IL FESTIVAL PER GIAN CARLO MENOTTI

7 July at 12.00

Church of St. Euphemia

NOON CONCERT

DEDICATED to GIAN CARLO MENOTTI

music by Gian Carlo Menotti

Trio

Singing and joking

The songs of distance

Conservatory of Novara

Gabriele Mercandelli clarinet

Cecilia Apostolo piano

David Agamemnon _violin _

Florence and Udine Conservatories

Stefania Scapin harp

Cornflower Quartet

Giacomo Nesi, Virginia Capozzi violins

Giulia Guerrini viola

Francesco Canfailla _violoncello _

Conservatory of Padua

Yukiko Shimizu soprano

pianist_ tbc_

7 July at 15.00

Pegasus Hall

AMAHL AND THE OVERNIGHT VISITORS

1955 - Film opera for NBC TV

realized from Gian Carlo Menotti

with Thomas Schippers conducting the orchestra.

opera in one act

music and libretto by Gian Carlo Menotti

Members of the Symphony of the Air

director Thomas Schippers

Amahl Bill McIver / The mother Rosemary Kuhlmann / King Gaspar Andrew McKinley / King Melchior David Aiken / King Balthasar Leon Lishner / The Page Francis Monachino / Shepherds dancing John Butler, Glen Tetley,

Carmen Gutierrez

First opera written expressly for American television, Amahl and the Night Visitors was commissioned to Gian Carlo Menotti by NBC and premiered at the NBC Opera Theatre on December 24, 1951, to New York City at NBC's Studio 8H in Rockefeller Center, where it was broadcast live on television. The composer found inspiration and produced the design for Amahl after being strongly impressed by Bosch's painting, theAdoration of the Magi, seen at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Amahl is a work of a fairy-tale character, set in the atmosphere of the nativity scene, which re-proposes in delicate and moving hues the mystery of Christmas Eve, the Three Kings and the Comet Star. It was a great success andopera was televised on the same occasion for several years. The target audience, children, helped to outline the stylistic traits of thisopera, designed for a small orchestral ensemble, devoid of complex vocal parts and instead endowed with many catchy melodies.

7 July at 17.00

Pegasus Hall

AMELIA AT THE BALL

2011 - Film of the new production of theopera

created for Spoleto54 Festival dei Due Mondi

On the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the composer's birth

opera one-act play

music and libretto Gian Carlo Menotti

conductor Johannes Debus

directed by Giorgio Ferrara

Milan Symphony Orchestra Giuseppe Verdi

New Roman Symphonic Opera Chorus

Amelia Adriana Kucerova / The Husband** Alfonso Antoniozzi** / The Lover Sébastien Guèze / The Friend **Adriana di Paola / **The Police Commissioner **Alexandro Spina **/ I Waitress Alessia Nadin / II Waitress Aurhelia Varak

Opera buffa in one act composed from Gian Carlo Menotti in 1936 to his own libretto, Amelia al ballo represents Menotti's first major operatic success. The first performance was held at the Academy of Music in Philadelphia on April 1, 1937. It was immediately revived in numerous American and then European theaters. Theopera arrived in Italy on April 4, 1938 at the Teatro Municipale in San Remo. The action takes place in an unspecified early 20th-century European city. Amelia, a young woman immersed in luxury, longs to attend the first ball of the season. Aided from two maids Amelia is feverishly preparing to go to the ball, but her husband has just discovered that he is being betrayed and wants to know the name of his mistress. In return for promising to go with her to the ball Amelia confesses: the lover is the upstairs tenant. After arguments, threats and quarrels, a gallant police commissioner enters the scene and finally ends up accompanying Amelia to the ball.