ARENA DI VERONA FESTIVAL THE 101th EDITION
from 7 June to 7 September 2024
The world's biggest opera festival is entering a new century: for the 101st edition of the Verona Arena Opera Festival, fifty evenings are scheduled from 7 June to 7 September.
In particular, it will be celebrating the centenary of the death of Giacomo Puccini, with a programme of three of his masterpieces: Turandot, Tosca and La Bohème, and will be celebrating the inclusion of Italian opera singing in UNESCO's Intangible Heritage of Humanity.
Italian opera singing enters UNESCO's Intangible Heritage of Humanity list
The season will open on 7 June with a unique event promoted by the Italian Ministry of Culture and organised in collaboration with the Fondazione Arena di Verona to celebrate the entry of Italian opera singing into UNESCO's Intangible Heritage of Humanity.
It will bring together 150 orchestral musicians and over 300 choral artists from all the Italian lyric and symphonic foundations (Scala di Milano, Santa Cecilia, Rome, Florence, Bologna, Bari, Palermo, Trieste, Cagliari, Turin, Venice, etc.) as well as some of the greatest voices and great names in musical direction, such as Riccardo Muti, who will do us the honour of coming to conduct part of the evening.
Celebrating the centenary of Puccini's death
On 8 June, the festival opens with Puccini's masterpiece Turandot, spectacularly staged by Zeffirelli and conducted by Michele Spotti, who will be making his Arena debut, as will Alfonso Signorini's new staging of La Bohème.
Finally, Tosca, whose title role will be sung for the first time in the Arena by Anna Netrebko, will be staged again by Hugo De Ana.
Re-creation of the historic Aida of 1913
Giuseppe Verdi's Aida will be presented in two different productions: the one signed by Stefano Poda last season for the anniversary of the hundredth edition, and the one in Gianfranco de Bosio's historic staging created in 1982 based on the archives of the very first performance given in 1913 for the first edition of the Verona Arena Opera Festival, whose staging was itself based on the notes and suggestions of Giuseppe Verdi and Auguste Mariette.
The premiere on 10 August will be particularly resonant, one hundred and eleven years to the day since the Festival opened with this same show.
Also on the bill, Georges Bizet's Carmen in Franco Zeffirelli's grandiose staging and Gioachino Rossini's The Barber of Seville, in Hugo De Ana's elegant rococo staging.
Cast: big returns and eagerly awaited debuts
As always, the great international opera stars will be returning to the Arena, making every evening a premiere. Among the more than seventy soloists from all over the world, Ekaterina Semenchuk, Yusif Eyvazov, Amartuvshin Enkhbat, Ludovic Tézier, Vasilisa Berzhanskaya, Lawrence Brownlee, Aleksandra Kurzak, Francesco Meli, Roberto Alagna, Luca Micheletti, Vittorio Grigolo, Elena Stikhina, Jonas Kaufmann and Luca Salsi all return to Verona.
The season will be marked by numerous debuts: Aigul Akhmetshina will sing the title role in Carmen, Pretty Yende that of Micaela in the same production, Juliana Grigoryan will be Mimi in La Bohème, René Barbera will interpret the role of Count Almaviva in The Barber of Seville.
It will also be a big first in the Arena for conductors George Petrou, who will conduct The Barber of Seville, and Leonardo Sini, who will conduct Carmen.
What's more, the 2024 Festival will include 6 exceptional evenings:
The grand dance by 'Roberto Bolle and friends' will return on 23 and 24 July, and Beethoven's Ninth Symphony will be performed two hundred years after its premiere, conducted by Andrea Battistoni and featuring the Arena ensembles and the solo voices of Erin Morley and Ivan Magrì, both making their Arena debuts, as well as Anna Maria Chiuri and Alexander Vinogradov, on 11 August.
The gala evening of 'Plácido Domingo Noche Española' on 21 August sees the return of the Spanish artist, who will be joined by other great operatic voices.
Orff's much-anticipated Carmina Burana will be conducted on September 1 by Michele Spotti, with soloists Jessica Pratt, Filippo Mineccia and Youngjun Park.
Finally, dance returns to Verona's Roman Theatre with two performances of Theodorakis's Zorba the Greek, with original choreography by Lorca Massine, on 27 and 28 August.
The Four Seasons in immersive version for the 300th anniversary of the work:
In a world premiere, the Fondazione Arena di Verona and Balich Wonder Studio present a huge immersive concert with three-dimensional projections on 28 August to celebrate The Four Seasons, the 300th anniversary of the publication of Antonio Vivaldi's masterpiece. "Viva Vivaldi.
The Four Seasons immersive concert" will be performed by the Orchestra dell'Arena di Verona and violinist Giovanni Andrea Zanon, as part of a visionary multi-sensory project conceived by creative director Marco Balich. A totally new approach to stage design, using technology to make the Verona Arena Opera Festival accessible to all audiences.
Martin Coulon
ROYAL ARTS VISIONS: ARENA DI VERONA FESTIVAL THE 101th EDITION