Gran Teatre del Liceu: La Sonnambula di Vincenzo Bellini (27/01 – 17/02)

27, 28 y 30 de enero y 1, 2, 4, 5, 8, 9, 11, 14 y 17 de febrero de 2014

Una història de amor, celos y equívocos en la que nada es lo que parece. Una òpera para todos, delicada y cercana.

Si existe en la casi bicentenaria crónica operística de Barcelona un título que merece un lugar destacado en sus anales ese es sin lugar a dudas La sonnambula de Bellini. Su estreno en el Teatre de la Santa Creu se recuerda como un acontecimiento apoteósico. Un éxito sin matices que volvió a repetirse en su presentación en el Gran Teatre del Liceu. Era casi impensable una temporada sin la presencia de esta obra maestra del bel canto. Un auténtico arrebato romántico, comparable en su pasión por la pérdida de la conciencia –freudiana sin saberlo– y su implícito apego a la dimensión onírica, a los ballets blancos de moda en las cortes imperiales. Amina posee la misma fragilidad emocional que Giselle. Marco Arturo Marelli propone una puesta en escena que acompaña perfectamente la idea de opera semiseria: humor y pathos romántico en delicado equilibrio.

+Información: Gran Teatre del Liceu

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27, 28 and 30 January and 1, 2, 4, 5, 8, 9, 11, 14 and 17 February 2014

A story of love, jealousy and misunderstanding in which nothing is what it seems.

If there is one title that occupies a unique place in Barcelona’s nearly two centuries of operatic history, it is unquestionably Bellini’s La sonnambula. Its Barcelona premiere, at the Teatre de la Santa Creu, went down in history as veritable apotheosis, an unqualified success, which was repeated when it came to the Gran Teatre del Liceu. An opera season without this masterpiece of bel canto was virtually unthinkable. Its unwittingly Freudian fascination with the loss of consciousness and its implicit fondness for the dreamlike create a truly Romantic ecstasy comparable to the ballets blancs then fashionable in imperial courts: Amina’s emotional fragility is on a par with Giselle’s. Marco Arturo Marelli’s production is perfectly in tune with the notion of semi-serious opera, striking a delicate balance between humour and Romantic pathos.

+Information: Gran Teatre del Liceu

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Barcelona Events: 21-30 July Aida by Giuseppe Verdi at Gran Teatre del Liceu

Plot Summary

The action is set in Memphis and Thebes, in the days of the great pharaohs of Ancient Egypt. The Egyptians are at war with the Ethiopians that threaten to invade them. The Egyptian army emerges victorious and Amonasro, the king of Ethiopia, is captured. It is against this backdrop that Radamès, the Egyptian military commander, and Aida, an Ethiopian slave, fall in love. As is often the case in the romantic drama genre, their love triumphs over the hatred between their peoples and their contrasting social status.

Set Design

One of the prime attractions of this production of Aida is the set designed by Josep Mestres Cabanes, which has been restored by Jordi Castells. The Liceu thereby wishes to pay tribute to one of the finest exponents of the “Catalan school of set design”.

Josep Mestres Cabanes executed his best works for the Liceu’s opera performances – many of Wagner’s works in particular – and was appointed the head scenery designer at the Gran Teatre del Liceu in 1942.

The art of Mestres Cabanes is part of the realist aesthetic, to which he applies an abundance of detail and ornamentation in order to achieve historical authenticity and which underline the dramatic and lavish nature of the stage. However, at the same time, his outstanding precision and profound knowledge of perspective – he is the author of the finest treatise on perspective of his time – create magical effects of light and depth, producing an exquisitely harmonious overall effect.

Mestres Cabanes very much appreciated this production of Aida first performed in 1945, on which he worked for eight years.

Isidre Bravo, a scholar of the Catalan school of stage design, claims, “Aida’s stage design, as far as architectural reproduction is concerned, represents one of the pinnacles of Mestres Cabanes’ set designs”.

Font: Gran Teatre del Liceu