to a variety of interpretations over the years, in which commentators from many disciplines have looked beyond the colorful narrative, to reveal its symbolic references, satirical portraits, psychological depths, and its mathematical and linguistic conceits. Such {…}