Rossini la scala di seta

Rossini la scala di seta
ARTISTIC
CONCEPT
In addition to the annual classical music festival in Volterra
(Tuscany), Punto Arte has produced operas in recent years
that are characterised not only by their artistic quality but
also by their inventive versatility. They can be performed in
(classical) theatres, squares, gardens, festivals and concert
halls.
Director Eva Buchmann and conductor Jan Willem de
Vriend have worked so well together in their many years of
collaboration that even the most imaginative and bizarre
directorial ideas are given a musical upgrade.
For example, they both staged Joseph Haydn’s ‘Lo Speziale’
(libretto by Carlo Goldoni) for the Punto Arte Festival in
2018, where the opera is not set in a Venetian square as in
the original, but in and around a Fiat 500 - a brilliant idea
by Eva Buchmann, who turned this iconic Italian cinque
cento into a fully-fledged additional character. This unique
pharmacy and home-on-wheels has since toured all over
Europe. The car can be used as a pharmacy, for sleeping,
making love and showering. Understandably, this also
requires a certain amount of flexibility from the singers! To
the great amusement of the audience.
For Rossini’s ‘La Scala di Seta’, first performed at the Teatro
Moisè in Venice in 1812, Eva Buchmann has another fruitful
idea: the stage set consists of a television set from the
1950s.
It was magical for the first viewers. The occupants of this TV
box could come into your living room through the screen at
any time. Just to be on the safe side, you checked that they
hadn’t sneaked out of the back door!
The plot of the farsa comica, the absurd comedy ‘La Scala
di seta’, is perfectly suited for presentation on a 1950s
television set. Especially when it cleverly turns its interior
inside out and the inhabitants actually emerge from their
secrecy onto the world of the stage. Because this opera is
also so versatile it can be performed effortlessly in concert
halls such as the Tonhalle, but also at festivals, in theaters and openair.