Donizetti Festival’s Il diluvio universale drowned in video

Il diluvio universale

Enea Scala (Cadmo)

Il diluvio universale

By Stephen Pritchard, 19 November 2023

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“projected video material so potent and unrelenting that it often overwhelms the performers”

Reviewed at Teatro Donizetti, Bergamo on 17 November 2023

Donizetti, Il diluvio universale

Fondazione Donizetti

Riccardo Frizza, Conductor

Masbedo, Director, Costume Designer

2050+, Set Designer

Fiammetta Baldisseri, Lighting Designer

Orchestra Donizetti Opera

Coro dell'Accademia Teatro alla Scala

Mariano Furlani, Visual dramaturgy

Nahuel Di Pierro, Noè

Nicolò Donini, Jafet

Davide Zaccherini, Sem

Eduardo Martínez Flores, Cam

Sabrina Gárdez, Tesbite

Enea Scala, Cadmo

Giuliana Gianfaldoni, Sela

Maria Elena Pepi, Ada

Salvo Sgrò, Choirmaster / chorus director

Shipwrecked: Donizetti’s Il furioso comes a cropper in Bergamo

Mark Pullinger, 16th November

Manuel Renga’s sensitive framing device sets up a sympathetic production of a problematic opera, but is scuppered by the central vocal performance.

***11

At Donizetti Opera Festival: farces flop, young singers impress

Mark Pullinger, 15th November

Il campanello and Deux Hommes et une femme bomb at the Donizetti Opera festival, but the young singers of the Bottega Donizetti – and wily old hand Alessandro Corbelli – impress.

***11

Donizetti’s Caterina Cornaro given a controversial update in Bergamo

Mark Pullinger, 14th November

Francesco Micheli reimagines Caterina Cornaro in a contemporary setting, switching to the historical past, to open this year’s Donizetti Opera festival in the composer’s home town.

****1

Young Sicilian soprano grabs the limelight in Bergamo Don Pasquale

Mark Pullinger, 17th November

They came for Javier Camarena, but cheered Giulia Mazzola to the rafters of the Teatro Donizetti as the third production of this year's festival opens.

***11

A modern makeover for Donizetti’s Zoraida di Granata

Mark Pullinger, 16th November

Bruno Ravella's effective production was seen in Wexford in its original 1822 version, but Donizetti Opera opts for the composer's 1824 revision, throwing the spotlight onto Cecilia Molinari's excellent Abenamet.

***11

Tudor history, gothic thrills: Roberto Devereux in Bergamo

Mark Pullinger, 15th November

Is Roberto Devereux the finest of Donizetti's four Tudor operas? Stephen Langridge's stylish, stylised production and a wonderful cast under Riccardo Frizza make a great case for it.

****1

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Stephen Pritchard

Stephen Pritchard began singing as a treble at the age of eight and progressed to become a tenor in Portsmouth Cathedral Choir, the Gibbons Consort and now the English Chamber Choir. Writing about music has been at the core of his 40-year career in journalism, chiefly at the Observer. He has been known to play a pretty mean jazz double bass.

Donizetti Festival’s Il diluvio universale drowned in a torrent of distracting video