Teatro Marrucino / Recenzje

Pregevole il versante musicale, a partire dalla direzione molto personale di Jacopo Sipari di Pescasseroli che si caratterizza per i morbidi attacchi ai vari numeri, che si vanno poi rinforzando di suono ma senza deflagrare in sonorità telluriche per poi spegnersi insieme al canto con bellissimo effetto. Molto suggestivo a questo proposito il “pedale” dei contrabbassi che nell’alba romana introduce al tema di Cavaradossi, sempre più incalzante come agogiche, e il modo in cui l’arpa sembra quasi si trasformi nel clarinetto che introduce l’aria. Merito naturalmente condiviso con la prestazione di livello della Sinfonica Abruzzese, particolarmente ricettiva alle indicazioni del direttore.

Titolo sempre di grande richiamo, la “Turandot” che è andata in scena come seconda opera del cartellone del Marrucino ha potuto contare su un allestimento che ha suscitato l’entusiasmo del folto pubblico presente in teatro. Il regista Maurizio Di Mattia ha un percorso artistico che va dal teatro d’avanguardia degli anni settanta al barocco, passando per molti festival asiatici nei quali ha allestito le opere più popolari del repertorio. “Turandot” è stata dunque terreno fertile per una riuscitissima fusione di generi: una grande sfera trasparente posta al culmine di una scalinata e racchiusa da un tempio stilizzato, grazie a un gioco di ombre e silhouette è sembrata racchiudere l’intero mondo della Principessa di gelo, fatto dei ricordi dell’ava e di pretendenti decapitati, mentre all’esterno il popolo di Pekino e gli altri personaggi vivevano i drammi presenti. Un velario posto al proscenio è servito da base per l’ormai usuale proiezione di immagini multimediali, il cui utilizzo però non è mai stato banale.

Although little known today compared to other eighteenth-century contemporaries, the Apulian Tommaso Traetta placed himself on a level of European fame that did not fear comparisons with the divine Mozart himself. Born in Bitonto in 1727, a pupil of the Loreto Conservatory, Traetta produced a catalog of 26 works and a dozen interludes and oratories. He made his debut at the San Carlo in Naples in 1750, with a "Farnace" that earned him immediate fame and writings: chapel master at the court of Parma, he was then called to Vienna, for whose theater he composed "Armida" and "Ifigenia in Aulide" . His fame led him in 1765 to the direction of the Venice Conservatory, a position he held for two years until he accepted the post of composer of the Russian imperial court, called by Catherine II to replace Baldassare Galuppi. "The Hedge Knight"is his third last work, composed in 1777 and defined as a "heroic-comic drama", according to the eighteenth-century librettist tradition of alternating between the masks of comedy and that of tragedy in the universe of the knights of fortune surrounded by magicians, enchanted islands and spells of all kinds. In fact, this score is scattered with a lot of parody, with an almost inconsistent plot that gives the minimum of backbone necessary for the display of recitatives and virtuosic arias for all the characters. The protagonist is in fact a Paladin of France, Guido, who, flanked by the faithful squire Calotta, loses sleep and wanders endlessly in search of his beloved, Arsinda, a French noblewoman. The sorceress Melissa is willing to help him, using her power to show him invisible ghosts that will lead him: thus the Knight can come in the presence of Arsinda, who is a prisoner of Stordilano on an enchanted island. And he of course he has to deal first with her powerful rival. But, just as naturally, he will win the battle, albeit overcoming not indifferent rocks: because even Stordilano has his own magical protector, in the figure of the magician Ismenus. she is a Despina in pectore; Stordilano, Prince of Grenade, also enmeshed by the magician Ismenus, sings an onomatopoeic tune, introduced by the tolling of the bell and carried out on a carpet of pizzicati strings, from the text “I have a bell in my head that din din din makes me! In my chest I have a drummer playing the tapatà tapatà ”. The absolute sublimation of this onomatopoeia will come thirty-five years later with the Rossini “Italiana in Algeri”. The conductor Vito Clemente is a scholar and specialist performer of Traetta, and he performs the score in the entirety of the critical edition, where, for once, the cutting of two or three arias would not have damaged the smoothness of the whole. The sound, however, is always light and transparent, the dynamics appropriate, the support to the singers absolute, especially in the most reckless steps, where the conductor and the orchestra literally breathe together with the stage. In the singing company, the serious male voices stand out: excellent Francesco Landolfi , the magician Ismenus, and Carmine Monaco 's Stordivano; voices of beautiful timbre and considerable volume, imaginative interpreters of characters who do not present enormous vocal difficulties, but require a good variety of phrasing. Monk, in particular, is truly admirable in differentiating the color of the voice and inflections in the "passage" from warrior to cicisbeo, during the magician's spell, and vice versa. Well done Pierluigi Dilengite , who also sports a respectable voice, but appears perhaps a little less involved than his colleagues in the folds of the character of Calotta: nothing serious, however, in the face of a really demanding part, which sees him on stage practically from the beginning to the end of the long score. The character of Paladino Guido is that of the warrior tenor a bit phony and languishing for her beloved, whoRaffaele D'Ascanio sings with good command of the recitatives, an accent always appropriate, and sufficient ability to resolve the writing of the arias, very acute in the weaving the cavatina “Sola pietà me spurs”, virtuosity in agility “In the battlefield”. Cinzia Rizzone deals with a part written for one of the virtuosos of the time, Clementina Baglioni Poggi, who among other things was the first Rosina in Mozart's "Finta Semplice": a tremendous part, in terms of extension, coloratura and cantilever singing, as demonstrated by the impervious aria of the first act “Pensa ch'io non fear”, which alternates with more extended pages, where without an accurate commitment in terms of legate and colors, boredom is cut into slices. The willing singer succumbs in several places, proving the role superior to her possibilities, but she is granted the honor of arms thanks to a pleasant timbre and an excellent stage presence. Good singing line also for Valentina Di Cola , with varied and easy phrasing, appreciable above all in the "Despinesque" aria "Do it my way my lady". Not well, however, Raffaella Ambrosino in the role of the sorceress Melissa, part not very long but which would require a tragic accent and absolute security of the registers: the singer does not convince first of all as an interpreter, lacking in her that certainty of the character that must still exist in a opera-catwalk of arias like this one. Effective the actress Rossella Micolittiin the role of the Sprite of the Opera, the reciting part who intervenes in some points to explain to the spectators the interweaving of the plot, always a bit tiring to follow in the chaos of spells, rivalry between wizards and exchanges of people. Chorus a bit uncertain in the first scene, but subsequently in crescendo, especially in the final act. Really beautiful directed by Michele Mirabella, fellow citizen of Traetta, who translates into a myriad of backstages, created by characters and choristers behind a baroque frame placed at the top of a double helical staircase. A shiny broom, a cauldron bubbling with smoke, a wooden cage, descend from above to symbolize chariots of fire, spells and constraints. Lights and computerized projections on a background curtain recreate the fantastic environments of enchanted mountains and islands, all framed in the splendid baroque costumes of Lino Cavallo, a triumph of helmets topped with plumes, glittering armor, puffs and cloaks. Mirabella centers precisely, in my view, the fabulous spirit of the work, conceived as a gigantic show for children in the most positive sense of the term, that of the fantastic and the supernatural seen through the eyes of pristine childhood.

Applauditissimi, naturalmente, anche Maria Francesca Mazzara (Lucia) soprano dalla voce calda, ricca e sicura (bravissima nella scena della pazzia)