"Puccini's 'Suor Angelica' and Dallapiccola's 'Il Prigioniero' at the Rome Opera

At the Rome Opera, after the diptychs made up of "Il tabarro / Il castello del Principe Barbablù" and "Gianni Schicchi / L'heure espagnole", the 'recomposition' of Puccini's Triptych comes to completion. The three twentieth-century one-acts have also been juxtaposed with Puccini's three by thematic assonance: in the first juxtaposition the incommunicability of couples; in the second the family dramas; and now the juxtaposition the violence and deprivation of freedom expressed through religious fanaticism.

In Milan and Turin, the RAI Orchestra plays a work by Francesco Filidei, whose new opera 'Il nome della rosa' is being performed at La Scala, and to whom the Milano Musica Festival is dedicated.

Until 2 May, the diptych comprising Puccini's 'Suor Angelica' and Luigi Dallapiccola's 'Il Prigioniero' is on stage at the Opera. This is a new production; the second one-act opera had not been on the bill since 1964. On the podium is the musical director of the Rome Opera, Michele Mariotti; Spanish director Calixto Bieito makes his debut on the capital's stage. The performance is filmed by Rai Cultura, which will broadcast it on Rai5.

Until 30 April on the Rai RadioTre website (in the RadioTre Suite programme) you can listen to the radio recording made at the premiere. The star of "Suor Angelica" is soprano Corinne Winters: winner of the Oper! Award 2025 as 'best female singer', she returns to Rome after the successes of 'Dialogues des Carmélites' and 'Káťa Kabanová'. The protagonist of 'Prigioniero' is Mattia Olivieri. "In Suor Angelica," comments Mariotti, "it is moving to see how Puccini, with delicate pastel colours, describes a female universe made up of women of different characters and temperaments, which the vow taken cannot and must not conceal."

On 2 May at La Scala and on the 4th at the Auditorium Toscanini in Turin, the Rai Orchestra conducted by Maxime Pascal presents Francesco Filidei's 'Cantico delle Creature', György Kurtág's 'Kafka-Fragmente', Stefano Gervasoni's 'Tacet' and Aureliano Cattaneo's 'Not alone we fly'. Together with the orchestra two soloists, violinist Patricia Kopatchinskaja and soprano Anna Prohaska. The Milan concert (8 pm) is broadcast live on Rai RadioTre, where it will be available for seven days.