Director Jūratė Vansk
Scenographer Marius Puskunigis
Video artist Akvilė Anglickaitė
Lighting designer Valdas Latonas
Costume designer Vitalijus Čepkauskas
Development manager Aurelija Koerfer
Orlando – Nora Petročenko
Alcina – Jomantė Šležaitė
Astolfo – Stein Skjervold
Angelica – Gunta Gelgotė
Bradamante – Rūta Vosyliūtė
Ruggiero – Dimitrij Sinkovskij
Medoro – Vaidas Bartušas
Vocal Ensemble B2
Klaipėda Chamber Orchestra (artistic director Mindaugas Bačkus)
Ieva Kuprevičiūtė (flute)
Vaiva Eidukaitytė-Storastienė (harpsichord)
The Lithuanian audience is yet to be introduced to Antonio Vivaldi’s opera Orlando Furioso. It will debut this December before Christmas. The premiere of the musical drama (drama per musica) took place in November 1727 at Venice’s San Angelo Theatre. That was the second attempt of the baroque composer to offer the public a musical spectacle based on the then-popular epic by Ludovico Ariosto, which has served as a basis for more than one hundred operas and dramatic works. One of them was Francesca Caccini’s opera-ballet The Liberation of Ruggiero from the Island of Alcina, which was showed to Prince Wladislaw Vasa in 1625 in Florence.
The first time around in 1714, Antonio Vivaldi’s opera Orlando Feigns Madness (Orlando Finto Pazzo) was no success. After more than a decade, the composer came back to the story, as well as to Venice’s San Angelo Theatre as its new artistic director. The libretto was written by Ferrara-based lawyer Grazio Braccioli. Even though the composer added a few recitatives and arias, the plot basically remained the same and featured a story about an enamoured Orlando, whose feelings were unrequited by the lady of his heart. The opera merged fates of seven characters, convincingly portraying their desires and hopes, pride and manipulations. At the time, the work’s magical atmosphere was conjured by flying horses, demonic forces, and various spells.
Angelica and her faithful friend Bradamante arrive on the island of love sorceress Alcina. Angelica and her lover Medoro get separated while fleeing from a madly enamoured Orlando. Angelica asks Alcina to help find Medoro. The conniving witch promises to reconnect them; however, as a reward, she wants Ruggiero, Bradamante’s boyfriend, whom she desires for herself. The love sorceress puts a spell on Ruggiero, but Bradamante learns how to break it.
Medoro reaches Alcina’s island. He is about to get married to his beloved one, but Orlando’s pride is frightening the spouses-to-be. Angelica resorts to trickery and, by showing some affection, lures him into a pernicious cave. Angelica and Medoro get married. They carve out remembrance words on bark of a laurel tree: ‘This is where Angelica became Medoro’s wife’.
Orlando manages to escape the cave. Having seen the love oaths and having realised that he has lost the woman of his love, Orlando becomes furiously mad. Delirious, he breaks wizard Merlin’s statue, destroying Alcina’s magic powers. Orlando comes back to his senses. He realises that you cannot win love by force and blesses the newlyweds, wishing them sweet eternal friendship ties.
This A. Vivaldi’s opera is characterised by the traditional interweaving of arias and recitatives.
Having a fairly small baroque orchestra at his disposal, the master of pictorial instrumental music created an intense emotional soundscape. In fact, this was probably the first time Venetians were introduced to the then-little-known transverse flute. In Ruggiero’s aria With You Alone, My Sweet Love (Sol Da Te Mio Dolce Amore), it sounds like a voice of a pure soul while love, the only true value, becomes the pivot of the story unfolding.
Aleksandra Pister
Tickets: Eur 21,50–43,50.
Book online at „Tiketa“
Production by "Artis Opera", VšĮ
More information and libretto online: www.operaorlando.lt
