Southern Ontario Lyric Opera will current Donizetti’s tragedy Lucia di Lammermoor on March 8. The efficiency takes place on the Burlington Centre for the Arts.
Maestro Sabatino Vacca talks about Donizetti as a composer. “Loads of nice moments. Pinnacle of Bel Canto period. Donizetti had an actual reward for melody. He fantastically weaves the story with music that helps the textual content.”
Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor
Gaetano Donizetti wrote his tragic opera Lucia di Lammermoor in 1835. Rossini had not too long ago retired, and Bellini handed away. It put the highlight on Donizetti because the premier composer of Italian opera. He set the story in Scotland, thought of to be a romantic land with a wealthy and sometimes violent historical past by fashionable Italians of the time.
Sir Walter Scott’s novel The Bride of Lammermoor (1819) sparked the creations of a number of musical works. Essentially the most enduring is Donizetti’s, which centres the story round Lucy (or Lucia) Ashton, a younger girl residing within the Lammermuir Hills of Scotland who’s caught within the crossfire of a feud between the Ashtons and one other household, the Ravenswood.
Naturally, Lucia is carrying on a secret affair with Edgardo, a member of Ravenswoods. Lucia’s brother Enrico tips her by telling her Edgardo has betrayed her, and forces her to marry Arturo, one other nobleman.
It’s the proper framework for a traditional tragedy. Opera luminaries like Maria Callas and Dame Joan Sutherland have made it one in every of their trademark roles.
Performers
The SOLO manufacturing options:
- Soprano Holly Chaplin, who sings the function of Lucia, is a rising star within the Canadian opera world. The coloratura soprano will even carry out in Beethoven’s ninth and Bruckner’s Te Deum with the Scarborough Philharmonic later this month.
- Tenor Joel Ricci sings the function of Edgardo. His performing expertise has taken him throughout North America and Italy, and he made his Carnegie Corridor debut in 2019.
- Canadian baritone James Westman returns to the corporate to sing what has grow to be one in every of his signature roles, Enrico. He’s sung in a number of worldwide corporations, together with Utah Opera and Opéra de Montréal.
- Baritone Michael Robert-Broder, who sings the function of Raimondo, has a busy profession domestically and internationally in recitals, oratorio and opera. He typically focuses on German lieder and operas.
- Alexander Cappellazzo sings the function of Arturo/Romanno in his firm debut. The Toronto-based tenor is busy each as a performer with corporations that embrace Toronto Operetta Theatre and Music on the Met, amongst others, and as a presenter with Apocryphonia, the group he based.
- Mezzo-soprano Stephanie Yelovich performs the function of Alisa in her firm debut. She started her stage profession in theatre, making the transition into opera, together with voice work, movie and TV appearances.
The manufacturing shall be directed by Greg Finney, with the SOLO Refrain and Orchestra carried out by Sabatino Vacca.
Director Gregory Finney feedback, “I really like the setting in Scotland. As a Cape Breton Islander born-and-raised something Celtic tends to resonate fairly strongly with me. It’s additionally an actual deal with watching how individuals from different cultures — like Donizetti — current Scottish tradition and heritage. I additionally take pleasure in when these two issues are very incongruent. I believe Donizetti might be thought of the peak of Bel Canto earlier than Verdi attributable to how properly he simply writes for the voice. He understands the language and the way it strikes within the mouth, so whereas the music could be very difficult, within the palms of the best singers, which we now have, it appears simple as pie, and as pure as something.”
- Discover extra data and tickets for the March 8 efficiency [HERE].
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Anya Wassenberg is a Toronto Metropolis Editor at Ludwig Van. She is an skilled freelance author, blogger and writing teacher.
