"Viva la mamma" by Donizetti, Mon 22 Sep 2014, From (2014/2014), Directed by Pierre-Emmanuel Rousseau, Conductor Franco Trinca, Stadttheater Schaffhausen, Schaffhausen, Switzerland

The opera is a madhouse! If you've always wanted to take a look behind the scenes of opera, Donizetti gives you plenty of opportunities to do so with his magnificent parody "Viva la Mamma": the new opera "Romulus and Ersilia" is to be rehearsed at a chronically underfunded provincial theater. But for the male and female divas in the ensemble, it is not the work that is in the foreground, but rather their own vanities. Envy and intrigue, jealousies and flighty artistic life - all the clichés of the theater business seem to be confirmed here. After two singers quickly throw in the towel and leave the rehearsals in exasperation, the husband of the haughty prima donna and Mamma Agata step in. She originally just wanted to get a better role for her daughter Luigia. But Mamma - the part Donizetti composed for a bass voice - seems to take a liking to the theater atmosphere, and in the end she even saves the entire production. The city council has now caught wind of the troops' chaotic conditions and wants to cut the subsidies without further ado. But Mamma Agata helps out with her family jewelry. Viva la mom! GAETANO DONIZETTI created with “Viva la Mamma” a brilliant work full of virtuoso music that parodies itself in the best buffo style. Initially performed as a one-act farce in 1827, Donizetti expanded it into a full-length opera three years later. The composer of over 70 operas, including “Lucia di Lammermoor”, “L'elisir d'amore” and “Don Pasquale”, is considered the undisputed master of bel canto.